How did you get started???

Started with a garden. I liked it so much I applied for a job at a local Greenhouse and got the job. Worked side by side with horticulturists and picked their brain. My garden was my mini-laboratory and I was always trying new stuff. Anyway, the vision of having a small farm started to grow in my mind and here I am.

I'd say, first step is to get the garden and chickens producing for you. Once you have a reliable stream of nutritional food for the table, other projects can be started with little distraction.

Get the fruit/nut trees and brambles (berries) started, as they will take several years to produce. If you want to use living fences (hedge rows) to partition off sections of the property, start them early also, as they will take several years to become effective.

Set the entire place up into zones (like in permaculture) so the chores you need to do daily are closest to the house, the chores done once or twice per year can be at the farthest edges. As you age, and simple chores become more tiring, you will appreciate this 'centralized' system.

I'm only 24, so just kind of starting. This is year four on the farm. I grew up in the country, but only ever had a few horses. I gardened a *little* bit with my mom. After I turned 18, and was on my own, I started really reading a lot of gardening books. Then I went off to college for a year and that got me thinking more about our food and where it comes from. I did some more reading.

Met my husband (complete city boy) and we moved 800 miles back to his deceased grandparents' farm (we are the fourth generation) that nobody had lived on for 30+ years. The first year we put a garden in. The second year we started a flock of chickens, got some goats and a cow. We've been steadily fixing things up and building fences every year (as much as we can afford), and planting fruit trees. The third year (last year) we had a baby. We raised 50+ butcher chickens, and I learned how to can. This year we sold the cow and goats and got more cold hardy milk goats and some ducks. We're in the process of getting a few pigs and sheep too. We'll be butchering 25 broilers and 25 ducks this year, as well as a pig, a lamb and a goat to last us through the year. We both also hunt deer. I will be dehydrating and smoking some food this year along with canning.

In the last year I've learned how to make soap and other natural body creations. I'm starting a small business doing this with hopes of eventually making enough money between that and other farm things to be able to stay here and not work off of the farm.

We learn how to do things better each year, and how we could have done things more efficiently. It's a learning process, but an exciting one! We will never get bored here. There is a lifetime of work to be done. I continue to read as many homesteading/gardening/animal husbandry books as I can. I am constantly thinking about where we are headed and what my plans for next year are. I also *HIGHLY* recommend Carla Emery's Encyclopedia of Country Living! That book should get you started!

My advice for newbie homesteaders as a semi-newbie homesteader would be this.......
Plant lots of fruit and nut trees, and other perennials like berries, asparagus, ect.
Fence your property with a universal fencing that will keep anything in! Like 48" "no-climb horse fence" (you never know what kind of animals you might decide you want, that way you won't have to rebuild fences plus it keeps predators out)
Make all of your animal pens adjoining so that you can run your critters from one pen to the other with ease.
Start out with ducks or chickens.

Hope that helps!

OMGosh........I was a full grown adult the first time I saw a black and white cow!! I thought all cows were brown!!!

One of these days.....I will have a black and white cow, and I will name her "Milkshake"!!!

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I am sure of two things: There is a God, and I am not Him.
The movie Rudy

I grew up in Queens, NY. The first place I remember living had more nature then most. We lived across the street from a cemetery and, in our very old - never redone neighborhood, there were strips of attached, 3-story buildings that circled the block and in the center all but the corner ones had teeny, tiny backyards. Not that I could get to ours, only the lower apartment had an entrance. But I could see it.

Even better, I could see the neighbors. He had a fairyland of flowers and birdbaths and roses climbing. Ours was a solid mass of weeds and junk. All I knew was that it was green. But another neighbor complained about it being a hideout for rats and the landlord put in a stairway down because my parents said they'd clean it up. And we did (and there were rats!) and in the back corner, climbing a fence from someone else's yard - was a grapevine! With little, tiny grapes on it!
I had had no idea you could grow food. And this wasn't even tended by anyone, it was wild, a miracle, a gift from God.

And my obsession began. I read, I learned, I found a HS with an agricultural program (John Bowne, in Flushing - you can buy fresh produce and eggs from them and I think they might have some adult education programs still).
I worked on other people's farms, I gave it up in disgust, I went and did it again. I raised gardens and rabbits. If I knew then what I knew now I'd have started with quail much sooner. I ate what I grew, learned more about cooking, overcame my fear of canning.

It's an ongoing process. There will always be more to learn. I finally, last year, got land of my very own. If I can do it you can do it!!

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A ship in the harbor may be safe, but that's not what ships are built for

Too funny!
I have dreams of a cow of my own and I think up names by color as well. Buttercup for a yellow of course, but Bonnie for a black and white, Belle for a brown one...

__________________
A ship in the harbor may be safe, but that's not what ships are built for

Thank you everyone for sharing your stories and advice I really appreciate it....

I grew up on a horse ranch in S. California and we had chickens and pheasants and the occasional pig roast.

When I graduated high school and started dating in a serious way, my boyfriends always ended up being the cowboy type. Then I married a city guy who loved the country life and we lived on places that were from 5 - 40 acres in size. I always had horses.

So somehow I ended up reading an article on chickens and horses and I researched chickens, ordered 25 from Murray McMurray hatchery and then with the chicken research I ran into homesteading ideas and bacame intrigued.... Got Carla Emery's book..... I began gardening, got goats, moved to Michigan on 106 acres, got sheep, a draft horse, ducks, more goats, learned to butcher poultry, deer, and goats......it just keeps going on and on.

As for affording it, I don't know, sometimes we can't but somehow we manage to make it work. We take on any odd job that comes along most years to supplement our income and I am working towards raising or making something here that will at least pay for the hay bill. I think you just have to point your life in the direction that you want and not be scared to take the risk. I have had the lesson learned that I can't live both the suburbanite culture and the rural culture at the same time. I can't afford to. I have to live on a farm, not an estate. I can't get my hair weaved and have a car payment plus pay the hay bill and the other expenses homesteading racks up. So I have a $1200 dollar used car (runs perfectly, no dents, but isn't sleek or shiny) instead of a $30,000 car. It's all choices really. I shop at thrift stores now instead of Macy's. Culture shock? You betcha!!! At times it was HARD!! And sometimes still is. It was about a 3 year process for me to adjust and to really make up my mind that my farm and its lifestyle was more important to me.

All the best of luck to you. It's a beautiful lifestyle in many ways.

I started with a small garden and chickens and then turkeys...then goats...then bees...
I feel like I am still just getting started! LOL! I have so many plans and dreams!

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Budget Friendly Kindle Downloads for Homesteaders: Pam's Pride Recommendations

SWAGBUCKS! YTD earnings: $210 in Amazon gift cards! 2012: $600 2011: $449

As if most things in life I got started in the homesteading lifestyle because of need. Single parent of 4, 1st time home owner of an old house living on the poverty line. The root of my homesteading skills lies in me trying to keep a mortgage going without working two jobs.
I needed to put food on the table so I learned to garden in an urban environment.
I needed to be able to preserve my harvest so I learned how to can & dehydrate.
Learned how to can on a woodstove on my patio because I needed to lower my cost of canning & had a supply of free firewood.
Same can be said of my baking & scratch cooking skills, as well as sewing, installing replacement windows, keeping meat rabbits.
My family says it's because I come from a long line of farmers. I doubt that as they all couldn't wait to come off the land.
I grew up in the burbs until I was a teen.

~~ pelenaka ~~
http://thirtyfivebyninety.blogspot.c...groceries.html