Two Problems With Homesteading

2 problems with homesteading: there is a lot to know, and it's really, really, really hard. Happy Sunday seed day! It is the one day of the week that we get to dedicate an entire day to growing more of our own food. How you guys doing on this garden job? You've been at it a couple of weeks. Put our chickens on this garden, hope to have them help us mow it down a little bit. You haven't touched this nasty, nasty weed here and it's just stopped being seed. These little guys started laying. Hey, that means we're back in eggs. All right, go get your egg basket. Today we are laying out roads to better access our pastures, our main crop, dairy. Looks like we got a side hustle of making sure these chickens know to lay in there. Oh wow, there's so many eggs. We need to get these weeds out so it's not as conducive of a laying area. I don't want to be alone. I don't want to be the only brain on laying out these roads. It's pretty important and permanent stuff. I've got a guide coming, a fellow permaculture designer, and he'll be here 30 minutes. We still got enough. I got rid of potential laying spots. We really need to get rid of that too. That'll make this the most conducive spot, hidden spot for laying eggs. Turn that fence off for me. A little chick started laying. Old news to her, she's been doing this her whole life. This is big news to us because we've been on the brink of having to buy eggs. And if I'm honest, buying eggs— we did have to buy them 2 or 3 times over the last few months. No more living egg basket to egg basket. No, zero eggs. Okay, funny thing is, Mama just radioed me. Henry's hungry and we need eggs. Mucho huevos. One egg, that's how we've been living. How's potty training Third day, you going strong? They say third day's the magic. It's the sit down on the toilet most of the day method. Plenty of stuff to eat, plenty of stuff to drink. Celebrate when he pees or poops, which he has been doing on the toilet. Leaving the kids to milking first. This know-how part, I've been at this 15 years, I still don't know it all. I still enlist help, like with this pasture access project. Ross is here. Good morning, Permaculture Liker in the house. Good to see you. Good drive this morning?

Ah, beautiful.

You know, where are you driving from?

Uh, we are now in, uh, Seagrove, which is like middle of the state, like Randolph County.

Uh, this is a delicate pasture, and I just want another set of eyeballs, another mind, permaculture-oriented mind on this thing. I'm not 100% confident what I want to do. I think I know, but not 100%. Right here we have 30-35 degree slope. Now notice this, Russ— Ross, I noticed an old logging road right here. Let's just use that because we already have something that looks like it's on contour.

Yeah, uh, yeah, my mind goes to, you know, why was it here and not there?

So Ross, permaculture lackey, is here to help.

So my mind goes to like seeing the crossing point on the low.

Yeah.

And just understanding what that is, like whether, oh, that's perfect, let's reinvest in that. And if that is your crossing point, right, then it's 100% redo it.

If you're—

I know if your new crossing point is either down there or up there, I might say, well, I drove this this morning, I'm like, okay, then where did the loggers go? Yeah. So, you know, it's somewhere. And, you know, that's just brush. I'm not seeing anything yet that isn't, you know— yeah, brush is easily removed.

Yeah. See, it's getting pretty gnarly right there. Definitely didn't go right there.

So that's my, like, main evaluation of that is, is does it link your low point on your, your valley?

Yeah.

To— and then what does it link to? And if you're on with that, then yeah, you're game on. And that is a, that is a cheat code, like them doing it in the past. Like, they'll lead you to a creek crossing, you know.

This is an old spring. This is the spring that used to feed the old house down there.

That pathway went to where, like, the water— you know.

Yeah, it could have went right there. Here is where we put it in because there was a little bit of a trail. We've already putzed around with water and electricity here.

Theoretically, you put a pathway in here and you do need water management, at least on this side. Hopefully we line it up. It's where it's 2.5%. That's like the number we want.

We actually don't want on contour, we want 2.5%, right?

Yeah, like if this is 2%, from here to there hitting that old path, this is like game on. Yeah, create a nice road in here. And it's cool, that is your— you know, there's ridges like, yeah, that's a ridge, you know. And then there's like, you know, I'll talk about this being a ridge and this being a valley, but I mean, but like, so theoretically, you in this situation, you're bringing water that way, which is, um, just cool to know that you're doing.

