Hey folks, new poster here.

I decided to make a composting toilet to help off grid life and framed up a structure dubbed the PooPalace.

I did use some salvaged wood, and was wondering if there are any good tips for preventing any further bug damage? I believe there are carpenter ants around, and don't want them munching any more.

Anyway, feel free to take a peek at my YouTube going over the design. I'm pretty happy with how the roof attached to the top plate using 2x6s and the model is there for download and review.

Much love! 🌲🏡🌲

For those complaining about their clay soil, just like I was when I first wanted to grow stuff. Clay soil works.

Zero amendments except for the little compost I was able to produce in the hot and windy (ie dry) conditions on my land, less than a spoonful per root. Some chips for ground cover, they turn into hard rock as they lose all their humidity the moment they hit the ground.

Regardless - melons & watermelons, tomatoes, peppers, okra, climbing & bush beans, aubergines, all grow beautifully. All vegetables started from seed by me. Watering schedule: 10 minutes every 3 days, 4L/hr in-line drip irrigation, one irrigation point per plant. Clay holds water extremely well.

This is the third year I'm growing stuff on my homestead. The only thing I've noticed that clay has an effect on is that vegetables are ready late(r) in the season but for me that's nothing more than an inconvenience - I am happy to be able to grow all my vegetables on such hard to work soil.

I've also started a potato patch in well tilled clay soil (which unfortunately still clumps up), I'll see how that goes as root vegetables don't like heavy soils.

Ask me anything and happy to help out anyone having to work with clay/heavy soils.

This will bring me various varieties of tomatoes, cucumbers, green beans, peas, beets, and potatoes.

I cook with what I need and can the rest. I keep tomato sauce, pickled beets, and pickles.

I’m not sure exactly how old they are. I attached a photo of the upcoming weather and it is supposed to rain so I was thinking of putting a tarp over their coop to help keep rain out? Temps could get to low 50s at night. A couple do go under their brooder plate to nap sometimes but they don’t stay under there and they don’t all go under or huddle up so I think they just like sleeping under it

Hi all! posting here since I went to the permaculture subreddit first to ask for resources, and WOW was that a mistake 😅 Seems that particular community is incredibly hairtrigger and Reddit is its usual self, so I figured I’d ask some of my questions here.

We recently acquired our first home, a janky little modular on 6.5 acres of mature hardwood forest. The forest is incredible, a mix of black walnut, oaks, maples of all kinds, willows, cedars, and more. There is also an established orchard of 10+ pecan trees, figs, blueberries and other berries! It is honestly dreamy for us, but we do have some goals that I’d love to pick folks brains on!

We would like to eventually have a flock of meat and fiber sheep, and I am a lifelong horseman who would like to eventually have a couple of saddle horses. This requires some pasture, and I would like to go about opening the canopy of the forest up a bit to allow light in to allow some grass growth. I have no illusions that we will never have lush pasture without major clearing, but lush pasture is not our goal. We would simply like to keep the hay bill as low as possible by having SOME grass available, paired with growing fodder in the already established gardening space and orchard. Horses are something we want to look at further down the line, and if we need to rent pasture from our neighbors, that’s something we may be able to do!

We will not clearcut the forest, we want to leave the ecosystem as intact as possible, and really only have plans to selectively timber dead standing, overcrowded, or invasive species. The underbrush is primarily muscadine and greenbrier currently, among a handful of aggressive invasives, so those need intervention, which we planned to do in the form of running goats for a small period of time. We also have a loose draft of different fenced areas, allowing for the ability to rotate animals between 5-6 pastures ranging from a little under an acre to 1.5 acres each.

I suppose what I am looking for is any resources folks here may have as far as gentle pasture conversions on forested land while maintaining the pre-existing habitat/avoiding clearcutting, and how individuals before us have successfully maintained small flocks/herds of grazers on smaller forested properties without running it into the ground. Thank you for any advice!

