Oh goodness Jess. That bit at the end had me in tears. The message of HOPE, not fear is so refreshing. We just moved into our new house and I'm preparing my garden to feed my family of 8 and my elderly neighbors. They are a lovely couple who treat us like family. They are on a limited income and food prices have hurt them a lot
How generous of you to take your neighbors into consideration. Doing God’s work is so worthwhile and satisfying. Thank you for being the answer, and not the problem.
Hi, Jess! I'm a retired single mom who is now on a small, fixed income. It breaks my heart to see people my age (68) have to worry about making it through the month before the food runs out. I lived in a suburb in Central Florida, kept 4 hens behind a privacy fence, grew a 1000 sq ft garden and learned. I canned, dehydrated and froze whatever I could, bought meats and poultry in large pieces and case lots, and learned just how good it was to have canning skills after a hurricane when the power was out for weeks. Last year, I parlayed that suburban house in Central Florida for a larger, more sustainable property in the North Florida Panhandle. I still have a mortgage, but my son and I now live on almost an acre of land with well and septic. I no longer have to worry about the City making me get rid of my chickens, and I'm secluded enough that if I choose to raise 25 meat birds or a bunch of rabbits, I can do that. My garden is now over 3000 sq ft, and I've learned to maximize every square inch of it. We also have planted some fruit trees and harvest wild black berries and elderberries from the surrounding countryside. We're so blessed! We have enough corn, green beans and squash to last until we harvest more, enough meat in the freezer to last months, and this year, my goal is to can enough tomato sauce to last all year. I'm mostly Greek and Southern Italian, so that's really important, LOL! I garden like my life depends on it, because it does. No, it's not easy, but it's a most rewarding life. I learn something new every day, and I'm so much healthier than when I lived in the suburbs. I wouldn't trade it for the world!
That's AWESOME! My daughter is moving to Fort Myers in June. Florida has some beautiful areas, world class beaches and yes, hurricane's. Are you changing hardy zones? I have been offered a job in Florida, I live in Georgia now, I would be moving two full zones and I have to say I'm not sure how to garden there. I can only grow for a fresh garden right now but it's so nice to go pick your own food. Almost makes it worth getting up in the middle of the night to pick off little brown beetles off your sunflower's. Is your pest problems different from south Florida to north Florida? Less or more?
Central Florida lady here. Living in a forest neighborhood that doesn't allow for 🐥. But I'm planning to change that in a few years. I want what you have managed to do for yourself. So, I'm in my learning classroom now. Thanks for sharing your story. It encourages me to know that if others have been successful, I have hope of achieving these dreams too.
You are my hero! I'm a city dweller, 54 and newly enthusiastic to gardening and sustainability in the last 4-5 years. I'm trying to get my extended family to understand that we don't all have to do everything, but if each us does something we are stronger collectively. I love what you're doing and look forward to heading more in that direction myself.
Thank you for sharing. I honour you for your determination to ‘live well’. There truly are so many who would live a better life, a healthier life, by following your example. Well done my friend🙌✨💫
I don’t have a big yard, but I (and my kids) have the energy to garden and a great space in our sunroom to start seedlings. My mom has a large yard, but needs someone younger to help garden the space. She and her husband are providing the land and compost, and my kids and I are providing the muscle and seedlings. Together we’re planning a big garden to serve both our families! 👩🌾
Good morning. My family sold our SoCal home, packed our life into a Pod and put it all into storage. We landed in SC about a week and a half ago. In CA we had a small backyard garden, a small worm farm, and a dozen chickens. When life changed and the the shelves emptied. We decided then that we wanted more. It took a lot of courage to even entertain the thoughts of relocating our family of 6 out of the city and into a more rural area where we could obtain acreage. The more crazy CA got the more courage it took for my husband and I to look outside of CA. But we have a dream ... a vision, and we are determined to see this through. I miss my garden and chickens. I want them back so bad it hurts sometimes. I dream of getting a couple cows and pigs ... And goats for cheese, milk, and soap. Please pray with me. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for all of the blessings that you have given my family. Thank you for our health and patients towards each other in this time of uncertainty. Dear Heavenly Father, please bring light to our property soon. We are so anxious to start this new adventure under your love and security. In Jesus' name, Amen. Thank you for praying with me. I hope your day is filled with laughter and love.
“Sorry about my cow, she’s in heat. She’s very enthusiastic about it “😂 favorite quote ever!! We have the same thing happening here! Thanks for the video and the ideas! You are why I started gardening 2 years ago 😍
Gardening is also soooo good for your mental health. I have put myself in a meditative trance before by just pulling weeds and digging in the earth. You also can’t beat the small pleasures of admiring beauty in the garden and snacking on something delicious that you’ve grown…. and also the satisfaction of seeing my honey bees and the fat bumblebees rolling in pollen and collecting nectar, that’s the best!
My only addition to your wonderful information to newbies is to not let it overwhelm you. Pick one small project, break it down into small tasks and only focus on that little task. It will add up and give you a sense of accomplishment and encourage to you do more as well as give you valuable knowledge and skills to build upon.
I used to live in a hoa on .24 acres of land. I grew over 300lbs of food in one year. It can be done. You don't need land. YOU CAN do it. Start now. I feel the same as Jess. I want people to succeed and learn and grown your own food.
Jess, I love how you teach us all. I am 61 and disabled living on my deceased husband's social security (900.00) a month. I have a suburban home in Memphis with a large pool, due to my health and money the pool turned into a pond so last spring I got my first ever chickens and ducks. I made a floating duck house from a plastic pallet and a dog house I found on the curb, I turned my plastic shed into a chicken coop, the ducks help keep the mosquitoes down but this year I am building a floating fountain to keep the water moving using a sump pump. Last year I planted tomatoes, peppers, okra, ginger, turmeric, did great, the beats, Lima beans, peas, long beans, squash and watermelon not so much, because of the "pond" and the concrete deck I've been using containers plus I had the chickens in a run. I have since removed the run and let my girls free-range. Last fall my son helped me build raised beds from lumber we salvaged on curbs and I decided to stop mowing grass and turn what little yard I have into gardens so we collected bags of leaves from neighbor's, laid cardboard we collected from dumpsters and started the process of killing the grass. I also dumpster dive and get lots of food for the chickens, my compost and some for us sometimes, I just dehydrated mushrooms, we got 1.5 gallons of dried mushrooms now. I was given a 50' roll of garden fence so I got some T- post and we are putting that up to keep the chickens out of the garden area. I have learned to do all this by watching you and lots of other friends of yours. I have canned in the past, but I plan to do more and try fermenting this year. I dehydrate what I can due to limited freezer space. I pickled eggs back in January and they are good. I was going to put a sign in my yard to sell eggs but I decided against it but I need some other way to sell them as I am over run with eggs, any advice is welcome. Thank you and your fellow homesteaders for giving me the inspiration and help to get me moving and giving me some joy, love watching my chickens and yes my grandkids visit more often and I get joy from passing knowledge onto them. Thank you again and I Bless you..
Your story is amazing. It put a huge smile on my face. The hardest thing is just getting started. You saw a dirty pool and went for it. Look at you now. Simply amazing. Maybe leave a note in your neighborhood mailboxes or doors letting them know you have fresh eggs for sale. From one Grandma to another, Becky.
@@carolinakudzu6284 I ordered some but cancelled my order when I learned they die when the water gets below 55 degrees, so maybe once it warms up I may try. I had goldfish but they died from the heat and lack of oxygen so once I get the fountain ⛲ made I may try that again.
@@alirumba1 I don't live very far from you. I LOVED your post. I garden on a little over an acre a county away from you. Thank you for insiring me. I don't have much help or a lot of funds. But, I do the best I can. Good luck to you and may The Most High be with us all!!!
Jess you have been the greatest teacher, and friend. I started my gardening journey when I found your channel. Thank you for being that person to stand up and help guied your community towards positivity and wholsomeness. You really are a huge blessing in my life.
Jess thank you for encouraging people that live in apartments or small yard HOA’s. There are homesteaders or farmers which have UA-cams and they criticize. They call them hobbies or wanna be. Not everyone are fortunate to be able to move to land where they can grow big gardens and have raise animals. They are not wanna be or hobbies they are actual people that are just a concern about their health, the welfare of the country, the food supply chain, and cost of raising food. They do want to be independent as best as they can and you by putting out you tubes as such is a huge encouragement. Thank you again.
Very good point thank you. I live in a rental and have many reasons I want to grow but mostly for the fresh healthy food and the peace of mind in times like these. I encourage anyone in a rental home or apartment if you have space enough for a bucket or bin Grow something! tomatoes are easy forgiving plants to grow in a 5 gallon bucket just look for a determinate variety which will grow smaller than the indeterminate one but still produce loads of fruit.
This comment right here! And some people actually do t aspire to live in the country. They just want good food and food security. It always amazes me how much lettuce I grow and I only dedicate half a raised bed for it. I can’t make myself eat lettuce that I didn’t grow.
You are the reason I was tomato rich last year. First garden at 43 years old and I grew enough tomatoes to feed my family, feed my first flock of chickens, and give hundreds of tomatoes to neighbors and friends. Thank you! ❤️
I totally agree that we can not LIVE in fear, BUT.... "fear" has turned on the light bulb for people who didn't ever consider our broken food system. Fear, or maybe it is "awareness" , is what started my journey. Don't continue in the fear, but instead, consider what you can do now. I have failed a lot, lol! But each failure, gets me closer to my goals and fear gets pushed aside as I learn what I am able to accomplish.
The only thing you missed with the learning to cook from basics. Learn to can so you can preserve the food you grow. I only started canning my tomatoes a few years ago and man that was amazing. I was never able to get enough to store for a full year for my family, but the amount that I was able to can enough to help cut my grocery bill. Plus the excitement of eating tomatoes I canned in the winter is amazing.
I have sixty years of experience with gardening and homesteading, and you have a lot of good advice. One thing I would add is, before you bring any animals home, even a handful of baby chicks, be completely set up for them. You may need to change things around later, once you have some experience and maybe see a better way to do things. But one of the biggest mistakes people make -- and I've done it myself -- is getting animals when you aren't ready for them. That leads to problems -- loose animals, predators getting at them, animals getting into all kinds of trouble, animals getting sick. And it makes people end up regretting the animals, when the experience could have been much better if they'd only gone at it the right way around.
The other thing I'd add is to start small. No matter how bad things look, no matter how much you want to all of a sudden be producing all of your food, right now, this year, each homesteading activity is a new skill to learn, with new equipment and facilities needed. If you've never gardened, don't try to manage an acre garden your first try -- start with maybe a 20' x 20' section of the back yard (as close to the kitchen door as you can manage, or it will be neglected). If you've never kept any kind of livestock -- or even any kind of animal at all, don't jump in over your head with chickens AND pigs AND dairy animals AND rabbits AND sheep all in one year. Start small. You might manage chickens and rabbits your first year. Or just a cow, or just a couple of dairy goats, or just a couple of feeder pigs. But don't try to do it all at once if you are new to keeping livestock. There is so much to learn! And there is so much equipment needed, and facilities to house/fence the stock, and places to store their feed and bedding, and you need to be able to keep fresh, clean water in front of them at all times. There are medical things you will need to learn to watch for and to deal with. If you try to do everything at once, it's likely that none of it will be done well, you'll be stressed, your projects and animals will suffer, and you'll come out the other end saying, that was too much work and too much headache, and I don't want to do that anymore. Take smaller bites, and chew thoroughly before adding another animal or another project, or making your garden four times bigger.
So, real quick, I just wanted to share this epiphany I had today: I bought two $80 grow lights at Home Depot and cringed doing so. Then I realized, no matter what happens outside my yard (I live in Flagstaff where we have a 60 day growing season on average) these grow lights mean I can have FOOD growing INSIDE no matter what! This is the kind of investing that brings me peace of mind and confidence when the fear creeps in. So if you need to get something, this might be an option. Get a small fan and watch your seedlings grow up big and strong! Happy growing, everyone! Lean in to that Grace of the Lord!
EXCELLENT video Ms. Jessica. Loved hearing you say "this is the southern girl in me talkin; eat red beans and rice." I too am from a southern heritage, way southern; Mexico. My Mexican grandmother taught me how to make home-made Pinto beans and Spanish rice. She also taught me how to make flour tortillas. While my wife and I raised four kids, these cooking skills that I learned from "Nana" were a great blessing as I am now able to pass these blessings on to my own grandchildren. God Bless your family.
Jack, I had a friend whose Abuela would cook tortillas from scratch. I've tried to make them myself but they've never been as good as hers. I need that Abuela magic touch!
