Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

Recycled storage shed container homes are probably the most innovative thing I have seen in awhile. Not only are they cheap but durable and the design is only limited by your imagination. At around a 1000 USD a storage container the sky is the limit for possibilities. http://green.yahoo.com/blog/daily_gr...er-houses.html

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

B. de Corbin I like goats milk, but no one else dose. Its also very difficult to make butter with it.

[Dez]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

[quote author=B. de Corbin link=topic=256.msg3006#msg3006 date=1287141992]
Oh - P.S. Deseret - when the kids are old enough, consider getting them into a 4H group. It's a great program, the kids will have fun and learn stuff, and you'll be able to meet good people who can teach you how to do pretty much any farm chore you might need to learn.
[/quote]

I've been looking at 4H out here, and you're right, it's excellent. Girl scouts, too, which you can't find anywhere in Utah.

[Amber]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

This is something I've always been interested in but living in the city I'm not sure if I can even have chickens :'(

We will be renting my grandmas house in a couple months (She passed away this summer) and hopefully will be able to buy it in a few years. While renting I KNOW I can't have chickens (had to beg to keep my cat) but I might when we buy it because A. chicken prices in the stores are REDICULOUS and B. I feel better knowing what has and hasn't gone into my food.

Then tho there is the coon and possom problem in the city as well

[B. de Corbin]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

Oh - P.S. Deseret - when the kids are old enough, consider getting them into a 4H group. It's a great program, the kids will have fun and learn stuff, and you'll be able to meet good people who can teach you how to do pretty much any farm chore you might need to learn.

[B. de Corbin]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

[quote author=Raphaeline link=topic=256.msg2792#msg2792 date=1287103191]
I want chickens for meat AND eggs - I plan on taking the chicken to a butcher to slaughter. But I primarily want to focus on eggs. What I'm thinking of doing is getting breeds that are dual-purpose ... although I kind of dread the idea of getting used to them, raising them, feeding them, and then eating them. I mean, that's the whole point of this change, to get connected to my food a little more, but still, I'm wary.[/quote]

That's my problem. We treat them more like pets than livestock. Fortunately, we're not farmers, so it isn't a problem. My dad's advice is "Don't give them names."

[quote author=catsraven link=topic=256.msg2797#msg2797 date=1287103562]
I have chickens and a garden. Im still trying to get a milk cow.
[/quote]

How about a goat? They give more milk than cows, and are very easy to take care of.

[quote author=Raphaeline link=topic=256.msg2792#msg2792 date=1287103191]
I'm thinking we might have a building we can use as a coop, otherwise we'll have to build one. Still working on what we're going to do with them! The person I'm going to see sometime soon has a pretty interesting set up, I'm hoping to kind of imitate what she's got going on (a coop and fenced in area) but make it more secure because we live in the woods - plenty of predators around. My mother's guinea fowl wanders around, but they're down to six from about twenty last Fall.[/quote]

[Dez]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

[quote author=B. de Corbin link=topic=256.msg2767#msg2767 date=1287098416]
They do it for a dollar per bird (apparently, Amish people have a lot of repressed hostilities and enjoy killing chickens).
[/quote]

That just made me laugh so. hard.

The local CAL Ranch store was selling chicks at Easter for 50 cents each, so I know there have to be some people who know how to do it...I'll just have to find the right people to ask

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

I have chickens and a garden. Im still trying to get a milk cow.

[thalassa]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

Rafe...I'll have to check...I might have ditched it in the Great Book Purge for the band fundraiser...but I have a book on raising animals

[Raphaeline]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

Whoops... by the time I got around to answering the thread (it's been open all day) there are three new replies. I'll handle this first, though.

I want chickens for meat AND eggs - I plan on taking the chicken to a butcher to slaughter. But I primarily want to focus on eggs. What I'm thinking of doing is getting breeds that are dual-purpose ... although I kind of dread the idea of getting used to them, raising them, feeding them, and then eating them. I mean, that's the whole point of this change, to get connected to my food a little more, but still, I'm wary.

I'm thinking we might have a building we can use as a coop, otherwise we'll have to build one. Still working on what we're going to do with them! The person I'm going to see sometime soon has a pretty interesting set up, I'm hoping to kind of imitate what she's got going on (a coop and fenced in area) but make it more secure because we live in the woods - plenty of predators around. My mother's guinea fowl wanders around, but they're down to six from about twenty last Fall.

[Celest]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

CHICKEN KILLING BUS??

[B. de Corbin]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

[quote author=thalassa link=topic=256.msg2685#msg2685 date=1287086056]
I've read that Indian Runner Ducks are a good choice--versatile for both mean and eggs and relatively easy to care for...do you have any preferences?

Rafe, here's the one of the links I had bookmarked on heritage breeds http://www.albc-usa.org/
[/quote]http://www.mcmurrayhatchery.com/phoenix.html

[quote author=Deseret link=topic=256.msg2687#msg2687 date=1287086183]
Corbin, that actually raises a question for me-- if I eventually keep poultry, I would want to do so for both eggs and meat. Did you dispatch your own? And if so, how do you learn how to do so humanely and quickly, as well as all the cleaning required?
[/quote]

[Dez]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

Wow...now that is something I never thought to check on YouTube for...I gotta hand it to you, Thal.

[thalassa]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

[quote author=Deseret link=topic=256.msg2687#msg2687 date=1287086183]
Corbin, that actually raises a question for me-- if I eventually keep poultry, I would want to do so for both eggs and meat. Did you dispatch your own? And if so, how do you learn how to do so humanely and quickly, as well as all the cleaning required?
[/quote]

Scott duck hunts, he's done tons of that--learning the cleaning and whatnot could be easily done from someone that hunts. Also, from what I understand from my grandmother, its not that difficult to kill them--you grab 'em by the feet and either wring their neck or chop their head off...those are both the quickest way to do it.

Believe it or not though, you can google "how to kill a chicken" and there are youtube instructions (I did not link them for obvious reasons)

[Dez]

Re: Homesteading, Living Off Grid, and Other Alternative Living

Corbin, that actually raises a question for me-- if I eventually keep poultry, I would want to do so for both eggs and meat. Did you dispatch your own? And if so, how do you learn how to do so humanely and quickly, as well as all the cleaning required?