The Sovereign Homestead Podcast

If you're seeing this in your podcast feed it means our first child has either arrived or is very nearly earthside! Sammy and I greatly appreciate your thoughts, prayers, and good vibes in this time. The podcast will be on an indefinite (though hopefully relatively short) break, while we welcome our first child into the world and find our feet as new parents. Thank you all for listening and keep shining your light. -Casey & Sammy (and Tater) ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Create Resilient Habitats Where People And Ecology Thrive Together Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram        

Floating wetlands are a "new" old technology that is well worth looking into if you are doing aquaculture at just about any scale - from small backyard tanks a few hundred gallons in size, on up to multi-acre ponds and lakes. Floating wetlands take the essential functions provided by wetlands and concentrated them into a smaller and more mobile footprint. Wetlands are the kidneys of the landscape, and floating wetlands amplify many of those beneficial functions, such as: Integrated wetland (edge) functionality into an open water body = excess nutrient removal and water clarification Increased biomass production = more habitat and more food for livestock, wildlife and humans More "optimized edge" without reducing storage volumes in ponds Shade - decreases water temps, reduces algal growth potential by reducing light in the water column Shelter - fish shelter underneath and amongst the hanging roots some systems even have protected fish spawning beds hung underneath the island Shoreline protection / floating breakwaters - if wave erosion is a thing in your pond, consider a chain of floating islands to reduce wave action and protect vulnerable edges while also creating a highly-valuable living filter element Habitat Creation - floating islands contain so much edge in such a small space, they inevitably create habitat for many forms of life - from the micro (biofilms) to the macro (water fowl and fish) and everything in between. Waste water treatment - floating rafts with nutrient-accumulating vegetation are utilized to clarify and treat sewage effluent Floating gardens are great for the homesteader as well. They are self-watering (obvious, but worth mentioning), benefit from increased sunlight availability to crops (light reflected off the water's surface to crop plants on the island), pest protection (no burrowing or terrestrial garden pests are going to make it to your floating garden - unless you've got Navy SEAL gophers!). They make excellent floating hutches for water fowl. Some folks have experimented with adding solar lights, fans and wheedwhackers to create nocturnal fish feeders by attracting insects and knocking them into the water for the fish to eat. There are many ways to make floating islands - from DIY to pre-made - this would make an amazing summer time home-school project - construction, design, aquatic ecology, observation, nature time...talk about stacking functions! Show Resources YouTube Playlist: Living Systems - Food Production - Floating Gardens Pre-made / Custom BioHaven Floating Islands Floating Islands International Floating Islands West Midwest Floating Islands Epi-59: Sovereign Food Systems - Pantry Ponds Epi-61: Up-Leveling Calorie Production Per Square Foot With Azolla Epi-64: Using Duckweed To Grow More Calories Per Square Foot Epi-62: 5 Tenets Of Carnivore Homesteading     _______________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Resilient Human Habitats Where People And Ecology Thrive Together Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

What do we mean when we say we want to "opt out" of the system? Firstly, it's the system(s) - the means of production, transport, communication, value transmission etc that we have to interface with to acquire the things we need to live in the modern world. In general, the further the distance a product or service must travel and the more technology involved means you will have less control over how to source it, how much you pay for it, when (and if) it is available etc. If it is produced or provided closer to home you have more agency in how you obtain that product or service and it is more resilient to "disruptions" Why are so many of us drawn to opting out? We have no agency over the direction of the system(s) - they are by and large completely hijacked by parasites - the political technocratic oligo-corporate controlling class. If we want to have more agency, and thus freedom to live life on our own terms - in alignment with our innate intelligence - the solutions are found in living in closer connection with Nature and other decentralized/distributed systems based on Nature. Fundamentally, this is about designing your life to create freedom from the system(s) via interdependence with Nature. We all have an ecological umbilical cord - we are completely and utterly dependent upon functioning ecosystems to provide us with ALL of the things we need and want to live well. The sooner we acknowledge this the sooner we can be FREE from pretending we don't have an ecological umbilical and all resulting pathology that follows. What We Can Do To Opt Out By Opting In To Nature Connection Create freedom from the system(s) by leveraging your interdependence with Nature - choose to ally your life with Nature - Nature is what "they" fear and cannot ever control. Harvest and use Nature's gifts - everywhere nature gives us gifts for free Become ecosystem literate where you live - every place has something that wants to grow there - use analogs to find productive species to meet your needs Embrace Cyclical vs. Linear Cyclical = biology-based - slower, but infinitely more resilient and powerful - where how you grow & harvest can enrich the whole ecosystem. Trust in Distributed wisdom vs. Centralized “intelligence” centralization of decision-making authority and technical know-how is a hallmark of the technocratic system being pushed upon us the opposite of this is Nature - wisdom in every cell YOU ARE ONE OF THOSE CELLS - composed of trillions of other cells - each with it's own innate wisdom Find your place and commit to it and it's people - so much of the control system is commodification of the things that used to be provided via reciprocity by close human relationships. Show Resources The Regenerative Agora - Counter-Economics For Stewards Of The Future Epi-73 - Debt, Wealth and Counter-Economics As A means to create a world worth inheriting Epi-009 - Green Is The New Gray For Thriving In The Dim Age Epi - 005 - Light, Water, Soil and Life - The 4 Pillars Of A Productive And Profitable Homestead Ecosystem DIY Soil Fertility series - ways to start engaging with more natural cycles that reduce your need to buy   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

Light is an essential human nutrient. So much of our modern built environment is built without regard to orienting and integrating natural light, and our health - physical, mental, spiritual, emotional and communal - suffers for it. The good news is that you can design your structures (or retrofit them) to bring natural light back into them and create buildings and places within them that support human thriving because they are well integrated with natural light. Join me for a dive into the patterns of human habitation design that enhance our relationship with light from Christopher Alexander's A Pattern Language: 105 - South Facing Outdoors 107 - Wings of Light 112 - Entrance Transition 128 - Indoor Sunlight 135 - Tapestry of Light and Dark 159 - Light On Two Sides Of Every Room 161 - Sunny Place 162 - North Face 163 - Outdoor Room 180 - Window Place 181 - The Fire (there is NO substitute for fire!) 182 - Eating Atmosphere 199 - Sunny Counter 223 - Deep Reveals 238 - Filtered Light 252 - Pools of Light Resources A Pattern Language [WHOLE TEXT PDF DOWNLOAD]: PatternLanguage.com – website for the book and Alexander's works Zone 0 Pattern Language Fundamentals - Designing Your Permaculture Kitchen ~Epi-076 Light, Water, Soil and Life - The Four Pillars Of A Productive And Profitable Homestead - Epi-005     ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

Join me today as we discuss designing functional kitchen spaces that people want to be in. Lots of people are inheriting kitchens designed more for magazine covers than for function - and where there is a lack of function there is a concommitant increase in friction, which means more stress and less joy. Kitchens are the Zone 1 of Zone 0 - Zone 0 referring to the space inside the home. Kitchens are the heart of human life - communion over shared food, shared work, a space for being together, conversing, and generally connecting over the daily activities that make up life. Poorly designed kitchens discourage healthy human interaction and bonding, and thus are a huge lost opportunity for not only creating a thriving, functional homestead, but can actively undermine human thriving. In today's show we discuss some of the fundamental emergent patterns detailed by Christoper Alexander and company  A Pattern Language - a seminal work on the patterns of human habitation that support and promote human well being. This book belongs on your shelf if you're serious about creating healthy human habitats. It is guaranteed to spark fresh ideas and perspectives for examining your space, even if you've been there for decades, and give you actual tangible design guidelines if you're starting from scratch or remodeling to build functional, beautiful places for life to happen. In this episode we will discuss the following patterns as they pertain to permaculture kitchens specifically and Zone 0 home design generally: 127 - Intimacy Gradients 129 - Common Areas At The Heart 159 - Light On Two Sides 139 - Farmhouse Kitchen 184 - Cooking Layout 182 - Eating Atmosphere Show Resources A Pattern Language [WHOLE TEXT PDF DOWNLOAD]: PatternLanguage.com - website for the book and Alexander's works   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