@@RootsandRefugeFarm Well, when you guys come up to visit the REDWOODS you can stop by and I'll show you how I make the "healthy" flour tortillas with unbleached flour, avocado oil, salt and water version. I make them half whole wheat/ half unbleached for my grandbabies. They love making quesadillas with them. God bless.
Thank you for not installing fear in the hearts and minds of those who are afraid of shortages. I've watched a couple other channels who, in my opinion, are trying to install fear and like you said working together to teach and help others without making them fearful is a smart thing to do!
Same. I was in a live last night that was telling people that within 3 years all the cows will be outlawed and destroyed and we will all be forced to eat plant based synthetic burgers... I couldn't listen anymore. I had to turn it off.
Jess prior to watching your channel I was a April - July gardner. Bed prep in April, planting in May and giving up by July weeds squirrels birds I just always gave up. Now I seed start in January & August and harvest food May through the following February. (Zone 8) Thanks for the motivation.
This is such a beautiful comment. It encourages me and I bet it makes Jess and her family quite happy too. Isn't it wonderful to watch their success and know that part of that success is possible because of their desire to help others. Pay it forward really does work miracles. It's a bit like gardening. Don't give up if it fails once in a while!!! ;)
@Tonya Matthews I’m also in zone 8 and am having such fun experimenting with two gardening seasons! I was giving up when the South Carolina sun got too hot in mid July and august
@@shodson314 Yes. I live in Virginia Beach and the sun and humidity here is similar to South Carolina. It takes dedication to pull through July & August 🙂
I live in east coast Canada. When Covid started I knew, a garden and a freezer were what I needed. It's been two years. I have made a point of buying extra tins of this and that, pasta , bean, lentils. I'm not fully self sufficient, but my trips to the grocery store are so much less. I'm 70, so it's hard work, but really good exercise too. I really like what you have to say, Hope for the best, prepare for...well, not optimum conditions. Thanks.
Tips from a 1/10 of an acre homestead: Chickens: give/sell eggs to your neighbors if you have too many. I never have a problem finding someone in my downtown neighborhood who wants fresh eggs from happy chickens. Compost: if you’re in a small space, a spinning composter or worm bin are good options Garden: get a good book about gardening in your local area. There is probably a local gardening group as well. It’ll give you a good place to start in your particular climate Start from seed: great activity to do with your kids! My kindergartner loved spraying the seeds with water last spring. You can get many of them going on a windowsill. Cook from staples: I am personally focusing on this one in particular right now. Learn just a couple basic recipes that you can adjust to the season and whatever produce you can get. Beans, rice, oatmeal, sourdough. Even just small steps will make a huge difference! Thank you Jess for the practical, empowering teaching and wisdom you put out in the world.
Another great resource is local libraries, historical societies, living history museums, gardens and community programs. It's amazing what you can learn. Just recently my daughter and I took a woodstove/hearthside cooking class at a local museum. We spent the day preparing recipes from scratch and cooking them like our ancestors did. It's good to know that we have the knowledge if we needed it. And it was a lot of fun!
Even though I don't have my own flock yet, (few weeks I will hopefully) I think Quail are a great first starter animal also. Especially for a single person or a couple. Although the eggs are small, it doesn't take long to build up stock with young layers of only 6 weeks of age. You can even house quail indoors like a parakeet or hamster. The care, cage and food are a mixture of both. Routine is key and it's a great way to add fuel to a compost pile. Thanks for sharing your knowledge Jess. You are dearly appreciated! God bless.
@@barefootfarmandcattery1159 once they get to adulthood at 6 weeks I feed the egg flock the same as chicken layer feed and got an egg a day from each hen. When they're growing I do give them chick starter feed just so they have the extra protein for the fast growth.
We fully moved onto our farm Dec 2019 a few months before covid. We moved without any food stores and only 7 chickens who were not laying yet. I was definitely freaked right the heck out when the store shelves were bare. We had just barely started our homestead and were barely growing anything at the time. At the time it was all just dreams. Boy, have we come a long way in a short time! We feel much more prepared and secure now.
I'm taking care of my mom who had a stroke and I find that my 8 hens give more than enough eggs. Got 2 roosters and will turn them out together within 2 months. Haven't raised chicks other than from the Tractor supply store so hopefully this goes well. If I can do this take care of mom n garden then can, freeze or dehydrate. I'm sure anyone can do it..Yes it is hard work, you need to tend to it frequently (daily), but it is doable if you are motivated. Congratulations on acquiring a homestead. Keep pushing forward even if I rd s just baby steps and it will come together. Where are you located? I'm in NE Michigan.
I started on a bread making adventure 5 months ago, I have perfected the bread that we like by following your advice. Jess, you said many times "not to let anyone tell you that it can't be done, try it anyway". You may not have meant it literally, but I Googled that you couldn't combine sourdough and yeast in bread making, because they have different rising times. Well! we don't like just sourdough bread, so I experimented and grew my sourdough starter first, then combined two cups of starter with my yeast bread mix and let it sit for two hours together, then followed the directions for any bread dough and it made the best bread we have ever tasted. We never buy bread any more. I'm working on a hamburger bun recipe now. I alternate twice a week, between making homemade biscuits and bread, then freeze some. My digestion has improved and I expect to make all my bread needs from now on. Thanks for your inspiration.
I’m not alone! I have tried and tried and I just dont like sourdough bread. I was so proud the first time my starter lived long enough to make bread. It’s darn good to know how to do it in a pinch, but..just yuck. I am inspired by you to give this method a whirl and see if I can find a good balance in my bread. Thank you so much for sharing this!!
The internet is full of opinions! You obviously proved that mixing the two works. I used to work in a bakery where we had some bread recipes that used both a starter and yeast.
Hi Jess. Love that you approached this subject without promoting fear. Just another thought in preparedness. My husband and I are now in our 70s and have always wanted chickens but won’t work in our small space and with regulations so we just recently found another way to be self sufficient in a small area. We have a garden and have canned, dehydrated, and freeze dry but still wanted meat and eggs so are now getting into quail. They need very little space. We have a double layered cage 8foot by two foot. You can have 3 quail per square foot. We’ll have eggs and meat and no regulations for coturnix quail. Also quail is more nutritional that chicken eggs. Lots of health benefits. You can have males so you can get fertilized eggs to incubate. Myshire farms on UA-cam has videos and all you need to know to get started. They are on live on Sunday night and Monday to answer any questions.
Single mom gardener here & loving it! Learning what we think are weeds that are edible is an important thing to know too! You make us all more brave Jes!! Ty!
Thanks to you my garden skills have improved 100x over.. N this year im expanding garden spots again.. Have rabbits n chickens n quial. Thats my fertilzer n i catch rain water.. Theres 7 fruit trees now. Plan on getin 2 more this year. Theres 5 berry bushes n a red raspberry n strawberry patches. Asparagus ruhbarb chard n kale. Most of my flowers are ate able.. Summer to fall my feed bill is almost zero.. I freeze n can n dyhydrate.. Got a herb garden spot.. N thats all thanks to watching you.. Wish i could find somebody with a cow so i could get milk n make butter n cheese.
Because I don’t have outdoor space, I practice and learn a lot of home preservation, scratch cooking, fermenting, and herbalism. That’s my classroom right now
I know I've said it on some of your other videos before, but I want to point out again that if you receive SNAP benefits (food stamps) you can buy seeds and food-producing plants at your local big box stores that accept those benefits. This also includes herbs. We bought about $300 worth of seeds last year with these benefits between the Spring through Summer and now have a healthy stockpile of things to grow, including new things we want to try growing and eating. Also, if you can't do chickens (we can't because our old grumpy dog will kill them) rabbits are a decent way to start with meat production. The feed isn't that expensive, you can supplement from your garden, and they have a decently quick turnaround once you get started. We just harvested six rabbits, will do another batch in less than a week, and 15 in about 8 more weeks. This was from 2 females and one male. We also have 2 more females we will be breeding in about 2 weeks. Our "hutches" and grow outs are made from scraps and dump hauls from our neighbor and we plan on building more out of free pallets this year. Start small and build from there. Also, rabbit poop is a garden gold mine and it doesn't need to be composted. Invest in ways to preserve your food. Food dehydrators are decently cheap, or you can learn how to sun dry foods. Pressure canners, while expensive to start, are worth the long-term investment. Also, places like Walmart often sell their food-grade buckets from their bakery for a buck or so with lids, so you can start buying simple things like flour and sugar in bulk. Ask around and make connections. =)
@@mdodgenwellness They're pretty easy to maintain, and once you get used to the dispatch they're quick to clean for the fridge. We bought some New Zealand/ Rex mutts to start us off and they provide some decent meat for our house.
@@bradysweitzer1939 I know. A lot of big seed places don't. But you can get good seeds at Walmart and other grocers that sell seeds and food products that take EBT benefits. I save my cash seed purchses for uncommon things, and start small. Spend the five dollars on a new seed and the shipping. Over time you'll accumulate a nice "cash" seed haul lol
Hi there! I just wanted to come on here and thank you so much for all the information you share. I started a balcony garden during quarantine, using your videos to help teach me how to be a better gardener. Two years later, I moved to Tennessee and I'm building a farm-to-table bakery from scratch. We're putting in raised beds for gardening next week and I have herbs and edible flower seeds started on my kitchen table. Quarantine really showed me how sustainable I wanted to be. My first farm animals are going to be ducks instead of chickens. They may be a little messier but they'll eat all the bugs that may attack my garden. And as a baker their eggs are larger and more consistent than chicken eggs which helps me out a lot. Thank you for never feeding into the fear and giving out as much information as you can!
Jess, what a good encouragement for people to start. I live in a rental house in town with a low budget. I asked my landlord if I could put in a garden. He said yes so I started small and it has grown bigger every year now for, this will be year 4. I dig out new spaces with a shovel as I go, every year,save all my seeds + some from the veggies I have bought at the store, start them in my house under the windows,use what I have as best as I can. I didnt even have a water hose until this past year. I used 5 gal. buckets. Just started composting last year also. I couldnt buy anything to stake the tomato plants so I pruned branches off my trees and used them & the trees keep growing lol. I only buy what I have to and sometimes what I want, usually new seeds lol.The cost for all the food I grow is minimal. And produces alot of food. If you need to buy something do it a little at a time as you need it. Best of all my landlord doesnt seem to mind. I'm just making the ground better. 😊 so go for it and dont worry about what you dont have. You can!🤗.... and also listen to Jess! She has encouraged and helped me quite a bit and many others also. Thank you Jess!😊
WATER I want to add one thing that people do not think about often in this realm of things. Another huge part of food sustainability is having a sustainable water source. Depending on where you live, it is not uncommon to have water shortages or to have pipes get contaminated and be unsafe to use for a few weeks. I live in Florida with hurricanes, so I know all about the second one. So another way to ensure you and your family have food security is to ensure you have a water filtration system. Perhaps a berkey or even just a little lifestraw, so when there is no public access to water or your water well is down/dry, you have a backup plan of some sort. You need water to live, guys
For us balcony homesteaders, I’ve found a lot of benefit in growing herbs, baby arugula, baby spinach, green onions, and celery as cut and come again crops. I also plant smaller batches of alliums that ripen at different times ie) leeks, shallots, onions, etc. This way I don’t have to run to the store for a quick side or for aromatics when I cook. The greens also sub well for parsley. Parsley and cilantro don’t always grow well for me and I prefer arugula’s peppery bite.
You are a gift and blessing to the homestead and self sustainability community Jess!!Last summer I Was looking at my pile of winter squashes drying in the sun for winter storage and saw the price of squash per pound in the store and felt so rich and blessed.. I totally have felt the cherry tomato rich feeling many times
I started this year learning what I could do on my 2/3 acre semi-suburban piece of land. It is amazing what you can do in a small space. I am documenting my efforts on UA-cam and I find it helps keep me motivated. I am learning so many amazing skills.
Even your temporary garden looks better than my 2 year garden. My husband also makes fun of me because I kill everything. I ignore him though. Even if things die like plants I don't care, it makes me feel better. Looking at seedlings 🌱 sprout helps my mental health.
Jess, you fill a niche that I could never fill. I was born into the homestead lifestyle although my generation called it farming. Coming into this lifestyle, as a personal choice, you know the steps and how to explain/teach them to beginners. I do not have those skills. I grew up taking the self-sufficient lifestyle and gardening for granted. We had a 40-acre truck garden, processed 200 chickens in a weekend, milked our own cows, slaughtered them on the farm, everything was made from scratch, cream and butter came from our milk. So keep up the good work of teaching well the basic skills for those who really want to learn. Stay blessed.
