Welcome to TheModernHomestead.US
(Click image for announcement
of Harvey's forthcoming book.)
Boxwood
. . .Nyssa. . .
Your Hosts: Ellen. . .
Unlike our ancestors, many of whom lived on traditional homesteads and small farms, most of us today have the apparent “luxury” of buying all our food in the marketplace. The decision to forego that luxury and work hard to produce more of our own food is a fundamental one. We are thus making not simply one more selection from the Lazy Susan of available food choices, but choosing a way of life, a new direction.
This site is dedicated to the skills and philosophy for more self-reliant living. Whether you have access to fifty acres or only a patio pot, you have the opportunity to produce more of your own food for yourself and your family, to enter more fully into the yearly cycle, and to know your place in the web of life.
. . .Titmouse
New on the Site
- February 10, 2010: Growers of table poultry who have been frustrated with the wretched Cornish Cross will be interested in “Alternatives to the Cornish Cross”.
- February 10, 2010: We can cultivate the grubs (larval stage) of the black soldier fly to convert what we too commonly think of as organic “wastes” into resources. As in vermicomposting, we can make an alliance with soldier grubs not only to enhance soil fertility, but for “harvests” of live protein feed for poultry, pigs, or farmed fish. I began working with a soldier grub colony in the summer of 2009. See an introduction to this fascinating species at “Black Soldier Fly, White Magic”.
- September 27, 2009: I have launched The Home Feeding Project and welcome your participation.
- August 1, 2009: You should be aware of a problem I've had with my maggot buckets for generating “Protein from Thin Air”. Please see the advisory I have placed at the head of that article. Be advised also that I have a fascinating experiment underway with Black Soldier Fly larvae to achieve the same goals. I will eventually post results and more info on the site.
Acknowledgments
Thanks to Ricky Nelson, owner of Blizzard Media, host for the site, for his invaluable help scripting the backend voodoo that makes it all work, and for his kind support (sometimes hand-holding) for this non-geek.
Thanks to Alexandra Howarth, who prepared the site's first 250 image files to be web-ready. Her offer to do so was made via the website, completely out of the blue, because she wanted to contribute to the site's mission. Her generosity is astounding, and the online friendship that accompanied the work most gratifying.
Thanks to Heather, my daughter, who inspired me to find and develop new tools—php, mysql, and other cyber-magic—to make the site more dynamic and useful, and who has been so supportive of this effort.
And always, always, thanks most of all to the love of my life, Ellen, who sometimes suffers with enormous patience the loss of a husband down a black hole in cyberspace.
Please note that, while I am writing my book, I do not have time to respond to as many emails as I would like. I would be glad to hear from you via the Contact form, but don't be surprised if I cannot respond. If your message relates to a topic area I'm working on for the book, I may be in touch.
Thanks for visiting, and enjoy the site! ~Harvey and Ellen Ussery
Oh, no!—not again!