Today I interview Joshua Longbrook on real world applications of Private Membership Associations for creating systems of support - i.e. the parallel society - outside the jurisdiction of the public (State dominated) sphere. We'll cover what PMAs are, what protections they do and do not offer, how they are best utilized as extensions of a larger unincorporated Church, and the types of voluntary interactions they enable within and between local communities. We'll also get into Josh's personal experience with running the Agora Food Club and how the structure has enabled many home-scale producers to supply their wares or seasonal abundance to their fellow food club members in exchange for credits they can apply towards their own grocery bill. I think this is one of the "killer apps" the PMA structure can provide a network of homestead-minded people. Let's face it - even if you're just gardening for yourself, or have a small orchard with even a handful of fruit trees, it's very easy to be overwhelmed with the seasonal abundance from these systems. The PMA creates a way for these small scale producers to exchange their goods that doesn't require all of the licensing and legal hopscotch that becoming an official business does. The PMA literally enables the creation of circular, local economies without the energetic drain of taxes, licensing and all the things the State requires to be deemed "legal". As Josh shares in the interview, a PMA enables the same dynamics that take place when you invite friends over for dinner - you cook food for them in your home (no food service business license, no health inspections etc), you might offer them a drink of wine (no liquor license required), and you might even offer them a bottle to take home for a few bucks. All of this is OK within the confines of your private home, but for some reason when this activity takes place in a business, and selling is happening, then it needs to be regulated (and taxed). The PMA is basically just a bigger dinner party with more friends all happening within the private sphere. Resources The Agora Hub - the Church that Joshua and company run, of which the Agora Food Club is an auxiliary The Agora Food Club The Agora Ministries - Christian ministry based in Hixson, TN. [VIDEO] Joel Salatin - Food Freedom In The Private Domain (PMAs) Rogue Food Conference David Edwards PMA Service Freedom Works - Mission Society-based Private Membership Association Josh's podcast - Our Foundations Josh's email if you'd like to contact him directly with questions: ourfoundations@protonmail.com     ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram       What Plants Crave T-shirts And Stickers! Another fun way you can support the show AND start some fun and interesting conversations along the way. For those of you that have seen Idiocracy, you know what this is all about. For those of you that haven't...watch this.        

Today's show is for those of you lucky enough to have a spring on your property. We will cover the basics of spring morphology and function - including the way I really think they work vs. what the textbooks say - and then we'll go over basic spring assessment criteria, and the main components of spring water collection and distribution systems.   Show Resources Past Spring Projects Rivera Family Ranch Spring Forestville Spring Retrofit Wilson Family Ranch Spring Retrofit Big Sur Spring Black Mountain, NC Spring YouTube - Spring Development Playlist Technical Manuals Springs - Their Origin, Development And Protection, Taylor, G.H., U.S. Dept. Of Interior Geological Survey. [PDF]: Basic Ground Water Hydrology - Water Supply Paper 220, Heath, Ralph C., U.S. Dept. of Interior [PDF]: https://pubs.usgs.gov/wsp/2220/report.pdf NRCS National Engineering Handbook - Part 650 - Chapter 12 - Springs And Wells [PDF]: https://directives.sc.egov.usda.gov/OpenNonWebContent.aspx?content=46258.wba SKAT - Spring Catchment Vol. 4, Meuli, Christian & Wehrle, Karl, 2001. [PDF}: https://skat.ch/wp-content/uploads/2017/01/Handbook_Volume4.pdf     ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram     What Plants Crave T-shirts And Stickers! Another fun way you can support the show AND start some fun and interesting conversations along the way. For those of you that have seen Idiocracy, you know what this is all about. For those of you that haven't...watch this.      

How do we create a regenerative economy and all that entails when that work is arbitrarily outlawed, suppressed or actively disincentivized by the value systems that dominate our current culture? HINT: We have to step outside of the current imposed power structure - no permission required. My presupposition for this episode is this: Mainstream, state sponsored and enforced economic theory and practice has herded humanity as a whole onto a degenerative trajectory with respect to environmental integrity, social cohesion and individual well-being. We are living in a debt-driven world - stealing from future generations so we can have more now. If we want to live regeneratively, there has to be another way of meeting our needs today without destroying the ecosystems that provide them. In fact, we need to make them stronger and more productive! That "other way" is Counter-Economics. Counter-Economics is the theory and practice of all human action neither accepted by the State nor involving any initiatory violence or threat of violence. Counter-Economics exists and can be practiced outside the boundaries of State power (the State being that institution that has a legal monopoly on the use of force within a certain arbitrary geographic border). State power exists at the intersection of three things: Scope – laws on the books. Reach – boots on the ground. Will – what lives in the heart of the agent of the State. To engage in the counter economy is to engage only in moral actions (voluntary, without initiation or or threat of violence). They may or may not be legal as viewed from the perspective of the State Agent. In order to get to a regenerative economy, we have to add one more layer - an ethical framework provided by the Prime Directive and three ethics of permaculture. Prime Directive: The only ethical decision is to take responsibility for yourself and your dependents. Make it now. Permaculture Ethics Care Of The Earth: Provision for all life systems to continue and multiply. Care Of People: Provision for people to access those resources necessary for their own existence. Setting Limits To Population And Consumption: By governing our own needs, we can set resources aside to reinvest towards the first two ethics. Once we have combined Counter-Economics with the ecologically sound guideposts from permaculture, we have created the foundation for a truly regenerative economy. One in which the 7th Generation Principle can come to fruition in act and spirit:  The 7th Generation Principle: A 7th generation systems creates socially and economically fulfilling lives for its inhabitants, whose daily activity patterns regenerate natural ecosystems and increase living capital year over year, such that the economic and social value of natural ecosystems is always increasing, and the value-ing of those systems is transmitted intact across generations.   Show Resources The Regenerative Agora: Counter-Economics For Stewards Of The Future The Prime Directive, Ethics and Principles Of Permaculture The 7th Generation Principle: Designing Ecosystems For Continuity Across Generations Counter-Economics: From The Back Alleys To The Stars - by Samuel Edward Konkin III   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

Today's episode is a short primer on live staking - what it is, how it works, what its good for, what types of species you can use to do it, and how to harvest, prepare and plant your live stakes. If you have perennially moist soils in need of stabilization, or are able to irrigate certain areas to ensure adequate soil moisture for establishment, you can plant hundreds of trees for pennies per stem and create living structures that provide many layers of function while getting stronger over time! Livestaking is a great way to establish living fences, plant and grow living structures, stabilize eroded stream or gully banks, establish large trees in pasture, plant living fence posts and much more. It is a greate example of how when we work with nature we can create landscapes that are exponentially more functional and abundant for us, both today and in the future. Show Resourcesb SHD Primer - All About Live Staking Expanded list of woody species that can be used for live staking - all but guaranteed that you've got what you need growing nearby Curated YouTube playlist showing live staking application across a variety of different settings and bioregions.   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

As within so without. If we want to see changes in our external world (i.e. regenerating landscapes and ecosystems), we have to first address our internal state. The older I get and the more I learn, the less I can say I know for sure. This, though, is one of those things that I've arrived at as being one of those "indivisible kernels of truth" - something solid and constant upon which I can build a foundation for regeneration. The external state of our landscapes is a direct reflection of our own internal states. This has always been true in every consultancy I have ever done. This is why I always have my design clients beging the process by creating a Minimum Holistic Goal. To start designing without first calming and clarifying your own internal landscape is basically the same as giving a bunch of apes spaghetti to throw at the wall and then seeing what sticks and saying "Look, design!". We can do better than that. We have to do better than that if our goal is to regenerate the ecosystems upon which we depend for our sustenance and quality of life. Every landscape ultimately becomes a mirror of one's internal state.   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal Building Your Sovereign Homestead   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

Adaptive Management: Observation-driven management for constantly increasing resilience and ecosystem function by employing planned, purposeful disruption. Prescriptive Management: Labeling your observations so that you can look up a prescription that fits that label. This is a much more myopic way of managing a landscape, as you're automatically confining yourself to pre-existing solutions for truly unique problems or challenges. Adaptation is Nature's way. Nature is always changing - things may rhyme but they are never exactly the same. Therefore our management needs to change with this constantly changing landscape. 3 Rules of Adapative Management  Compounding: every decision creates a cascade of compounding effects, these effects are never neutral, they are either positive or negative with regards to ecosystem function and whether or not they move you closer to your Quality of Life goals or further from them. Diversity: Greater species diversity is always better, and creates positive compounding effects. Disruption: Introduce planned, purposeful disruption in order to vary the stimulus that the landscape receives to continue making gains in ecosystem function, homestead efficiency and resilience, and enterprise profitability. Never assume you've got it in the bag! ALWAYS base your actions on observation - adapt to the feedback that Nature is always providing, instead of prescribing from a narrow field of pre-existing solutions. Show Resourcesb https://understandingag.com/resources/fact-sheets/ Adapative Grazing Webinar - 3 Part Series w/ Allen Williams: https://pastureproject.org/webinar-archive/adaptive-grazing-101-webinar-series-with-dr-allen-williams/ About Dr. Allen Williams: https://soilhealthacademy.org/team/dr-allen-williams/ VIDEO: What Is Adaptive Grazing?   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram      