I thank the lord every day for my parent raising me to live off the land,canning and preserving. If not for growing and preserving we wouldn't have eat during the winter.We were a poor family of 8. Our farm kept us alive. We eat beans, corn,potatoes tomatoes and cornbread daily. We survived then and we will survive now. For that I'm grateful. ❤
Well done Jess!! You are truly one of God's faithful servants with Wisdom and knowledge filled with Peace and understanding that you're sharing with the world!! I love your sincere honest heart, work ethic and the way you are fulfilling your dreams with your family along with making your classroom part of ours! I've learned so much from you & continue to share this knowledge with others asking along my journey! I love your SC farm coming together! God is Good! I Bless You in Return!
I love that you say "turn your waiting room into a classroom" because that is exactly what I have been doing while I wait for a better job to come along so that I can save and buy my first little homestead that I can retire on.
Over the last couple of years I've started taking more and more of an interest in the food production chain, the environmental aspects of our way of life and the changes that we could easily make to take a step in the right direction. So after reducing the variety of products, focusing more on seasonal and regional produce and learning to make more and more things from scratch, I finally dove into growing our own food. I started with a small container garden at our apartment and grew a few tomato plants, cucumbers, blueberries, strawberries and some herbs. Things escalated quickly 😅 one year later we rented a garden and are now in our third year of growing our own food. We don't grow every fruit or vegetable that we eat and that's not our goal. But we grow some of the things that we really enjoy eating. Last years garden was almost a complete loss due to really poor weather conditions. But this only means that we are itching to start gardening season. We are planning on growing our most abundant garden this year. Tomatoes in different varieties, cucumbers, zucchini, peppers, chili, pumpkins, radishes, greens, beans, peas, cabbages, kohlrabi, onions, garlic, potatoes, herbs, eggplants, broccoli, cauliflower, leeks, celery the list goes on. The first seedlings have already been started and the first round of transplanting them into bigger pots is coming up next week to make room for the March round of seeds to start. You are one of my major inspirations and my favorite source of gardening advice because we are growing in comparable zones and you are amazing at teaching the ways of the garden. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and being such an inspiration!
1. Chicken math. 6 months of 5 laying hens = 1 years worth of feed. 2. Plastic coffee containers make great kitchen compost bins for those with little space. 3. Gardening. Don't be afraid to fail or get creative. 4. Don't forget about storage. Include storage into your garden and scratch cooking plans. I'm no pro by any means but I've implemented all these thing on less than 1/4 of an acre in the suburbs. Jess thank you for helping to inspire others like myself.
Definitely look into rabbits as a meat source. They are easier and cheaper than chickens as a meat source. Chickens for eggs (and eventually a jar of canned meat at the end of their production) have a lot of value. Rabbits have a lot of value for cheap easy meat. Easy to raise and butcher. Plus the poo won't burn your garden!
Last year I finally put my foot down and started a garden. A lot of it was my daughters age and wanting her to grow up with a garden. I only have an okish sized back patio, but I have a raised bed, 2 green stalks, and a ton of pots. Last year was only supposed to ease me in with some flowers and a couple edible things like lettuce, but I turned into the plant hospital and most of what I grew was starts my friends ended up giving me or me learning new things and deciding to jump into learning to grow potatoes. This year I'm just going full force with starting most everything from seed and growing a lot of new things. I finally learned to can last year too and can't wait to do more this year. One day I'll have the big garden and I can grow everything I need, but I can do a pretty good amount right now even if it's a bit cramped.
Starting a balcony garden for the first time this summer! Not for fear of lack, but just for the creativity and joy of trying new and fun plants. Your enthusiasm for beautiful plants and seeing things grow is contagious!
I hear your cow mooing n I think of my grandma coming to back door n yelling at my grandpa. "Get that girl a man!!" Joke between them. Then they would just laugh. This city girl understands now. Whoa. Lol.
When you have chickens you don't only have eggs, but manure and gorgeous pets that love cuddles and like to follow you around and scratch and hunt snails and other bugs, when you garden, not only do you grow food but you get exercise, sunshine fresh air dirty hands and if really successful you can share with your friends family and neighbours, you stop the food miles that contribute to pollution you know what's on the food and there is no excess packaging to go into land fill. It's truly a win win situation.
Just love your spirit, your messages, your heart. God bless you Jess. I started my journey on a 9th floor apartment balcony. Grew some lettuce and cherry tomatoes. I’m now out in the country and have chickens and getting started on my seeds. My chilies are inch high inside my kitchen on the fireplace hearthstone and I’m excited about getting some potatoes in the ground soon.
A reminder about chickens, after 3 to 4 years they slow down to almost nothing. So they need to be replaced with younger birds and take into mind the time from "birth" to laying eggs takes time so don't wait until you are almost out of eggs to add the new ones. Live not in fear but having faith that God has you covered and will give you what you need to live either by grace or knowledge. I can honestly say from the very first of this with the media using their fearmongering to keep you down, I have lived my life, gone to my church weekly, and loved visiting my family and my neighbors! Thank you, Jess, for giving hope and not spreading more fear! So many times and places in the Bible tell you to not live in fear but live by Faith! KJV; 2 Timothy 1:7 - For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind. Hebrews 13:6 - So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me. 1 John 4:18 - There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love. Psalms 23:4 - Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me. Deuteronomy 31:8 - And the LORD, he it is that doth go before thee; he will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed. Psalms 27:1 - (A Psalm of David.) The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid? John 14:27 - Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid. Romans 8:15 - For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father. Isaiah 41:10 - Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness. Psalms 23:1-6 - (A Psalm of David.) The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. (Read More...) Psalms 34:4 - I sought the LORD, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears. Matthew 10:31 - Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows. Psalms 27:14 - Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD. Isaiah 43:1-2 - But now thus saith the LORD that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine. (Read More...) Proverbs 14:27 - The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, to depart from the snares of death. Jeremiah 39:17-18 - But I will deliver thee in that day, saith the LORD: and thou shalt not be given into the hand of the men of whom thou art afraid. Luke 12:7 - But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows.
So glad you brought up the fact that you don't need a large property to grow your own food. Living in a small town right on main Street and surrounded by neighbors, I'm still able to grow and raise a lot of what we eat. Fruits, veggies, eggs, meat birds, and honey all on under an acre. I wasted many years saying I'd start after I had more land, a bigger tractor, ect.. learn from my mistake and jump in no matter how small, anything is better than nothing. Love your channel and can't wait for all of Jeremiah's build videos
Thanks to you Jess and other homesteading channels that I've taken lessons/encouragement from, I was able to have a complete meal of boiled green bananas and yam with callalloo and spinach seasoned with escallion (green onions) from my back yard garden for my breakfast this past Sunday. I also have tomatoes, carrots grown in containers, ginger, pak choy growing in raised beds in my small backyard. Also herbs and fruits. God bless you all for blessing others with your channel.
We started with chickens and a small raised bed about 5 years ago. Not realizing how much we were learning with failures that we experienced. Fast forward 5 years we have a small goat herd - they are mostly our landscapers but they will serve their purpose in a time when we may need more from them. We added beef cattle and put a bull calf in the freezer. This all happened in 2019 right before the “point of reference”. We now have a 10x 20 in ground garden and 4 raised beds. It’s a process. All about learning. We learn a lot from you and Miah!
I think this is one of your best and comes on a day we’re all thinking of war. The victory garden has been on my mind a ton. Not due to fear but family security. Grateful for you, your family and the victory garden series you mentioned a long time ago. Blessings to you.
I have made contacts with a local diary and chicken farmer to get my eggs raw milk and chicken from the source instead of the store and so much healthier! Everyone can do this.
You just Hit it out of the park Jess ! The exact thing I loved when I 1st started watching you years ago turn your waiting room into a classroom back when you were living with a smaller space and just starting things in a bag of soil with a tub on top! Love it!💖
I go through episodes of making sourdough bread then don't for awhile. Every time I start again...I literally start again. I have to learn all over. But After the first time I was no longer scared. "I have made bread in the past...I can do it again". Jesse you inspired me to start again....just put me some flour and water out and made some starter (always the best when you grow from the yeasts around you). I am now feeding four adults and did the math and am saving about $500 a year just by making the bread. That just about covers the inflation we have in my area. So while everyone else is talking about increased grocery bills, mine actually went down. Just want to let you know I am not a Christian...but I watch to the end of every video just to hear you Bless me. Makes my heart rise up. Thanks for your great content.
This is our second year of having laying hens, and we have a freezer full of chicken and turkey that we raised last summer. It’s such a comfort to have all the proteins we need on hand. It was a learning curve but totally worth it.
Also research the wild foods around you. My first greens are wild. Some grow in mid winter. Growing food takes time until harvest. So look what you can harvest around you before that. Lambs Quarters are just like spinach and packed with nutrition. Wild mustards and amaranth as well. Dandelions are amazing food and medicine too. If you are limited on space think of plants like kale which is nutrient dense to grow. And if stocking up on rice and beans and things like that, do not forget spices! As a trained chef and a person who has known hunger, you still want flavors! I always look at nutrient information when picking out say beans. Which one has more protein, more essential nutrients. Because all beans are not the same. It is not hard to be responsible for your food. It is not prepping, or hoarding. It is responsibility. So much research out there! And my favorite book that no one seems to mention anymore is The Encyclopedia of Country Living by the late and brilliant, Carla Emery! Every homesteader, urban or country, should have this book! Great chat Jess! No fear, just responsibility!
Thank you. We are starting our sustainable journey. I won't be driven by fear. I'll take this step by step process as mindfully as I can. Just going to be working on establishing our garden and learning proper canning.
Hi Jess! We are urban homesteaders and work very hard to try to do what we can to ensure our food is ethically sourced...so the backyard to the rescue. We cannot keep chickens, but can keep quail. We have a flock of 30 quail (we just rejuvenated our flock) to keep us in eggs. Yes, it takes 4-5 quail eggs to equal one chicken egg, but is a doable option in our area.
Absolutely. I have lived the learned wisdom of having to start small. When things failed, my losses were smaller. And I gained understanding. Now that I’m exploring another interest of mine, bushcrafting, and my budget is very limited, i’m learning a lot before I invest in higher priced tools. I’m also gaining more skills.
I love growing fresh sprouts on my kitchen window in a jar during the winter when I am missing the garden. Alfalfa, fenugreek, clover, radish, and broccoli are some of my favorites.😋
Hello first of all Jess you have kept my father who was going to be 90 God willing in July happy he enjoys your videos we watched them all through the beginning of the pandemic we watched you move from one place to the other thank you for that, I grew up with the generation of family call in the garden victory garden, we’ve grown Staples peas corn green beans tomatoes variety of squashes, I have learned so much from you keep doing what you’re doing. I remember watching one of your videos and saying have a place to sit in your garden and enjoy it thank you for that I did it last year and I enjoyed it immensely. I’ve learned to barter with people I live in a suburban area but not far from me is the country and a few people are doing small farming and I was able to barter some of my canned goods I do can tomatoes salsa jams and jellies during the pandemic and we were able to barter some of my canned goods for eggs. Your idea with your seeds and you storing them and those plastic containers love that I’m gonna utilize that this year.. here’s a tip you had mentioned friend who has space perhaps using chickens, a friend of mine she and another friend found a place where they could get half a cow and they split the cost and they both have small families and they were able to split the cow if you will and get steaks and burgers and what not and they were able to put it in the freezer I thought that was a really good idea so if anybody’s out there that lives in the urban areas like I do and you want to stock up on beef beef is expensive if you know somebody maybe you guys can go in together and do it that way… thank you for all that you and your family doing the best of luck to you and again, my daddy is your big is hero. Many blessings to you and yours
Guys I started growing food in a couple of cheap large plastic flower pots that I made sure had holes in the bottom for drainage. I bought Bonnie (brand) plant starts from a big box store. I grew a green pepper plant and a tomato plant. I bought bagged "Potting Mix" ... don't use garden soil in pots, it's too heavy. I also bought a bag of Cotton Burr Compost (you could use any compost) and I mixed them together about 50/50. They grew like wildfire. Keep them watered but not too wet. Stick your fingers in soil to see if dry before watering. Give them plenty of sun and watch you grow food. This little way of starting is less scary and lots more manageable and it might just send you on a path to success! I still struggle with my raised bed garden at times but you just cannot quit. ⭐️
I don’t comment often on this channel because of the sheer volume of comments and the fact that most of the time what I’d say has already been said. This has been said too but I don’t think you can hear thank you enough. You approached this topic with grace and presented information in a way that hopefully won’t feel overwhelming to viewers who feel a sense or urgency but have have no idea what to do.
Every time when I am picking my tomatoes I am thanking you for encouraging me to start growing 3 years ago. Now I have capsicum, tomatoe and the very first time I will have pumpkin so far I counted 5, I have few herbs. Slowly I am expending my food garden. My only problem is we are on a slope and water availability is in the middle. So logic would be plant on the front so I can gravity feed but not enough space. The way the property layout is a big challenge. But still I am grateful what I have.
