Any other farmers/homesteaders out there

[RandyWayne]

Our solar panels are a first step for us. The second big step will actually involve getting some manner of battery backup system in place so we will continue to have power when the local grid goes down.

But the battery systems currently available cost more than the panels!

[Digging4Truth]

Originally Posted by Titus2woman

We have friends in Hull/Daisetta! Now that is 'in the boonies'!!!

What'choo talkin' 'bout. Hull is where we used to go grocery shopping with Grandma from Batson. That was the "pretty big" city. Liberty was, of course, the big city.

Batson runs a population of... maybe 200-300. I have many great memories of summers in Batson.

Of course Hull might be smaller now than it used to be but if they have a grocery store they're still doing better than Batson. I remember Daisetta... but not enough to recall the size etc.

I think it was Saratoga that, when you passed through, you could smell their water in the air driving by. It was very sulphury.

Ahhhh... good times.

My grandfather on my dads side was a rice farmer and had his own pulp wood truck. He would cut some wood off of his land and sell it from time to time.

[Titus2woman]

Originally Posted by RandyWayne

Our solar panels are a first step for us. The second big step will actually involve getting some manner of battery backup system in place so we will continue to have power when the local grid goes down.

But the battery systems currently available cost more than the panels!

We'd love to have solar. I have family in No.California where just about every commercial building you see has panels and so do a lot of houses... and they do not get nearly the amount of sun we do... or well heat anyway, I am not sure if that translates accurately.

[Titus2woman]

Originally Posted by Digging4Truth

What'choo talkin' 'bout. Hull is where we used to go grocery shopping with Grandma from Batson. That was the "pretty big" city. Liberty was, of course, the big city.

Batson runs a population of... maybe 200-300. I have many great memories of summers in Batson.

Of course Hull might be smaller now than it used to be but if they have a grocery store they're still doing better than Batson. I remember Daisetta... but not enough to recall the size etc.

I think it was Saratoga that, when you passed through, you could smell their water in the air driving by. It was very sulphury.

Ahhhh... good times.

My grandfather on my dads side was a rice farmer and had his own pulp wood truck. He would cut some wood off of his land and sell it from time to time.

That sulphury water is lots of places... Lufkin, the home of TBC and the campgrounds, has the smelliest water anywhere. It is undrinkable and the restrooms smell like rotten eggs... phew! Beaumont is pretty stinky too.

I think Hull still has the grocery. Liberty had the big rice mill. It is a small city now.

[AreYouReady?]

T2W, are you having to "chip" or tag your animals yet? I was listening to talk radio about the National Animal Identification System (NAIS) that the USDA wants to saddle the small farmer with. This website is 6 years old and I have not heard anything lately as to if it will be made law or regulation. http://nonais.org/but-what-is-nais/

I know a friend of mine has goats and she has had to tag each goat.

[Digging4Truth]

No tagging here... but they'll have to come out to my house to even know I have an animal.

[Titus2woman]

NAIS failed but there is always something right around the corner just like it. They are translating all the illness caused by the commercial food production system and trying to use inverse logic to make a case for small farms having to be regulated unto death. Big Agra and Big Pharma and the Chem giants know that this will kill any remaining food source but the government approved one.

[Sister Alvear]

Love farms....

[Margies3]

We grew up in town (albeit a very, very small town!). But my dad farmed my Grandma's farm (about 80 acres). We raised everything imaginable as far as animals go. And we grew corn, soybeans, wheat, etc.). Plus working 2 very large gardens so Mom and Grandma (and us!) could can enough food to make it thru the winter. And we had cherry trees and peach trees. We bought our apples and strawberries from a neighbor farmer who sold "pick your own".

I would NEVER want to go back to living/working on a farm. However, I do wish that my sons could have been raised on a farm and learned their work ethics the way we did as kids. Kids today don't have any idea what it really means to WORK. They complain if you ask them to dust the living room. Please!!! give me a break!

[Scott Hutchinson]

I can't grow anything except corn on my feet.