When we design holistic ecosystems, we start with mapping out desired and required functions THEN search for, select and/or design elements/systems that provide those functions in a way that aligns with the site-specific context. This is contrasted with how most people "design" systems - they see an ad or read an article and like the thing or the method/technique they see, and then say "I want thing A" or "I'm going to do technique B" on my land. And then systems start being built around these sexy, cool things that are out of alignment with the context of time and place. Today I hope I can convince you that starting your homestead design (or re-design) by first assessing your desired and required functions - and thus creating a map of functions and functional outcomes that you require to support your chosen Quality of Life - that you can then much more quickly and effectively design or select the appropriate elements to populate your design. This is functions-first design, and I encourage everyone to at least give function mapping a try when designing their homesteads.   Show Resources The Prime Directive, Ethics and Principles of Permaculture The 4 R's of Regenerative Hydrology   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram

If you are serious about food sovereignty, you're serious about building soil. In this episode I detail 4 methods for creating your own soil fertility inputs from what you are already growing, can source on your property or very close to home, or are already in the course of putting food on your table. They are: Vermicomposting ------------------> good biology Compost Tea Brewing --------------> amplify biology Biochar ----------------------------> retain biology Plant-based Liquid Fertilizer --------> feed biology It is in the SYNERGY between these methods that the real exponential gains are to be found. I chose vermicomposting as a way to create good biology in the first place as it is relatively simple to get started with and will yield returns of worm castins within a growing season or less. Next, utilize aerobic compost tea brewing to expand the amount of beneficial biology you have created from the worm castings. Once you have a tea you can spray it and cover large areas of plant bodies or soil surface with beneficial biology and nutrients. This is WAY more efficient than spot application of compost. Next, use your aerobic compost tea inoculated with worm castings to inoculate charcoal and turn it into biochar! Biochar is a millennia+ soil amendment - it will outlive you and the next 20+ generations in the soil - and it will provide a home for beneficial biology and retain nutrients for the entire time it persists. This is as close to an infinite improvement as we can get in our human form. And finally, to charge up naked charcoal and give all the beneficial biology something to eat, we make anaerobically fermented weed tea (though animal products can be used too) to create a mineral and nutrient rich solution. Use your compost tea brewing set up to hyper-aerate this solution to kill all of the anaerobic organisms, leaving a nutrient soup, and then introduce naked charcoal and beneficial micro-organisms (vermicompost) to create a nutrient-rich, hydrated, beneficial microbe hotel that will provide increasing benefit to your growing systems year after year without you having to do it year after year. This is about getting off the treadmill of annual inputs. Don't give your money to the big fertilizer companies when you can make a way better, site-specific product on your own for very cheap that doesn't have a long-term downside like typicaly salt-based fertilizers and centralized, commodity soil amendments. Food sovereignty can be acheived when our food systems build soil by default. That is what this synergy can do for you. Resources DIY Soil Fertility - Part 1: Vermicomposting DIY Soil Fertility - Part 3: Compost Tea Brewing DIY Soil Fertility - Part 6: Charcoal & Biochar DIY Soil Fertility - Part 8: Fermented Liquid Nutrient Fertilizers - write up coming soon!     ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram              

Today is an expose about one of America's dirty secrets - we're talking about the nation wide biosolids program. Supposedly its a great way to beneficially cycle a "renewable resource" to help fertilize crop fields, protect water sheds and keep people healthy. In reality, its anything but - and we know from first hand knowledge because we lived with it right across the street from us for months.  For any would-be homesteader looking to re-locate to the country, be aware of the potential for biosolids in your watershed and potentially right across the fence (as in our case). This is a huge problem, one that has resulted from a society and civil infrastructure built around the assumptions of a perpetual and never-ending supply of cheap energy. Now those chickens are coming home to roost, and its on us to fix it. First things first we have to learn just how extensive the problem of dealing with our own shit is so we can wrap our heads around what will be required to retrofit existing systems to make them work for a lower energy future. Show Resources Actual EPA Laws & Regs: https://www.epa.gov/biosolids/biosolids-laws-and-regulations Plain English version (its 175 pages long - don't get too excited): https://www.epa.gov/sites/default/files/2018-12/documents/plain-english-guide-part503-biosolids-rule.pdf EPA Propaganda Page for National Biosolids Initiative: https://www.epa.gov/biosolids PFAS Guide Doc: https://www.epa.gov/system/files/documents/2023-07/Joint-Principles-Preventing-Managing-PFAS.pdf The EPAs sheet on PFAS: https://www.epa.gov/pfas/pfas-explained EWG PFAS Factsheet: https://static.ewg.org/ewg-tip-sheets/EWG-AvoidingPFCs.pdf https://thesovereignhomestead.com/soil-fertility-for-homesteads-vermicompost/ Home Bio Gas Toilet - turn your sewage and food waste into methane gas for cooking and valuable and SAFE fertilizer for your garden: https://www.homebiogas.com/   ____________________________________________________________________________ WHAT I DO: Design: On-Site Consultation Online Site/Project Consultation Holistic Ecosystem Design   Implementation: Water Harvesting Earthworks High-function, Low-Maintenance Access Living Systems Spring Development   Courses: Minimum Holistic Goal   Media: The Sovereign Homestead Podcast YouTube Instagram          

Today's show is all about the things you have to do to get yourself onto your land quickly without shooting yourself in the foot withe improperly located or oriented structures and roads. Vehicle access is basically an absolute necessity in today's world. By their very nature, roads are a break from the inherent landform, and thus ALL ROADS CAPTURE AND MOVE WATER. This is just part of what a road does. If you put in a road, or are inheriting a road without understanding that fact, you will pay for it later - all it takes is one good storm. So today, in this first installment of the Making Landfall series, we're zero-ing in on Water > Access > Structures - the three primary design layers that have to get sorted out quickly when you move onto a new landscape. Where am I going to live? How am I going to get to it? How will this affect and be affected by water moving through the landscape? This show is about the essential things you need to do to get it right and not create a Type 1 Error that will hamper your efforts to create your sovereign homestead as long as it exists. Show Resources Vehicle Access For Regenerative Landscapes - First Principles ~ the basic principles that guide planning and implementing vehicle access that has a regenerative effect on your site hydrology and ecosystem function. Vehicle Access For Regenerative Landscapes - Essential Terminology & Guiding Questions For Watershed Assessment ~ all the things you need to know and consider when assessing your landscape to plan efficient, low-maintenance, high-function vehicle access. Water Drainage Elements Index - blog post index of lesser-known cross drains and drainage elements more suited to regenerative water management. Don't install 'not my problem tubes' unless you absolutely have to! Yeah, I'm talking about culverts here - I rarely see these done well, especially with regards to what happens with the water after it leaves the culvert. Perhaps try a rolling dip instead!   Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out the Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.       I also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.  

New Year's Evolution. This show is about doing the most important work first - your own internal visioning - an rooting that vision in your heart to create a WHY strong enough to bear any HOW. If you haven't done it yet, give yourself the gift of creating your Minimum Holistic Goal. It is the ONE THING that will make everything else that comes after easier, more fun and more effective. Creating a legacy worth inheriting starts in you.  Let your life be a love letter to future generations and leave beauty in your wake. That's how we create a world worth inheriting.

