I just found a stash of eggs behind the snow blower. They could be a few days or 3 months old. They are dirty but in good condition. These chickens seem to like to lay their eggs anywhere but their nesting box 😂

Does anyone have a recommendation on a shredder that could be used to shred up woody plant material, like brassica stalks, corn stalks, etc.

Hi,

Wife and I are moving to a piece of property in Northern CA in a month or two with 4 acres. It’s a flat property with a well, septic tank/leech field, wood stove, propane, and underground power. It’s right outside of a city, so it’s not super off the grid, but it is property.

We are both from the city, but have spent quite a bit of time on the property as it is a family property. Mostly what I’m looking to find out is what are things that you wouldn’t expect/need to know moving from a suburban area where everything is new and city provided, to property?

Examples: don’t flush anything down the toilets… wood stoves need to be cleaned every year… or info about water softeners/neutralizer.

I know it’s a broad question. I feel good about most of the skills and basics of living on property, as we spent some time out there, but looking for more of the random bits of info/tips.

Thank you! Looking forward to this experience.

Also any advice on places to learn/watch DIY, as it’s a 50 year old home and our current home is just a few years old.

Going for a morning walk with Meelo and a nice warm cup of coffee, thought the lighting and fog made the view quite something!

I’m in North Dakota zone 3. I’m looking to plant onions this fall so they can overwinter. I’m looking for long storage, long day onion sets. I’m hoping to get 500-800 bulbs. I haven’t had much luck looking online for that exact type.

Also I haven’t been able to find cheap garlic bulbs anywhere. I was hoping to plant 300 plants. If anyone could point me in a good direction it would mean a lot.

29 gauge #1 painted vs Galvalume metal roof

I’m putting a roof on my wood shed. I don’t know about the difference in metal roof choices but this is what the local place had to choose from. Galvalume was $33 for 16 foot sheet and painted #1 was $44 for 16 foot sheet. Any reason to spend more on the painted or will Galvalume be fine?

I have a flock of 4 hens that are all around 1.5 years old and are well established. I bought 3 new chicks earlier this year to add to the flock but wasn't comfortable putting the babies with the adults so I raised them separate. Now the chicks are almost fully grown and it's time to move them in. They have been in coops right next to each otherfor close to a month and have been seeing each other often, however any time I try to let them free-range together they won't interact and when they do one of the bigger adult hens is very aggressive to the point that one of the new hens is completely terrified of the older ladies. Any tips to make this more seamless? I'm worried for the younger hens safety as the one gets very aggressive.

Also side note the really aggressive adult hen was broody earlier this year and she seems to be broken of it now as she's no longer sitting on eggs. Is this a by product of the broodiness we dealt with earlier and it will pass?

I know big ag will grind cornstalks and use it as hay, or blend it with other grass silage for feed. Wondering if anyone has experience with this on a smaller scale.

My Blocks of corn did stellar this year, 12+ feet tall. I normally throw harvested cornstalks to my goats and sheep, they eat the leaves and leave the stalks.

I was considering getting one of those cheap-o electric wood chippers, or maybe doing it when I rent a bigger chipper, but im somewhat concerned the fibers might jam up something too small.

What do you do with your cornstalks?

We just purchased a home with a large garden area that was unplanted last year. I don’t have money to get the soil tested before winter but want to do some prep work to be able to plant next year. I am located in Colorado, zone 5b.

My husband and I put in an offer on our dream property (150 acres, 1/3 wetlands with a river running through it, the rested wooded agriculturally zoned). The disclosures and all that were clear - no easements and no encumbrances. However now that we are under contract, we discovered through the title insurance that there is a railroad easement from 1907 and the railroad company owns the mineral rights on 2/6 parcels. It also looks like there might be some mineral profits rights owned by the previous owner from the 70s on a different parcel. In our state (WI) there is no disclosure requirement for severed mineral rights - and it's not covered under encumbrances since there is no actual mining/testing equipment on the property. As far as we can tell the railroad line was decommissioned over 60 year ago, and they've never actually tested/mined the property.

I'm so torn on whether or not to try to break the contract or just live with it. We can probably claim back the mineral profits rights due to a lapsed rights claim. The railroad mineral rights are in the wetlands zone, but that only means they'd need a special permit not that it's impossible.

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Does anyone have any experience with this type of thing? How did it work out?

So I'm new to this forum, and I was wondering if anyone had any ideas on how to aquire stone for a cobblestone fence /mailbox/car parking area, on the cheap? I've been scouring my local Craigslist for any free stone that may pop up, are there any other resources I should look into? Thanks!

This is a very traditional style of garden in Europe. The purpose is to help regulate sunlight by having taller plants in verticals rows create shade for smaller plants in horizontal rows as well as improved air circulation because the taller plants in vertical rows create natural windbreaks.

The photo may not be the best example, it’s from Google but does anybody do this? Can anybody recommend if this is this actually viable ?

So the well drillers were here today and yesterday (I'm in Maine).

First they put 60 foot of steel casing, since they dug it about 60 feet away from the septic field and apparently code requires pipe if that close.

Then they dug down about 400 feet before they said they hit anything, just 0.25 gpm.

So they said they had to go deeper, and continued to 584 feet until they hit 4 gpm.

The total cost ended up being a little over 17k (no pump, they said they just drill and I have to find someone else to install the pump). Their rate was 25 per foot for the drilling, and 35 per foot for the 60 feet of casing.

Just trying to figure out if all of this sounds about right and I just got unlucky, or if there is anything to be concerned about.

My grandparents moved to Canada and started a homestead through the Dominion Lands Act. And putting aside the fact that the land they acquired was already occupied by generations of indigenous folk, they were given a parcel of land to turn into a meek existence. It was a struggle of hard labour and poverty. They had memories of the profound moments in their lives, like the time my grandfather patched the only bucket that they owned...

Fast forward a few generations and Canadian real estate is at an all time high. Land ownership is either something you inherit, or go massively in-debt to occur. The cost of acquiring land in Canada is outrageous, and you need at least 50% down to get a mortgage on a property with no permanent structure. And unless you are willing to homestead (an already challenging idea) in an area that has 9 months of winter, then you are paying $400,000 for a tiny parcel of land. How is anyone who isn't already wealthy supposed to afford that?

Maybe things aren't so dire in other parts of the world, but at this point the upstart cost of living somewhere rural seems completely unattainable to someone like myself, let alone the luxury of time and energy it costs to start and maintain the homesteading lifestyle.

How did you all find yourselves living in the place that you are now?

I have an apple tree the main trunk has died but I have shoots coming up all around it well this time I’d rather create a fruit tree this time instead of a ornamental tree. So question is do I just pick 1 shoot and go from there or can I do all of them. First time doing this and just want some guidance.

Part of my property has a huge number of wild sunchokes- hundreds of them, probably more than an acre in total. The problem is, they need to go- they grow really tall and are blocking the line of site of the railway crossing between the two parts of the property.

I would like to make a patch elsewhere on the property to keep having these tasty buggers around, but I am not sure how to propagate them. I know they grow from the root, but I am not sure if I have to pull them and plant them after they die back in the fall, or try to mark them over the winter and relocate them before they break dormancy in the spring. Does anyone have any experience with these?

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