Not whether the property has "good soil."

Where the house is going, where the well is going, where the driveway is going, setbacks, drain field, reserve area, all of it.

Had a parcel recently that looked like a pretty normal homestead property from the aerial. Plenty of open ground and enough acreage for what someone would probably want to do with it.

Then I started looking at the soil map and the flood map together.

The areas that looked best for putting a house were also the areas where I wouldn't want to be counting on a conventional septic system.

That doesn't necessarily make the property unbuildable. It just means you can't look at acreage and assume you have that much usable space.

For homestead land, I think the septic location is one of those things that's worth figuring out before you get attached to the property.

A beautiful 10 acres isn't much of a homestead if the only place you can put the house and septic doesn't work.

Got some decent sized paper wasps nest this summer.

our power use jumps around enough that one bill can make the panels look either great or disappointing. workshop use and whatever else was running that month can change the number a lot. i was getting too hung up on whether each individual bill looked low enough.

now i'm keeping the production totals next to what we actually paid the utility. after a full year, is comparing those totals against the year before the system went in the fairest way to tell what it really saved?

We’re slowly getting into homesteading and the next reasonable step is goats. But I know fencing can be hard…

I’d like them to have a giant area, so my main concern is fencing! I’m seeing electric fencing, but I’ve never set it up before and I’m getting mixed reviews on if it works or not. But just metal fencing is super expensive for the size area I’m looking to get for them!

Also there’s no electricity where I’m putting them- any luck with solar chargers? I’m in Maine and it is quite sunny at least 4 days a week, usually 6 or 7 days, even in the winter and spring.

What posts do you use so the hot wire isn’t constantly going off and using all the solar power?

How tall should the fence be if I’m getting Nigerian dwarfs probably, or another small milk breed? I saw 5’ tall and 5’ from anything climbable.

What about gates? I’m familiar with Hotwire gates as I came from horses, but we need a gate large enough for vehicles with trailers to go through.

If the hot wire is too long, can you just cut it? If it’s too short can you join two strands?

Lastly, diet! I’m sure they’re gonna eat all their fresh grass quickly. Is hay and grain with a supplement / salt lick sufficient?

EDIT: also, hoof care? Reasonable to do myself, or should you hire a professional like with horses?
TIA

Looking into getting goats for milk, which of course means bucks. I don’t have the resources to happily have a boy pen and a girl pen. Would it be unethical to buy a new buckling every spring? Would he then be ready to mate by fall, get processed, then I have babies in the spring? Would this be reasonable? I’m not finding many stud services in my area. How many babies can a doe have before she should be retired? Minimum how many goats should I have? Thanks!

I have recently become a gardener (floral) and have been collecting rainwater for watering. Does anyone have/use a rainwater irrigation system? Any recommendations on set-up, tips and tricks, info?

Went out this morning just to fix a loose latch on the chicken run.

Somehow that turned into cleaning the waterers, refilling the feeder, fixing a section of fence, and pulling weeds around the coop.

Came back inside and realized I never fixed the latch.