There's another old logging road up right here. I think I'm kind of flat here on a 35 -degree slope. Permaculture Lackey is set to put the flags up right now. We're gonna go check on the boys and the sheep. Goal today for Ross is that he sets some flags and then give us an example with the Mini-X of what we're gonna do. That should be exciting. Look at this though! This is what we cleared over the winter, Jonah. So much better after you mow it. Heck yeah! See, our walnut that accidentally got pushed down is coming up. I think we should cut Everything but one sprout off that. See this? We need to move their shaw every day. That's too much manure in one spot. See their shaw? We need to move it every day inside of here. These guys, a whole separate system, mostly bramble, moving them once a week. Why is that going now? You just fixed it. Oh, good job, Josiah. The second problem: it's hard. Like, we just lost a second Feeder sheep, we only have 6. It's hard. It's hard in the first place to manage them right, and sometimes even if you do it all right, things still go wrong. When you have livestock, you have dead stock. When you get into homesteading and you're growing things, you're gonna kill something and it's gonna be your fault. It's— other times it's going to be accident, and other times we're not going to know who, who's at fault. Is anybody else sickly? I don't think so. We had one die. Oh my God. Parasites. That makes 2 of 6. We're down to 4 lambs we can have for our harvest this year. That's not nearly enough for us, guys, for our lamb consumption. We need 12. Okay, I don't see any more diarrhea. Moving their shed every day so they're not eating grass around their manure will help them not get parasites. See, we had a leak. Quick solution to any of this— not that there's a quick solution but is that you don't want to do this alone. Oh, okay, did you fix it with a hose clamp? Good job, buddy, proud of you. I have my family, I have friends, I have mentors I can text, I have the people in the Abundance Plus community. I have communion with other people in this venture. I'm here to say you can homestead. This is my mantra: you can homestead I can help. Mom's here. The question is, can you be here and he not bother you the whole time? Our new grass is coming up so nice. We addressed problem number one with those sheep. They need to be moved away from their manure. That's just basic management 101. Half a cup per 50 gallons, and we've got 3 tanks. Problem here, water line burst. Well, we don't have the drill. Hey, where's the drill for fixing a water line? Uh, that's Jonah's department. Where's the drill? The drill? Yes.

It's in the Salma.

Where's Salma?

Over at the show.

There are 3 ways I can help you with one thing, and that is Abundance Plus, my membership area. First, inspiration. We have a brand new TV show. We've worked hard all summer and we've gotten all 4 episodes. They're all ready to go. They're going to leak out the next If you're— sorry, it is Bring Your Kid to Work Day on the farm every Friday starting October 6th. A new show throughout all of October. We— what are we doing? Well, we're flipping homesteads. We take regular homesteaders just like you in this area, and we've gone to them and we've, we've taken tours, and then we've seen what they need, and we come in with the surprise volunteers and our heavy-duty machines, and we surprise them by helping them get towards their goal much more quickly than they would in the past. And you see these amazing homestead transformations. You see my input into these homesteads, their input into this. This show ends up being so inspirational and educational, it's two in one. It's something you gather the family together and you watch and you have fun watching, but you also learn at the same time. That is our new TV show, Elevated. It's inspirational, well, and educational. It's on Abundance Plus this Friday, premiere weekend. Quick clamps have not been holding under pressure. We found that these hose clamps do, so we just replaced quick clamps with a hose clamp. Kids, let's go do the soap. Let's do the soap now real quick before lunch. Looks like Mr. Lackey has put in some flags for our roads. Second thing I'll do to help you inside Abundance Plus, I'll give you a sense of know-how. Hundreds of videos on how-to permaculture, gardening, milk cows, Uh, gun safety, you name it, we've got it.

This one is the top of the two. Yeah, I ended up right here. Okay, feel really good about this spot. Yeah, I'm shooting the gap on these trees. Y'all naturally have the fence line here. Yeah, that would be level, that flag from that, uh, I see valley way over there.