You are so correct about backyard chickens being the gateway drug to homesteading. One minute I had 4 chickens, the next I have 11 (and continuing to add) and I’m putting in a greenhouse and looking for sources of raw milk so I can make my own butter. 😂
Such a great video Jess, thank you!! For everyone else, here’s my tiny tip - do whatever you can to lessen your food waste! For me, it was a GAME-CHANGER to get a dehydrator and learn to work with dehydrated produce. It was my gateway to serious food preserving and I cannot recommend it enough. A lot less work than canning, a lot more hands off & can get a lot of shelf stable produce in your pantry. There’s a women named Darcy who was a UA-cam/FB/Insta called The Purposeful Pantry & she has everything you need to know to get started. Plus, if nothing else, just make some dehydrated mini marshmallows, you’ll thank me later!!
Can I chip in about dehydrating. I'm severely disabled/chronic illness. There are so many things I cannot do, but dehydrating is something I CAN do. So if you enjoy homesteading, but have limited capacity, this is quite achievable
This video makes perfect sense, and it's good to hear someone actually saying it. Surprisingly (in the U.K.), I have done all these things (before seeing this UTube) on a much smaller scale, in a town house. 2 Greenstalks, six chickens, a small wormary, a couple of fruit trees in the garden, and a snall greenhouse. It saves a fortune on shopping, and I often have spares to share with neighbours 😊😊😊
YAY! love it! I've been moving in this direction for the last 2 years. I've learned SO much from working with what I've got. It started with a small compost pile while my husband and I lived with his parents for a year in a small suburban yard. Then sourdough, pickling, fermenting, sewing, and learning to cook from scratch. We recently moved from our tiny efficiency studio into our first home and finally have a yard! It's SUPER small and in the high desert but I am stoked to turn it into a micro food forest. One thing at a time! Getting my compost system back up and I am really excited to plant a small garden this spring. Even though my dream is to have lush green rich land and space, It's not what my reality looks like. When I look back though at the last few years I can see how much I've learned and grown from all the skills I've been focusing on. All this growth happened while living in my inlaw's basement and while living in a tiny one-room studio in a large city. Imagine what I can accomplish in a tiny backyard and actual home with my family:) If I hadn't started when I did then I wouldn't have the knowledge to build upon now.
I think if you’re just starting out in gardening with limited space, growing a few tomato and pepper plants in 5 gallon buckets is a cheap way to get started. They can produce a lot of food if they grow well and are very versatile to put in soups or stir fry or make great salsa. If you’ve got a bit more space, I highly recommend growing lettuce in the fall and spring. I got so much lettuce last fall from one of my 4x10’ beds that it more than paid for the time and money spent on seeds. Jess even has a video on growing lettuce in a bag of soil if you don’t have a garden space.
I’ve seen a lot of folks use lack of space as a crutch to why they can’t grow their own food. I firmly believe that other priorities outweigh self sufficient food production rather than space for these individuals.
You are so right I grew 4 plants one year and had to throw away tomatoes they produced so much. anyone limited for space can grow in a bucket. I encourage anyone to grow at least one plant this year.💯
Food preservation is also key to sustainability. Jess has addressed this in other videos. Goodwill is an excellent source for finding inexpensive food dehydrators. It’s one of those items people buy and often never use. Non-winterized chest freezers are another economical food preservation option. Since these chest freezers were to remain inside my house and not my garage I didn’t need the more expensive winterized freezers. Dehydrating not only preserves well it also saves storage space. On average a gallon of fresh vegetables dehydrates down to a quart of dehydrated vegetables. If you turn that into powder with a dedicated coffee grinder for something like onions, peppers or tomatoes that reduces down to a pint. Vegetables I want to pressure can go straight into the freezer then I use the cooler fall weather as pressure canning time. With chest freezers, dehydrators and pressure canning I can grow and preserve most of my own veggies and berries for the year in an urban downtown rowhouse 40’ x 30’ garden.
I greatly appreciate your fear statement in the beginning of your vlog. For my mental health, I avoid videos that use fear for clicks, or fear as an intro to "teach". It's not needed. It's you, so I watched, yet usually I see "food security" and the content doesn't share skill-building in a positive affirming manner. Everyone wants to feed their family. Feeding people, how we all do so, is a community reinforcing activity. I have a backyard garden and am composting, but I need to do so more efficiently as I need more as I am converting lawn to more garden. I haven't tried compost tea but I think it will work for me. I am also donating seeds to a seed swap as I plant 1-3 plants per variety but 170000000 varieties. I have so many extra seeds. I thank you for that content. I started with a 20x6 garden in 2016 and now half of my backyard is garden. One neighbor thinks it's "tacky", but everyone else has been supportive! I love sharing the goodies. Oh the joys of suburbia.
I thank my mother almost each day who thought my sister and I how to cook from scratch at a early age. I thank my parents for teaching us how to and survival skills beginning at a young age. I thank my grandma for showing us each summer for 4 weeks in Tennessee how to take care your farm animals and they will take care of you, how to cook on a wood stove because that's all she had, how to get your water from a well because there was no indoor plumbing and then there was the outhouse! I truly appreciate your message. More people should ask themselves what would I do if it was taken away tomorrow? Am I prepared? Do you know what to do? Can you punt if you don't have some modern conveniences? 2020 should have taught many people many things. The question is did they learn.
I love this and I'm really trying to localize my food sources this year 🧡 I live in NYC and have an urban garden and I'm growing from seed (which I learned from you). As you said you can learn a lot by starting small, my garden actually produces a lot more than I expected! And I'm in a rental. I'm even able to do my own compost which I'm really grateful for. And even though chickens are not a reality for me, I do love supporting the local farmers that sell meat and eggs at the farmers market. I'm also a professional cook so I do most of my cooking at home from scratch and using whole ingredients. I think that cooking at home is a crucial skill to start learning now too. Thank you for sharing all of this information, Jess. I hope you're having a wonderful day 🌻
I'm putting in as much as possible on my 1/5 of an acre suburban lot. Chickens, rabbits, garden & now quail. Because I'm in my mid 60's I will not be getting any large animals even if I had the property. I am however, buying meat on the hoof & buying what I can't grow from farmers markets. Starting seeds can be time & space consuming, I winter sow all my cold hardy plants including herbs & flowers. It's so rewarding to have a meal come from my garden & it tastes better also.
Jess, this video is a message of ‘hope’, for the new and the experienced homesteader/gardener/urban and country home keeper. ‘A rising tide raises all ships’. Thank you for being a light in the world and during such unusual times💐💖
We wanted to be chicken meat independent, like not even having to buy the Cornish Cross chicks from a hatchery independent. It was a substantial investment, but we purchased our first American Bresse chicks from a hatchery, raised them, culled the extra roosters and kept a flock of layers and two roosters (just in case something happened to one). Less than a year later, we have 9 laying hens and a rooster (yep, that extra one bit the dust!). Four weeks ago we hatched out our first clutch of chicks, and have 16 babies growing to become future meals, future laying hens, and our ticket to becoming chicken meat independent from now on. That incubator used to keep us in meat chickens will also keep us in laying hens, ducks, and hopefully geese for the future too!
Thanks for the encouragement. I started my first garden ever this year and I'm 60 years old, and I know I've made some mistakes that I won't be making next year already. I'm still learning and I'm really enjoying it very much. I also started a compost pile (a can) and I toss lots of stuff in it for later use. Hopefully it all works out for me but the journey is coming along and I'm learning lots. Thank you for another great and encouraging video. ❤️😀 P.S. I garden on a 3rd floor porch in containers. I also started buying and storing some food staples for preparedness! 😉 Thanks
We live in the country and have a few friends who don’t have space/desire for chickens, so we raise their chickens. They get all their eggs from us. Our 40 chickens currently feed about 20 people.
Love this list! We make our own compost but I recently discovered that zoos sell composted non- meat eating animal manure called "zoo poo" that they sell cheap which benefits gardeners as well as the zoos to care for the animals. Just a FYI for people who may not have a place to compost and are looking for a source.
I'd like to add to point one about the chickens. We have both chickens (expanded flock with chicken math) and Khaki Campbel ducks and our ducks will reliably lay through winter. Oh! Duck math happens too! Just FYI. :) We were able to bless some friends and family all winter long even though for a portion of the time we were only getting chicken eggs infrequently. Our 5 ducks gave us anywhere from 3-5 eggs every day this winter until they recently started to molt and hit a pause. If ducks are an option, I recommend it to everyone I can. :) And Jess - Thank you for being an encouragement to all and stressing that no matter where you are, you can start there. Thank you!
We are starting our first garden. Started from seed in our bay window! Super excited to be more self reliant. Thank you for your teachings! Looking forward to the next devotional video!
@@justgoodness333littlehomes5 nice to meet ya! We are starting small in containers so we don't kill ourselves and give up! Trying to be smart about it instead of letting our excitement get us in over our heads!
We have over 200 sq ft of edible gardens, 3 chickens, 3 fruit/nut trees and a 2-bay compost system on less than a quarter acre within the city limits of Portland, Ore. So, yes! Even if you don't have land, you can have food sustainability.
❤️❤️ I have watched you for years but never commented. This is a wonderful vid. I can’t have chickens but thinking about quail (space). Been gardening for about 11 years and most of my knowledge has come from your channel. Thank you for the wonderful advice and total complete honesty/transparency with your channel. This is what keeps me coming back and I always look forward to the next video. Can’t wait for Miah’s channel!!
LOVED growing from seed last year and all of my plants did so well and I was very proud of all of the seedlings that grew into beautiful gardens in my yard, my son's yard, my daughter's yard, and a few co-worker's yards. Many of my veggies were what you recommended Jess and were so fun to see grow, cook and eat!
Oh goodness Jess. That bit at the end had me in tears. The message of HOPE, not fear is so refreshing. We just moved into our new house and I'm preparing my garden to feed my family of 8 and my elderly neighbors. They are a lovely couple who treat us like family. They are on a limited income and food prices have hurt them a lot
How generous of you to take your neighbors into consideration. Doing God’s work is so worthwhile and satisfying. Thank you for being the answer, and not the problem.
Very kind of you. Not easy but worth it. God bless yall
She is a gem 💎 such a good spirited person.
Thank you for helping your elderly neighbors. That kindness is what our world needs more of.
@@nishidindeyal1850 I'm 4'10 and angry. It fits.
Hi, Jess! I'm a retired single mom who is now on a small, fixed income. It breaks my heart to see people my age (68) have to worry about making it through the month before the food runs out. I lived in a suburb in Central Florida, kept 4 hens behind a privacy fence, grew a 1000 sq ft garden and learned. I canned, dehydrated and froze whatever I could, bought meats and poultry in large pieces and case lots, and learned just how good it was to have canning skills after a hurricane when the power was out for weeks. Last year, I parlayed that suburban house in Central Florida for a larger, more sustainable property in the North Florida Panhandle. I still have a mortgage, but my son and I now live on almost an acre of land with well and septic. I no longer have to worry about the City making me get rid of my chickens, and I'm secluded enough that if I choose to raise 25 meat birds or a bunch of rabbits, I can do that. My garden is now over 3000 sq ft, and I've learned to maximize every square inch of it. We also have planted some fruit trees and harvest wild black berries and elderberries from the surrounding countryside. We're so blessed! We have enough corn, green beans and squash to last until we harvest more, enough meat in the freezer to last months, and this year, my goal is to can enough tomato sauce to last all year. I'm mostly Greek and Southern Italian, so that's really important, LOL! I garden like my life depends on it, because it does. No, it's not easy, but it's a most rewarding life. I learn something new every day, and I'm so much healthier than when I lived in the suburbs. I wouldn't trade it for the world!
Awesome! Good for you.
That's AWESOME! My daughter is moving to Fort Myers in June. Florida has some beautiful areas, world class beaches and yes, hurricane's. Are you changing hardy zones? I have been offered a job in Florida, I live in Georgia now, I would be moving two full zones and I have to say I'm not sure how to garden there. I can only grow for a fresh garden right now but it's so nice to go pick your own food. Almost makes it worth getting up in the middle of the night to pick off little brown beetles off your sunflower's. Is your pest problems different from south Florida to north Florida? Less or more?
Central Florida lady here. Living in a forest neighborhood that doesn't allow for 🐥. But I'm planning to change that in a few years. I want what you have managed to do for yourself. So, I'm in my learning classroom now. Thanks for sharing your story. It encourages me to know that if others have been successful, I have hope of achieving these dreams too.