In this episode I am sharing what I have come to call the 7th Generation Principle - a principle guide post of sorts that I've been refining for nearly 10 years now to help guide my design work (for my own life and for others) in the direction of inter-generational regeneration. Basically, it seems like throughout human history we've actually lived in a truly sustainable fasion - i.e. regeneratively. Some of those examples even persisted for quite some time, but now we are left with very few intact cultures that can successfully transmit the cultural values of regeneration through time from one generation to the next. Even those that still exist are struggling to keep it up. This principles is my attempt at refining design imperatives such that we prepare fertile soil for the values of regeneration to once again take root in the hearts and minds of the up and coming generations, and for them to have the tools to successfully transmit those values to their descendants. We'll break down all the context and various pieces of it in the podcast, but here it is in full: A 7th generation system creates socially and economically fulfilling lives for its inhabitants, whose daily activity patterns regenerate natural ecosystems and increase living capital year over year, such that the economic and social value of natural ecosystems is always increasing, and the value-ing of those systems is transmitted intact across generations. In this episode I'll walk through the questions that led to me writing this principle this way, and the ways to apply it in your own lifestyle design using the Regenerative Triple Bottom Line - Economic, Social and Ecological to create guiding  criteria and questions to assess if you're on target or not. Show Resources BLOG POST: The 7th Generation Principle - Designing Regenerative Systems For Continuity Across Generations VIDEO: The Living Root Bridges Of Meghalaya (4 min) VIDEO: India - The Living Bridges - ARTE.tv documentary (24 min) Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs. Or... Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     Sovereign Homestead Design also offers consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.    

In today's show we discuss the idea of the Carnivore Homestead. For those of us that eat a mostly animal-based diet,  we want to produce mostly animal-based calories from our homestead production systems. I got news - just because we like to eat steak doesn't mean we aren't going to grow plants - in fact, we've got to grow them in greater quantity and quality in order to feed the animals that become our food. Carnivore homesteads have to be regenerative by their very nature if they are to be sustainable. Join me as we discuss the ins and outs of what I'm calling the 5 tenets of carnivore homesteading: Maximize Calorie Production / Unit Area - this means growing a better solar collector, which means growing lots of plants. We do this by managing the 4 pillars of any productive ecosystem - water, soil, light and life (biology/living organisms). Extend Calorie Production Throughout As Much Of The Year As Possible - extend the growing season, and no its not just about greenhouses, though those are great. Livestock Species Selection & Integration - select species that WILL thrive on what your land is innately good at producing, and integrate them with other species that improve the habitat for one another (non-competitive niches). Preserve Seasonal Abundance With Long Term Storage - we need to employ a variety of methods to preserve fat and protein during times of abundance for the times of dearth - freezers and canning are great, but there is so much more! Build relationships with other producers - don't go it alone! Animal products are high-value, and if you are producing one you probably have an abundance greater than you can use. Trading, exchanging or sell to or with other local producers creates stronger, healthier, more resilient communities and allows us to create our own food systems parallel to the mainstream commoditized, centralized and controlled industrial food system. Show Resources Epi-058 - Sovereign Food Systems: Silvopasture For Sovereign Meat Forests BLOG POST: Silvopasture - Sustainable Food Systems For The Era Of Energy Descent BLOG POST: High Value Livestock Fodder Trees For Temperate Climates Epi-007 - High Value Livestock Fodder Trees For Temperate Climates YouTube Channel: Farming With Trees Epi-059 - Sovereign Food Systems: Aquaculture Pantry Ponds Epi-061 - Up-Leveling Calorie Production With Azolla Permies Thread on Carnivore Homesteading   Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you create a master plan for your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.   What Plants Crave T-shirts And Stickers! Another fun way you can support the show AND start some fun and interesting conversations along the way. For those of you that have seen Idiocracy, you know what this is all about. For those of you that haven't...watch this.          

Today's episode came out of a Permies.com thread on Carnivore Homesteading. The seed questions for the thread was, for those of us enjoying the benefits of a carnivore lifestyle, how can we produce more high-quality animal-based calories for our own consumption from well designed and integrated systems at the homestead scale. Basically, there are three main focal points that need attention here: First and foremost we need to maximize is the number of calories grown per unit area (per acre, per square foot, per roof, whatever space one has)  if we are to be eating primarily animal products coming from our own properties. This means optimizing the landscape/whateverscape to the fullest extent possible to maximize our use of those freely available resources that go into growing and producing calories - namely water, light, and soil minerals. Second, we need to optimize the distribution of those calories throughout the year (this includes preserving seasonal oversupply/abundance for leaner times) such that high quality nutrition is available to whatever form of livestock we might be keeping or tending. Third - select and stack livestock species that are appropriately suited to the given unique context (i.e. ruminants where pasture forages are plentiful, fish/water fowl/invertebrates where water is plentiful etc). Generally, at least in my own limited experience, that when faced with a repetitive task or "problem" that has to be backfilled with my own labor/time/energy, I'm almost always missing an additional living system - i.e. the solution almost always seems to be to "add more life". With these focal areas in mind, we arrive at azolla - an incredibly productive free-floating aquatic fern that fixes its own atmospheric nitrogen, yields a high-protein vegetative crop that can be harvested DAILY, is incredibly simple to grow and propagate indefinitely for almost no cost after the initial system set up, and can be stored fed to practically all classes of livestock, fresh or dried! Azolla truly is a super plant, and if you haven't come across it - or even if you have - this one deserves your attention. It, along with other highly productive and nutritious aquatic vegetable crops, deserve a spot on the roster in your homestead production systems - especially if you're trying to raise nutrient dense animal products for your own final consumption! In this episode we will discuss... General plant characteristics - what makes Azolla so darn special Azolla's history in agriculture as well as its significant role in creating the current earth climate. Livestock pallatibility - cattle, sheep, goats, pigs, rabbits, chickens, ducks, fish, worms, insects - you name it, it'll probably eat azolla! Digestibility Growing Requirements - light, temperature, humidity, ph, salinity, nutrition, pests - everything you need to know to set up a successful azolla growing environment Propagation Methods - different small-scale systems for growing azolla on the homestead Harvesting and processing Other Applications of azolla beyond animal feed and more! Show Resources https://www.feedipedia.org/node/565 https://www.agrifarming.in/azolla-farming-project-report https://theazollafoundation.org/ https://permies.com/t/40/226880/Carnivore-Homesteading#2060792 Takota Coen VIDEO - How he uses duckweed to feed pigs, chickens and cows on his family farm - the same process will work for azolla ~Epi-13 - DIY Charcoal and Biochar For Home Use ~Epi-59 - Sovereign Food Systems: Pantry Ponds For Perennial Food Production Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.     Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.    

Just a quick update on recent events here and announcement for taking a break until Novemeber 1st to visit family and dive into some design projects here in Tennessee and North Carolina. You can also follow Sovereign Homestead Design on YouTube. We've been having massive technical issues with our webhosting and emails this past month - basically incommunicado as far as our ability to reach out to the world, BUT, our Instagram account @honeybadgernursery is still up, detailing some of what's going on at the homestead. The Honey Badger Nursery website is still down, but we are hoping to resolve that and all the internet drama soon! We'll be diving into some larger property design work this month for the property we are currently living on, and hopefully into implementation in late October / early November for some mainframe water harvesting earthworks and vehicle access. I'll also be retrofitting a spring for 3 houses in Black Mountain, NC, just outside of Asheville, and will endeavor to film that project and turn it into a helpful tutorial video. If you have specific systems or designs that you'd like me to explore on the show, drop me a line and let me know - casey@thesovereignhomestead.com ------------------------------------------------ Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.  ---------------------------------- Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  --------------------------------- What Plants Crave T-shirts And Stickers! Another fun way you can support the show AND start some fun and interesting conversations along the way. For those of you that have seen Idiocracy, you know what this is all about. For those of you that haven't...watch this.      

