farming / homesteading

[Thad]

So i found out earlier today that my family wants to move to middle of nowhere Oregon and start a farm/ homestead.

I'm not to sure on what to do, on one hand it'd be really cool to grow all the fruits and veggies i can eat and not be relying on city power or water but on the other hand...  no internet for switch/ computer games no heat/ ac. dust and dirt everywhere. oh and most importantly of all no diapers or even a washing machine! i know it can be done with planning and stuff but my family isn't very understanding of my need to wear diapers and i'm just conflicted and would appreciate thoughts or comments either for or against me going with my mom and her 2 sisters.

i'm kinda handy, i guess. i mean the most i've made / fixed was screwing together some 2x4's to make a small chicken door for my dad when i lived with him for a year in washington and that's about all i can do with tools. i do have disability benefits so there's  that i guess.

so yeah any thoughts or comments anyone?

[diaperwearntigger]

Why do you need to go with your family?  Are you underage?  A minor?  

[Thad]

9 minutes ago, diaperwearntigger said:

Why do you need to go with your family?  Are you underage?  A minor?  

no, i'm not underage or a minor. it just sounds kinda cool to grow my own food, plus i'll have like an acre at least to build my own house and do my own thing.

my family is just sick of people and the daily 9-5 and want to slow down and enjoy life and nature.

[Little BabyDoll Christine]

52 minutes ago, Thad said:

no, i'm not underage or a minor. it just sounds kinda cool to grow my own food, plus i'll have like an acre at least to build my own house and do my own thing.

my family is just sick of people and the daily 9-5 and want to slow down and enjoy life and nature.

Just watch how fast that changes after about 3 months

[WetDad]

I am not aware of any homestead opportunities in the lower 48.

[Thad]

@Little Christine they're very serious about it. my 2 aunt's have been living in an rv trailer for the past year.

@WetDad there are opportunities in the lower 48 you just have to know what to look for and where to look.

my mom wants to flat out buy the land and start farming / homesteading that way.

[Little BabyDoll Christine]

Take a look at what is involved. Ask yourself if your have the skill set or if you want to acqure them OJT. Two months of 12 hour work days, running into prolbems you had no idea existed and learning the difference between life in 2019 and life in 1889, and people come running out of theire screaming and cursing. And just wait till you get the BILLS for trying to live like the Ingles family and trying to find the tools they used, which were common then, but today make "lagacy" seem downright up to date

[AbabeBill]

If you go and try it out, but don’t  like it, is there a contingency plan to go back to where you’re at now? If so, then maybe there’s nothing to lose. Nothing ventured nothing gained. 
 

[Little BabyDoll Christine]

11 minutes ago, AbabeBill said:

If you go and try it out, but don’t  like it, is there a contingency plan to go back to where you’re at now? If so, then maybe there’s nothing to lose. Nothing ventured nothing gained. 
 

Not for nothing did they invent rubber panties, life jackets and parachutes?

[Thad]

21 minutes ago, AbabeBill said:

If you go and try it out, but don’t  like it, is there a contingency plan to go back to where you’re at now? If so, then maybe there’s nothing to lose. Nothing ventured nothing gained. 
 

for me, yes. i have the means to rent a place in town if need be. problem is i don't have a drivers' license, where i am now i can just walk and get everything i need at walmart or fedex delivery.

as for my mom and her sisters' i'm not sure. they are VERY determined not to deal with people more than ABSOLUTELY necessary.

27 minutes ago, Little Christine said:

Take a look at what is involved. Ask yourself if your have the skill set or if you want to acqure them OJT. Two months of 12 hour work days, running into prolbems you had no idea existed and learning the difference between life in 2019 and life in 1889, and people come running out of theire screaming and cursing. And just wait till you get the BILLS for trying to live like the Ingles family and trying to find the tools they used, which were common then, but today make "lagacy" seem downright up to date

i know for a fact i don't have the skill set, but i've been wanting to build and grow stuff but just don't have the room needed to set it up.

i'm not too sure what you're trying to refer to with the Ingles family, is it searchable on youtube?