Yeah, too steep to mow behind the cows in this paddock, so we're hitting it with the brush saw. The third thing, and I'm I'm excited about all the things, but this one might be the most exciting. It's the new community feature inside Abundance Plus. In the past, we've had to have 2 different apps, one for community, one for streaming. No longer. We're all under one roof like one big happy family. You can go in and watch the streaming videos, the ad-free vlogs, the censorship-free vlogs, the documentaries, the how-tos, the TV shows, and then you can— a little button on the app or on the website says community, Go and interact with this vibrant community. Need some lunch? Yeah. All right, I'll take you. I got the mower stuck in a bee's nest. In a bee's nest? Plot thickens. The soap for the main herds is gonna have to wait. I don't think you need any more airsoft. You just got an airsoft gun. Look at this. What have you been up to, honey? Baking banana bread. And then what's that? Banana bread muffins. Oh my gosh. Wow. Actually, when I filmed this vlog, it was Sunday and I felt so down and out for whatever reason, just almost even depressed. And I thought, well, I'll turn to the community. So even for things like that, I've asked, I've asked, I have asked. I'm not only in there every day answering y'all's questions and cheering you on, I'm in there asking questions sometimes. How long do I need to orient a cat to a new place so it doesn't run away? Uh, when I just asked the other day, what do you guys do to get through when you're down and out, almost depressed, what do you do to get through? And a number of people have gotten in there and encouraged me. It's great. Surprise, Enrique's here to wash his machine. You know it needs a cleaning when grass starts growing in the back of the machine. Let's go get this stuck mower. It needs washing too. He's pulling it out. He's got it behind the track loader. Also, if you're like me, you're maybe a side hustler homesteader, meaning You got other things to do, meaning you have a job. My job's this content. Your job may be a utility worker, a nurse, a construction person. And anyway, you're very busy, and sometimes you need to just get straight to the pants. Don't— don't— straight to the pants— straight to the point. Don't mess. You don't want to mess with Mr. Google Pants. You don't have time to read the whole book. You can't even watch all our all our videos, you text me. I, I'm giving my text for a limited time. We're accepting, uh, premium members through fall registration, October 6th, 11:59 PM Eastern. You got to get in there, uh, and you can text me. If I don't know the answer, we have other aunts and uncles. Like, I'll be the uncle you always wish you had in fruit growing. If I don't know the answer I'll give you— I'll get you somebody who does, or I will find the answers generally within 24 hours. I'm sorry, guys, this is kind of a new phase we're entering these days. It used to be when we had a project, I had to be there. Projects equals content for you guys. Now I feel like I can't even— I can't keep up. Oh, it feels like I'm a step behind these boys and coming and then showing you what they've done. Like, Jonah mowed all this with the mower. It's a lot less we're gonna have to mow with the brush saw. He got the mower out. Still a good bit to get with the brush saw, so hopefully I'll come back, you'll see that action, because the boys don't want to do that. They want free time. That's fine, they've been working hard this morning. Let's get this mower down to Enrique for a wash. What are you guys doing? Wal— not walnuts, uh, acorns. A whole bucket. You want to feed, uh, the cakes for weeks. Beefcake and Pound Cake are pigs. I am currently down here, just got access to my pasture from the state road. I want to be way up there, okay? And here lies my problem. Do you see this? This is problem number one. Look at this, this is getting compacted. I'm having to drive in here. I try to go a different place every time, but still the kids tend to favor one spot. It's compacting this pasture and it just will not grow the grass that an uncompacted pasture will. And we have limited pasture. Ross hard at work marking. Thank God for Ross. When would I have been able to do this? I'm about to drive by. Do me a favor, cringe with me. Cringe with me. Uh, we're having to drive over the pasture. The last thing we're doing inside Abundance Plus, the community area, just around this fall registration, and we'll get back to the the vlog here in just a second. But we're going to roll out a survey after, after everybody gets in from the registration and take people's info. And then we're going to connect people across the nation. Well, I imagine and world. Connect everybody to their areas and get you in mastermind groups. And this might start out online where you just share some of your struggles and share some of your successes and give each other feedback based on that. But then it could very well turn into like we've done this once before in the past. Where people actually end up getting together physically, and we're gonna try to facilitate that. So maybe you can have your own elevated situation, and you know, maybe that doesn't work out. We're gonna give you a worksheet, just like one, maybe front and back worksheet on how to organize your own workday on your own farm with your own friends and family. Believe me, it's a lot easier than you might imagine, and people don't mind helping. They like getting their hands dirty. They're gonna appreciate it. You just need to know what to say and how to say it and when. And we're gonna give you those steps. But those things only available on fall registration. So lots available in fall registration. Premiere weekend of Elevated. Every weekend for the next week, we'll be having discussions in the community about, about what's happened in the show, and I'll be fielding questions. And then we've got the mastermind groups. You gotta get in by— and premium membership. Closes, and it's not available forever. I can only adequately uncle so many people, and we're already over 60% sold out on that. So you want to get in that while you can. Spots are limited and time is limited on that. Go to abundanceplus.com or check out the link down in the description.