Today we look at another Sovereign Food System - what I'm calling the Pantry Pond. Basically a homestead-scale aquaculture system designed to maximize your food sovereignty via independence from the centralized systems of supply and distribution for any of the inputs required to grow what you want to grow - fish, aquatic vegetables, crawfish, shrimp, water fowl etc. Well-designed homestead-scale aquaculture systems aren't that common here in the modern U.S., and yet they have a tremendously long and productive history in many cultures the world round. Because aquaculture is so context and place-specific, we're going to talk about things today from a paradim and principles perspective, as well as list the specific design criteria you'll need to pay attention to when shaping your pond(s) and selecting the species to live in them. We'll look at... Context - what you need to analyze to know if this will work for you Zones within the pond Litoral, limnetic, euphotic, profundal and benthic and the different characteristics of each (HINT: litoral is where most of the action is going to be) Different production elements Fish and factors affecting their yields Invertebrates - crawfish, shrimp, prawns, snails, insects Amphibians Filter Feeders - molluscs, clams, oysters etc. Vegetation - 4 types of aquatic vegetation Marginal  Emergent Submerged Floating Physical Structure Of Your Pond(s) Segmentation / Segregation of different ages, sexes, species etc. Life-stage design: eggs > fry > fingerlings > adult / market weight > breeding adults Predator protection - aquatic and terrestrial Temperature and aeration considerations Feeding / harvest pens Optimizing the pond edge for calorie production Shallows, chinampas, paddies, floating islands, trees etc. If you're serious about creating food sovereignty from your landscape, pantry ponds deserve consideration. Per unit area, there is nothing as productive, especially when it comes to producing protein. Show Resources Azolla Foundation - everything you could want to know about this super plant for homestead aquaculture systems! Permaculture Design Principle Deep Dive ~ Epi 10 - Optimize The Edge Chinampas playlist Adjustable monk/swivel pipes in action   Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  

In today's show we are talking about creating Sovereign Food Systems. I think this will be a series, or at least a collection of episodes, each one focused on a different type of sovereign food system that can be applied at a variety of scales across a broad range of contexts. Basically, a sovereign food system is one that has eliminated any dependence on inputs from centralized production and distribution systems for its continued operation.  I believe these systems are increasingly important in light of the war on independent food that we are seeing and experiencing all around the world right now. We are being squeezed, and the pressure is only going to keep building. Sovereign food systems are a way to in-source the inputs for your food producting systems - to literally grow and cycle them on-site - so that you don't need to depend on globalized supply chains, the price of deisel, and a functioning currency to put quality food on the table for your family. Sovereign food is all about designing systems that maximize the sunlight, water and soil resources on your property with good design and proper management such that the systems builds soil while feeding people. That's what sovereign food is all about. Show Resources Silvopasture playlist on The Sovereign Homestead YouTube Channel. Livestock fodder trees playlist on The Sovereign Homestead YouTube Channel.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.  

Today we discuss permaculture design principle #12 - Collaborate With Succession. The more that we can align our designs, systems and management styles with the inherent successional trends already present in our landscapes, the greater our yields will be with fewer resource inputs required. This is all about energy efficiency, and it starts with OBSERVING AND INTERACTING (Principle #1) with your landscape to identify the patterns that are already present. Your land is telling you what it wants to become, you just have to have the eyes to see it! Show Resources YouTube Playlist - Chinampas Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.    We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.  

Today we take a deeper look at the 11th permaculture design principle: Make The Least Change For The Greatest Effect. This principle is about economy of effort. When designing a sovereign homestead, we need to make sure that our systems are providing us with not only the right types of yields, but also in sufficient quantity and at a reasonable return to make our continued tending of the system worthwhile. Living systems that provide for generation after generation exhibit a high degree of economy of effort. We'll look at how you can analyze your current homestead and lifestyle to identify the leverage points where optimizing your system can produce outsized returns to your quality of life. We also talk about biasing your interventions and applications of time/energy/money to more "permanent" improvements - things that will require less of your time/energy/money as they mature while increasing in productivity and/or value that will outlive you by a long margin.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.    We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.  

In today's episode we take a deep dive into Permaculture Design Principle #10 - Optimize The Edge. We will discuss: Edge: What is it exactly? The real-world effects of edges in your homestead landscape with regards to energy translation, species diversity and overall productivity. How to manage edge for physical environments/elements to get more of what you want and less of what you don't (HINT: It's really about surface area!) Lots of examples of edge Optimizing edge is really about optimizing relationships between elements Why greater harmony is the ultimate aim of making adjustments to the edges between different elements and media Benefic vs. neutral vs. negative relationships -> and how to get all your living systems to place nice together   Sovereign Homestead Design Services Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.      

This week we look at Permaculture Design Principle #9: Choose Small-Scale, Intensive Solutions. This is all about managing intensively in a small footprint at the start - and expanding what works and changing or eliminating what does not. We'll talk about the importance of testing your systems before expanding them by conducting Safe To Fail experiments. We also talk about PROFIT - that most important of words - that little bit of surplus energy above and beyond what the system requires to maintain and sustain itself that you can use to conduct safe-to-fail trials that will lead you towards greater efficiency, productivity and resiliency. Show Resources Jon Jandai Video - What Most People Don't Know About Farming   Sovereign Homestead Design Services Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.       We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.      

Today we take a deeper look at Permaculture Design Principle #8 - Integrate, Don't Segregate. This principle is fundamentally about 'stacking functions' - a common term we hear a lot in perma-speak - but what does that really mean and HOW do you go about doing it? We'll talk nuts and bolts of creating functionally redundant systems, including: Segregation vs. integration, and the energetic costs of going down one path vs. the other in the design of your homestead How building functional redundancy into your systems leads to resiliency in the face of disruptive events, and how this can lead YOU to become a more anti-fragile person and thus have a more anti-fragile homestead. Why CONNECTION is the secret sauce for 'stacking functions' HOW To Do It What Functional Design is - starting with functions first, and working towards the elements from there The importance of element location and orientation to maximize function. List all of the main functional categories a la the Permaculture Design Scale of Permanence. Maximizing function is ALL about designing relationships between things, not so much the things themselves. Become a designer of connections between elements, and you'll become a better human being in all ways.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.   What Plants Crave T-shirts And Stickers! Another fun way you can support the show AND start some fun and interesting conversations along the way. For those of you that have seen Idiocracy, you know what this is all about. For those of you that haven't...watch this.    

Design from pattern to details. Anyone who has read a permaculture book has heard this - but how to actually DO IT? Today we talk about Natural Constants and the Yeomans Scale of Permanence as tools you can use to help you design from big, broad, largely immutable patterns down to small, granular, actionable details. This is how you can ground the small actions you take in any given moment to a 7th generation vision - each action is informed by the many layers of contextual foundation that underlay it.   The most fundamental bit of pattern understanding you can develop to guide the design and evolution of your homestead is knowing your own internal map - your values, and what your life looks and feels like on a day-to-day basis when you live an alignment with them (your Highest Quality of Life). If you haven't done that work yet, start by developing your Minimum Holistic Goal. Then move on to researching and developing all of the factors the should guide sound design decision - do your own Foundational Site Assessment or bring us in to help. Once you've got your bases covered, then its time to put pen to paper and start designing. Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  ============================================================== Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.  

Today we're talking about the 6th permaculture design principle: Make No Waste. In Nature, "waste" = food. How can we design our homesteads and the various life support systems on them such that the "waste" from one becomes the food for another? How many energetic loops and connection can we create between elements, systems and organisms? We'll discuss one of the simple tools for enacting the Waste = Food principle - called Input/Output/Intrinsic Analysis. We'll also talk about the switch that flips once you change the way you view what most of our society calls "waste" and junk piles start looking like diamond piles. The more "waste" we can eliminate by creating systems that cycle energy better, the more resilient and independent we become, and the healthier the ecology becomes.   ==================================== Need some help getting the "birds eye view" of your property and its surrounds to help you design your sovereign homestead? Check out our Hi-Definition Contour Base Map package. This package includes: Hi-definition LiDAR contour map layer (contour lines can spaced at whatever scale you desire - as tight as 1 foot or less if you desire).  Aspect Map Layer - color-code your entire property by which direction it faces - very helpful in identifying ideal growing zones and microclimates for specific plantings. Hillshade Layer - for easily visualizing landform across your entire property. Slope Layer - color-code your entire property based on the % grade - very helpful for access planning, living systems establishment and site selection for buildings etc. Deliverables include: Hi-definition .jpeg or .pdf of your entire property and/or its contributing watersheds, at whatever size you desire (if you wish to print a poster and have it laminated as an iterative design tool images can be generated at whatever size the poster shop will print). .KML file of the contour lines for importing and 3D viewing in Google Earth Pro (free to download) - this is a very helpful and accessible design tool.     We also offer consulting calls if you need some design help or a fresh perspective - see the Virtual Property Design Review for details.   ==================================================== What Plants Crave T-shirts And Stickers! Another fun way you can support the show AND start some fun and interesting conversations along the way. For those of you that have seen Idiocracy, you know what this is all about. For those of you that haven't...watch this.      