[diaperguy85]

totally off the grid is a pretty lengthy undertaking, that's 100% self sufficiency from within the family group and some surrounding neighbors, if you have any a reasonable distance away. people have done it in recent years, there are many youtube channels about homesteading, living off the land, and primitive living. seems like alot of work, planning, more work, work some more, but at the end of it, incredibly rewarding. with new modern tech, odds are you'll have electric, web access (most likely limited to an extent), heat, clean water, flush toilets (if you want, diapers and all), and many, if not all the comforts of home, albeit with a bit of a learning curve/creative and reverse engineering. do a bit of research and digging- the biggest thing i've discovered about homesteading: it's not for everyone! 

personally, i'd opt for a partially-off-grid living. i'd prefer to have the means for my own electric, water/septic, web access, and some food stuffs. solar panels, wind turbines, small nuke reactor, what-ev's, plus a large garden, a few livestock critters perhaps, plus hunting and fishing for meat. a green house or three, learning how to can, preserve, smoke and cure veggies and meats, an actual root cellar, wood stoves in bedrooms and the main room, passive and active solar for water, heat and power. i don't know, sounds pretty nice to me  

 

[Thad]

12 minutes ago, diaperguy85 said:

totally off the grid is a pretty lengthy undertaking, that's 100% self sufficiency from within the family group and some surrounding neighbors, if you have any a reasonable distance away. people have done it in recent years, there are many youtube channels about homesteading, living off the land, and primitive living. seems like alot of work, planning, more work, work some more, but at the end of it, incredibly rewarding. with new modern tech, odds are you'll have electric, web access (most likely limited to an extent), heat, clean water, flush toilets (if you want, diapers and all), and many, if not all the comforts of home, albeit with a bit of a learning curve/creative and reverse engineering. do a bit of research and digging- the biggest thing i've discovered about homesteading: it's not for everyone! 

personally, i'd opt for a partially-off-grid living. i'd prefer to have the means for my own electric, water/septic, web access, and some food stuffs. solar panels, wind turbines, small nuke reactor, what-ev's, plus a large garden, a few livestock critters perhaps, plus hunting and fishing for meat. a green house or three, learning how to can, preserve, smoke and cure veggies and meats, an actual root cellar, wood stoves in bedrooms and the main room, passive and active solar for water, heat and power. i don't know, sounds pretty nice to me  

 

yep, that right there is what we're after, well maybe not the nuke reactor but the rest, yeah. we're planning on doing like a cul-de-sac type set up where we all have our own houses, garden's solar panels ect. but come together for things like fixing, maintaining the road out and other big projects that one person can't do alone.

as for partially off grid, well that's a matter of persective. since we're not going to be hooked up to public utilities like electric, water/sewer ect, that's considered off grid. it's affectionately called "modern homesteading / farmsteading"

[diaperguy85]

34 minutes ago, Thad said:

yep, that right there is what we're after, well maybe not the nuke reactor but the rest, yeah. we're planning on doing like a cul-de-sac type set up where we all have our own houses, garden's solar panels ect. but come together for things like fixing, maintaining the road out and other big projects that one person can't do alone.

as for partially off grid, well that's a matter of persective. since we're not going to be hooked up to public utilities like electric, water/sewer ect, that's considered off grid. it's affectionately called "modern homesteading / farmsteading"

hey! the reactor is a thing! you can find small ones like the ones they launch into space and put on subs and aircraft carriers from the government and other places. they have some that are on the backs pf semi-trucks and they power a small town out about 150 miles from the middle of nowhere in places like canada and russia. personally, for the ease of mind for endless power, the little reactor is your best bet lol

yea, on your own for power, water, etc is off grid, yes, but it isn't self-sufficient unless you grow/raise/hunt/gather/make/build everything you need/want to live. personally, living without having to pay companies for utilities and have easy enough access to go and get a slurpee and a hot dog after i clean the chicken coop works for me  

