Livestock fencing for the small homesteader
By Don Lewis
In 1874, a United States patent (#157,124) was issued to Joseph F. Glidden, a long-serving sheriff in DeKalb County, Illinois. His invention — possibly one of the simplest ever recorded by the...
Building David’s Cabin, Part One
By Jackie Clay-Atkinson
Issue #172 • July/August, 2018
Like most young folks today, our son David graduated high school, got a job, and went to college (accumulating student loans in the process). After that, he worked...
Ambidextrous chainsaw filing
By Thomas Brewer
Issue #57 • May/June, 1999
I am not ambidextrous. My wife, Judith, uses chopsticks with either hand or even both hands at once. She is ambidextrous. I can barely write with my right...
Build a stone wall
By Charles Sanders
Issue #70 • July/August, 2001
The natural beauty of a stone wall has been romanticized in poem and picture for hundreds of years. There is a soothing permanence that can be seen in...
Build an attached solar greenhouse
By David Lee
Issue #125 • September/October, 2010
We planned it to be permanent, well built, and able to withstand the extremes of temperature, humidity, and weather a greenhouse must tolerate inside and out for many...
Herb Boxes from Fence Boards
By Maggie Larsen
Issue #86 • March/April, 2004
During a binge of spring cleaning, I ventured outside and began to renovate the exterior of my home, a 47-foot trailer in a mobile home park. While waiting...
How to Install a Steel Roof
By Morgan Barker
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Issue #159 • May/June, 2016
Steel roofing isn't just for factories and barns anymore. The choice to go steel is fast gaining popularity...
Build a Composter
By Charles Sanders
Issue #170 • March/April, 2018
As with most of the other facets of homesteading, composting can be as simple or as elaborate as you wish to make it. One of the easiest ways...
Build this sturdy large-capacity food dehydrator
By Charles Sanders
Issue #63 • May/June, 2000
Drying of food as a means of preservation has been around for a long time. Populations in suitably dry climates all around the globe have dried meat, fish,...
From triumph to tragedy to triumph again. Dorothy Ainsworth makes her valiant comeback
By Dorothy Ainsworth
Issue #50 Mar/Apr 1998
BHM readers are familiar with Dorothy Ainsworth, the log home-building Ashland, Oregon, waitress who spent more than six years building a beautiful log home, only to have it burn...
Build a portable woodstove for $30
By David Scott Matthews
Issue #78 • November/December, 2002
I had a problem. Other men love football, baseball, basketball, or golf. I love to hunt. And the animal I love to hunt more than any other...
Build a deluxe barrel stove
By David Lee
Issue #108 • November/December, 2007
Winter is coming again, pretty much on schedule in spite of global warming, and it will be cold, just like always. Having a reliable heating system makes winter...
A cabin for one
By Lee Greiman
Issue #109 • January/February, 2008
Between 1989 and 1990 I built a 20 by 20-foot log house on the Musselshell River in Montana. The next year I built an addition on it that...
Build a graceful footbridge
By Harrison Stone
Issue #77 • September/October, 2002
Tap your heels together three times and repeat after me, "There is no place like homeThere is no place like homeThere is no place like home, especially when...
Building and Using Wattle Fences
By Kathryn Wingrove
Issue #139 • January/February, 2013
Wattle fences are made by weaving material in and out of posts in the ground. They were often used on the small farms of Victorian England. In fact,...
Build a holz hausen to dry firewood
By Doug Fluckiger
Issue #132 • November/December, 2011
My secret passion is tall, dark, and handsome. I may find her lying luxuriantly among a dark grove of firs. She may be standing proudly on a sunny...