Today we continue our Deep Dive series on the 12 foundational principles of permaculture. In this episode we take a deeper look at Principle #5: Use And Value Nature's Gifts / Collaborate With Succession / Work With Nature, Not Against It. There are numerous different ways this principle is written, and we'll explore the nuance of all three of the most common versions, as well as what you can specifically look for in your landscape and within your unique context to better align your design and management of your homestead with natural pattern, and how you can both increase your harvestable yields while expending less energy to do so! We're starting to get to the point where all of the preceding principles are indivisibly linked to each additional one. Indeed, its almost like they all function together somehow to create hyper-functional systems - i.e. natural ecosystems! Show Resources Permaculture Principle Deep Dive Series thus far...if any of the prior principles I refer to today are new to you, go back and listen to the other episodes in the series to better understand each one. #1: Observe & Interact #2: Catch & Store Energy #3: Obtain A Yield #4: Self Regulate & Accept Feedback Ways You Can Support The Show You can support our work at Sovereign Homestead Design by working with us - we offer remote and on-site/in-person design services, including high-definition LiDAR contour map development for your property that you can visualize in Google Earth, Virtual Property Design Reviews, and on-site/in-person work for conducting Foundational Site Assessments and Mainframe Homestead Design. You can also support us by grabbing one of the 'What Plants Crave' T-shirts from our store - we've got 'em for Compost Tea, Water and Biochar.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.    

In today's episode we continue with our Permaculture Design Principle Deep Dive Series with Principle #4 - Self Regulate And Accept Feedback. We talk about why those two terms - 'self regulate' and 'accept feedback' come packaged together, and how each is important to create an environment that promotes rapid iteration and 'safe to fail' testing of systems followed by planned amplification or dampening based on the results. We'll go through the Cynefin Sense-Making Framework as a tool for understanding the context in which you are in and adjusting your Decision Model to suite it appropriately. This includes: The 4 Types of Decision Scenarios Simple, Complicated, Complex and Chaotic The Zone of Disorder where we spend most of our time trying to figure out which type of scenario we are in so that we can respond appropriately. How to set up 'safe to fail' experiments vs. 'fail safe' experiments A simple 5 option ranking to determine what kind of situation you are in - Simple, Complicated or Complex The danger of the "Complacency Cliff" between Simple Systems and Chaos - and how to avoid falling off of it! This is all about becoming a better designer and manager of your homestead. Show Resources Cynefin: A Sense-Making Framework PDF Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  

Today is the third episode in our Permaculture Design Principle Deep Dive series - Obtain A Yield. This is all about intentionally designing living systems on our homesteads that provide for our needs to live a great life. Join me as we discuss... The different types of yields you can design for: product, energy and intangible/impalpable The Definition of a system yield - and the 5 ways you can go about obtaining it True-Cost Yield Accounting to accurately account for all costs involved in obtaining the yield. Strategies for creating yields Physical/Environmental Biological Spatial/Configurational Temporal Technical Conservation Cultural Legal/Administrative Social Design Where the real limits to the yield potential of any system truly lies And more...   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  

Today we take a deeper look at the second of the core permaculture design principles - Catch And Store Energy. This is what designing a functional and resilient ecosystem is all about - energy in vs. energy out. Everything that is alive needs to bring in more energy than it expends in order to 1) sustain its own existence and 2) to reproduce. If we design our homesteads and homes to catch and store useful forms of energy, we can create a holistic system that works for us even when we aren't around.  In this episode we will discuss what to look for when you are designing a system to capture and store energy - gradients and cycles.  We'll also cover the many different forms of energy you can capture and store with appropriate elements integrated seamlessly into a functioning whole. This show should give you a very tangible way to employ this second design principle as you go about designing your homestead and your life. Show Resources Mr. Teslonian's YouTube videos on trompes - using falling water to compress air.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  

This is the first in a series of episodes that will go into depth on how to apply and leverage each of the 12 foundational design principles used in permaculture.  The first design principle is Observe and Interact. It is the keystone design principle, from which all others are held together and applied toward a functional end. Join me as we discuss: The context for applying the permaculture design principles - i.e. the oft-forgot Prime Directive and the oft-misinterpreted 3 Ethics. Why Observe & Interact is NOT about being a neutral observer, or being separate from what is being observed. First and foremost we are part of Nature and we need to understand that our observation of a thing influences the thing. The 4 Styles of Observation Child-like Thematic Instrumental Experiential Why separating observation from analysis, at least immediately, is very important to preserve possibilities. Methods of Observation Sit Spot Routine - this is from Jon Young of Wilderness Awareness School and the audio recording of Seeing Through Native Eyes. This is the most powerful practice I know of you can start using today to enhance your powers of observation and your connection with the natural rhythms of your landscape. Show Resources Seeing Through Native Eyes on Last.fm Seeing Through Native Eyes audio hard copy Epi-002 - The Prime Directive, 3 Ethics, and 12 Principles of Permaculture As Sovereign Homestead Design Tools   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  

Today we are talking about homestead security. It's a topic that is left out of a lot of "mainstream" permaculture design books - and really its hardly mentioned at all as a design consideration. We live in a weird time, when for just a few short generations, and then only for a select few people, we've been able to delegate our security to "the authorities" (911, the cops etc). We are quickly heading into disruptive, turbulent and hard economic times - with that comes an increase in crime - we are already seeing it, and have been for quite a while in urban areas. Even if you're out in the sticks, perhaps even more so, you need to be in charge of your own homestead and home security. Security is something that some people can go their whole life without ever thinking about - amazing but true. But when you NEED security, you NEED IT IMMEDIATELY. Far faster than any emergency responder can get there. So it has to come from us - by our own design, mindset and environment. Today we discuss the 4 D's of Homestead Security as I'm calling them - Deter - Detect - Delay - Defend.  I did not make this up, but I don't know where or if I heard it from someone, but it is the framework I am using as we fix up our current old farmhouse, and it is the framework I recommend to all of my clients when thinking about homestead security from a design perspective. Deter OBJECTIVE: To decrease the likelihood of being attacked/invaded/intruded or aggressed upon. METHODS: Relocation - MOVE somewhere where this is less likely! Appearance - make your homestead uninviting to criminals Awareness - let the criminal know that they are being monitored - signs for cameras, beware of dog, home security monitoring etc. Access - fences, gates, walls and what goes on them and plantings around the house the deter someone from even trying to get sneaky. Detect OBEJCTIVE: To be alerted sooner rather than later when someone enters your property or approaches your home. METHODS: Dogs Motion-activated cameras, doorbell cameras etc. linked to your phone. Peep Hole - cheap and effective! Acoustic warnings from various access points: Bells on gates, doors Loud vegetation around perimeter of property or home or barring easy access through windows etc. Window Monitoring Alarms - generally call out to a monitoring company if a window is broken. Delay OBJECTIVE: TO slow down an intruder once they have made the decision to enter your property or home - to buy you more time to respond effectively! METHODS: Distance - from road, driveway or publicly accessed area - paired with early detection! Gates & Fences - locked gates, sharp fences, electric fences Doors Amored Door Jambs - we used ArmorConcepts.com Anti-Kick Plates HavenLock Night Lock Windows bars or security film (we used the 8 mil film from BDF) Demo, demo, installation. Safe Room: Have a plan and rehearse it that makes you an even harder target within your home. Defend OBJECTIVE: To neutralize any threat to life or property. METHODS: Owning a firearm and equally important being well trained in safe and effective operation and maintaining that skill regularly. Dogs - if you get a dog that is purpose-bred for protection you have a human-seeking fur missile!   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.  

In today's episode we re-cap the takeaways from the 2-day grazing school I attended at Greg Judy's Green Pastures Farm in Clark, Missouri. The school was awesome, with great instruction from Greg and his co-instructor Abram Bowerman of Still Waters Farm in Spickard, MO. Intensively managed ruminant livestock are the tool for building soil rapidly, at scale over broad acre landscapes. The benefits are too numerous to enumerate here, but suffice to say if you have even a couple of acres, you need to get livestock on them and you need to move them. Anything less and it'll be like trying to homestead with one hand tied behind your back - so much more work or damn near impossible! When it comes to building a fertile, rich and productive soil bank, there is nothing that can compete with well-managed livestock. And building soil is fundamentally what sovereign homestead is all about. If you don't have living soil, you don't have many choices available to you. Show Resources Green Pastures Farm Greg Judy's YouTube Channel Livestock Fodder Trees Dryland & Mediterranean Livestock Fodder Trees Temperate Climate Livestock Fodder Trees - individual tree write-ups and TSH Epi-007 - High Value Livestock Fodder Trees For Temperate Climates Livestock Fodder Trees at Honey Badger Nursery   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.    

