Self-reliance Archives - Backwoods Home Magazine

Food security 101: part 2

By Rowena Aldridge Issue #139 • January/February, 2013 Last issue we talked about some things you can do to stretch your food budget and make great use of every bit of food...

Bartering for bad times

By John Silveira Issue #138 • November/December, 2012 Bartering may not be a part of your life, right now, but if there's a deepening of the recession, or it becomes a depression, or we enter a...

There’s no such thing as free land!

(But if you're smart, you can get it cheap) By Setanta O'Ceillaigh Issue #165 • May/June, 2017 I have been a homeowner since I was 18 years old and I still continually shop for land opportunities in...

Making apple pectin

By Kristina Seleshanko Issue #167 • September/October, 2017 One day, as I walked past an apple tree that was naturally thinning its fruit by dropping tiny, baby apples, I thought, “I wish there was something useful...

How we found our remote backwoods home

By Jackie Clay Issue #65 • September/October, 2000 Right now I'm sitting in a south-facing huge, sunny window, looking through our own private valley to a larger mountain valley below and the pine covered mountains beyond....

How to Resurrect Old, Rusted Tools

By R.E. Rawlinson Issue #176 • April/May/June, 2019 The homesteading lifestyle can require a number of tools to cultivate the garden, maintain the home, repair the tractor, and build various pens and coops. We use them...

Space heater safety tips

By Tom Kovach Issue #90 • November/December, 2004 If you are going to try to take the chill out of your home without turning on your main sources of heat, or if you want to add...

Handy Keychain Mini-Gadgets

By Jeff Yago, P.E., CEM Winter, 2017 I believe when most people think of being prepared, they immediately think in terms of bug-out bags, stored food and water, guns, and generators. However, there can be less...

Foraging for wild berries

By Kristina Seleshanko Issue #176 • April/May/June, 2019 I had just posted a photo online of some wild berries I was going to preserve, when suddenly I was inundated with messages: “Are those really safe to...

Just for Kids: Take a nite hike!

By Lucy Shober Issue #22 • July/August, 1993 Click on pictures for printable, full-sized versions to color. How many times have you lain awake in your bed on late summer nights listening to the symphony of creatures...

Homeschooling your dylsexic kid

By John Silveira Issue #142 • July/August, 2013 I write and edit for a living. I'm the senior editor for Backwoods Home Magazine for which I've written numerous columns during the last 24 years. Before that...

Storm survivors

By Anita Evangelista Issue #71 • September/October, 2001 First couple days of June, 1998, weather pretty good, a bit wetter than it is now. Clear day, clouds moving in during the afternoon. By suppertime, the sky...

Shearing, carding, spinning, weaving and creating with Margaret Boos

By Annie Duffy Issue #52 • July/August, 1998 "If you're going to make something that you want to last, why not start with good quality material," says Margaret Boos who raises and spins her own wool....

By Hook or Crook: A Billhook is a Handy Homestead Tool

By R.E. Rawlinson Issue #173 • September/October, 2018 When compared to our ancestors, we are very lucky to have readily-available tools. Stores are full of anything you could need and with online shopping, you don’t even...

Your survival depends on water

By Jackie Clay-Atkinson Issue #167 • September/October, 2017 As you develop your preparedness plans, consider your water supply. You can go without food for weeks but when you lack water for as little as two days,...

35 country jobs — How folks make a living near my hometown

By Charles Sanders Issue #89 • September/October, 2004 If you're relocating to the backwoods, you will very likely have to give some thought to generating some income, that is, making a living. Hopefully, the topic is...