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Get the most out of your vehicle and your maintenance dollar

Forget the dog, chicken is man’s best friend

Practical Ideas for Self-Reliant Living

The homestead cat

By Jackie Clay-Atkinson We have had at least one cat in our home ever since I was a young child. So it’s no wonder we...

Grow some winter squash this year

Vitamins D and K — way more important than you thought

Boost your immune system with fast and easy fish dishes

Nut Trees on Your Homestead

By Jackie Clay-Atkinson Issue #149 • September/October, 2014 While growing up in Detroit, we had no nut trees in our yard (though we did have seedlings...

Time to Forget About Snail and Slug Bait

Leafy Green Vegetables — The Underrated Heroes of the Garden

Build an Old-Fashioned Hotbed and Start Your Seeds in Style

Follow Jackie Clay-Atkinson and her husband, Will, as they homestead a 120-acre piece of northern Minnesotan woods entirely off-grid. Sharing their homestead are horses, beef cattle, a milk cow, dairy goats, chickens and turkeys.

Massad Ayoob on Guns

This blog, from a retired police captain and self-defense instructor, covers the use of different firearms, political musings, and self-defense tactics.

Building

Build a Vertical Storage Rack for Cans

A salvaged oak floor for $5

Build a wood crib with free materials

Adventures with a portable sawmill

Self-Reliance

Homestead Helpers

Boost your income by adding a processing step to what you sell

By Harry Styron Issue #36 • November/December, 1995 Three boys spent several raw November days picking up black walnuts. We hoped to get a nice bit...

Paring down for off-grid living

By Steven Gregersen Issue #93 • May/June, 2005 My first exposure to a home power system came when I visited the remote homestead of a retired...

Animals

The homestead cat

By Jackie Clay-Atkinson We have had at least one cat in our home ever since I was a young child. So it’s no wonder we...

Cheaper than Store-Bought Eggs

Raising your own beef

Fermenting Chicken Feed

Keeping homestead animals healthy

Science and Education

Gee-Whiz: Time

Gee-Whiz: Dinosaurs

Gee-Whiz: Alcohol

The MTHFR mutation and why it may matter to you

Energy

Solar power for farm and ranch

By Jeffrey R. Yago, P.E. It may be surprising to learn that there are now all kinds of do-it-yourself solar powered devices specifically designed to...

Power-up bag

Amateur Ham Radio – The Ultimate Tool for Survival Communications

Keep the Ice On

Power Up

Americana and History

Constitution of the united States of America

Remembering what grandma used

Quilts — Masterpieces of the heart and windows into women’s history

Farm baseball … with ghost runners!

Firearms

Frontier style handguns for the modern backwoods home

BHM hosts Appleseed marksmanship event

By Massad Ayoob Issue #139 • January/February, 2013 Long a supporter of the Appleseed concept, Backwoods Home Magazine hosted one in Gold Beach, Oregon, in second...

Canning game meat

By Linda Gabris Issue #166 • July/August, 2017 Attempting to can meat (or any other low acid food, for that matter) without the use of a...

Moderate power firearms

By Massad Ayoob Issue #110 • March/April, 2008 Robert Ruark, the great American writer of the mid-Twentieth Century, was also a big game hunter. One of...

Preparedness

Bugging out in place

Commonsense preparedness just makes sense

Food security 101: part 2

Preparedness for travelers

Wildfires: Before, During, After

A survival key ring — Your everyday tool for emergency preparedness

Articles By Dave Duffy

My View: Call Me Miracle Man!

By Dave Duffy Issue #177 • July/August/September, 2019 Superheroes are the rage these days at movie theaters. Even I am fascinated by them. Old style heroes...