Today's episode is a short one about just doing the next thing. You don't have to have everything mapped out ahead of time. If you have a set of principles (permaculture) and a long-term, BIG vision (your Minimum Holistic Goal - aka your "10 Year Vision"), it becomes very easy to prioritize and act on the next most impactful thing, without having a master plan. It's the SAPA framework - Survey, Assess, Prioritize, and Act - a short acronum for a decision-making loop based on permaculture principles. Survey (Observe And Interact),  Assess (Integrate Feedback), then Prioritize and Act on things that you can complete in an appropriate time frame and that will pay you back a multiple of what you've invested. If you feel overwhelmed with choosing your next thing to do in the evolution of your homestead towards greater self-sufficieny and self-reliance, start by getting your BIG vision outlined (I recommend this process).  From there, assess your survival needs and start with something small that can be completed in one hour (there is almost always some low-hanging fruit that you can literally complete in an hour or less that will increase your self-reliance or self-sufficiency for one or more of your core survival needs - this is permaculture principle #9: Choose Small-Scale, Intensive Solutions. Then do it again tomorrow. And the day after that. And the next day, and so on. This is how you will create your sovereign homestead that is a perfect reflection of what you value most and will provide you with the things you need the most to live your highest quality of life. Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey!  Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear understanding of 1) who and what resources you have to work with, 2) your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and 3) what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Olexy from Pixabay.      

Today's show is all about getting clear on what makes a homestead sovereign vs. a modern homestead vs. just a homestead. SPOILER ALERT: It's all about CHOICE. A well-designed homestead gives you more choice - more freedom to say NO to those things that are not in alignment with your highest quality of life, so that you can say yes to the things that are. We then go into the SAPA Framework for conducting your own sovereignty self-assessment for your life and landscape, applying it to all the basic survival needs: Water, Nutrition & Calories, Shelter, Physical Security, Hygiene & Sanitation, Health & Medical Care, Energy, Finances. Survey -  What your needs for BLANK? Where does your BLANK come from? Assess Who controls the source? Rank yourself in terms of Self-Reliance (time) vs. Self-Sufficiency (%) differences between the two Which are you trying to increase for each category? How well are they being met? Are these needs better met by moving the locus of production closer to you or further away? Prioritize Where would you feel the pinch first? Two ways to gauge this… If you had to stay home for 30 days, can't leave - what is the first thing that would run-out or malfunction? That source is gone - how long until you feel it? Does it threaten life or property? YES: This is a high priority. If so, how long until you would be forced to do something ill-advised under the circumstances to meet this need? NO: this is a facet of your current lifestyle that isn't essential to your survival, but its absence makes you less comfortable Act FOCUSING QUESTION: What's the one thing I can do, such that by doing it, will make everything else easier or unnecessary? Tailored: What's the one thing I can do for my [BASIC NEED] sovereignty, such that by doing it, will make further steps towards self-reliance or self-sufficiency for [BASIC NEED] easier or unnecessary? In short, applying the SAPA framework to all of your basic survival needs areas will help you identify the action steps with the greatest ROI that you can take today to move you and your family in the direction of resilience and greater time freedom.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

Today's show is the interview I just did with Jen and Sammy of the Millennial Pioneers Podcast on What Is Permaculture?  We talk about the basics of what permaculture is about, and tangible, simple ways to get started integrating permaculture design and mindset into designing our own lives. We are living in a time when the bills racked up over the past centuries and decades of over-taxing our ecological support base, looting our economy and profligately expending energy are coming due. Permaculture design can solve a lot of the problems, or at the very least help us navigate the consequences of the predicaments that we find ourselves in, that we face as we navigate a future of decreasing net energy, fractured and dysfunctional ecologies and the death of the prosperity=constant growth economy. You can find Sammy's work and her own podcast at TheResilientLearner.com, and the Millennial Pioneers podcast at Jen's website GirlSeeksJoy.com Show Resources Toby Hemenway's books - Gaia's Garden and The Permaculture City Permaculture Designer's Manual by Bill Mollison if you want to go DEEP into the nuts and bolts of applied permaculture design. The Permies.com forums for just about anything permaculture TSH Epi-002 - The Primer Directive, 3 Ethics and 12 Principles Of Permaculture podcast episode Getting Started with vermicomposting - Nutrient Cycling For Homesteads: Part 1 - Vermicompost YouTube Channels Geoff Lawton's YouTube channel - excellent, free educational content on his YouTube, and also an amazing do-at-your-own-pace online PDC. Andrew Millison's channel for excellent narrated visual presentation of applied permaculture concepts.       Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl      

Homestead Super Plant Showcase - All About Amazing Vetiver Grass If you haven't heard of vetiver grass and are homesteading in USDA zone 7b or higher, this is a must listen! Vetiver Grass - Chrysopogon zizanioides - is a perennail, tufted, clump-forming grass that grows up to 9' tall in the tropics, and typically 6' tall in Mediterranean and humid temperate climates. It is known worldwide for its incredibly dense and fibrous root system that grows 15'+ deep, and is utilized around the world for erosion repair and prevention, slope stabilization, water clarification, sewage effluent treatment, biomass, livestock fodder, hay, and essential oil. Vetiver grass is also incredibly well-behaved - it does not produce viable seed and does not have running rhizomatous roots or stolons - meaning it will stay where you put it. To make more you can very easily divide a mature vetiver clumpe to produce upwards of 30 viable vetiver tillers (young vetiver plants budding off the mature clump). Vetiver grass can survive winter temperatures as low as 0-5 degrees Fahrenheit, and highs up to 130 degrees Fahrenheit. It can handle snow and frost as long as the ground doesn't freeze - which generally means it will grow and survive well in USDA Zones 7b and higher. Vetiver grass is incredibly drought hardy once established due to its incredibly deep root system and its C4 physiology. Vetiver grass culms are very stiff and upright, and when planted in contour strips, the grass will grow into a dense living wall that prevents sheetflow erosion and enhances infiltration. It can be buried in sediment and will root into accumulated sediments. It can be burned to the ground and will regrow from subterranean buds. It can be grazed heavily and is an excellent forage or cut fodder for horses, cows, sheep, goats, pigs, rabbits - even certain types of herbivorous fish! It can be cut multiple times a year and it literally a "carbon pump". It is used throughout the world to treat sewage effluent and to clarify manure lagoons, while producing mineral rich hay as a by-product. If you have a greywater reed bed or blackwater treatment system vetiver grass is amazing and reducing total dissolved solids (TDS) and E. coli counts. Join me in this show as we dive deep into all of the amazing characteristics and many functions that vetiver grass can perform for your homestead. This plant is incredible and is a true ally for any regenerative landscape. It is a total honey badger - incredibly tenacious once established and well-behaved in any landscape - this one can do so much for your homestead, especially if you have erosion issues or are looking to produce feed for your livestock at low to no cost! Show Resources Vetiver.org - international consortium of vetiver systems practitioners - this website has an immense library of scientific literature detailing the many applications of vetiver grass for a wide range of environmental restoration purposes. All freely available. Vetiver grass suppliers - look up a place near you to get some vetiver slips. Honey Badger Nursery will be carrying vetiver grass in the near future in southeast Tennessee. All Things Vetiver Grass - curated YouTube playlist - lots of great videos in here demonstrating vetiver grass in a wide variety of applications - from stabilizing beaches to treating sewage effluent to holding fragile hillslopes to feeding animals.   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

How can we design our lives and our homesteads to maximize our freedom in Time, Health, Wealth and Spirit? This is a primary lifestyle design aim for anyone interested in living as a sovereign human being today. Join me today as we discuss the 4 freedoms - all of which are aspects of FREEDOM - the ability to choose / say "no" to things. Freedom in time is by nature a state of abundance. Abundance is a state of living off the interest, or surplus, of natural systems without consuming the principal. Abundance comes about when savings are continually reinvested to productive ends. Time Freedom is Abundant Living. We have freedom in time when our basic needs are met by systems that largely function without requiring our constant involvement. Freedom in health is continuous, harmonic energy flow amongst the mental, spiritual, emotional and physical aspects of our nature. Fundamentally, health is about being functional - can you do the things that you are capable of and need to do (physically, mentally, spiritually, emotionally) in order to realize your highest quality of life? Freedom in wealth is having access to required forms of capital when needed on the path to realizing one's purpose. When needed is key - being able to transmute one form of capital to another as appropriate for the time and place. Freedom in spirit is having knowledge of Self and the courage to live true to it. To be free in spirit is to use self-knowledge to shed that which is not authentic to the Self, and in so doing live ever more true to one's purpose. Freedom in Spirit is courageous and self-validating and cannot be bound by the thoughts, projections or opinions of others.  Show Resources The 4 Freedoms: Principles For Regenerative Lifestyle Design Permaculture: Foundational Ethics & Principles Creating Resilient Wealth With The 8 Forms Of Capital Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