You are my hero! I'm a city dweller, 54 and newly enthusiastic to gardening and sustainability in the last 4-5 years. I'm trying to get my extended family to understand that we don't all have to do everything, but if each us does something we are stronger collectively. I love what you're doing and look forward to heading more in that direction myself.
Thank you for sharing. I honour you for your determination to ‘live well’. There truly are so many who would live a better life, a healthier life, by following your example. Well done my friend🙌✨💫
I don’t have a big yard, but I (and my kids) have the energy to garden and a great space in our sunroom to start seedlings. My mom has a large yard, but needs someone younger to help garden the space. She and her husband are providing the land and compost, and my kids and I are providing the muscle and seedlings. Together we’re planning a big garden to serve both our families! 👩🌾
Good morning. My family sold our SoCal home, packed our life into a Pod and put it all into storage. We landed in SC about a week and a half ago. In CA we had a small backyard garden, a small worm farm, and a dozen chickens. When life changed and the the shelves emptied. We decided then that we wanted more. It took a lot of courage to even entertain the thoughts of relocating our family of 6 out of the city and into a more rural area where we could obtain acreage. The more crazy CA got the more courage it took for my husband and I to look outside of CA. But we have a dream ... a vision, and we are determined to see this through. I miss my garden and chickens. I want them back so bad it hurts sometimes. I dream of getting a couple cows and pigs ... And goats for cheese, milk, and soap. Please pray with me. Dear Heavenly Father, thank you for all of the blessings that you have given my family. Thank you for our health and patients towards each other in this time of uncertainty. Dear Heavenly Father, please bring light to our property soon. We are so anxious to start this new adventure under your love and security. In Jesus' name, Amen.
Thank you for praying with me. I hope your day is filled with laughter and love.
Don't forget that localizing your food sources has a positive impact on the environment which helps everyone.
“Sorry about my cow, she’s in heat. She’s very enthusiastic about it “😂 favorite quote ever!!
We have the same thing happening here! Thanks for the video and the ideas! You are why I started gardening 2 years ago 😍
I might buy that t-shirt. Lol 😂😂😂
This made me LOL
Gardening is also soooo good for your mental health. I have put myself in a meditative trance before by just pulling weeds and digging in the earth. You also can’t beat the small pleasures of admiring beauty in the garden and snacking on something delicious that you’ve grown…. and also the satisfaction of seeing my honey bees and the fat bumblebees rolling in pollen and collecting nectar, that’s the best!
My only addition to your wonderful information to newbies is to not let it overwhelm you. Pick one small project, break it down into small tasks and only focus on that little task. It will add up and give you a sense of accomplishment and encourage to you do more as well as give you valuable knowledge and skills to build upon.
I used to live in a hoa on .24 acres of land. I grew over 300lbs of food in one year. It can be done. You don't need land. YOU CAN do it. Start now. I feel the same as Jess. I want people to succeed and learn and grown your own food.
Jess, I love how you teach us all. I am 61 and disabled living on my deceased husband's social security (900.00) a month. I have a suburban home in Memphis with a large pool, due to my health and money the pool turned into a pond so last spring I got my first ever chickens and ducks. I made a floating duck house from a plastic pallet and a dog house I found on the curb, I turned my plastic shed into a chicken coop, the ducks help keep the mosquitoes down but this year I am building a floating fountain to keep the water moving using a sump pump. Last year I planted tomatoes, peppers, okra, ginger, turmeric, did great, the beats, Lima beans, peas, long beans, squash and watermelon not so much, because of the "pond" and the concrete deck I've been using containers plus I had the chickens in a run. I have since removed the run and let my girls free-range. Last fall my son helped me build raised beds from lumber we salvaged on curbs and I decided to stop mowing grass and turn what little yard I have into gardens so we collected bags of leaves from neighbor's, laid cardboard we collected from dumpsters and started the process of killing the grass. I also dumpster dive and get lots of food for the chickens, my compost and some for us sometimes, I just dehydrated mushrooms, we got 1.5 gallons of dried mushrooms now. I was given a 50' roll of garden fence so I got some T- post and we are putting that up to keep the chickens out of the garden area. I have learned to do all this by watching you and lots of other friends of yours. I have canned in the past, but I plan to do more and try fermenting this year. I dehydrate what I can due to limited freezer space. I pickled eggs back in January and they are good. I was going to put a sign in my yard to sell eggs but I decided against it but I need some other way to sell them as I am over run with eggs, any advice is welcome. Thank you and your fellow homesteaders for giving me the inspiration and help to get me moving and giving me some joy, love watching my chickens and yes my grandkids visit more often and I get joy from passing knowledge onto them. Thank you again and I Bless you..
Wow you are doing so much. I saw a video one time of someone raising talapia in their old swimming pool!
Your story is amazing. It put a huge smile on my face. The hardest thing is just getting started. You saw a dirty pool and went for it. Look at you now. Simply amazing. Maybe leave a note in your neighborhood mailboxes or doors letting them know you have fresh eggs for sale. From one Grandma to another, Becky.
@@carolinakudzu6284 I ordered some but cancelled my order when I learned they die when the water gets below 55 degrees, so maybe once it warms up I may try. I had goldfish but they died from the heat and lack of oxygen so once I get the fountain ⛲ made I may try that again.
How amazing and exciting all that you've accomplished in your yard. Very impressive. Enjoy the journey!
@@alirumba1 I don't live very far from you. I LOVED your post. I garden on a little over an acre a county away from you. Thank you for insiring me. I don't have much help or a lot of funds. But, I do the best I can. Good luck to you and may The Most High be with us all!!!
Jess you have been the greatest teacher, and friend. I started my gardening journey when I found your channel.
Thank you for being that person to stand up and help guied your community towards positivity and wholsomeness.
You really are a huge blessing in my life.
Couldn't have said it better. My gardening life exponentially improved when I found R&R. Not just the hands on but the heart joy as well.
Jess thank you for encouraging people that live in apartments or small yard HOA’s. There are homesteaders or farmers which have UA-cams and they criticize. They call them hobbies or wanna be. Not everyone are fortunate to be able to move to land where they can grow big gardens and have raise animals. They are not wanna be or hobbies they are actual people that are just a concern about their health, the welfare of the country, the food supply chain, and cost of raising food. They do want to be independent as best as they can and you by putting out you tubes as such is a huge encouragement. Thank you again.
Amen!! 💕
Very good point thank you. I live in a rental and have many reasons I want to grow but mostly for the fresh healthy food and the peace of mind in times like these. I encourage anyone in a rental home or apartment if you have space enough for a bucket or bin Grow something! tomatoes are easy forgiving plants to grow in a 5 gallon bucket just look for a determinate variety which will grow smaller than the indeterminate one but still produce loads of fruit.
This comment right here! And some people actually do t aspire to live in the country. They just want good food and food security. It always amazes me how much lettuce I grow and I only dedicate half a raised bed for it. I can’t make myself eat lettuce that I didn’t grow.
You are the reason I was tomato rich last year. First garden at 43 years old and I grew enough tomatoes to feed my family, feed my first flock of chickens, and give hundreds of tomatoes to neighbors and friends.
Thank you! ❤️
I totally agree that we can not LIVE in fear, BUT.... "fear" has turned on the light bulb for people who didn't ever consider our broken food system. Fear, or maybe it is "awareness" , is what started my journey. Don't continue in the fear, but instead, consider what you can do now. I have failed a lot, lol! But each failure, gets me closer to my goals and fear gets pushed aside as I learn what I am able to accomplish.
The only thing you missed with the learning to cook from basics. Learn to can so you can preserve the food you grow.
I only started canning my tomatoes a few years ago and man that was amazing. I was never able to get enough to store for a full year for my family, but the amount that I was able to can enough to help cut my grocery bill. Plus the excitement of eating tomatoes I canned in the winter is amazing.
I have sixty years of experience with gardening and homesteading, and you have a lot of good advice. One thing I would add is, before you bring any animals home, even a handful of baby chicks, be completely set up for them. You may need to change things around later, once you have some experience and maybe see a better way to do things. But one of the biggest mistakes people make -- and I've done it myself -- is getting animals when you aren't ready for them. That leads to problems -- loose animals, predators getting at them, animals getting into all kinds of trouble, animals getting sick. And it makes people end up regretting the animals, when the experience could have been much better if they'd only gone at it the right way around.
The other thing I'd add is to start small. No matter how bad things look, no matter how much you want to all of a sudden be producing all of your food, right now, this year, each homesteading activity is a new skill to learn, with new equipment and facilities needed. If you've never gardened, don't try to manage an acre garden your first try -- start with maybe a 20' x 20' section of the back yard (as close to the kitchen door as you can manage, or it will be neglected). If you've never kept any kind of livestock -- or even any kind of animal at all, don't jump in over your head with chickens AND pigs AND dairy animals AND rabbits AND sheep all in one year. Start small. You might manage chickens and rabbits your first year. Or just a cow, or just a couple of dairy goats, or just a couple of feeder pigs. But don't try to do it all at once if you are new to keeping livestock. There is so much to learn! And there is so much equipment needed, and facilities to house/fence the stock, and places to store their feed and bedding, and you need to be able to keep fresh, clean water in front of them at all times. There are medical things you will need to learn to watch for and to deal with. If you try to do everything at once, it's likely that none of it will be done well, you'll be stressed, your projects and animals will suffer, and you'll come out the other end saying, that was too much work and too much headache, and I don't want to do that anymore. Take smaller bites, and chew thoroughly before adding another animal or another project, or making your garden four times bigger.
So, real quick, I just wanted to share this epiphany I had today: I bought two $80 grow lights at Home Depot and cringed doing so. Then I realized, no matter what happens outside my yard (I live in Flagstaff where we have a 60 day growing season on average) these grow lights mean I can have FOOD growing INSIDE no matter what! This is the kind of investing that brings me peace of mind and confidence when the fear creeps in.
So if you need to get something, this might be an option. Get a small fan and watch your seedlings grow up big and strong! Happy growing, everyone! Lean in to that Grace of the Lord!
EXCELLENT video Ms. Jessica. Loved hearing you say "this is the southern girl in me talkin; eat red beans and rice." I too am from a southern heritage, way southern; Mexico. My Mexican grandmother taught me how to make home-made Pinto beans and Spanish rice. She also taught me how to make flour tortillas. While my wife and I raised four kids, these cooking skills that I learned from "Nana" were a great blessing as I am now able to pass these blessings on to my own grandchildren. God Bless your family.
Jack, I had a friend whose Abuela would cook tortillas from scratch. I've tried to make them myself but they've never been as good as hers. I need that Abuela magic touch!
@@RootsandRefugeFarm Well, when you guys come up to visit the REDWOODS you can stop by and I'll show you how I make the "healthy" flour tortillas with unbleached flour, avocado oil, salt and water version. I make them half whole wheat/ half unbleached for my grandbabies. They love making quesadillas with them. God bless.
Please do share the recipe.
Thank you for not installing fear in the hearts and minds of those who are afraid of shortages. I've watched a couple other channels who, in my opinion, are trying to install fear and like you said working together to teach and help others without making them fearful is a smart thing to do!
Same. I was in a live last night that was telling people that within 3 years all the cows will be outlawed and destroyed and we will all be forced to eat plant based synthetic burgers... I couldn't listen anymore. I had to turn it off.
@@WickedAwesomeGardening yeah my Subscribed To list has reduced lately for this very reason.
@@sandra127100 and this Sandra has done that also!
She’s doing exactly what she should do. I appreciated all she said and more power to her!
Keep the knowledge you can use discard the rest.
Jess prior to watching your channel I was a April - July gardner. Bed prep in April, planting in May and giving up by July weeds squirrels birds I just always gave up. Now I seed start in January & August and harvest food May through the following February. (Zone 8)
Thanks for the motivation.
Bravo!!! Way to go Tonya!
This is such a beautiful comment. It encourages me and I bet it makes Jess and her family quite happy too. Isn't it wonderful to watch their success and know that part of that success is possible because of their desire to help others. Pay it forward really does work miracles. It's a bit like gardening. Don't give up if it fails once in a while!!! ;)
@Tonya Matthews I’m also in zone 8 and am having such fun experimenting with two gardening seasons! I was giving up when the South Carolina sun got too hot in mid July and august
@@shodson314 Yes. I live in Virginia Beach and the sun and humidity here is similar to South Carolina. It takes dedication to pull through July & August 🙂
Agreed never grew fall garden until you didn't seed start until u been garden for year prior
I live in east coast Canada. When Covid started I knew, a garden and a freezer were what I needed. It's been two years. I have made a point of buying extra tins of this and that, pasta , bean, lentils. I'm not fully self sufficient, but my trips to the grocery store are so much less. I'm 70, so it's hard work, but really good exercise too. I really like what you have to say, Hope for the best, prepare for...well, not optimum conditions. Thanks.