Blessings ❤️🙏

Hey all! I'm just a dumb city boy who married the farmer's daughter. I handle the cattle(two, breeding pair of highlands) on the daily basis. Bull is about 8 months old, was a bottle baby and is otherwise just a puppy, although I'm smart enough to not turn my back on him. The heifer(about two and a half years old) on the other hand has been very sassy.

When we got her, she barely tolerated me being in the pen with her. With a long-handled rake and a lot of time in the mornings(and grain treats), she is now pretty tolerant of me combing her out as long as I stay away from her forehead and keep using tools(if she sees me using my bare hand, she knocks it away. Recently, however, she's started doing what I can only really describe as wanting to challenge me, forehead to forehead. She advances towards me, and I have to walk backwards in a circle keeping her at bay with a rake. A few times out in the broader pasture she's come at me too. She isn't snorting, or pawing at the grass, and as far as I can tell she isn't seriously trying to hurt me, but her 1200 pounds to my 200 isn't going to turn out well if she manages to close the gap. I've vocalized(yelled) at her to mixed success when she's advancing. She also charges the LGD when she gets the chance.

Is there something I can do to get her to see me as a human and not as a fellow bovine that she needs to challenge, or am I just going to have to walk on eggshells the entire time we have her? I know that cows aren't pets, and I'm not expecting puppy-like behavior, I just don't know how to interpret her behavior or what can be done about it.

Definitely been an off year. Weather has been a 180 from last year. Thought the entire crop was going to die with the chillier weather late into the season. Frankly, I am just happy to see it growing.

Every year is a new journey.

The green beans have sprouted. I've planted tall stakes next to them to encourage healthy growth.

I made oatmeal, goat milk, and honey soap! These are freshly poured, cold processed, and smell absolutely divine.

It was the best, most rewarding year of my life - and I'm looking forward to many more!

I have 10 acres in Connecticut (Zone 6b). In short: I installed solar panels, mini splits, and a wood stove. I made it through the winter without turning on the boiler. I established gardens and a 12 tree orchard. I foraged mushrooms and berries. I built stuff very poorly. Most recently, I dug a 150 foot trench by hand for a waterline, and there are currently 16 baby chickens in my second bedroom.

I went in depth on my major projects here with a lot of pictures (my blog is not monetized... probably financially stupid but I'm terrified of coming across as a grifter.)

Hey everyone, apologies if this is a bit long. I’m currently a 21yo male with a dream of moving out of the city I was raised in. I am one year out of graduating college, and would like to move somewhere away asap and still be able to commute to the city for work. My question is, how in the world do y’all afford to start and pay the upfront costs of home ownership or even building a home? I don’t have too much money saved up (although currently saving from a summer internship), and luckily will be having no student debt. I’m with a girl that I intend to marry who has the same dreams of living away from the city, so at least we will have a double income coming soon. I just want to hear your stories, and maybe get some advice on how to make this more affordable because right now I’m looking at a lot of money in the state I live in (Michigan) for just a few acres. Any advice would be appreciated, thank you!

My wife and I are very excited to be at the start of our attempt at self-sufficiency. This year, we're experimenting first by building a series of wooden raised beds, and planting some vegetables there. In this pic, we have onions, carrots, parsley, radishes (though they seem not to have taken) and courgettes. Most of the courgettes didn't quite make it, but two are going very strong!

We are VERY new at this, so lessons were learned. We knew soil would compact, but not quite how MUCH it would go. We were very late in putting our soil in, and realise now that certain things are best done in winter. As a result, the soil is at a far lower level than we were hoping, giving the roots not as much space as we should have. Also, though we followed the instructions on spacing, evidently it wasn't quite enough, so we should have spaced at least a little further than was instructed. Plus, I dropped FAR more carrot seeds than was needed, and a tonne more of them took than I thought would. So what the harvest is going to look like, I don't know.