[Glennie]

sounds like a great time to cut them apron strings and strike out on your own.. screw family they usually just let you down anyway.. lol

[Thad]

18 minutes ago, Glennie said:

sounds like a great time to cut them apron strings and strike out on your own.. screw family they usually just let you down anyway.. lol

true, that's also an option

[WetDad]

Thirty years ago my wife and I bought acreage with a plan to clear it and build a house. We drove over every weekend and worked dawn to dusk cutting down trees, and stacking them in a pile for later use as firewood. After 3 months of this work, we had what we thought was a very good start, but lots of small stumps to trip over. 

After the well was drilled, we knew we would need a driveway and a level clearing for our mobile home, a temporary structure. So we called out a dozer guy that was recommended by the well guy. In an hour's time, he cleared more and better than we had in those three months. 

Many lessons have been learned over the years, but that one comes back to mind every time we think about clearing brush, digging a hole or any other activity that could be better done by power equipment. 

[rusty pins]

I had to chuckle.  You said, " it just sounds kinda cool to grow my own food, plus i'll have like an acre at least to build my own house and do my own thing.  my family is just sick of people and the daily 9-5 and want to slow down and enjoy life and nature".  Do they have any idea at all what is in store for them?  Do you?  The last thing they will be doing is slowing down and enjoying nature!  Do you also know how hard it is to build your own house, and I'm assuming you mean by yourself from nature.  Personally, from what you have said in your posts I think you are going to be in way over your head.  Just because your mom wants as little contact with other people and the outside world doesn't mean you have to live that way.  Your experience to date has been getting all you need fed-Ex and by walking to WalMart.  Boy, would you be in for a major surprise moving to Oregon and farming!  You even said, "i know for a fact i don't have the skill set, but i've been wanting to build and grow stuff but just don't have the room needed to set it up.  i'm not too sure what you're trying to refer to with the Ingles family, is it searchable on youtube?"  No offence, but farming is a lot different than growing a back yard garden, and the fact that you asked if you can look up the Ingalls on youtube tells me just how much you rely on things like your computer and the internet.  A garden for growing veggies is one thing, but to plant and grow enough different vegetables to sustain you every day of the year is a farm, not a garden.  Ity's not like you will be able to walk to WalMart to pick up a bag of potatoes or carrots when you have run out from your garden and need food.

Watch some of the reality shows like Mountain Men and Alaska The Last Frontier on your TV.  What often sounds great (living off the land, growing your own food) can be a very hard subsistence lifestyle.  Without heavy machinery, how are you going to plant the fields, harvest the food, get the water you need for irrigation?  How will you pay for the machinery and tools necessary to farm?  How about meat?  If you raise chickens, you will have to slaughter them to eat.  That means raising chicks.  How will you do that in winter when a brooder might be needed when you have no electricity?  If you raise cattle for beef, you will have to butcher them and process the meat.  How will you refrigerate it in the summers with no electricity?  Will they wash clothes by hand?  How are they going to dry them in winter?  There are things you need that you can't grow on a farm.  Sugar, spices, medications clothes, shoes, boots, furniture, feed for the chickens and hogs (if you grow hogs).  You will need money for the seeds to grow your vegetables, you will need farm equipment to plow and plant.  How about heat for the house?  You will have to either buy oil for an oil burning furnace or cut wood.  That means either a chain saw (which requires gas) or a cross cut saw or an ax.  A crosscut saw requires 2 people to use and is time consuming.  It tales a lot of wood to heat a home in wither with a wood burning stove and that means after doing all the farm chores, planting, feeding, plowing, harvesting, house hold chores, fixing broken pens and fences, mucking out the chicken and hog pens, shoveling cow manure, composting, fertilizing and all, you will be cutting down trees and splitting them for firewood.  That is, if you have enough trees around to sustain enough wood to heat the house.  Trees don't always grow next to the house or woodshed.  That means horses to haul them from the woods where you cut them down, or a tractor if you can get a tractor into the woods to haul out the tree you cut down.  Who's going to drive the tractor?  You said you don't have a driver's license so I don't know if you know how to drive or not. 