Tips from a 1/10 of an acre homestead:
Chickens: give/sell eggs to your neighbors if you have too many. I never have a problem finding someone in my downtown neighborhood who wants fresh eggs from happy chickens.
Compost: if you’re in a small space, a spinning composter or worm bin are good options
Garden: get a good book about gardening in your local area. There is probably a local gardening group as well. It’ll give you a good place to start in your particular climate
Start from seed: great activity to do with your kids! My kindergartner loved spraying the seeds with water last spring. You can get many of them going on a windowsill.
Cook from staples: I am personally focusing on this one in particular right now. Learn just a couple basic recipes that you can adjust to the season and whatever produce you can get. Beans, rice, oatmeal, sourdough.
Even just small steps will make a huge difference! Thank you Jess for the practical, empowering teaching and wisdom you put out in the world.
Another great resource is local libraries, historical societies, living history museums, gardens and community programs. It's amazing what you can learn. Just recently my daughter and I took a woodstove/hearthside cooking class at a local museum. We spent the day preparing recipes from scratch and cooking them like our ancestors did. It's good to know that we have the knowledge if we needed it. And it was a lot of fun!
Even though I don't have my own flock yet, (few weeks I will hopefully) I think Quail are a great first starter animal also. Especially for a single person or a couple. Although the eggs are small, it doesn't take long to build up stock with young layers of only 6 weeks of age. You can even house quail indoors like a parakeet or hamster. The care, cage and food are a mixture of both. Routine is key and it's a great way to add fuel to a compost pile.
Thanks for sharing your knowledge Jess. You are dearly appreciated! God bless.
What are you feeding your quail?I had them for a bit but I didn't like getting them different foods from the chickens/ducks.
They used to have quail years ago, and eventually faded them out.
@@barefootfarmandcattery1159 once they get to adulthood at 6 weeks I feed the egg flock the same as chicken layer feed and got an egg a day from each hen. When they're growing I do give them chick starter feed just so they have the extra protein for the fast growth.
We tried quail, they all died. NOT sure why, but my guess is that where we got them they sold us super OLD ones. But I am not for sure.
Brilliant. I literally just asked that question 😊
We fully moved onto our farm Dec 2019 a few months before covid. We moved without any food stores and only 7 chickens who were not laying yet. I was definitely freaked right the heck out when the store shelves were bare. We had just barely started our homestead and were barely growing anything at the time. At the time it was all just dreams. Boy, have we come a long way in a short time! We feel much more prepared and secure now.
I'm taking care of my mom who had a stroke and I find that my 8 hens give more than enough eggs. Got 2 roosters and will turn them out together within 2 months. Haven't raised chicks other than from the Tractor supply store so hopefully this goes well. If I can do this take care of mom n garden then can, freeze or dehydrate. I'm sure anyone can do it..Yes it is hard work, you need to tend to it frequently (daily), but it is doable if you are motivated. Congratulations on acquiring a homestead. Keep pushing forward even if I rd s just baby steps and it will come together.
Where are you located? I'm in NE Michigan.
@@kristinestanden6850 we have probably 60 chickens now and so much more! We live in southwestern KY!
"Not to be afraid, but to feel secure." Priceless 💕
I started on a bread making adventure 5 months ago, I have perfected the bread that we like by following your advice. Jess, you said many times "not to let anyone tell you that it can't be done, try it anyway". You may not have meant it literally, but I Googled that you couldn't combine sourdough and yeast in bread making, because they have different rising times. Well! we don't like just sourdough bread, so I experimented and grew my sourdough starter first, then combined two cups of starter with my yeast bread mix and let it sit for two hours together, then followed the directions for any bread dough and it made the best bread we have ever tasted. We never buy bread any more. I'm working on a hamburger bun recipe now. I alternate twice a week, between making homemade biscuits and bread, then freeze some. My digestion has improved and I expect to make all my bread needs from now on. Thanks for your inspiration.
I’m not alone! I have tried and tried and I just dont like sourdough bread. I was so proud the first time my starter lived long enough to make bread. It’s darn good to know how to do it in a pinch, but..just yuck. I am inspired by you to give this method a whirl and see if I can find a good balance in my bread. Thank you so much for sharing this!!
I would actually love to have your bread recipe if you are willing to share it. (Already picturing the first tomato sandwich of the season. 🤞)
Had you thought of doing a video to share your technique as I am very picky with homemade bread and have been discouraged in the past with my results.
The internet is full of opinions! You obviously proved that mixing the two works. I used to work in a bakery where we had some bread recipes that used both a starter and yeast.
@LindaSueRussell will you share your recipe?
Hi Jess. Love that you approached this subject without promoting fear. Just another thought in preparedness. My husband and I are now in our 70s and have always wanted chickens but won’t work in our small space and with regulations so we just recently found another way to be self sufficient in a small area. We have a garden and have canned, dehydrated, and freeze dry but still wanted meat and eggs so are now getting into quail. They need very little space. We have a double layered cage 8foot by two foot. You can have 3 quail per square foot. We’ll have eggs and meat and no regulations for coturnix quail. Also quail is more nutritional that chicken eggs. Lots of health benefits. You can have males so you can get fertilized eggs to incubate. Myshire farms on UA-cam has videos and all you need to know to get started. They are on live on Sunday night and Monday to answer any questions.
Single mom gardener here & loving it! Learning what we think are weeds that are edible is an important thing to know too! You make us all more brave Jes!! Ty!
I love gardening, and in the last few years , I had an organic garden on my apartment balcony.....was a blessing during the pandemic.
Thanks to you my garden skills have improved 100x over.. N this year im expanding garden spots again.. Have rabbits n chickens n quial. Thats my fertilzer n i catch rain water.. Theres 7 fruit trees now. Plan on getin 2 more this year. Theres 5 berry bushes n a red raspberry n strawberry patches. Asparagus ruhbarb chard n kale. Most of my flowers are ate able.. Summer to fall my feed bill is almost zero.. I freeze n can n dyhydrate.. Got a herb garden spot.. N thats all thanks to watching you.. Wish i could find somebody with a cow so i could get milk n make butter n cheese.
Because I don’t have outdoor space, I practice and learn a lot of home preservation, scratch cooking, fermenting, and herbalism. That’s my classroom right now
I know I've said it on some of your other videos before, but I want to point out again that if you receive SNAP benefits (food stamps) you can buy seeds and food-producing plants at your local big box stores that accept those benefits. This also includes herbs. We bought about $300 worth of seeds last year with these benefits between the Spring through Summer and now have a healthy stockpile of things to grow, including new things we want to try growing and eating.
Also, if you can't do chickens (we can't because our old grumpy dog will kill them) rabbits are a decent way to start with meat production. The feed isn't that expensive, you can supplement from your garden, and they have a decently quick turnaround once you get started. We just harvested six rabbits, will do another batch in less than a week, and 15 in about 8 more weeks. This was from 2 females and one male. We also have 2 more females we will be breeding in about 2 weeks. Our "hutches" and grow outs are made from scraps and dump hauls from our neighbor and we plan on building more out of free pallets this year. Start small and build from there. Also, rabbit poop is a garden gold mine and it doesn't need to be composted.
Invest in ways to preserve your food. Food dehydrators are decently cheap, or you can learn how to sun dry foods. Pressure canners, while expensive to start, are worth the long-term investment.
Also, places like Walmart often sell their food-grade buckets from their bakery for a buck or so with lids, so you can start buying simple things like flour and sugar in bulk. Ask around and make connections. =)
We can’t do chickens in our neighborhood (it may not stop us though 🫣) but i never thought of rabbits.
@@mdodgenwellness They're pretty easy to maintain, and once you get used to the dispatch they're quick to clean for the fridge. We bought some New Zealand/ Rex mutts to start us off and they provide some decent meat for our house.
Great information for those of us who can't keep chickens!!
Baker creek doesnt accept ebt for their seeds yet 💔
@@bradysweitzer1939 I know. A lot of big seed places don't. But you can get good seeds at Walmart and other grocers that sell seeds and food products that take EBT benefits. I save my cash seed purchses for uncommon things, and start small. Spend the five dollars on a new seed and the shipping. Over time you'll accumulate a nice "cash" seed haul lol
Hi there! I just wanted to come on here and thank you so much for all the information you share. I started a balcony garden during quarantine, using your videos to help teach me how to be a better gardener. Two years later, I moved to Tennessee and I'm building a farm-to-table bakery from scratch. We're putting in raised beds for gardening next week and I have herbs and edible flower seeds started on my kitchen table. Quarantine really showed me how sustainable I wanted to be. My first farm animals are going to be ducks instead of chickens. They may be a little messier but they'll eat all the bugs that may attack my garden. And as a baker their eggs are larger and more consistent than chicken eggs which helps me out a lot. Thank you for never feeding into the fear and giving out as much information as you can!
Jess, what a good encouragement for people to start. I live in a rental house in town with a low budget. I asked my landlord if I could put in a garden. He said yes so I started small and it has grown bigger every year now for, this will be year 4. I dig out new spaces with a shovel as I go, every year,save all my seeds + some from the veggies I have bought at the store, start them in my house under the windows,use what I have as best as I can. I didnt even have a water hose until this past year. I used 5 gal. buckets. Just started composting last year also. I couldnt buy anything to stake the tomato plants so I pruned branches off my trees and used them & the trees keep growing lol. I only buy what I have to and sometimes what I want, usually new seeds lol.The cost for all the food I grow is minimal. And produces alot of food. If you need to buy something do it a little at a time as you need it. Best of all my landlord doesnt seem to mind. I'm just making the ground better. 😊 so go for it and dont worry about what you dont have. You can!🤗.... and also listen to Jess! She has encouraged and helped me quite a bit and many others also. Thank you Jess!😊
WATER
I want to add one thing that people do not think about often in this realm of things. Another huge part of food sustainability is having a sustainable water source. Depending on where you live, it is not uncommon to have water shortages or to have pipes get contaminated and be unsafe to use for a few weeks. I live in Florida with hurricanes, so I know all about the second one.
So another way to ensure you and your family have food security is to ensure you have a water filtration system. Perhaps a berkey or even just a little lifestraw, so when there is no public access to water or your water well is down/dry, you have a backup plan of some sort. You need water to live, guys
For us balcony homesteaders, I’ve found a lot of benefit in growing herbs, baby arugula, baby spinach, green onions, and celery as cut and come again crops. I also plant smaller batches of alliums that ripen at different times ie) leeks, shallots, onions, etc. This way I don’t have to run to the store for a quick side or for aromatics when I cook. The greens also sub well for parsley. Parsley and cilantro don’t always grow well for me and I prefer arugula’s peppery bite.
You are a gift and blessing to the homestead and self sustainability community Jess!!Last summer I Was looking at my pile of winter squashes drying in the sun for winter storage and saw the price of squash per pound in the store and felt so rich and blessed.. I totally have felt the cherry tomato rich feeling many times
I started this year learning what I could do on my 2/3 acre semi-suburban piece of land. It is amazing what you can do in a small space. I am documenting my efforts on UA-cam and I find it helps keep me motivated. I am learning so many amazing skills.
Subscribing to you now. I love the idea of your channel!
Even your temporary garden looks better than my 2 year garden. My husband also makes fun of me because I kill everything. I ignore him though. Even if things die like plants I don't care, it makes me feel better. Looking at seedlings 🌱 sprout helps my mental health.
Jess, you fill a niche that I could never fill. I was born into the homestead lifestyle although my generation called it farming. Coming into this lifestyle, as a personal choice, you know the steps and how to explain/teach them to beginners. I do not have those skills. I grew up taking the self-sufficient lifestyle and gardening for granted. We had a 40-acre truck garden, processed 200 chickens in a weekend, milked our own cows, slaughtered them on the farm, everything was made from scratch, cream and butter came from our milk.
So keep up the good work of teaching well the basic skills for those who really want to learn.
Stay blessed.
I thank the lord every day for my parent raising me to live off the land,canning and preserving. If not for growing and preserving we wouldn't have eat during the winter.We were a poor family of 8. Our farm kept us alive. We eat beans, corn,potatoes tomatoes and cornbread daily. We survived then and we will survive now. For that I'm grateful. ❤
Well done Jess!! You are truly one of God's faithful servants with Wisdom and knowledge filled with Peace and understanding that you're sharing with the world!! I love your sincere honest heart, work ethic and the way you are fulfilling your dreams with your family along with making your classroom part of ours! I've learned so much from you & continue to share this knowledge with others asking along my journey! I love your SC farm coming together! God is Good! I Bless You in Return!
God is good all the time!
