Homesteading on the Hillside

In real estate sales the phrase is location, location, location. When looking to buy the ideal, self sustainable, homestead it's also true.
Somethings to look for...

1. Access to water- not much will grow without it. It's difficult to keep yourself and livestock alive without it too. Ideally, your
homestead will have a creek, fresh water pond, and be sitting on a huge aquafer that's easy to tap into. Or you have a decent rainfall each year so water catchment systems are a viable option.

It's amazing how much of the clear, liquid stuff you need on a homestead. There's your own hydration, cleanliness, and cooking needs at a bare minimum. On the low end you'll need two gallons of water per person. That's just to survive. That's not counting the luxury things. Keep in mind, the average tub bath is 30 to 40 gallons of water. A small load of laundry takes 3 gallons to wash and rinse.

2. Sunlight- everything needs sunlight to grow and thrive. Most plants take full sun (6-8 hours a day). So if the property is heavily treed, you have to think about cutting some down. That costs money. If you have tall pines, oaks, or maple trees you may be in luck and find a buyers for the trees. Then you only have to worry about removing those stumps and roots. If not, it will take months and back breaking labor to clear enough space to grow anything. If you look at the cost of having someone else clear it for you, it will set you back a few grand.

3. How much land will you need? It depends. Are you looking to raise several head of cattle? For your beef and milk consumption, you need about four to start... two steers and two cows. One bull for fertility and one to eat. The cows, if you rotate your breeding roster, you can have fresh milk year around. You have a 50/50 shot of one of your cows birthing a steer for future consumption. Cattle eat a lot of hay/grass. About 24-27 lbs a day.  That's about 1/2 a ton per cow or bull. The average yield for hay, baring any unforeseen weather calamities, is about 1 ton per acre of field. You do the math. Of course you do get plenty of free fertilizer with these animals when it's composted properly. You also got to consider  shelter for these animals too. This only takes added time.  You also need to remember the gestation period for a cow is 283 days. And, you thought your pregnancy lasted forever.

Now compare this to a rabbit. A rabbit will consume about its body weight of hay per day. The average meat rabbit weighs 10 lbs fully grown at six months old. Two 50 lb bales of hay per year should almost provide what it needs in a year per rabbit. Rabbits can birth a litter 6-10 babies per litter every two months. An acre of hay field can feed 200 or more rabbits per year. That's a lot of meat. It all depends on what weight you harvest your rabbits at. I prefer the 6 lb weight mark or about four months old. The same field would only feed two cows. You'll also need some kind of confinement/ shelter system for your rabbits or your rabbits will join their wild cousins.

Now if you add chickens to the mix, let them free range or put them in a mobile coop. They can be harvested at 12 weeks. They may even raise their own young if separated. Remember, chickens are cannibals too. They are omnivores like us. Again using the same 1 acre field hay measurement, you can raise 50 hens per acre for egg production. The same amount of chickens will produce 2.5 tons of manure. But it will have to be composted if you are planning on fertilizing human crops with it. You'd never have to fertilize your field plus you get eggs. You could even raise more broilers for your dining pleasure because they have a shorter life span. How much chicken can you eat in a year?

So as you can see it all depends on what you are planning to raise in relation to how much land you need. You'll need at least 1/2 an acre (rotational planting) to produce your fruits and vegetables too. Man does not remain healthy on a strict meat diet.

Of course, you'd also need some place to live. Some way to power it. Doing everything with manual power may be a great ideal, but difficult to achieve. There's heating and cooling costs. We do like our creature comforts. You'll need a source for light. Some way to cook your food. You'll also need someplace to store your processed harvest for the lean months when not much grows.

Now having said all of that, we come to the Cockeyed Homestead. It was originally bought site unseen. It had been abandoned for a few years. Heavily over grown with vegetation, and a mixture of old and new trees. In fact, you can't even see the house in Google maps satellite view. At ground level, the property slopes downhill from the main road. It's more than a 200 ft drop to be exact. Located in the NE Georgia foothills the soil is hard packed clay over granite. Not the ideal homestead property. At only two acres, we are limited in what livestock we can raise here. We're even limited by the tree coverage for plantable areas. The only things going for it was it was cheap and it has a spring fed creek bordering the southern and western property lines. Our well water supply comes from a shallow spring fed area between the granite layers. The only thing good about the property is that it's paid for and the property taxes are really low. The trees are not lumber quality, but makes decent firewood if allowed to season for a year or two.

So we are starting our homestead with the deck stacked against us. For two widows almost 60 years old with limited resources, we are etching out our spot. Every inch of our cleared 1/2 an acre cleared land is spoken for. Everything has to pull double or triple duty on such a limited space homestead. Our 1/4 orchard also doubles as our hay field for the rabbits and chickens to feast upon. Vegetables and fruits produced so far has been fresh eating with limited storing for later months. It's going too take a lot of organic matter to expand our vegetable patch larger than it is. What we've got now has been a three year labor of love.

But nothing ventured, nothing gained. This is the lifestyle we've chosen for ourselves. It's what we love doing and we are happy. Yes, it could have been easier with forethought, more planning, and an ideal homestead, but we don't mind hard work. More land would mean more responsibilities and more to keep up with.

Y'all have a blessed day.