What is their source of income?  You said you have some source of income, but what about your mom and aunts?  It takes money to buy the land, livestock, equipment to run a farm weather that be tractors and plows or horses.  You need more than just a tractor as far as tools, and you have to buy gas to run the machinery.  Feed for the cows and horses in winter means planting fields of hay in the spring and then harvesting and bailing enough to last the winter until they can graze again in the spring and summer.  You need machinery for that.  What if the hay goes bad or gets moldy?  No feed for the horses and they die.  You have to have buildings to store it all in, that means barns large enough to store grain and your tools and tractors.  Hog pens and chicken coops.  Who's going to build all that?  I'm not talking large scale here, but even just a tractor, tools, a couple horses and a few cows and chickens need proper shelter.

How many people are going to live on this "farm"?  You mention your mom and her two sisters.  Are there other family members?  Other siblings, husbands, uncles, whatever?  If not, you are the only man.  I have a feeling a lot of the hard work will be on your shoulders.  Sure, you won't have to pay for city water heat or electricity.  Instead you will be hauling water from a creek or pumping it from a well several times a day - no running water!  That means pooping in an outhouse even in the dead of winter.  No electricity means having some kind of solar panel or windmill to generate what little power it can.  The chopping of wood to heat the house.  My dad was raised on a farm in North Dakota in the beginning of the 20th century.  His parents immigrated from Europe before the turn of the last century and he was born in the late teens.  He was one of 10 children who all worked the farm.  He was always having to climb up to the top of the windmill to fix it so it would charge the batteries for their radio.  They chopped ice in the winter for the ice house and the huge blocks would have to be hauled from the pond and stacked floor to roof in the ice house (which was made from mud and local rocks that were gathered from around the farm and half buried in the ground to help keep it cool inside.  That ice had to last from one winter to the next in order to keep perishable food cold enough so it wouldn't spoil.  This was a very small farm, his parents were also homesteaders, but he had his mom, dad and 9 siblings all working 7 days a week from before sun up until sun down and later.  This was in the 1900's to about 1930 when the depression hit, well before TV, games, computers, solar power and modern conveniences.  It was a very hard life and his father died in 1930 at a young age in his late 40's

You are 30 years old, I assume you have a good job and earn money to make a living.  Are you willing to give up your job, home, comforts, computer, games, TV, stores and shops, friends, city life, washing machine, running water, your choice of whatever food you want to buy, mail order and especially your diapers to move up north to Oregon with your mom and her two sisters in the middle of nowhere, live a hard life in isolation from other people just so you can have fruit and vegetables that you grow yourself and not have to pay an electric bill?  Keep one thing in mind - there is no guarantee that whatever is planted will be harvestable!  You have to have good soil, fertilize it, if not sprayed with pesticides a lot will be damaged by insects.  If not kept weeded daily (more work), it will not grow good vegetables.  You have mice and other rodents that can devastate a crop.  Fruit can be damaged by an early frost after the plants have started to bud.  Not to discourage anyone from their dreams, but this might just sound better than the reality of it.  What experience does your family have in running a small farm, planting and harvesting?  What experience do you have?  Many a people have died from lack of experience and knowledge trying to homestead without the experience, proper tools and endurance it takes.  Do as you please, but with all that is at stake and the harshness of the lifestyle and what you have to give up currently, don't let yourself be bullied or intimidated into doing something you don't want to do or that you can't end up handling due to the lack of resources and amount of hard work involved.  It takes more than 3 people to do what they are planning.  At 30 years of age, you have your own life to live. 

