Backwoods Home Magazine - Practical Self-Reliance

Seventeen great tips for caring for windows, mirrors, and other household glass

Build a wood-fired stock tank heater

For summertime baking needs, build yourself an outdoor horno

Practical Ideas for Self-Reliant Living

Grow some winter squash this year

By Lisa Nourse I love summertime — I love the green of the trees, the warm weather, and growing my own food. I especially love...

Boost your immune system with fast and easy fish dishes

Vitamins D and K — way more important than you thought

Testing Soil

By Tom Kovach Issue #119 • September/October, 2009 Testing the soil content of a garden is very important and is quite easy to do. Soil tests...

Use Plastic to Get a Head Start on Corn in the...

Gardening in the Desert Using Only Rainwater

A Small Space Yields a Big Crop of Garlic

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 Heated Germination Bed

Building and using wattle fences

The house that Dorothy built

Simplify life in your backwoods home by using these easy mountain methods

Self-Reliance

Homeschooling through high school

Seventeen great tips for caring for windows, mirrors, and other household glass

By Sandy Lindsey Issue #43 • January/February, 1997 1 To make windows and mirrors sparkle, dip a clean cloth in a 50/50 mixture of borax and...

Pump water for free

By Kai Moessle  Issue #158 • March/April, 2016 I opened the valve on the output side of the pump slowly, like the instructions said, and after...

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

How big is the solar system?

The many benefits of garlic

Gee-Whiz: From Paper to Canning

Avian Flu — How afraid of this

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

The Great Depression — A reminiscence

Biological and chemical weapons through history

Presidents’ wives of the past Part 3

George Washington Carver — He wrote the book on self-reliance

Firearms

Teaching a 10-year-old to shoot

Firearms handling refresher Part I: Handguns

By Massad Ayoob Website Exclusive • December, 2003 One of our readers e-mailed John Silveira to tell him that taking a handgun afield after a long...

Hiding a gun — The rules of three

By Claire Wolfe Issue #140 • March/April, 2013 My friend Jack pulled the car into a grassy clearing. We donned rubber boots, fetched a metal detector...

Understanding the gun debate, part 3

By Massad Ayoob Issue #163 • January/February, 2017 Click Here to read Part 1 Click Here to read Part 2 As noted in the two previous parts of...

Preparedness

Caring for wounds in the field

Oregon Trail preparedness: What supplies did the settlers carry?

Power Up

Dollar Store to the Rescue

Frostbite — Don’t flirt with this sneaky danger

Keep the Ice On

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...