The Library for Preppers and Homesteaders

What books should you have in your library?

You have a library right?

I have a couple thousand on just about every topic, but I really don't need all of them.

I am putting this list together of 5 books (plus a bonus) I think are important, that you can get from Amazon, and yes they will be from affiliate links, but well worth your time and investment.

1.  The Self-Sufficient Life and How to Live it. By John Seymour

I have the previous edition of this book and it is pure gold for those trying to make their way on their own small piece of land.

2. The Encyclopedia of Country Living by Carla Emery

This is the 50th Anniversary edition, but any of the editions are great!

This is the book that launched me into seriously pursuing the move to a homestead.

My wife and I even corresponded with Carla about one of the later editions before she passed away!

3.The Disaster Preparedness Handbook: A Guide for Families by Dr. Arthur T. Bradley

Very detailed book going into most aspects of surviving a disaster.

This book has some good and handy forms that you will find useful in the back.

4. Back to Basics  edited by Abigail Gehring

Another more or less complete guide to doing it yourself on the homestead.

Excellent and popular book!

5. The Backyard Homesteader by Carleen Madigan

Even if you live on a large spread this book give you lots of insight into doing this in a small efficient way for big results!

Bonus: You can Farm by Joel Salatin

While I don't own this one, I must have checked it out of our library 100 times!

Joel takes you through many, many ideas on making an income on a homestead.

If I could pick one book on learning to make a living from the land this would be it.

So there are 6 of the best books out there to put in your library.

It was difficult finding ones that were still in print and immensely useful.

Check them out and if you can't afford them try your local library's inter-library loan, they can probably get them for you.

Still clinging to my God and my guns

Randy

How to make balm of Gilead salve

If you ever wondered how to make black salve also call balm of Gilead.

I ran across this post from "freedom of the hills" that tells how to make it.

You can view it here; Balm of Gilead Salve

This is a great skill to have and a handy salve to keep on hand.

Still clinging to my God and my guns,
Randy

How safe is your food supply?

With the new of terrorists wanting to hit us in our stomachs, so to speak, how careful are you of what you put in your mouth?
Link

They are hitting real close to home now because my favorite food is buffet. LOL

Once more it brings back how safe are we truly and what are we individually going to do about it?

"God shall supply all my needs" not China buffet or Golden corral.
Get some food security, plant your garden, can, dry, freeze.
Egypt was prepared by God for seven years of famine, do you think it would behove us to at least have seven days of supplies on hand? (try 30 or even 365)

I'll try to weigh in a little more often, when I get my laptop back.

Still clinging to my God and my guns,
Randy

Avoiding Genetically Modified Food

Tanya wrote a pretty good article on the subject and posted it on Helium.
You can view it here: LINK
Had a gathering of like minds at the farm Saturday.
A good time was had by all.
Still clinging to my God and my guns,
Randy

Swine Flu and you ? Are you prepared for a quarantine?

The .Gov says we will be facing a serious return of the swine flu this fall.
If you have been reading the news you have seen that some people have been quarantined already.
So what will you do if someone in your family (or even kids school) gets sick and the health department parks a police car in front of your house and says "don't go out for two weeks"?
If you are quarantined by the .Gov most likely they will have food on hand to give you if you don't have enough of your own. But why take that chance?

I put together a list of last minute preps you can make in case this fall is your time behind closed doors.

Simple basic foods for when you are sick.

- Ramen- so easy just put some water in your coffee pot and throw the seasoning and noodles in the pot and a few minute later you have hot soup.

- Lemon Jello- A guy I work with swears by hot liquid lemon jello when he is sick. It will keep you hydrated.

-Hot Toddie- If you drink alcohol hot cinnamon tea with honey and a shot of whiskey can make you feel lots better.

-Pedialite- Whoever is sick this stuff will hydrate you when you can't keep anything down. Similar to Gatorade or Powerade.

-Chicken noodle soup- Classic sicky meal

Quick storage foods for non-sick people.

-Peanut butter and crackers - will fill you up and goes a long ways

- MRE's - .Gov may be giving these to you to eat. Designed for soldiers in the field a person under quarantine could stretch one meal for the whole day ( I have done it camping) Coffee and dessert for breakfast/cracker and spread for lunch and entree for supper.

-energy bars - like power bar / clif bar etc. can replace meals

-Sardines and a chocolate bar- old in the field hunters meal.

- canned tuna and veggies- easy and can be eaten without cooking.

-pop tarts- easy meal or snack

These are some ideas that you can pick up at the store tonight.
Just use your imagination and pick up about two weeks worth of simple to prepare food.

One more thing,
Don't forget recreation.
Cards/ books/ videos and games, Being cooped up in your house for two weeks without anything to do can drive you crazy especially if you are not sick.

Most importantly realize it CAN happen to you and think your way through a what if situation.

Still clinging to my God and my guns,
Randy

Omnivores Dilemma

Tanya did a review of this book on her blog and I think it is worth your time to read it.
you can find a link in the right hand column or use THIS ONE.

