We are planning to have an organic garden this year but the soil needs a lot of work on our new homestead so I am hauling compost to mix into it. I got a nice lumber yard haul to build our new chicken coop.

 

Many of you already know that we recently moved from our fully off grid homestead in New York to an on grid homestead in Michigan. We are taking this new homestead off the grid on a budget so stay tuned.

 

We are also planning to become as self sufficient as possible by planting our own organic garden, fruits and berries this year. We hope to be able to put away a lot of food for the winter. Along with fishing and hunting this year we hope to be able to feed ourselves for the most part through the entire year.

 

This will also include chickens for meat and eggs. I met a sawmill owner this week and made a deal to take his old and slightly marred lumber off his hands. This works for him because he gets to free up space for good lumber. This works out for us because now we have enough lumber to build a nice walk in chicken coop.

 

 

I got a nice sized truck load on the first haul. I still have a bit more lumber to get over there.

 

Clean lumber from a lumber yard haul

 

Lumber for building our walk in chicken coop

 

I stacked up the lumber for the chicken coop on pallets near the place where I will build the chicken coop. I hope to get building this week already. This will be a nice sized walk in chicken coop with egg laying boxes.

 

I also got some nicer lumber which I stacked up over by the wood shop. This lumber will be used for book shelves and other things for our homestead. There are some worm holes in the wood which make it of no value to the lumber yard but which give the wood character for our book shelves and furniture.

 

I also met a neighbor recently who is getting rid of multiple truck loads of composted leaves. These leaves have been building up for about 4 years and the older stuff has broken down entirely into dirt. This is mixes in with layers of soil which he had mixed in through the years. Now it looks like black, fertile soil.

 

Adding composted leaves to amend garden soil

 

I got three truck loads of leaves from him already and put them into our pallet wood composting bins. Now I am into the good stuff. The black composted leave matter is going straight onto our new homestead garden. The garden needs a lot of work before we can plant because the soil is quite acidic and most likely not very fertile.

I have a soil test kit which I will be using once I finish adding the compost and tilling it into the soil.

 

I hauled two truck loads of compost today and spread one onto the garden already. The second load stayed on the truck because this was Wednesday and I had church in the evening. It looks like I will be needing about six truck loads of compost to amend the soil on our 30 x 50 foot garden plot.

 

I am also planning to extend the garden for a corn and tomato field along the side of the yard. This will also be amended with compost from my neighbor. We figure there are at least 10 truck loads of compost there waiting for me. He is happy to be rid of it and I am happy to have it. This works out well for us both.

 

Melanie spent her day cleaning up in front of our new home. We had a mess from the move which had to be cleaned up. I headed out here and there as I could but I was on the road most of the day hauling stuff. I also cleaned up about 70 percent of the mess in front of the garage. When we moved here the houses and garage were both filled up with stuff. I had to dump a lot of things from the garage before I could even move my own things into it. I am finally getting stuff cleared up out front.

 

It is looking good at the new homestead now.

 

You can watch today's video here: Hauling Compost For Garden ~ Lumber Haul ~ Cleaning Up

 

While you are over there please subscribe to my YouTube channel and follow our daily videos as we strive to become self sufficient and off the grid on a budget.

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Troy Reid

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