Another thing to think of.  Will you make any money this way?  Will you have any savings over the years?  What back up would you have if the farm fails?  How will you pay for health insurance?  Working a farm with machinery and tools, building things, harvesting and working with animals can mean injuries that require a doctor or even hospital.  That has to be paid for.  When you can no longer work the farm, what will you do?  No saved money means no food, home, way to pay bills, etc.  Might be a good idea to stay where you are, let your mom and her sisters homestead (finding out how hard it really is), and let them hire a farmhand to help them out and do the hard work (if they can find one and afford to pay him).  Just my 2 cents.

[Thad]

@rusty pins thank you for advice and hopefully to answer some of your concerns, my mom and her family grew up on a farm in northern Idaho, we have a house that can make an extra 100 thousand just on value alone that's not counting the grass, raised veggie beds and some fruit trees we put in.

no, other than my younger brother as far as i know no one else is going to be there but that might change since she has like 10 other siblings lol.

the first thing my mom is going to do is buy a travel trailer for us to live in, my aunt's already share one of their own then when we get there, hire people to drill a well, then plant seeds she's been collecting from our garden, then start building buildings for house and barn and stuff like that. she's planning on early march of 2020 so seeds need to in the ground a.s.a.p up there.

basically they (and i myself) understand how hard it can be and there is no stopping them(i'm on the fence which is why i'm getting feedback here), they're going to succeed come hell or high water. we're not expecting much of a harvest the first plant, but that's just to test the soil and see what grows and what doesn't, then we'll worry about building the soil up as some grown crops are better than none grown at all.

i don't have much experience with power tools in general but i'm more than willing to learn , and yes, i have been considering just staying put and letting them do there thing up there but i also grew up with on half an acre with a fairly large veggie garden and i helped my mom out when i was younger but she had to stop because life got in the way and she want's to get back into growing again. keep in mind when i say grass earlier i don't mean like a good amount, it's just a strip along the side, the rest of the space is raised bed garden.( that's why i say i don't have space to do my own thing lol) that's how committed she is to this idea.

[rusty pins]

At least they sound like they know what they are getting in to and seem to have a grasp on things and some experience.  They also have some equity to fall back on and apparently the means to hire work to be done such as well digging, planting and putting up buildings.  From what you first said, I got the impression everyone was going into this endeavor with no experience or realization of what it would be like.  I think most others here thought that as well.  thanks for clarification.  you still need to consider for yourself if you want to give up all you have now to live that life.  It's a lot to give up.

[Thad]

@rusty pins ah, sorry, i don't really start topics very much around here lol.  actually i don't think they're going to hire any helpers. basically what i think is going to happen is: after the well and general garden is put in, we're all going to kinda spread out and look for building sites of our own and each one of us is going to build a house, with garden (whether it's raised beds or direct in soil depends on what grows in the first plant garden.) then they might run pipe from the well to there places but i'm not sure on that last part

sorry for the confusion everyone. i realize it's alot to give up which i why i'd like to get some opinions from others into ab/dl lifestyle. i'm not really a people person so being away from people isn't a big deal to me, as i never had many friends growing up. to put it in perspective, until jr. high school i had 3 friends my age and they were all neighbourhood friends not school.

[technomonkey]

All I have to say is good luck. I own a 120 acre farm.  An hour of where i live now. YES I has to move to bigger town to make money, have cell phone that works and Internet. where my farm is located old land line is all you get.  Back when my grandparents bought the farm you could live off the land.  but now to hard to make money on small farm.  In my state property tax and car insurance will get ya not counting everything else you need to live.

[le Hollandais]

Back in my early 20s, (that was in the 1970s) I was really intrigued by the whole Mother Earth News (even had a subscription), back-to-the-land idea. And I took to reading every issue of Mother Earth News as it arrived in my mailbox, even going so far as to look in the classified ads for real estate deals. The more I read, the more I looked around, the more I realized that this whole back-to-the-land thing is a whole lot of work! 

The more I looked into it, the more seriously I began to question myself: Do you really think you are going to have enough time to do this and pursue your musical interests too? Are there enough hours in a day to do both?

