While most people in the Western hemisphere are brought up thinking of milk as a cow product, in much of the world, goats are the primary source of milk. For a smaller homestead, goats make perfect sense. They take up less room, cost less to purchase and feed, and are easier to care for simply due to the smaller size. No matter which you decide to keep, or if you have both on your property, goats and cows provide a wonderful, self-sustaining source of delicious, high-quality milk that you can not only drink, but also
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Tired of the same old carrots, potatoes, and turnips? Try growing some rarer root vegetables that will introduce new tastes into your diet and help preserve America’s horticultural legacy. Seldom-grown root vegetables include skirret, scorzonera, salsify, and parsnip. Skirret (Sium sisarum) Skirret is a perennial root vegetable with a taste somewhere between carrots and parsnips. It yields several four-to-sixteen-inch misshapen roots with colors varying from white to light brown to gray, depending on the varietal and growing conditions. Widely grown in the Far East, skirret has not been common in the United States since the
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Einstein supposedly said, “If the bees disappeared from the surface of the Earth, man would have no more than four years left to live.” Whether Einstein really said this has never been verified, but the comment is provocative. Are we really so dependent on bees? Not exactly, says Keith S. Delaplane, a professor of entomology at the University of Georgia. According to Delaplane, 75 percent of our crops benefit from pollination by bees, but only 10 percent rely solely on insect pollination to produce fruit. Crops that are pollinated by bees typically produce lower yields
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Survivalists and preppers alike know how having a properly stocked pantry and surviving perilous times go hand in hand. Regardless of your reason for preparedness, every prepared home has a well-stocked food pantry. For generations, storing food has long been an important factor in preparing families for survival. Throughout history, there can always be found
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Vegetable gardening is the most popular hobby in the United States. In addition to the pleasure gardening provides, many gardeners cite a desire for organic food as a motivation in vegetable gardening. Yet, plant diseases in the garden can thwart your efforts to grow chemical-free produce. How much your garden is affected by disease depends partly on your climate. Gardens in dry climates with cold winters suffer fewer disease problems than warm, moist climates. This is one aspect of gardening that you don’t have much control over. Fortunately, how you tend your garden also plays
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I’d canned vegetables, fruits and jams for years, but I was a bit skeptical when I first heard about canning meat. How could that possibly be safe, I wondered, and what would the quality of the finished product be? Then, my friend Janice, a registered dietician and canning diva, came to my house and spent an afternoon teaching me how. I was surprised and pleased with the results. The meat was perfectly preserved, tender, and flavorful. Since it was already cooked, I could use it for spur of the moment, quick meals. Canning meat is
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There’s a lot of talk in gardening circles these days about the value of using heirlooms and saving their seed. Hybrids have fallen out of favor with many gardeners who favor older, often tastier, varieties. But do hybrids belong in the same category as GMOs? Do hybrids pose a safety risk, and just what are the differences between the two? Read on for everything you need to know about hybrids and genetically modified organisms (GMOs). What Are Hybrids? The process of hybridization occurs continually in nature as open-pollinated plants pollinate each other. Over years and
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A cooking staple, button mushrooms are actually a lot easier to grow than even the most seasoned of gardeners are aware. Some may feel hesitant about growing their own mushrooms, but the reality is that when you purchase spores from a reputable company, you won’t need to have any concerns about the mushrooms that you grow. There are numerous growing kits available from so-called mushroom boutique stores, and they can allow you the opportunity to grow portabella, oyster, shitake, and button mushrooms, along with several other kinds. This is a great way to experiment with
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If you found out you couldn’t run to your local supermarket or corner quick stop for many of the things you use every day, what would you do? Many people are answering this question by learning to live without commercially made products. This doesn’t mean these people are suffering or having to live without little
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You’ve probably heard the arguments for organic produce and food versus inorganic varieties, but what about organic fertilizers? Walk down a garden center aisle and you’re faced with a dizzying array of choices when it comes to fertilizers. Sometimes, choosing the right one can be downright impossible. Here’s the low-down on organic versus inorganic fertilizers. First, both supply nutrition to plants, primarily in the form of nitrogen, phosphorus, and potassium. Synthetic fertilizers are usually made using petroleum products, which makes them less environmentally friendly. In fact, excessive runoff from synthetic fertilizers after storms can actually
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