A lilliputian over 5 years ago my married man and I branch out into this lifestyle called homesteading . It was in the centre of wintertime of all times but something within us just clicked .
Oddly enough , the whole thought come while I was fretting over not being able to afford to feed our 3 baby as healthy of a diet as I require to because of our meager grocery budget . Then , while watch an instalment of Alaska : The Last Frontier , it dawn .
I hear Eve planting in her gamey tunnel , and I thought , “ I take one of those . ” Then my husband saw the chickens and said , “ You know we could raise our own intellectual nourishment instead of buying it . ”
Just like that , the dream was born .
However look back , we made a tidy sum of mistake . Some because of poor planning . Some because we hadnoidea what we were doing , and some because we had special funds and had to do with what we had .
Today , I want to share a few of those homesteading mistakes with you . Hopefully , it can keep you from making the same unity .
1. We Failed to Plan
I know that this is one of the most foolish thing you may do . However , we really had no secret plan plan .
Honestly , I think it ’s because we never really dreamed that we ’d make it this far .
reckon back , I imagine we believe we ’ll only raise chickens for eggs , and a garden plus agreenhouseto extend our growing time of year . The thought of prove animals for meat had n’t even get in our mind at this point .
I thought that would be it , but it was n’t .
Had we taken the time to really call back about what we were doing , our life could ’ve been much easier . And we belike could have forefend a few of the catastrophes that we confront .
If you may , appear before you jump . Think long - term .
Give yourself some form of instruction so you’re able to fend off some of the homesteading mistakes I ’m going to blab about below .
2. We Took on Too Much at Once
As I say , we hit the ground running when we decided to homestead . A week after we watched the TV show that inspired it all , our greenhouse was up . Less than a week after that , we had a chicken coop and our first 5 birds .
We did not mess around . However , unluckily , we just keep doing the same matter over and over . We would have an idea and leap into it headfirst .
This became a problem .
For instance , I find the idea ofraising small stature pigsjust to feed our family . I thought they ’d be easier to curb instead of remove on a full - size of it hog . Well , before we did any research , my hubby had already adjure on a pig through an auction site and impart home our first pig for $ 7 .
Granted it was a great deal , but I had nowhere to put the pig nor did I have a clew what I was getting into .
Now , guess who had a pig in her fenced - in backyard until my husband and oldest son could get a proper slovenly person pen progress ? Guess who had apig escapingevery other Clarence Shepard Day Jr. because the ‘ right pig penitentiary ’ still was n’t warm enough to keep him indoors ?
Then we bought a mama squealer and her baby . And then the mama had babies .
And before I knew it , I had a full - blown copper family and was completely exasperated because we had done very little right .
Then we did the same thing with bees . The idea come to mind , the chance confront itself , and we jumped in . Yet again , we failed miserably our first year ofbeekeeping .
Thankfully , we have learned over the age but not without some hard belt . Be sure you could chew the mouthful you are plan to bite off when it come to your homestead .
3. I Put Livestock in the Wrong Spot
Our first investing in stock and fowl was our poulet . We build theirchicken coopin our backyard so they would be easily accessible .
There have been some perks to the location of our volaille . I mean they are better protected being that close to our house . They actually have 2 fences around them because of our backyard fencing plus the fence in their chicken 1000 .
However , there are some downsides . We have no tone in our backyard . So now , I plantsunflowersaround their coop each year to render proper nicety during our hot southern summers .
learn from that mistake , I placed my goats in a very shaded spot that was further off from the home . However , my goats would cry and call out because they want to see us and the other stock we had .
What I ended up having to do was to extend my Capricorn area around our property so they could arrive to a sealed smirch and see the rear of our mansion . That way when I ’m out in the yard or on the back porch they can still see me , and I can blab out to them .
( Yes , I talk to my goats like they are toddlers . I do the same to my chicken , but that ’s a unlike story . )
face back , had I locomote my goat ’s lot over and put my Gallus gallus where my Goat primitively started everyone would ’ve been happy , and I would have had to do a lot less workplace .
Still , you live and memorise , right ? When resolve where to put your animals think it all the room through so you may hopefully have to make few ‘ adjustment ’ than we ’ve had to make .
4. We Went From Zero to Sixty With our Garden
When we got the musical theme to begin uprise our own food , we had gardened a couple of years prior to that . We would grow a few light-green beans or some tomato plants in a small above ground bed .
It was just enough for us to make a repast or a sandwich out of .
We had never daydream ofcanningor preserving our own food .
That did n’t deter us from thinking we would maturate this ginormous garden . And we did just that .
However , we take the hard way that the larger the garden the larger amount of piece of work that come with it . I spent a lot of summer chasing my tail seek to keep this garden weeded and thriving .
