Update and a Homesteading Idea

8/06/07 - 2nd Day - After Breakfast. The summer heat has finally set in down here in Texas. Basically, although we have had a few hot days, it has been like an extended spring down here until this first week of August. Temps close to 100 are expected over the next week or so, with no rain in the forecast. The good news is that seasonally we are on the downhill trend, and we only have about 6 weeks left in summer. All-in-all it has been a dynamite year weather-wise, and we are not complaining at all.

More tomatoes and green beans. Tracy is canning about 10 quarts of tomatoes this morning, which is nice. I'm starting to make plans for planting some fall garden crops. Our pig is huge, and we still are not certain if she is pregnant, though we suspect she is not. So it looks like we will be putting up a lot of pork here in a few weeks, which will help us this winter as well. I also have a goat to butcher as soon as the temps cool a bit, which will be some more meat and sausage we can utilize throughout the coming fall and winter.

Mr. Sifford reports that our cows are ready to drop any day now. He said Maria and Holga should be dropping their calves any time. This will be our last calf from Holga since we traded her to the Ante's for their motorhome (for me to use for an office). So, if the Lord wills it, my heard should be increasing by two in the next week or so, which, minus Holga, will bring my personal heard to 8. We are continuing the training of Pita, and she is doing really well. Sometime this afternoon we should be saddling her up for another ride.

Lord willing, Robert will be back with us on Friday morning some time. We continue to pray for his safe return.

Here is a response to another question which came about because of my answer to an earlier question about Homesteading which was posted on this blog:

Michael,

I read your recent treatise on off-grid living (from the last Q&A) and I am interested in hearing more about it. This is the type of thing I would like to read more of on BA. You state that most Christians right now are able to afford to move off-grid. Can you give examples? How would this be done?

Thank you.

We discussed this at great length at one time on another forum we had about homesteading. On that forum I laid out a proposed bottom-dollar homesteading plan which involved building a cabin on 5 acres of land. In this response, I will discuss another option that I think virtually any Christian in any situation can afford (with few exceptions). This plan is not in any way complete, but will have to suffice for this Q&A arena, but is based on two more years of experience in homesteading and off-grid living.

In this plan, the procurement of land will not be discussed (that is the topic for another question in another Q&A perhaps). For our purposes, we will assume that between 2-5 acres have been procured at a cost of $1500 an acre, which is entirely possible in some areas, and is more per acre than we paid for the land we currently occupy. Some might think that 2-5 acres is preposterously small for a homestead, and in some ways that might be true – but there are many, many people homesteading this amount of acreage, and several of their accounts on the Internet show them profitably marketing crops and other items from this amount of acreage. It is unarguable that a family of virtually any size can produce more than enough food and sustenance for themselves to prosper on 2-5 acres of farm land if it is wisely used. According to this plan, then, somewhere between $3000 - $7000 has been spent on land. Once again, for the naysayer who immediately responds (HA! I don't have $3000 - $7000 for land; first... YES YOU DO, and second... I said that issue is for another Q&A).

This plan is one I have recommended for several different people in several different situations, but, as of yet, not one person has taken my advice. Too bad. I am currently taking my own medicine, as I propose to use this plan in building my “office” on the back of the land. This plan also takes heed of the wisdom found in Proverbs:

Pro 24:27 Prepare thy work without, and make it fit for thyself in the field; and afterwards build thine house.

Which is not to say that it is not permitted to prepare a place to live first, only that it is wise that we create a temporary dwelling place (a tent, small cabin, camper, etc.) while we prepare our fields and farm, and THEN we should build our permanent home. This is so that if a disaster were to come, or if some social or political unrest should make life difficult, our farm will already be in food production which will sustain us if the Lord wills.

Ok, in this plan we are going to acquire a camper (trailer, RV, etc.) of some sort and size, according to our needs. One of the men that lived here at one time purchased an old Winnebago RV for 800 dollars. It still ran well enough to get it here. It would sleep two very comfortably, and possibly a married couple with a child. Another family here purchased a large used RV for $3000 that easily housed their family of 5. I have seen campers and trailers for $1500 that would do well for my family of 6, though we would certainly live in tight quarters for some time. That “closeness” is good for a family at some level, and the bad elements of it can be alleviated by further parts of the plan.

Also, please note that this plan is conceived from Central Texas, where we have our own unique challenges to overcome (heat, drought, bugs, etc.). Your own area will have its own concerns that you will want to identify before you begin.

