Here are a few resources that have helped us out around the homestead.
Animal Help:
Backyard Chickens – An overall good resource for all things chicken. They also have a very good online forum for any questions you can’t find answer to on their site.
Basic Beekeeping – This blog has very informative and easy to understand lessons on beekeeping starting with the most basic and go up to complex things that I one day hope to understand. This is what we are using to figure out what to do with our little bees.
Fias Co Farm – Everything dairy goat related, from basic care to kidding to milking to cheesemaking. Such a great resource! This is also the site that inspired me to use herbal remedies for the animals.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Garden Help
Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds – We have ordered most of our seeds from them over the past few years. We have been very pleased with the quality of what we’ve grown.
Botanical Interests – We’ve gotten seeds from them for several years. My favorite thing is the inside of their seed packets. The inside has tons of good info about that seed printed on it so be careful when ripping open the packet.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Help Around The House
Mountain Rose Herbs – A great place to find all kinds of herbs, oils, remedies and supplies we use for making things like medicinal tinctures, hand salves and soaps.
Premier 1 Supplies – We’ve gotten our lambing/kidding supplies, sheep shearers, and basic sheep and goat supplies from Premier. We bought our portable electric netting from them as well. Before we place orders, we call our friends to see if anyone wants to tack onto our order (and they do the same for us) because you can always use something from them. Great quality and fast shipping.
The Well Trained Mind – Our homeschooling style. If you homeschool or are thinking about it, check out not only the blog but also the forums. Lots of useful info from other homeschoolers plus a forum for buying and selling used curriculum.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
General Help
University of Wisconsin Cooperative Extension – Every county has a local extension office that can provide you with tons of good information specific to your area. They offer things like food preservation, parenting classes, animal care, plant varieties that do well in your area and farm visits to look over your pastures. (I attended a sausage making class offered by them.) They are also the local resource for 4H clubs so your kids can have some fun too!
Homesteading Today – Online forums with just about every topic imaginable to homesteaders. While I haven’t visited each area (since I have no interest in things like rabbits, fiber arts or cleaning), the ones I do peruse are packed with great questions and answers.
Public Libraries – Don’t overlook your local library as a valuable resource. If they don’t have it, they can most likely get it for you. And when you live in a small town like we do, often times they can tell you someone who does what you’re only reading about.
Mother Earth News – Not just an awesome magazine about living a more self-sufficient healthy life, but also a great online resource. They have tons of articles about organic gardening, alternative energy, modern homesteading and do-it-yourself projects.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
Inspirational Help
Nature’s Harmony Farm – Who we want to be when we grow up! This farm in Georgia is connecting people to their food while taking care of the land and animals in the most natural way possible. They have an excellent podcast that is not all informational but also inspiring!
Polyface – A farm located close to where we grew up. A trailblazer in bringing more natural farming practices into the mainstream. The owner, Joel Salatin, has written several books that are great resources too.
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
These are just a few resources we find ourselves turning to often. We’re always looking for help so if you have someone or something that is particularly helpful to you, please leave a comment to let us know!
Found you at Farm Friend Friday, and have been reading your blog for 30 minutes now. Love the saga of the henhouse. We, too, adapted a building on our place for our first one… built a second from which we learned a lot, and are now putting up a third (yes, the chicken population keeps growing) that we laid out today. I wish we had old buildings to recycle as you do! What a great job, the henhouse looks great.
Mary Ann, thanks for coming by! The henhouse was a long process but we’re glad that we were able to reuse what we could. Three chicken houses – oh my! But how great that you donate leftover eggs. And I wanted to say that losing a pet is so hard – I’ll be keeping you in my thoughts.