Hope you all had a blessed Easter.
Still clinging to my God and my guns
Randy

This week on the homestead

Worked on a couple projects this last week.

Last Saturday dad brought two tons of stone over in his trailer and we filled holes in the driveway.
Our driveway if you don't remember is 1/3 of a mile long. If I order enough stone to cover it and spread by the quarry it costs almost $800. This way it was just a few dollars and then walking along behind the trailer with a shovel filling in holes. I have a grader blade for the old ford 9n and have kept the lane in fairly good repair since the last time we had stone delivered about 5 years ago. the important thing to remember with a gravel lane is to make sure and keep a crown on it. You should grade it so the center is higher than the sides that way the water runs off instead of puddling. No matter what I do, I eventually need stone. This driveway has been eating stone for 150 years and I don't think it will ever stop. There are a couple soft spots that just seem to sink and make big puddles. When I use the grader I bring all the loose material to these places and leave it there. But I had about run out of loose material so we got the two tons of new stone.

After we were done with the driveway I started tinkering with the rototiller. I got it running for the first time this year and made a pass through the garden. It turned out the garden was too wet to till on Saturday, But I ended up being able to do it on Tuesday after it had dried just a bit and before we got our rain on Wednesday.

Since the garden was too wet I went over to a patch of ground where the old bank barn had stood. About 5 years ago we had it torn down. They dug a big pit and burned it and then covered it back up. So now I have a big patch of subsoil. Anyway I mowed it last year and tilled up about a 15X40 patch Saturday. I hauled three wheel barrows of wood ashes and spread them on the east half of the patch. I only did half the patch because I'm not sure how wheat will react to wood ashes. (I killed all our squash a couple years ago by putting wood ashes on them to see if it would kill squash bugs... Well it killed the squash. I shouldn't of tried it on all of them at once) Then I raked everything semi smooth and let the wood ashes mellow until Monday night then I went out and scattered wheat all over the patch and raked it in. I know wheat will grow if planted in the spring it will just be ready a little later and won't have the jump start on weeds. It then rained off and on the rest of the week.

I have been having a reaction to my BP meds. I am extremely drowsy off and on. Thursday was awful. I also did something to my hand at work last night while we were moveing equipment. It feels like I have really bad arthritis ,we'll just have to see if that gets better as the day goes on.

The kids have wanted a fort for a couple years and my sister came over this morning to build it finally. She came in just a bit ago with a flat finger form hitting it whit a hammer. She smashed it real good.

Plans for today include running the grader up and down the lane to even it out just a bit and then I will try to disk the old orchard field. I am planning on putting in sunflowers, beans,corn and annual rye(for weeds).

Added:
I graded the lane but the field was way to wet to disk. I watched my sister work on the kids fort and I will try to get some wood together to make a top bar bee hive this afternoon.

Still clinging to my God and my guns,
Randy

Found this while reading...

Supreme court justice William O. Douglas said...

"We need exercise as individuals. We need to keep physically fit and alert as a people. ... History is the sound of heavy boots going upstairs and the rustle of satin slippers coming down. Nations that are soft and slack--people who get all their exercise and athletics vicariously--will not survive when the competition is severe and adversity is at hand. It is imperative that America stay fit. For today we face great danger, as fearsome a risk, as any people in History."

Hard to believe those words were written four decades ago.
History truly repeats itself over and over. Lets learn from it one of these times.

Still clinging to my God and my guns
Randy

Article on probiotics and catch up

Yes it's been a tough winter.
I have finally started writing again.
Here is my latest, an article on probiotics.

The human body is full of countless bacteria, some harmful and many beneficial. Probiotics are microorganisms (mainly bacteria) that are the same or very similar to the good bacteria that lives in the human digestive tract or gut. They are available as supplements or can be found in foods you eat or can add to your diet.
Probiotics work in your gut to break down various substances in your food so that your body can absorb them better. They also compete with harmful bacteria and are especially useful during and following a round of antibiotics, because antibiotics tend to kill both good and bad bacteria. In many cases probiotics work like a mulch in your garden by preventing the weeds (bad bacteria) from growing while your vegetables (good bacteria) get a head start....

You can read more HERE

I went and spent some of our tax return and bought a Stihl ms 310 chainsaw.
There is a review coming.
I have to teach at church tonight, then preach Sunday night and then teach again next Wed.

I had a trip to the ER last week.
I was having chest, shoulder and arm pain. Turns out it was just a perfect storm of the little things that are wrong with me. My acid reflux, ulnar nerve problems and pulled muscle in my back from cutting wood. So things are ok health wise.
Tanya on the other hand is not getting any better with her allergies. It might be this old farm house with its damp basement and probable mold.
Dad said if it turns out to be the house to not feel like we have to keep the farm. I told him if we sell the farm we are going back to Colorado, and he said he knew that.
So if that happens we will work on homesteading and survival there, which was my original plan before my grandparents farm became available.
Tanya has started seeing an alternative treatment doctor that people on the allergy forum she is on have had good luck with. The really good thing is he's only 10 miles away and there are people driving 6 hours just to see him. So we will see what happens with that.