We are using a camper or RV because it is already a self-contained homestead. Most campers (even old ones) already have most of the things you might want as “amenities”, such as a multi-source refrigerator (propane, 12V, and 110), propane stove, hot water heater, sink, shower or tub, etc. In most of these used campers, these items are more valuable than the cost of the entire camper. In fact, I recommend homesteaders look into RV or camper bargains merely for salvage value. One of the campers we have found has a working 4,000 watt Diesel generator. The RV I bartered for my office has a generator, a large propane refrigerator, and a propane stove.

The camper is pulled onto an ideal area of the land (ideal for its purpose, but preferably NOT where you are ideally going to build your permanent house or other structures. This camper can be used (in the future, after a house is built) as a guest house or office. An outhouse can be dug in most regions in a day. In our case, due to the abundance of rock about 4 feet down, a backhoe was used to dig the outhouse hole. You do not want to build your outhouse too close to your future garden, or within 100 feet of any source of water. We built our outhouse of used and spare lumber, but a very nice outhouse can be built for only a few hundred dollars. Do not neglect to use the outhouse roof as a catchwater by installing guttering and having it flow into some type of barrel or other catchwater system. One of the single men in our community has survived very well on catchwater coming from his camper and his outhouse for several months.

Next you will want to build a “shed roof” over the camper. A shed roof is simply a single sloping roof line that slopes from the front to the back. Basically you are going to build a roof over the camper which slopes to the rear (not as if you were driving or pulling the camper, but the rear being the side opposite the front door). This shed roof will cover the entire camper, extending 8-10 feet to the front, and a foot or more to the rear. The roof should also extend several feet (or more if desired) to either side of the camper. Think of it as building a carport under which you will park your camper. You will want the carport roof to be big enough to keep the summer sun off of the camper for most of the day. You will also want it to be high enough to allow the heat to blow away that permeates the roof line... so maybe 10 inches to a foot of space minimum above the camper. I would use steel roofing on the shed roof (or corrugated steel) because you are going to be utilizing the catchwater as a primary source of water.

Next you will screen in the area of the shed roof, effectively screening in the camper. If you ever plan on moving the camper again, one wall of the screened porch can be made into a hinged, screened door that can be opened and the camper pulled out. We screened in our front porch using a large roll of screening and 2x4 boards. We split the 2x4's (making 2x2's), which worked great. The screening is rolled out and stapled to the boards, and then the stapled areas are covered with trim material (we used old salvaged wood fencing slats). Now you have a screened room (hopefully quite a bit larger, maybe twice as large, as the camper) that can be used to spread out a bit, and to stay cooler in the summertime. Bring in a picnic table for outdoor food preparation and for eating and now you have a summer kitchen. Skirt in the area under the camper (this keeps out cold winter winds, and gives you an area for storage), and, if needed, build a small storage shed in one corner of the screened in area. Attach guttering and build a catchwater system. If you are thinking ahead, you can run your catchwater into a small elevated tank with a pipe or hose running into your camper water system (an external water filter system can be used before the water enters the camper). The elevated tank can be rigged with an overflow which sends excess water into a larger, ground level tank (or a cistern) where large amounts of water can be stored for future use. The small elevated tank will give you water pressure enough to have the water flow into the camper. Most campers have a 12 volt water pump that is operated off of the battery.

As I said, most RV's and campers have a built in 12V power system. This system is ideal for homesteading use. The batteries can be charged using a solar panel, or a small generator. A single 110 watt solar panel can be purchased for less than $600, and a generator can be purchased for anywhere from $250 - $700. The solar panel does not require gasoline though. If the camper came with a generator, you might use that until you can purchase a solar panel to charge batteries. The 12V system in most campers can be used to power the lights, the refrigerator, and the outlets for short periods of time. If you want more power, a battery bank system can be put together using several batteries with far greater storage capacity. It is preferable to use propane to run the refrigerator and the stove. Better yet, don't use these things at all. Get to work on a root cellar, and procure a wood burning stove which can be installed outside in the screened area for cooking.

Get your garden prepared for planting, and begin to procure animals as well. You are officially an Agrarian homesteader.

Here you have land, shelter, water, heat, etc. and you are ready to begin to produce food. All of this can be done for as little as $6500 (not counting the land), and if you want to do the solar panel system with a battery bank – closer to $9000. There will be incidental expenses, most of which are included in that amount, but all of this does not have to be done at once. It can be done incrementally over a (hopefully short) period of time. If barter and trade are used, and used and salvaged materials can be gotten, then this can be done for far, far less than the amount I have mentioned.

What are you waiting for?

Michael