In this informal livestream, host Victor (Speaker A) and helpers Arun, Jonah, and others manage a busy day on the homestead. They begin by moving cows into new paddocks in low light, dealing with a soaked cow and a frantic herd. The team milks the cows, navigates a fence that’s too close to the animals, and uses a remote‑controlled electric fence to calm them. Mid‑stream, Victor promotes a recent "Family Friendly Homesteading" session and the Homestead Bundle, offering replay links and show notes. The crew then tackles a series of DIY projects: setting up a temporary electric fence for pigs, improvising a solar‑powered energizer, building a drop‑cord, and constructing rebar posts. They also discuss cooking a ham in a smoker, planting sweet potatoes, and preparing breakfast. Throughout, the dialogue is conversational, with moments of humor, problem‑solving, and occasional frustration, reflecting the real‑time challenges of small‑scale farming.
Chapters
Hey guys, keep the lights on please, both. Looks like it's time for a move. Rain, shine, darkness, light. Jonah's putting up that net. Kim's getting our water out. You never know what you're gonna get to when you come here, do you? No, you don't. But you keep coming back. That's right, you love it. Look at there, we did it! No drama. I don't think we've ever moved them in the dark. Looking pro. Step on that side, Lily. Yes, not too excited to get out in the Where are you, ladies? We just wrapped it up. How's it going out here, Arun?
Oh, it's not going good.
He's soaked. Oh my gosh, bless you. Okay, have you been able to milk?
Just one shot and then—
Oh my goodness.
Everybody's doing great.
Wait, so is Phyllis— so nobody's in their new paddock?
Everybody's in their new paddock.
Everybody? Yeah, but not Phyllis.
Phyllis actually also been there.
Just— okay, all right, all right. I hear them bellowing. Are they— why are they being so crazy?
I don't know.
All right, while I walk up there, we just did our session, Family Friendly Homesteading. It was so much fun. We laughed so much. Uh, Rebecca and I shared on working together as a spouse, getting your spouse on board, uh, how to get your kids involved, what we do for homeschooling. It's all there and you guys can get it You can get the replay and so many other shows. I'll leave the link down in the description for my invite. You can join my Homestead Bundle and I'll give you our show notes for that, and you can sign up for it as well.
Do you have a thing to check your fence?
Oh shoot, I don't have my apron. That's probably the problem, some of it. These guys are here. Okay, everybody's in. Phyllis. Everybody's in the next paddock, but we got to bring Phyllis back to where the stanchion is. And it's good she's over here and they're over there, so I think this is our chance. Come through. Come on, come on, come through. Please come through. Good deal. Yeah, look. Oh, you know what it is? We pulled this We pulled this close to this side and we're trying to milk her and put alfalfa in. Yeah, look how crazy it's gotten. And they're trying to get— bust through to get to it. What's happening is I'm seeing— I'm seeing right now what's happening. The fence is too close. Oh yeah, and everybody's wanting to actually turn that fence on. Because I bet they were— I bet they were charging through that fence.
Yeah, see the fence? Yeah, and I'm trying to build the fence back. Ran down 3 times.
Bless your heart, Arun. Bless your heart. All right, because lady cannot do anything, she has to stay there. Yeah, yeah, because they're like crazy. That's a good idea. She's way more important than getting milk on time.
I know.
Okay, so there, since we're so close, we've ignited this fence. Flossie's already got shocked. I think she likes the alfalfa the best. All right, Jonah, can you help us put her in here?
I wonder if this is a really good mix. It's a really good alfalfa mix.
All right, stay there.
Look at that view though. First round of milking done. Everybody's behaved, but boy, they're pushing it, and we had to turn it off for a second. To get the calf through. So maybe I'm gonna get— try to keep her off of this a little bit. How do I keep you off, huh? Good deal. Turn it back on. You might put it on the, um, the connector of the end so that's a good connection. Turn it back on. We have these really cool remote controls that you can turn it off from the fence. Letting her get that second run down for us. Hold back on you, Phyllis. She is full though. You've been happy to eat something this morning, probably all that alfalfa we're giving you.
Did you make another batch of ice cream?
Uh, nope. We could. Well, we got them calmed down. I think, I think they must have been so riled up. I don't even think I would have calmed them down based on all this ruckus. So yeah, I think, I think what happened was you came down to get me, they took a break, and I think they just calmed down.
Yeah.
