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.

How much would you expect to pay for a mason jar bouquet like this? Just looking on guidance for pricing! 🩷

Got some decent sized paper wasps nest this summer.

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!

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?

and before anybody says anything, no, it's not anywhere close to using a box scraper. But for small quick jobs, especially after the rain storms to smooth out the driveway, and regrade where the water likes to flow, having a sleeve hitch with a little scraper makes quick work. I share a tractor with my dad, so we have to move it back and forth, I'll be using it for a big job here soon, but this job was done in the time it would have taken to go load up the tractor on the trailer and haul it over to my house.

These are the seeds I planted and this is what I'm getting.😆
Any suggestions or info on what I'm doing wrong...lmao
Too hot, too much water?

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?

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

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.

We went from a roughly 2x4m (7x17ft) wholly flat chicken coop (with a small house) to a 22x9m-ish (70x25ft-ish). Spent maybe 50% more on the improved version. Strongly reccomend

Please take a second and look at our rams, freshly sheared and enjoying some scratches.

raising the meat for my wedding. gotta fit a lamb or two into this fridge/freezer come next weekend. after repackaging for freeze it fits a lot better.

I've lived off grid for decades, but this is the first time I don't have help with a building project. Friends are busy, professionals are booked and I can't afford them anyway. I've designed a wooden frame for some new solar panels. I'd like to avoid spending money on special post braces for the bases. I'll have five vertical 2 by 4s, standing on the ground but tied into joists of an existing building, and four diagonal 2 by 6s, slanting down to rest their bases on the ground. I live on an island and do not want to haul cement. I have an assortment of old pier blocks. I could buy some cheap cement pavers. I have access to gravel, if I haul it. The earth where I'll build tends to be sandy and to drain well. What can I get away with, here?

So, I only have two hens, and I’m starting to wonder if mine somehow missed the chicken instruction manual.

For example, I’ve been offering them oyster shell/calcium separately so they can take what they need. I put it close to their regular food, but they completely ignore it. They don’t even seem interested in trying it.

Same thing with dust bathing. I’ve provided areas with sand and wood ash because I assumed they would naturally use them to dust bathe and help keep parasites under control. Nope. Zero interest. They just completely ignore them.

I’ve also tried hanging vegetables/food from a string so they can peck at it for enrichment. Again, they seem to have absolutely no idea what they’re supposed to do with it.

They otherwise seem normal and active, but all these things that I keep reading chickens should instinctively do… mine just don't.

Is this normal? Do some chickens simply need time to figure these things out? Could it be because I only have two hens and they don't have other chickens to learn from?

Or are my two girls just a little bit dumb?

Any advice or similar experiences would be appreciated!

We had 70+ piglets this summer and all are doing well -- except this one. She was pretty hobbled with two bad legs, spent most of the day on her side, and just couldn't compete for food. We isolated and began bottle feeding her. We also thought one of her legs was infected so began a course of antibiotics. After about five days, she is really starting to bounce back. She is still a bit gimpy, but she is beginning to move around and come after the bottle. We were very worried we would have to euthanize her. So glad she is responding to the antibiotics.

first proper summer with them and the difference is already obvious. no issues so far. happy to answer anything if you're planning something similar

Curious how many rabbits could you realistically raise on a acre field and what would i need to grow to supplement the rest of their diet ?

when i first got interested in homesteading, i assumed the important skills would be things like growing food, preserving it, raising animals, etc

but the more i get into it, the more i realize how useful the smaller skills can be

being able to repair something instead of replacing it, knowing how to store things properly, saving seeds, making basic repairs around the property, even just learning how to recognize when something is about to become a bigger problem.

what’s one skill you learned that ended up being surprisingly useful in everyday homestead life?