The answer for me was an emphatic "Eh.....maybe not." And I then resigned myself to permanent city or town living. Forty years later, there is a whole urban agriculture movement happening. Even my next door neighbors have turned their lawn into a vegetable garden, and their back yard into a chicken run, with a coop and everything.

Don't want to move to the country? Plow up your lawn, plant a garden where the grass once was, and farm out.

[Thad]

Good God! I'm so sorry to everyone but I had my password saved on my USB drive and accessed it a few months ago via a raspberry pi i bought, but didn't remember I started this thread, lol. Also very sorry for being a necromancer!

Ok, update time! Oregon was meh, we were staying in a tent in various campgrounds until july 2020, then we had a bit of a falling out with my 2 aunts, had to buy a new cargo trailer to transport all our stuff as the one we were using was my other aunts, and headed back to reno, nv around September until March 2021, then my family decided, hey alaska seems like a good place, so we tried to cross the boarder up in Washington various times until June 2021 but as we don't own land we couldn't cross the boarder plus covid restrictions and stuff.

So from June 2021 until today we've been in an extended stay hotel. The money that my mother had saved up to buy land instead has went towards the room rate, my brother and mother both got jobs (brother works 10pm to 8:40 am, mother works 6:30 am to 3 pm ) and I'm basically the dog sitter (female pitbull) here in the room, I did manage to buy a case of tranquility atn November 2021 and as of today, July 8th 2022 I've used approximately 5 diapers from the whole case! There's been various discussions about moving into an apartment or a toy hauler trailer because my brother has a motorcycle (cue eye roll here) here in Washington state but there's no definitive plan one way or another, all I know is that this hotel room is costing us $3,000 per month, hence the jobs for my family.

So in conclusion, we're not off-grid surrounded by veggies and chickens but in a hotel living day by day, they still want to go off grid but I've been trying to talk reason into them about Alaska and staying in the lower 48, possibly going east to Tennessee-ish where we'd be around other's doing the same thing, but it's an uphill battle.

Anyways I've gone on long enough so I'll try to check back occasionally when I remember I can come back anytime I want.

Edited July 8, 2022 by Thad
Added a raspberry pi reference to clarify access

[AbabeBill]

Tough position to be in. Having to maintain the cost of staying where you are, and trying to save, for what it would take to start out off grid. 
I would imagine, going to Alaska and setting there, would be most costly, both initially and to maintain. Winter there too, would be extremely hard to deal with. 
It’s much easier, dreaming about the ideal of off grid living, then it is actually living it. 
Something else I’d like to point out, there’s tons of things, but I’ll just interject this one. I’ll assume everyone is relatively young, even your mom and aunt, and also in relatively good health? How is getting older going to play out, in this plan? How will unforeseen bad health or injuries play out? 
Tennessee might be a better choice, you should be able to be isolated, off grid, but still have some infrastructure around, and better weather. 

[Thad]

26 minutes ago, AbabeBill said:

Tough position to be in. Having to maintain the cost of staying where you are, and trying to save, for what it would take to start out off grid. 
I would imagine, going to Alaska and setting there, would be most costly, both initially and to maintain. Winter there too, would be extremely hard to deal with. 
It’s much easier, dreaming about the ideal of off grid living, then it is actually living it. 
Something else I’d like to point out, there’s tons of things, but I’ll just interject this one. I’ll assume everyone is relatively young, even your mom and aunt, and also in relatively good health? How is getting older going to play out, in this plan? How will unforeseen bad health or injuries play out? 
Tennessee might be a better choice, you should be able to be isolated, off grid, but still have some infrastructure around, and better weather. 

To answer your concerns about age, my brother and I are in our early 30s, my mother is in her early 50s, one of my aunts are late 50s and the other is mid 60s. As for health, we're in decent health I'd say but then again I'm no medical expert. As for my aunts, one is currently undergoing chemotherapy and the other has a stomach band that affects her ability to eat meats reliably. They may have other issues that I don't know about though. As for Tennessee it was just an example, I've heard several states being tossed around so it's not set.