All right, we've got Sally hooked up, we've let the cows in, we've got our milk. We got a whole, we got a whole jug, 2.5 gallons. Yes! Here's the plan. See how steep this is? See that? Look how Sally's leaning. Okay, I feel like I need to point down. I don't think I should even try to come up at all. That was the point of getting that where it is. We knew it was going to rain today. We're going to cut right through here. Two strong men gonna push and I'll drive. I think you're a little hair low. All right, is that better? Okay, here. Can you see? Oh yeah. Now stay there, please. It's raining. I want to get inside. All right, I gotta get this 2.5 gallons cooled off as quickly as possible, so we'll go back. All right, so we're gonna get breakfast for everyone. Look, Ken, our grocery store. And look at that Swiss chard, my man. That's a nice looking Swiss chard. That's good. How'd your French toast turn out? Nice. Perfect. You hear in the background the Spirit of Homesteaders of America in the house. We're listening to the show as we go about our lives. It's been kind of neat that it's online. We miss it in person. Pause this for one second. So cool, such a cool, cool vibe. But some of that's coming over to the internet. Still able to learn a lot, you can interact with the speakers. It's been fun. We finished our Q&A panel. Joel's talking now. That's a confidence builder in kids. Their trust in you that you're not going to put them in a dangerous compromised situation. Um, you guys can catch that. This is live right now, but by the time you're seeing this, it's over. But you can be live— but you can catch the replay. I'll leave it down in the description. Pop Sweet Potato's right here. It was about a year ago that he was saying that if he kicked that sickness, that he would, um Plant sweet potatoes. We're just gonna plant some sweet potatoes. We're gonna set up a training fence for these pigs. Okay, 2 strands of electric, that's what we're doing, right? Yeah, just the fence we have too. We're not buying anything more. No, we're gonna make it work. Make it— what is that? Boots would be proud. Use it up, wear it out, make it do or do without. We should probably have metal high-tense, uh, 12-gauge, but we've got all this wire. Let's make it work. We've got a ham going in the smoker. Does that look good or what? Okay, all we got to do is put a little miniature fence up inside their physical holding. Jonah says he's got a plan. I'm not so sure. I'm just gonna see what this is about. So you're gonna get a, uh, you're gonna get a plug-in energizer? I was thinking we just get a solar. Okay, yeah, and then we don't— yeah, then we don't have to worry about a battery. We don't have light in there. Uh-oh, where's the knob?
So the green ones didn't come with any knobs, so I had to take them off of the—
this came with a knob.
It did, but the green ones didn't, so I took the knobs off.
If you're looking for a plug, it's right there. See how you're gonna get in?
Oh, that's pretty fun.
See, that's not gonna happen.
I can get my grinder and just cut a small hole through it.
Yeah, you could, you could. Wouldn't it be easier just to get a solar? See, I'm gonna build one thing you could do. Hey, you could do a drop cord. Oh, you could do a drop cord out.
I was gonna—
and over to it. Let's just— let's not do any grinding or anything like that.
Okay, how do I get in here?
Well, hold on. Do you have a— do you have a place you can put it up in the air? Okay, you work on that. Find a drop cord. I'll work on the temporary fence. We're gonna have rebar— just rebar posts, guys. It's gonna be so easy. One pretty low. Medium low, we're gonna have 2 strands. That's what I saw all the pros doing while on the Great American Farm Tour. Oh sure, where's your Leatherman?
I'm wearing shorts.
You got it all figured out?
Yeah, can I, um, cut a hole with this through it and it won't— and then we won't have to get a drop cord, just be less setup.
Here it comes, here it comes. Wait for it.
Yes.
Sure.
Oh my—
you all know sure means we just give in because we get soft and we want to be nice. Uh, and we, we think it's, it's 50/50 chance it's gonna work out. Yes, you can do it, but I hope I don't regret it. Oh wait, wait, don't, don't cut that. Sorry. No. No, no, I'm regretting it. Okay, no, uh-uh, because no, I didn't— no, shoot. I don't know what I thought. No, we can't do that because it can't touch any of that, honey, or it'll be all electrified.
I'm pulling the cord through it to electrocute it.
All right, but that's enough. That's enough cutting. No, that's enough because it's— it's so hard to replace that. Okay, it was— that was a good sure, but all right, all right, all right, let go, let go, let go. Favorite quote of all time: let go, let go. You could put it on my tombstone.
Lego, hand me that electric piece.
I hope you've— have you calculated and figured out if it would reach? No, no, I'll get it to you. Ready? Sure.
It's hooked up.
All right. Hey, let's train these guys. You know, you need to be trained to a bucket. That's half your training. The other half is getting you trained through our electric fence. And get you guys handled unafraid. She's like, I just give it a foot. Peek, peek, peek, peek, peek, peek, peek, peek, peek, peek. They aren't getting it yet. Peek, peek, peek, peek, peek, peek. Here you go. There you go. We want to see you guys fight over this. Jam your head in that bucket. Come on. Pick, pick, pick, pick, pick, pick, pick, pick. So you're out in the field. Trying to walk you somewhere. Peek, peek, peek, peek, peek, peek. Come on, beefcake. I wish you'd follow me a little bit better. I mean, he is here helping me, so he's not off playing like the other kids. I'm not making you be here, am I? That's exactly how it's going to look out in the field, except these will be further apart. They'll be curious and they'll come over here and put their nose on it. Tomorrow we're not going to move them. Monday— so within 2 days they would have touched it easy, probably within 20 minutes, and they'll learn not to go anywhere near that. Pop's sweet potatoes, right, coming out of the oven. Mucho vegetables. Casey ostrich lettuce and radishes. And carrots and microgreens. Nice. And then I added some Rhodes family ham right there. That's right.
