I don't know if this up your alley, but when oranges are cheap up here I sometimes make orange wine. It is wonderful, dry, and palate-cleansing, like an after-dinner "stomach bitter". I have toyed with the idea of using other citrus fruits for wine, but they don't go on sale. Wine making uses...
Back to Frosting and FarmerChick: yes, obviously you're taking different points of view, or else, no debate! :) That much is self-evident. As I understand it, the crux of the matter (which got lost in my long-winded post) is whether you say "the heck with it, the big guys will probably win...
Debate over? :) [furtively looks left and right before stepping forth].
I can see what both Frosting and FarmerChick are saying; but essentially I think they are taking positions from two points in time: FarmerChick, from where we are right now; and Frosting, from where we have been and to...
Thank you all for your thoughts on feed-grade oats and whole wheat. (Er, the whole wheat was for my bread flour, but anyhow!) I've heard of guerilla gardening, and since I am surrounded by vacant and abandoned properties, it makes audacious sense to try it...so long as irrigation is not...
I hang all laundry out in the summer, and next to the woodstove once it's freezing out. I don't have a crunchy towel problem--maybe it's because I wash by hand, or maybe this is to do with whether water is soft or hard? The soap I use is generic dish soap from the dollar store, and I'm not...
Caveat, this is from a chicken noob! They look lean, but are they a lean breed? They look scruffy, but are they moulting? They look haggard...harder to make an excuse for that. My gut feeling is that you can do better. Maybe you could start fresh with hatching eggs (if you have the time to...
Over the next year, I mean to:
build a permanent, solid greenhouse
raise meat chickens
build a coop for said meat chickens
expand the garden
fence in the rest of the yard
actually install the furnace ducts which are just lying there
I can already:
make jams, pickles, and salsas
make wine
make...
Quail Antwerp, here's another "dense" question for you. Those rolled oats at the feed store--can you eat them yourself, for breakfast? Or are there certain, um, inclusions that can be expected in the sack, that would make this unappetizing? :P I also notice they sell whole wheat (unground)...
I'm here too from BYC. I'm also not Officially Organic or Fully Self Sufficient by a long shot, but am trying to point my feet in that direction. I have thirteen Red Sussex Cross pullets in a coop, with a Not Quite Officially Big Enough run which I swear I will enlarge as soon as my...
I think it's something that I'm "meant to" do, being interested in various ways since a child. Not that there was much call in my childhood environment for self-sufficiency, as we were in the city and definitely were of adequate means. I got my financially conservative outlook from both my...
Thank you all for your welcomes! I recognize a lot of your names.
Noobiechickenlady, I have 13 Red Sussex cross gals, just about 9 weeks old now.
Beekissed, while I was PMing you, you were anticipating my questions and answering them in this thread! Sorry for cross-timing. I still think...
Hello!
I'm not sure if this is the best place to introduce myself; apologies if it isn't. Backyard Chickens has suggested that those of us interested in a section on organic chicken raising should show up at Sufficient Self, so here I am! (I'm not really sure of the logic there, unless it is...