@@camicri4263 And all the time, God is good!
@@Romans828girl Amen! He sure is!
I love that you say "turn your waiting room into a classroom" because that is exactly what I have been doing while I wait for a better job to come along so that I can save and buy my first little homestead that I can retire on.
Over the last couple of years I've started taking more and more of an interest in the food production chain, the environmental aspects of our way of life and the changes that we could easily make to take a step in the right direction.
So after reducing the variety of products, focusing more on seasonal and regional produce and learning to make more and more things from scratch, I finally dove into growing our own food. I started with a small container garden at our apartment and grew a few tomato plants, cucumbers, blueberries, strawberries and some herbs. Things escalated quickly 😅 one year later we rented a garden and are now in our third year of growing our own food. We don't grow every fruit or vegetable that we eat and that's not our goal. But we grow some of the things that we really enjoy eating. Last years garden was almost a complete loss due to really poor weather conditions. But this only means that we are itching to start gardening season. We are planning on growing our most abundant garden this year. Tomatoes in different varieties, cucumbers, zucchini, peppers, chili, pumpkins, radishes, greens, beans, peas, cabbages, kohlrabi, onions, garlic, potatoes, herbs, eggplants, broccoli, cauliflower, leeks, celery the list goes on. The first seedlings have already been started and the first round of transplanting them into bigger pots is coming up next week to make room for the March round of seeds to start. You are one of my major inspirations and my favorite source of gardening advice because we are growing in comparable zones and you are amazing at teaching the ways of the garden. Thank you so much for sharing your knowledge and being such an inspiration!
1. Chicken math. 6 months of 5 laying hens = 1 years worth of feed.
2. Plastic coffee containers make great kitchen compost bins for those with little space.
3. Gardening. Don't be afraid to fail or get creative.
4. Don't forget about storage. Include storage into your garden and scratch cooking plans.
I'm no pro by any means but I've implemented all these thing on less than 1/4 of an acre in the suburbs.
Jess thank you for helping to inspire others like myself.
Definitely look into rabbits as a meat source. They are easier and cheaper than chickens as a meat source. Chickens for eggs (and eventually a jar of canned meat at the end of their production) have a lot of value. Rabbits have a lot of value for cheap easy meat. Easy to raise and butcher. Plus the poo won't burn your garden!
You don’t fear the future bc you’re a Proverbs 31 woman and God has you! What a treasure you and your family are! AR misses you!! I bless you!
Last year I finally put my foot down and started a garden. A lot of it was my daughters age and wanting her to grow up with a garden. I only have an okish sized back patio, but I have a raised bed, 2 green stalks, and a ton of pots. Last year was only supposed to ease me in with some flowers and a couple edible things like lettuce, but I turned into the plant hospital and most of what I grew was starts my friends ended up giving me or me learning new things and deciding to jump into learning to grow potatoes. This year I'm just going full force with starting most everything from seed and growing a lot of new things. I finally learned to can last year too and can't wait to do more this year. One day I'll have the big garden and I can grow everything I need, but I can do a pretty good amount right now even if it's a bit cramped.
I’ve become extremely satisfied at having some thing, almost everyday of the year, that I have grown myself! It’s my spice of life!
Starting a balcony garden for the first time this summer! Not for fear of lack, but just for the creativity and joy of trying new and fun plants. Your enthusiasm for beautiful plants and seeing things grow is contagious!
It so much fun :D I was playing in the dirt today repotting some herbs and time just flew by.
Oh I'm excited for you to try this this year. Enjoy the journey!
I hear your cow mooing n I think of my grandma coming to back door n yelling at my grandpa. "Get that girl a man!!" Joke between them. Then they would just laugh. This city girl understands now. Whoa. Lol.
Jess, you are a most gifted natural born teacher. It is a privilege and a pleasure to learn from you. Looking forward to a lifetime of your classes 😊
When you have chickens you don't only have eggs, but manure and gorgeous pets that love cuddles and like to follow you around and scratch and hunt snails and other bugs, when you garden, not only do you grow food but you get exercise, sunshine fresh air dirty hands and if really successful you can share with your friends family and neighbours, you stop the food miles that contribute to pollution you know what's on the food and there is no excess packaging to go into land fill. It's truly a win win situation.
Just love your spirit, your messages, your heart. God bless you Jess. I started my journey on a 9th floor apartment balcony. Grew some lettuce and cherry tomatoes. I’m now out in the country and have chickens and getting started on my seeds. My chilies are inch high inside my kitchen on the fireplace hearthstone and I’m excited about getting some potatoes in the ground soon.
A reminder about chickens, after 3 to 4 years they slow down to almost nothing. So they need to be replaced with younger birds and take into mind the time from "birth" to laying eggs takes time so don't wait until you are almost out of eggs to add the new ones. Live not in fear but having faith that God has you covered and will give you what you need to live either by grace or knowledge. I can honestly say from the very first of this with the media using their fearmongering to keep you down, I have lived my life, gone to my church weekly, and loved visiting my family and my neighbors! Thank you, Jess, for giving hope and not spreading more fear! So many times and places in the Bible tell you to not live in fear but live by Faith!
KJV; 2 Timothy 1:7 - For God hath not given us the spirit of fear; but of power, and of love, and of a sound mind.
Hebrews 13:6 - So that we may boldly say, The Lord is my helper, and I will not fear what man shall do unto me.
1 John 4:18 - There is no fear in love; but perfect love casteth out fear: because fear hath torment. He that feareth is not made perfect in love.
Psalms 23:4 - Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me; thy rod and thy staff they comfort me.
Deuteronomy 31:8 - And the LORD, he it is that doth go before thee; he will be with thee, he will not fail thee, neither forsake thee: fear not, neither be dismayed.
Psalms 27:1 - (A Psalm of David.) The LORD is my light and my salvation; whom shall I fear? the LORD is the strength of my life; of whom shall I be afraid?
John 14:27 - Peace I leave with you, my peace I give unto you: not as the world giveth, give I unto you. Let not your heart be troubled, neither let it be afraid.
Romans 8:15 - For ye have not received the spirit of bondage again to fear; but ye have received the Spirit of adoption, whereby we cry, Abba, Father.
Isaiah 41:10 - Fear thou not; for I am with thee: be not dismayed; for I am thy God: I will strengthen thee; yea, I will help thee; yea, I will uphold thee with the right hand of my righteousness.
Psalms 23:1-6 - (A Psalm of David.) The LORD is my shepherd; I shall not want. (Read More...)
Psalms 34:4 - I sought the LORD, and he heard me, and delivered me from all my fears.
Matthew 10:31 - Fear ye not therefore, ye are of more value than many sparrows.
Psalms 27:14 - Wait on the LORD: be of good courage, and he shall strengthen thine heart: wait, I say, on the LORD.
Isaiah 43:1-2 - But now thus saith the LORD that created thee, O Jacob, and he that formed thee, O Israel, Fear not: for I have redeemed thee, I have called thee by thy name; thou art mine. (Read More...)
Proverbs 14:27 - The fear of the LORD is a fountain of life, to depart from the snares of death.
Jeremiah 39:17-18 - But I will deliver thee in that day, saith the LORD: and thou shalt not be given into the hand of the men of whom thou art afraid.
Luke 12:7 - But even the very hairs of your head are all numbered. Fear not therefore: ye are of more value than many sparrows.
Jessica you have helped me SO MUCH with my garden, my whole outlook on life - I can't even say. Thank you and best wishes to you and your family.
Same! So thankful for you Jess! God is using you to change lives. Thank you for following His guidance for your life. ❤️
So glad you brought up the fact that you don't need a large property to grow your own food. Living in a small town right on main Street and surrounded by neighbors, I'm still able to grow and raise a lot of what we eat. Fruits, veggies, eggs, meat birds, and honey all on under an acre. I wasted many years saying I'd start after I had more land, a bigger tractor, ect.. learn from my mistake and jump in no matter how small, anything is better than nothing. Love your channel and can't wait for all of Jeremiah's build videos
Thanks to you Jess and other homesteading channels that I've taken lessons/encouragement from, I was able to have a complete meal of boiled green bananas and yam with callalloo and spinach seasoned with escallion (green onions) from my back yard garden for my breakfast this past Sunday. I also have tomatoes, carrots grown in containers, ginger, pak choy growing in raised beds in my small backyard. Also herbs and fruits. God bless you all for blessing others with your channel.
"Yardy" lol Jamaican?
We started with chickens and a small raised bed about 5 years ago. Not realizing how much we were learning with failures that we experienced. Fast forward 5 years we have a small goat herd - they are mostly our landscapers but they will serve their purpose in a time when we may need more from them. We added beef cattle and put a bull calf in the freezer. This all happened in 2019 right before the “point of reference”. We now have a 10x 20 in ground garden and 4 raised beds. It’s a process. All about learning. We learn a lot from you and Miah!
I think this is one of your best and comes on a day we’re all thinking of war. The victory garden has been on my mind a ton. Not due to fear but family security. Grateful for you, your family and the victory garden series you mentioned a long time ago. Blessings to you.
I have made contacts with a local diary and chicken farmer to get my eggs raw milk and chicken from the source instead of the store and so much healthier! Everyone can do this.
You just Hit it out of the park Jess ! The exact thing I loved when I 1st started watching you years ago turn your waiting room into a classroom back when you were living with a smaller space and just starting things in a bag of soil with a tub on top! Love it!💖
I go through episodes of making sourdough bread then don't for awhile. Every time I start again...I literally start again. I have to learn all over. But After the first time I was no longer scared. "I have made bread in the past...I can do it again". Jesse you inspired me to start again....just put me some flour and water out and made some starter (always the best when you grow from the yeasts around you). I am now feeding four adults and did the math and am saving about $500 a year just by making the bread. That just about covers the inflation we have in my area. So while everyone else is talking about increased grocery bills, mine actually went down. Just want to let you know I am not a Christian...but I watch to the end of every video just to hear you Bless me. Makes my heart rise up. Thanks for your great content.
This is our second year of having laying hens, and we have a freezer full of chicken and turkey that we raised last summer. It’s such a comfort to have all the proteins we need on hand. It was a learning curve but totally worth it.
Also research the wild foods around you. My first greens are wild. Some grow in mid winter. Growing food takes time until harvest. So look what you can harvest around you before that. Lambs Quarters are just like spinach and packed with nutrition. Wild mustards and amaranth as well. Dandelions are amazing food and medicine too. If you are limited on space think of plants like kale which is nutrient dense to grow. And if stocking up on rice and beans and things like that, do not forget spices! As a trained chef and a person who has known hunger, you still want flavors! I always look at nutrient information when picking out say beans. Which one has more protein, more essential nutrients. Because all beans are not the same. It is not hard to be responsible for your food. It is not prepping, or hoarding. It is responsibility. So much research out there! And my favorite book that no one seems to mention anymore is The Encyclopedia of Country Living by the late and brilliant, Carla Emery! Every homesteader, urban or country, should have this book! Great chat Jess! No fear, just responsibility!
Thank you. We are starting our sustainable journey. I won't be driven by fear. I'll take this step by step process as mindfully as I can. Just going to be working on establishing our garden and learning proper canning.
excellent attithude!!
Hi Jess! We are urban homesteaders and work very hard to try to do what we can to ensure our food is ethically sourced...so the backyard to the rescue. We cannot keep chickens, but can keep quail. We have a flock of 30 quail (we just rejuvenated our flock) to keep us in eggs. Yes, it takes 4-5 quail eggs to equal one chicken egg, but is a doable option in our area.
Absolutely. I have lived the learned wisdom of having to start small. When things failed, my losses were smaller. And I gained understanding. Now that I’m exploring another interest of mine, bushcrafting, and my budget is very limited, i’m learning a lot before I invest in higher priced tools. I’m also gaining more skills.
I love growing fresh sprouts on my kitchen window in a jar during the winter when I am missing the garden. Alfalfa, fenugreek, clover, radish, and broccoli are some of my favorites.😋
Hello first of all Jess you have kept my father who was going to be 90 God willing in July happy he enjoys your videos we watched them all through the beginning of the pandemic we watched you move from one place to the other thank you for that, I grew up with the generation of family call in the garden victory garden, we’ve grown Staples peas corn green beans tomatoes variety of squashes, I have learned so much from you keep doing what you’re doing. I remember watching one of your videos and saying have a place to sit in your garden and enjoy it thank you for that I did it last year and I enjoyed it immensely. I’ve learned to barter with people I live in a suburban area but not far from me is the country and a few people are doing small farming and I was able to barter some of my canned goods I do can tomatoes salsa jams and jellies during the pandemic and we were able to barter some of my canned goods for eggs. Your idea with your seeds and you storing them and those plastic containers love that I’m gonna utilize that this year.. here’s a tip you had mentioned friend who has space perhaps using chickens, a friend of mine she and another friend found a place where they could get half a cow and they split the cost and they both have small families and they were able to split the cow if you will and get steaks and burgers and what not and they were able to put it in the freezer I thought that was a really good idea so if anybody’s out there that lives in the urban areas like I do and you want to stock up on beef beef is expensive if you know somebody maybe you guys can go in together and do it that way… thank you for all that you and your family doing the best of luck to you and again, my daddy is your big is hero. Many blessings to you and yours
Guys I started growing food in a couple of cheap large plastic flower pots that I made sure had holes in the bottom for drainage. I bought Bonnie (brand) plant starts from a big box store.