I'm not seeing anything. Okay, just doing that side that makes me want to change anything. Okay, I'd be like highlighting it more.

What time you want to dig?

Let's do it now.

Okay, you ready to get on that digger, aren't you?

Maybe in that turn up there. And, uh, I would love to know whether or not you're hitting rock pretty quick. If you're not hitting rock pretty quick, the whole thing's feasible. If the whole area is rock—

yeah, we can test that. Okay, never mind. We are not brush sawing. I am not complaining. We're putting Ross and this access project first. We're digging. Where are the boys? I know the boys around. They went inside. They're not gonna want to do this. Hey boys, boys, boys, I need a digger. A digger. Who wants to run the mini X? Me! For what? For fitting in this access road. I'll do it. He's going to show us what to do. Hey, we dug up a nice rock. I know, I wanted him to put it in my front yard. Uh-huh. At the new house, at our house. Okay. And we'll see what we're gonna find. If we find a bunch of those rocks, maybe that will be my path from the house to the stairs going down. Okay.

You know, it moved right away, and here I was thinking maybe this whole thing was bedrock. So this is the top end of the rock?

Yeah.

And we're going to grade out and it's going to have to fade in right there, like connect in. So it's going to climb right now. He's taking off the topsoil just right in here. Hey, that's good that way. You take it out right there. You go, you'll end up cutting the dirt probably about right here.

Yeah.

So it'll start to go down more right in here. And then we're getting down to like now you're at the road. So this gets steeper. So cut and then this fill is put in here.

This gets graded up.

To here so that it does more of a turn and then it's a hump.

Got the surface off. Now what?

Probably I'm just trying to judge what area we're going to impact right now. Yeah, take some more off the top side. Start cutting in and about right here, this is going to be your low point. So you kind of shape this and create a low. And when you dig this dirt out, you're going to put it right here and and level it out.

Big rock.

Grader.

He can grade. You want a welder and a grader? Yeah, now I'm like, we need a chiropractor in the family. I guess Randolph's our carpenter. And today's school lesson: how to build a road on the side of a mountain. I know, right? Not just any old road, a grass road. We're putting the grass back. Are you catching what he's having you do? We're just building the road here, lowering it here, raising it there.

Soil moisture is an important factor when you're working. If it's too dry, this will become like—

it's crazy.

It's like a fluid material. Like you can push it or drive over it or hit it with the blade or something and it'll move, but it won't settle. It needs the moisture. The moisture is like a volume, and then when the moisture leaves, it compacts. It's like a cob brick drying out kind of action. Or, uh, so moisture content is like— sometimes the ground can be too dry. Like I'm just saying, this ground theoretically could be too dry to work. So that'll be a factor when you're working. Or it could be too wet, you know. Yeah.

Look at this. Thank you, Ross, permaculture lackey.

You're welcome.

Thanks for having patience and directing Jonah.

Oh, he did, he did good. He's a natural at it.

He's gonna have to putz at this every day times 2. He's got 2,000— he's got almost a half a mile of access road to dig. Look, you're walking on somewhat level ground. We are done. I might have overheated it. Well, that's some of the Burn It Up Cooking Show. It's gonna be a little drier maybe than than it could be, but it's not burn, burn. I don't know, this one looks really juicy. Does that hit the spot in all the right places? Oh, it's so good, right? It's been a while. We used to eat this all the time, but it's a revived recipe and it's hitting the spot.