We also did n’t consider where we would like to place the garden . It is presently ( and belike will always be ) in the half of our backyard that is n’t fenced .
And it takes up a huge part .
I could ’ve made it smaller and put it flop out in my front pace . I live out in the centre of nowhere so I do n’t have any stern regulations I have to keep an eye on .
Being in my front yard would have render my kids a band more room to trifle in the backyard . Now , I have theswing setin our side one thousand along with a trampoline because our garden took up much - needed backyard play space . And we are let apoolnext year so who knows where I ’ll end up putting it .
My advice is to really mean about the emplacement of your garden . verify it is n’t so big that you ca n’t handle it . Because you may always go back and increase it later if needed .
check that it is n’t so big that you ca n’t handle it . you’re able to always go back and increase it later if needed .
Do n’t forget that you need space for sport and living too . Otherwise , you ’ll end up being like me and trying to figure out where to jostle the play equipment without make your house look like a theme park .
5. I Had to Redo Things…A Lot
I catch myself saying things like ‘ I wish ’ a lot .
The ground is that anything you do with homesteading takes so much exploit you rarely require to have to take it down and do it over again .
For representative , our perimeter fence .
It will have to be redo , no doubt . I wish we had made it a priority . A perimeter fence not only observe your beast home but it also keeps predators out .
Because we were shortsighted on investment company when we started , we demand the ‘ free ’ route . yield something was better than nothing . However , what we have really does n’t function all that well .
We created our own perimeter fence out of pine slab . There is a lumbermill down the road that gives them aside for free , and we used them . We hauled them for day but eventually got them all home , hammer them into stakes and tree . They completely palisade our domicile .
Even so , they did n’t last .
Between storms and children , some have collapsed . We keep repairing but it is something we put a lot of piece of work into that will have to be taken down and replaced with a more stalwart option .
realise that if you have stock , you ’ll need a margin fence . Find a style to create one that is the inflexible option for your budget . Hopefully , you wo n’t have to incessantly maintain or finally make over something that you worked so severely on .
Just understand that no matter what you do you are likely going to look back on it and wish you had done it differently . I could tell you that I wish I had cleared certain trees at one time instead of going back and induce to clear Tree over and over .
The list goes on .
Pay attending to small details as you go so you wo n’t have the ‘ I wish ’ syndrome quite as bad as I tend to have some twenty-four hours .
6. I Developed the ‘Stress Yourself Out’ Syndrome
I ’m going to be stark . When you are building a homestead there are days your house and terra firma will appear like a junkyard .
That is just something that happens . When you have 18 million projects going on at one time , do n’t be surprised by this .
Even so , I was . I had always subsist in the suburban area with the manicured yard and it freak out me out ! So I stressed . And some days , I even cried because I wanted my house to take care pretty and be a functional homestead . I wanted it all at once .
Well , the realness was , unless I desire to go into major debt I was going to have to be patient . When I finally came to that reality , I let this syndrome go .
However , I waste days stressing myself out instead of run on making our homestead our dreaming .
If you are feeling the strain of your homestead , take a deep breathing time and realize it will all come together . It all just takes time .
7. I Failed to Locate Livestock Conveniently
Our chickens were the only animals we bought that we actually placed near our home for their convenience , and ours .
After that , we kind of stuck the animals where we think they ’d jibe . The goats were off by themselves ( until we made the extension . ) Our pigs were down in the woods by themselves . And our coney were in 2 different location because they ballooned faster than we had prepared for .
On winter mean solar day when I had to thaw and bring sweet water multiple time , I was boost all over the place .
It was a jam . uncalled-for to say , that had to be fixed . Yet again , we find ourselves remodel something we had put so much effort into .
You should really consider yourselves when placing your animals . Obviously , you wo n’t need your hog really snug to your house .
However , if you could place them even where it is n’t such a terrible hike on a cold , frigid day then it will be worth it .
8. We Didn’t Create Proper Storage as We Expanded
We completely did not do this . And this is why our property stayed so mussy for so long . As we built and added , we did n’t stop to think that we ’d take additional space for the extra creature each addition required .
For example , as the garden grew I had more tools I take beyond what I used in my tiny above ground garden . And that equated to needing more space .
And I necessitate agarden shed . Then we have awoodstoveand needed a place to store woods .
We are just now catching up on all of the memory board we needed . We had to build up apole barnin addition to a few other storage spaces as well .
When you are building your homestead , always recall about storing anything you purchase . You do n’t desire anything to get ruined and having right storage will help with that and keeping your place neat and tidy .
Well , these are the top 8 mistakes I made as far as functionality on my homestead when I was just starting out . I go for these points will avail you to rethink a few things so you do n’t have to have as many hard knock and redo ’s as we had .
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