I grew a green pepper plant and a tomato plant.
I bought bagged "Potting Mix" ... don't use garden soil in pots, it's too heavy. I also bought a bag of Cotton Burr Compost (you could use any compost) and I mixed them together about 50/50.
They grew like wildfire. Keep them watered but not too wet. Stick your fingers in soil to see if dry before watering. Give them plenty of sun and watch you grow food.
This little way of starting is less scary and lots more manageable and it might just send you on a path to success! I still struggle with my raised bed garden at times but you just cannot quit. ⭐️
Thank you Jess! Just wanted you to know that today I decided that I'm going to "do UA-cam like it's my job!" You're always an inspiration! ❤
I don’t comment often on this channel because of the sheer volume of comments and the fact that most of the time what I’d say has already been said. This has been said too but I don’t think you can hear thank you enough. You approached this topic with grace and presented information in a way that hopefully won’t feel overwhelming to viewers who feel a sense or urgency but have have no idea what to do.
I started a garden last year and will do it again this year mostly because of you!!!! And we plan to get a homestead property in the next 5 years
I love how no nonsense you are at the end. You are imparting knowledge which might save people. Excellent video
Every time when I am picking my tomatoes I am thanking you for encouraging me to start growing 3 years ago. Now I have capsicum, tomatoe and the very first time I will have pumpkin so far I counted 5, I have few herbs. Slowly I am expending my food garden. My only problem is we are on a slope and water availability is in the middle. So logic would be plant on the front so I can gravity feed but not enough space. The way the property layout is a big challenge. But still I am grateful what I have.
You are so correct about backyard chickens being the gateway drug to homesteading. One minute I had 4 chickens, the next I have 11 (and continuing to add) and I’m putting in a greenhouse and looking for sources of raw milk so I can make my own butter. 😂
Do you know that you can make butter with any cream? It's nice to have raw milk but not necessary.
@@bota7763 this is true! I really just like the idea of making it from the raw milk. 😊
Such a great video Jess, thank you!!
For everyone else, here’s my tiny tip - do whatever you can to lessen your food waste! For me, it was a GAME-CHANGER to get a dehydrator and learn to work with dehydrated produce. It was my gateway to serious food preserving and I cannot recommend it enough. A lot less work than canning, a lot more hands off & can get a lot of shelf stable produce in your pantry. There’s a women named Darcy who was a UA-cam/FB/Insta called The Purposeful Pantry & she has everything you need to know to get started.
Plus, if nothing else, just make some dehydrated mini marshmallows, you’ll thank me later!!
Can I chip in about dehydrating. I'm severely disabled/chronic illness. There are so many things I cannot do, but dehydrating is something I CAN do. So if you enjoy homesteading, but have limited capacity, this is quite achievable
This video makes perfect sense, and it's good to hear someone actually saying it. Surprisingly (in the U.K.), I have done all these things (before seeing this UTube) on a much smaller scale, in a town house. 2 Greenstalks, six chickens, a small wormary, a couple of fruit trees in the garden, and a snall greenhouse. It saves a fortune on shopping, and I often have spares to share with neighbours 😊😊😊
YAY! love it! I've been moving in this direction for the last 2 years. I've learned SO much from working with what I've got. It started with a small compost pile while my husband and I lived with his parents for a year in a small suburban yard. Then sourdough, pickling, fermenting, sewing, and learning to cook from scratch. We recently moved from our tiny efficiency studio into our first home and finally have a yard! It's SUPER small and in the high desert but I am stoked to turn it into a micro food forest. One thing at a time! Getting my compost system back up and I am really excited to plant a small garden this spring. Even though my dream is to have lush green rich land and space, It's not what my reality looks like. When I look back though at the last few years I can see how much I've learned and grown from all the skills I've been focusing on. All this growth happened while living in my inlaw's basement and while living in a tiny one-room studio in a large city. Imagine what I can accomplish in a tiny backyard and actual home with my family:) If I hadn't started when I did then I wouldn't have the knowledge to build upon now.
Words of WISDOM! I can’t wait to see your new garden! There is always something I take from your videos.
I think if you’re just starting out in gardening with limited space, growing a few tomato and pepper plants in 5 gallon buckets is a cheap way to get started. They can produce a lot of food if they grow well and are very versatile to put in soups or stir fry or make great salsa. If you’ve got a bit more space, I highly recommend growing lettuce in the fall and spring. I got so much lettuce last fall from one of my 4x10’ beds that it more than paid for the time and money spent on seeds. Jess even has a video on growing lettuce in a bag of soil if you don’t have a garden space.
I’ve seen a lot of folks use lack of space as a crutch to why they can’t grow their own food. I firmly believe that other priorities outweigh self sufficient food production rather than space for these individuals.
You are so right I grew 4 plants one year and had to throw away tomatoes they produced so much. anyone limited for space can grow in a bucket. I encourage anyone to grow at least one plant this year.💯
Food preservation is also key to sustainability. Jess has addressed this in other videos. Goodwill is an excellent source for finding inexpensive food dehydrators. It’s one of those items people buy and often never use.
Non-winterized chest freezers are another economical food preservation option. Since these chest freezers were to remain inside my house and not my garage I didn’t need the more expensive winterized freezers.
Dehydrating not only preserves well it also saves storage space. On average a gallon of fresh vegetables dehydrates down to a quart of dehydrated vegetables. If you turn that into powder with a dedicated coffee grinder for something like onions, peppers or tomatoes that reduces down to a pint.
Vegetables I want to pressure can go straight into the freezer then I use the cooler fall weather as pressure canning time.
With chest freezers, dehydrators and pressure canning I can grow and preserve most of my own veggies and berries for the year in an urban downtown rowhouse 40’ x 30’ garden.
The garden is where I find true happiness. It’s beautiful to have your hobby hold so much value. I will strive for my farm one day 🌿
Same here Vanessa! I'm urban gardening in a rental in NYC but I can't wait to have a farm one day 🌻
I greatly appreciate your fear statement in the beginning of your vlog. For my mental health, I avoid videos that use fear for clicks, or fear as an intro to "teach". It's not needed. It's you, so I watched, yet usually I see "food security" and the content doesn't share skill-building in a positive affirming manner. Everyone wants to feed their family. Feeding people, how we all do so, is a community reinforcing activity.
I have a backyard garden and am composting, but I need to do so more efficiently as I need more as I am converting lawn to more garden. I haven't tried compost tea but I think it will work for me. I am also donating seeds to a seed swap as I plant 1-3 plants per variety but 170000000 varieties. I have so many extra seeds. I thank you for that content.
I started with a 20x6 garden in 2016 and now half of my backyard is garden. One neighbor thinks it's "tacky", but everyone else has been supportive! I love sharing the goodies.
Oh the joys of suburbia.
I put my started seeds right next to my kitchen because that way I won’t forget about them! 😅
I thank my mother almost each day who thought my sister and I how to cook from scratch at a early age. I thank my parents for teaching us how to and survival skills beginning at a young age. I thank my grandma for showing us each summer for 4 weeks in Tennessee how to take care your farm animals and they will take care of you, how to cook on a wood stove because that's all she had, how to get your water from a well because there was no indoor plumbing and then there was the outhouse! I truly appreciate your message. More people should ask themselves what would I do if it was taken away tomorrow? Am I prepared? Do you know what to do? Can you punt if you don't have some modern conveniences? 2020 should have taught many people many things. The question is did they learn.
I love this and I'm really trying to localize my food sources this year 🧡 I live in NYC and have an urban garden and I'm growing from seed (which I learned from you). As you said you can learn a lot by starting small, my garden actually produces a lot more than I expected! And I'm in a rental. I'm even able to do my own compost which I'm really grateful for. And even though chickens are not a reality for me, I do love supporting the local farmers that sell meat and eggs at the farmers market. I'm also a professional cook so I do most of my cooking at home from scratch and using whole ingredients. I think that cooking at home is a crucial skill to start learning now too. Thank you for sharing all of this information, Jess. I hope you're having a wonderful day 🌻
Hi! Urban apartment dweller, here. How are you composting? I'd love to, but don't have a yard.
Worms under the kitchen sink.
I'm putting in as much as possible on my 1/5 of an acre suburban lot. Chickens, rabbits, garden & now quail. Because I'm in my mid 60's I will not be getting any large animals even if I had the property. I am however, buying meat on the hoof & buying what I can't grow from farmers markets. Starting seeds can be time & space consuming, I winter sow all my cold hardy plants including herbs & flowers. It's so rewarding to have a meal come from my garden & it tastes better also.
Jess, this video is a message of ‘hope’, for the new and the experienced homesteader/gardener/urban and country home keeper. ‘A rising tide raises all ships’.
Thank you for being a light in the world and during such unusual times💐💖
We wanted to be chicken meat independent, like not even having to buy the Cornish Cross chicks from a hatchery independent. It was a substantial investment, but we purchased our first American Bresse chicks from a hatchery, raised them, culled the extra roosters and kept a flock of layers and two roosters (just in case something happened to one). Less than a year later, we have 9 laying hens and a rooster (yep, that extra one bit the dust!). Four weeks ago we hatched out our first clutch of chicks, and have 16 babies growing to become future meals, future laying hens, and our ticket to becoming chicken meat independent from now on. That incubator used to keep us in meat chickens will also keep us in laying hens, ducks, and hopefully geese for the future too!
Thanks for the encouragement. I started my first garden ever this year and I'm 60 years old, and I know I've made some mistakes that I won't be making next year already. I'm still learning and I'm really enjoying it very much. I also started a compost pile (a can) and I toss lots of stuff in it for later use. Hopefully it all works out for me but the journey is coming along and I'm learning lots. Thank you for another great and encouraging video. ❤️😀
P.S. I garden on a 3rd floor porch in containers. I also started buying and storing some food staples for preparedness! 😉 Thanks
We live in the country and have a few friends who don’t have space/desire for chickens, so we raise their chickens. They get all their eggs from us. Our 40 chickens currently feed about 20 people.
Love this list! We make our own compost but I recently discovered that zoos sell composted non- meat eating animal manure called "zoo poo" that they sell cheap which benefits gardeners as well as the zoos to care for the animals. Just a FYI for people who may not have a place to compost and are looking for a source.
I'd like to add to point one about the chickens. We have both chickens (expanded flock with chicken math) and Khaki Campbel ducks and our ducks will reliably lay through winter. Oh! Duck math happens too! Just FYI. :) We were able to bless some friends and family all winter long even though for a portion of the time we were only getting chicken eggs infrequently. Our 5 ducks gave us anywhere from 3-5 eggs every day this winter until they recently started to molt and hit a pause. If ducks are an option, I recommend it to everyone I can. :)
And Jess - Thank you for being an encouragement to all and stressing that no matter where you are, you can start there. Thank you!
We are starting our first garden. Started from seed in our bay window! Super excited to be more self reliant. Thank you for your teachings! Looking forward to the next devotional video!
Welcome to the addiction. Hello my name is Scherilyn and I'm a Gardenaholic.
@@justgoodness333littlehomes5 nice to meet ya! We are starting small in containers so we don't kill ourselves and give up! Trying to be smart about it instead of letting our excitement get us in over our heads!
We have over 200 sq ft of edible gardens, 3 chickens, 3 fruit/nut trees and a 2-bay compost system on less than a quarter acre within the city limits of Portland, Ore. So, yes! Even if you don't have land, you can have food sustainability.
❤️❤️ I have watched you for years but never commented. This is a wonderful vid. I can’t have chickens but thinking about quail (space). Been gardening for about 11 years and most of my knowledge has come from your channel. Thank you for the wonderful advice and total complete honesty/transparency with your channel. This is what keeps me coming back and I always look forward to the next video. Can’t wait for Miah’s channel!!
LOVED growing from seed last year and all of my plants did so well and I was very proud of all of the seedlings that grew into beautiful gardens in my yard, my son's yard, my daughter's yard, and a few co-worker's yards. Many of my veggies were what you recommended Jess and were so fun to see grow, cook and eat!