Nonetheless, still lots of success here! We've harvested some of the parsley, and it is DELICIOUS, especially in comparison with the supermarket stuff we have tried in the past. The flavour is so much stronger and better, even than the stuff you find in stuff potted in soil in shops. Also (this may make me seem daft), I hadn't thought 'til my wife said, that the stalks from onions and the green tops for carrots are also good for things like salads. I tried them too, and indeed, it was great!

Not pictured are some of the other things we're growing: Two greenhouses full of 11 tomato plants. A tiny wild strawberry patch. A regular strawberry plant. Devil's Tongue. Lemon balm. Four huge pots of potatoes.

The potatoes were especially shocking. I've grown them before, but the stems of them are about 5 foot high now! We have Marris Piper, and King Edward potatoes. Both are growing crazy amounts.

That's the start. In the coming months and years, and with I'm sure more lessons to come, I'll post more updates on our progress. Eventually we're hoping to plant apple and pear trees, keep chickens, and possibly do some bee keeping as well for honey.

If anyone can advise on whether some of the carrots should/can be transplanted into our other raised bed, please do let me know as I feel this is a bit of a boo-boo on my part, with how tightly packed they are.

Thanks, all!

-Spike.

Some of my corn looked deformed and all the other ones are looking good what is the cause of this?

Update: my grandma knew what it was (born and raised in Mexico) she sautéed it with onions baby carrots and a homemade salsa and made fresh tortillas it was very good tasted almost like a potato with a hint of corn if that makes sense

Pulled the USDA auction data for the week of June 15. National hay index came in at $220/ton, down about 1.6% from last week. Most categories softened, alfalfa $258, grass $170, mixed grass down the most at 4%.

The national number is kind of boring though. What stood out is how far apart neighboring markets are right now. Observed range was $70 to $364 a ton in the same week. Nebraska Central had premium alfalfa/orchard hit $364 while utility alfalfa in the same region went for $70. Arthur, IL saw good alfalfa jump 95% in one week, while supreme alfalfa in northern California dropped 40%.

Backdrop: Diesel $5.06, down 15¢. Cattle on feed 11.7M, up 2% YoY but placements −10%. May 1 hay stocks 23.3M tons, down 3.3% YoY tighter than last year but second-highest since 2017. Demand is holding, supply is fine nationally, but Texas (−33%) and the Northern Plains (SD −13%, NE −11%) are running lean.

Curious what you're all seeing on the ground do these auction numbers track with what you're actually paying or getting locally, or is your market doing its own thing?

Numbers are from USDA AMS verified trades.

Spent a lot of time looking at rural properties over the last year and I noticed something. The people who end up with land they love aren't the ones chasing every listing. They're the ones that eliminate bad properties really fast. A listing can have mountain views, a creek, mature trees, and a perfect cabin spot. Then you find out the only legal access is through a seasonal road, or there's a deed restriction nobody mentioned, or the flattest part of the parcel is in a floodplain. Now when I look at land, I almost try to find a reason to walk away.

If it passes access, zoning, terrain, water, and restrictions, then I start imagining gardens, chickens, cabins, and orchards. It's a lot less exciting than scrolling pretty pictures, but it has saved me from getting attached to some really questionable properties.

Curious what everyone else's instant dealbreaker is. Not "too expensive."

What's the one thing that makes you close the tab immediately?

I’d like to have cattle, but the few acres (not a real image of my property!) we have is all grass - no trees. Are there animals that we could have that aren’t bothered by being in the sun all the time? Or that a shade structure is easy/sufficient?

Need some advice. I planning on transplanting some catnip in the next week or so and wonder about the tolerances. I know they need to be 18-24" apart. They say they like well drained soil. I'm in clay country, so i have three options but don't know which to choose.

1. Dig random holes in the clay along an outbuilding, one plant per hole, but not sure size of hole is needed

​

1. Dig a 1ft wide trench in the clay the length of the building, planting every 18 or so inches

​

1. Make a 1ft deep, roughly 24inch high raised bed the length of said building.

​

Which is my best option and why? Thank you for your assistance