Category Archives: Beyond Sustainable

Beyond Sustainable – Advice on Homesteading and Chickens

Beyond Sustainable … a weekly blog from Homesteaders Supply Here we will highlight articles from homesteaders and related helping organizations blogging about their experience and insights for creating a sustainable lifestyle. Many of these articles will demonstrate their creative ingenuity for income, insights into the care of the land and their animals, and how to effectively grow, preserve, and prepare the foods we need for a healthy lifestyle.  We will also highlight articles from organizations that are helping us in our efforts toward a healthy and sustainable lifestyle.

Homemade Non-GMO and Organic Chicken Feed Mix

By   on the website blog for gnowfglins.com

Homemade-Chicken-FeedHomesteading starts usually with having a couple chickens and enjoying the bounty of their wonderful eggs.  But what about what we feed them?  Read Tracey’s store and the recipe she shares for making organic and Non-GMO chicken feed!

“After plunging into backyard chickens to rid our yard of chemical laden pesticides, we began enjoying the great benefit of having chickens: the eggs! That was until we read what we were feeding them. Handfuls of words we couldn’t pronounce, nor did we have the faintest clue what they could be. Certainly, I thought, our eggs were better than ones in the store, yet in my mind remained a nagging doubt. Were they really?”  Read more for her homemade NON-GMO recipe for chicken feed…

Homesteading advice from the master… an interview with Joel Salatin

by Carol J. Alexander, photographs by Amber Karnes, originally published in the June/July 2013 From Scratch Magazine

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“FS: Living a sustainable lifestyle is a trend. Never in my life have I seen a more powerful thrust to provide for one’s own family, live off the land, reduce one’s carbon footprint, eschew chemicals, cook whole foods, etc. And everyone wants a front-row seat on the green bus. But is everyone cut out to grow their own food? Share with us the traits the successful, modern homesteader possesses.

JS: Everyone can’t grow their own food, but everyone can live as if they were. And everyone can do something, even if it’s just a vermicomposting bin under the kitchen sink and using cloth diapers instead of disposables. The point is that every single act should be a physical manifestation of our thought process, a conscious decision. Mindless acts have no place in our lives. Even wanting to do something mindless like watch a silly movie should be for a reason: “I need a break from the 120 percent I’ve been giving all day to such-and-such an activity.”   While I appreciate the desire for self-reliance, I’m much more in favor of mutual inter-dependence. Sometimes we can become so independent we do things we’re not good at or deplore, and then burn out or fail miserably. Part of self-reliance is building a resilient community of hard goods and soft goods (spiritual, emotional, educational) around us, proximate, and relationally-oriented. All that said, here are some traits to think about:   ”  Read more…

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Get Joel Salatin’s newly published book Fields of Farmers

 

 

 

 

 

Chicken Treat Chart The Best Treats For Backyard Chickens

by Buff Hooligans  posted on Backyardchickens.com

chicken and lobster

“This is a list of everything you can feed a chicken. However, everybody’s chickens have their own tiny brains full of likes and dislikes, so while one person’s chickens may come running for grapes or watermelon, another person’s chickens may turn up their pointy little beaks at it. Anything on this list is worth a try. AND …  Don’t feed the following things to your chickens:”  Read More for both lists….

Beyond Sustainable

Beyond Sustainable,  a new weekly blog from Homesteaders Supply!

Here we will highlight articles from homesteaders and related helping organizations blogging about their experience and insights for creating a sustainable lifestyle. Many of these articles will demonstrate their creative ingenuity for income, insights into the care of the land and their animals, and how to effectively grow, preserve, and prepare the foods we need for a healthy lifestyle.  We will also highlight articles from organizations that are helping us in our efforts toward a healthy and sustainable lifestyle.

12 Fascinating Facts about Chicken Eyesight 

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An interesting article from Lisa Steele and Fresh-Eggs-Daily.com

I always wondered why my chickens tilt there head when looking up at me, now I know!   Did you know that Just before hatching, a chick turns in the shell so its right eye is next to the shell (and absorbs light through the shell) and its left eye is covered by its body. As a result the right eye develops near-sightedness to allow a chicken to search for food, while the left eye develops far-sightedness, to allow a chicken to search for predators from afar. That is why when a hawk flies overhead, you will notice your chickens tilt their heads with their left eye to the sky.   read more 

A Green Tea Take on Obama Care

a blog from our friend Shannon Hayes, author of the book Radical Homemakers, and more.  

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“This story has been popping into my mind a lot these past few weeks as I listen to the media, neighbors, and friends discuss the Affordable Care Act. In spite of the approximately 50 million Americans who are uninsured, I am hearing folks express a lot of fear of the unknown. Some who are uninsured are defiantly choosing to pay the tax penalties rather than purchase a policy. Some are seething with anger that their tax dollars will be paying for someone else’s healthcare. Others are simply petrified that if they move forward and enroll in the exchange, they will suddenly be without any coverage. As a nation, we are being asked to take the first steps to leave behind a cruel relationship. We are collectively confronting a great big unknown. Suddenly, all the homelessness, suffering, and bankruptcy offered by our current system seems preferable to confronting something new and different. It is as if we’ve become co-dependents to our existing abusive healthcare system.”  read more….

Julia Child Was Wrong: Don’t Wash Your Raw Chicken, Folks

julia-child-roast-chicken

by Maria Godoy from her NPR blog ‘the salt… what’s on your plate’

“It seems almost sacrilegious to question the wisdom of Julia Child. First with her opus Mastering the Art of French Cooking and later with her PBS cooking show, the unflappably cheerful Child helped rescue home cookery from the clutches of convenience food. She taught us how to love — and take pride in — making something from scratch.

And yet, in at least one important kitchen skill, Child got it dead wrong: rinsing raw poultry.”   read on…

Food Safety Modernization Act:
Stand Up Today for Food and Farms!

From the the National Sustainable Agriculture Coalition

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The US Food and Drug Administration has proposed new rules this year that will have a huge impact on how fresh fruits and vegetables are grown and processed in the US. This is a big deal for farmers and eaters! Everyone has a role in ensuring safe food from field to fork – but FDA’s new proposed rules as written will unfairly burden family farmers, target sustainable and organic farming, and reduce the availability of fresh, local food in our communities. Right now, we have a chance to tell FDA that this is unacceptable – and we need your help to do it.

As currently written, the rules will:

  • put many farms out of business;
  • reduce the supply of fresh, local produce in schools and hospitals;
  • push farmers to tear out wildlife habitat; and
  • increase the use of chemicals rather than natural fertilizers.

FDA’s new food safety rules must:

  • Allow farmers to use sustainable farming practices, including those already allowed and encouraged by existing federal organic standards and conservation programs.
  • Ensure that diversified and innovative farms, particularly those pioneering models for increased access to healthy, local foods, continue to grow and thrive without being stifled. 
  • Provide options that treat family farms fairly, with due process and without excessive costs.

Now stand up for your farmer, stand up for your food!

FDA is seeking comments from the public – that’s you! The #1 most important thing you can do to help fix FSMA is take a few minutes RIGHT NOW to submit a comment to FDA either online or through the mail.  Read more on how to take action:

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