Backwoods Home Magazine - Practical Self-Reliance

Goat birthing and raising kids

For summertime baking needs, build yourself an outdoor horno

Vinegar — A splash is all you need for healthful eating, natural healing, and sparkling home

Woodbarrow

By Setanta O’Ceillaigh When I first abandoned a slum town and fled back to the countryside I gathered and carried firewood with a laundry basket....

Vitamins D and K — way more important than you thought

Boost your immune system with fast and easy fish dishes

Grow some winter squash this year

Build a Keyhole Garden

By Katelynn Bond Issue #152 • March/April, 2015 One of the hazards of living on the side of a mountain in northern New Mexico is that...

A New Use for Old Tires: A Garden Using Tires

Time to Forget About Snail and Slug Bait

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

Choosing a chain saw

Build a Trail

Make a fully functional cold storage pit/mound and enjoy your garden’s production all winter

From triumph to tragedy to triumph again. Dorothy Ainsworth makes her valiant comeback

Self-Reliance

Homemade Toys! — Easy to make, fun to play with, and great for gifts!

Simplifying simplicity

By Claire Wolfe Issue #117 • May/June, 2009 In the bustling 19th century, Henry David Thoreau urged us to "simplify, simplify, simplify." In the even more hectic...

Preparing for a Temporary Catastrophe

By Dave Duffy Issue #139 • January/February, 2013 November's Superstorm Sandy on the Northeastern coast of the United States was our most recent grand reminder that...

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: Alcohol

Three more ways the world can end … and I’m not kidding

The world is coming to an end… and this time, I’m not kidding

Gee-Whiz: From Paper to Canning

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 vanishing outhouse

Presidents’ wives of the past Part 4 — Cunning, vindictive, and one may have been a murderess

Emancipation Proclamation by Historical Document

Who were the best…and worst U.S. Presidents?

Firearms

Picking a holster

Answering some well asked questions about personal defense

By Massad Ayoob Issue #97 • January/February, 2006 Jeff Yago, Backwoods Home's energy writer, recently completed a couple of concealed carry handgun courses. The classes apparently...

Firearms handling refresher Part II: Shotguns

By Massad Ayoob Website Exclusive • December, 2003 In Part I, we began a series of refreshers on safety and proper handling of firearms. This time,...

Savage Model 110 — A proven economical backwoods rifle

By Massad Ayoob Website Exclusive • July, 2008 Fifty years ago, Savage Arms introduced a new bolt-action sporting rifle. In the gun world, this was news....

Preparedness

Bugging out in place

No dentist? Oh, no!

Prepper power! Part 2

Battery-Powered Tools are Changing

Building and stocking your pantry

Protein — The Cornerstone of a Survival Diet

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...