We are out of wood.
I had a delivery of 2 1/2 cords of sawmill slab-wood scheduled for Feb. 2nd but we got snowed in that week. I could get the 4x4 truck out but Tanya was stuck at the house all week and the dumptruck wouldn't come down our lane to deliver. We are burning propane now and had to have the service guy come to fix it before it would work right. ( I guess thats what we get for not using it for 3 years) I have another load of wood coming March 3rd so hopefully we will be back on the wood furnace then. The fields and woods are too muddy to cut in right now, maybe if we stay cold I can cut this weekend.

I think that about catches up.
Sorry I was so remiss in my posting.
I see we past 5000 visitors while I was gone, and lots of cool flags in the flag counter.

Randy

Still kicking

Sorry It has been so long since my last post.
Been fighting health and weather here on the home place.

Firewood is my life in the winter this year. Any chance I get when it's daylight I go cut wood (if I'm not sick)
Everyone needs to remember that your best laid plans usually don't take into consideration being down sick, and once that happens the plan goes out the window. Even just a sinus infection like I had/have where my endurance dropped to almost nothing will mess things up. I wasn't what I would call sick since I still could function pretty good, but I sure couldn't do any physical labor for very long.

I am going to buy a Stihl 310 with our tax money.
The Poulan is an ok saw but it just can't handle the workload I need it to. I have a couple large logs I drug up to the house with the tractor. I tried to cut them up with my poulan and it used one tank of gas for every 5 cuts. The saw will cut it in an emergency but not something I want to do every day. So I shopped around online and I'm pretty sure the Stihl 310 is what I want. Echo doesn't make one the size I want and husky is slightly smaller and only $40 less so I decided why not get the best.

We got the van stuck in the driveway Sunday after church. Our 1/3 mile long lane was drifted shut so I walked up the the house in my cowboy boots and light coat and got the truck. I busted through the drifts and run up and down the lane twice. Then my sister went up and down it twice with her little 4x4 nissan. By then I figured the van would make it through if I went fast enough. LOL Well I didn't go fast enough I guess. I had to drive the truck to work on Monday because the van was plugging the lane.

We have great neighbors that come and use their behemoth tractors with snowblowers on them and clean out the lane. One of them came Monday and cleaned out up to the van on both sides. Tanya and my sister got it out before I got home from work.

It was below zero here for about 3 days with heavy winds. I decided if we were going to have Gunnison weather I at least wanted to live there. In case you didn't know we are from Gunnison Colorado and moved onto this farm when my grandparents went into the nursing home. And we are very homesick this winter.
We were planning on building a homestead in the mountains and we still may do just that someday when we can afford to live there again.

That about catches up for now.
Still clinging to my God and my guns,
Randy

Still sick

I've been struggling to get wood.
I got an antibiotic from the doctor for a sinus infection Monday.
Monday night and Tuesday were horrible I was in so much pain.
Kinda weird headache and joint and muscle pain.
So I have been neglecting the blogs until I am healthier.
I have no stamina to cut wood.
In November I could cut three loads a day by myself and still felt like I could do more.
You know the old saying about a team of horses "leave one good pull in them" so I did three and called it good.
New Years eve I was able to cut about 2/3 of a load, New Years day almost a full load.
Since then I have pulled up three logs with the tractor and that wore me out.
I have to go out here in a couple minutes and cut enough off of them to last until I get home tonight and repeat the process for overnight. Using a chainsaw in the dark is an accident waiting to happen especially while I am sick but no one else will do it.
I have a dumptruck load off slab wood being delivered Feb. 3rd so I just have to hold on till then.
I ordered three all together spaced a month apart.

I really hate writing this because it seems like I'm doing a lot of whining, but if someone learns something from it.(like whatever you do keep a winters supply of wood on hand) I guess it's worth some thinking less of me.

Still clinging to my God and my guns
Randy

Middle age has snuck up on me

I was in Walmart on Saturday and decided to test my blood pressure in the machine.
It read 186/104 !!!!!
I was like wow!!!!!!
So I made a doctors appointment and got it tested today.
190/110 doctor sent me home with some pills to take and an order for blood work and another appointment for two weeks down the road.
I didn't worry about this kind of stuff when I was younger but I guess I have officially arrived at middle age.

Still clinging to my God and my guns,
Randy

so you want to buy your chicken at the store?!?

Tyson injects eggs with antibiotics, then claims that the chickens are raised without them.
They also said it is an indusry wide practice. Read about it here......LINK

Tanya and I have been talking about here allergies.
She is allergic to both corn and soy and it seem there are quite a few people who have this problem. Corn and soy or some dirivative of them are in almost everything.

We have been discussing making our homestead corn and soy free.
It is possible to raise animals without either. It will just take a more careful approach to planning. Europe survived thousands of years before explorers brought back either maize or soya. I feel we can too.

It is kind of strange concidering all our rented land is rotated between corn and soybeans.
But I think it is doable.
Give me some feedback.....

Hit the blog catalog link at the bottom of the right hand side and give my site a rate.
5 stars is best....

Randy