The day has finally arrived! We are leaving California and moving to Tennessee! In today's show I go into all the things that are pushing us out of California and pulling us towards the Volunteer State! We'll cover the economic and regulatory reasons why California just isn't an option for us to build a life here, and why the economic and regulatory landscape of Tennessee is a much better fit for the things we want to do and the kind of life that we want to live. We'll also talk about taxes, business regulations, general legislative climate, actual physical climate, topography, cultural factors, and (gotta keep it weird seeing as we are from CA and all) even some astrological factors that are indicating that Tennessee, and specifically southeast Tennessee, is the place to be for us. Show Resources Freedom In The 50 States Index - a state-by-state ranking of individual and economic freedom - this is a great starting place to drill down and find the state that is most aligned with what you require to live free and well! TaxFoundation.org - index of income tax rates across the U.S. - a good place to look up the tax advantages or disadvantages of relocating. Out Of Bounds Astrology - can't recommend a natal chart reading with Phil more strongly - do this if you're looking at relocating! Phil can look up where you're thinking of going, or help to find places that align with your invidual makeup. It is guaranteed to be a very insightful and grounding conversation! Tennessee Specific Resources Tennessee Greenbelt Law for limiting property taxes for agricultural, forest and open space properties. Greenbelt brochure Tennessee made ivermectin available over the counter without a prescription during the pandemic - one of the few states that did! Tennessee State Fire Marshal's list of building codes by county and township - if you're looking for a place with freedom to build what you want without permits and unnecessary red tape, check this list. Tennessee passed SB123 which will create a state-level meat inspection agency to address the current shortage in slaughterhouses - instead of dealing with Federal inspectors, they're bringing it down to the state level - a step in the right direction to get ready for the next engineered "crisis"! Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl    

In today's show I detail my journey into what will be a multi-year endeavor - completely de-Googling my life. For us to live as sovereign human beings this day in age, we have to consciously design our digital lives to maintain appropriate levels of privacy and security amidst the ever-rising tide of surveillance and tracking. De-Googling my phone was one process I began a year ago in order to start to take back some control over my data and my reliance upon centralized tech cloud services. Despite the many pitfalls we face daily with smartphones in our lives, they are also tremendously powerful tools, and can be one of the most powerful tools you have when operating your homestead and homestead enterprises as a well-integrated whole. We need to be conscious of how we integrate tech into our lives, and understand that anything they say is "free" means that you are the product. Join me today as I share my experience in de-Googline my phone and give you the concrete steps to follow to do the same and claw back from digital privacy from the technocrats. Show Resources (aka your guide to de-Googling a Google Pixel phone) Operating Systems CalyxOS - this is what I ended up going with - maintains the Android privacy standards, very user friendly, faster than Graphene, looks great, excellent functionality and plenty of options to customize everything - oh and privacy is the default setting, but you have plenty of options to make yourself less private if you so desire. Watch TechLore's review of CalyxOS: The Private & Secure Android ROM For Everyone! GrapheneOS - more secure and private than Calyx, but requires more technical knowledge to operate, is slower and has a less seamless user experience - for more advanced folks IMO. LineageOS - steered clear of this due to reported lack of verified boot mode - backdoors perhaps? Installing & Setting Up CalyxOS Calyx OS Installation Guides Linux (Ubuntu) Windows Mac Set Up Guides TechLore's Complete Android Privacy & Security Guide Android Privacy Lab's CalyxOS - Full Post-Install Set Up Guide - Maximize Privacy On Your Android Phone Rob Braxman's deep dive into MicroG - what it is, what it does, how it impacts your privacy  - excellent resource! very helpful Reddit thread - How I Made CalyxOS The Perfect Balance Of Private & Awesome - A Guide   App Stores F-Droid Store:   Sandbox Shelter App - a MUST have! Basically allows you to have two phones in one - one for work, one for personal, and limit any unruly behaviors from work-necessary apps to a small sandbox so they don't have access to all the info on your phone. You can also "freeze" apps that have spyware or trackers so they can't constantly report back to the mothership. Read this article from MakeUseOf on how Shelter works. Browsers Fennec (Firefox) Tor Video Calls - Jitsi - has desktop and mobile apps for open source video conferencing Simple Mobile Tools - found in Fdroid, all the basic data management tools we've come to expect on a phone - only simpler. Gallery Pro - all photos and videos, multiple formats Contacts Notes Calendar - use EteSync service to create shared calendars, sync across devices - very affordable and works great File Manager Camera Open Camera App Documents / Office Suite NextCloud - Calyx has great integration here - can also be self-hosted on Embassy and auto-sync with your phone! NextCloud Hub NextCloud Files - file sharing NextCloud Talk - calls, chat, video conferencing NextCloud Groupware - calendar, contacts, email NextCloud Office - real time document collaboration - integrates with LibreOffice on Desktop Email K-9 Mail ProtonMail File Sharing SyncThing - self-hosted on Embassy, for syncing files locally (at home) or remotely (over Tor) Navigation Magic Earth - download map files ahead of time - will work even if you have no service or connectivity - this is Great for off-grid stuff! Has voice directions Organic Maps - based on OpenSTreetMaps - no spoken directions Password Manager BitWarden - I self host my own instance on my Embassy personal server, but you can create an account with BitWarden or download and run your own instance if you have the technical chops. Messaging Telegram Signal Briar - haven't used this myself, but I've read good things. Simple Messenger (native to CalyxOS - slim on features, but can do group texts etc) Phone - integrated w/ contacts, call history, simple dial pad etc. Drawbacks - no Missed Call alert flags, have to dial in to listen to voicemail, can't merge calls (at least I haven't successfully done so yet).   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

What if we chose to view nature's gift of annually-replenishing fixed carbon sources (i.e. brush, forests etc) in high-fire danger areas as an opportunity to harmonize with the annual carbon cycle instead of as a nuisance to be combated? Could we improve home safety in the urban-wildland edge and take steps towards living within our annual solar energy budget, while saving money and improving habitat and ecology? We absolutely can. Join me for a journey into what could be if we chose to integrate fire into daily life again. In today's show we cover... What a fire-integrated culture could look like The amazing technology that we already have to make burning biomass a central part of meeting our needs without sacrificing convenience while boosting the health of our homestead landscapes! Rocket-stove technology for heating water, heating people and spaces, cooking, even forging and making maple syrup! Making biochar from clean-burning pyrolytic stoves and kilns while meeting our heat-generation needs. What needs to happen for such a future to be realized at scale. Acceptance of the true nature of this climate and bioregion - Fire is a part of this place and its rhythms and we can't change that - let's stop fighting this natural energy and design our lives and homes to align with it instead! More freedom to innovate To build fire-proof homes from natural materials. To burn biomass to meet basic energy needs. Fire-literacy that comes from LIVING WITH FIRE - respecting fire because we have intimate first-hand knowledge of its power. a SLOWER PACE…fire demands attention and calls us to slow down - and this is a good thing especially now in the times we are living in. Show Resources Space & People Heating DIY Rocket Mass Heaters 8 movie set - HD instant view, download or DVD set. DragonTech Rocket Mass Heater store - a place to order pre-made, done-for-you RMH part and complete systems. DIY Plans for building your own RMH + Free Heat RMH movie 3D Plans for DIY Rocket Sauna Heater - yes! Water Heating Rocket Hot Water Systems Playlist Wood-Fired Hot Water system from SunDog Builders shows just how simple this can be. Cooking Cooking With Biomass Playlist DIY Rocket Ovens Movie HD Download Riserless Rocket-Powered Cooktops for Home Cooking - Walker Stoves.com 3D Plans for a DIY Rocket Heater with Lorena Cooktop Option Charcoal & Biochar Making Charcoal & Biochar Playlist Bluesky Biochar - Michael Wittman - wood vinegar for sale and a great educational resource!   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

  In today's show we continued with the Living With Fire series in Part 3 - all about fire-proof or at least fire-wise home construction and home refit suggestions to increase fire survivability. Its all simple - some steps are easy and cheap, some are not. We will cover... Fire Proof Building Materials - stone, compressed/rammed earth (super adobe), earthbag construction, straw bale construction, earth-bermed structures. Dealing with apertures - apertures (openings) into the home are primary ignition pathways - the radiant heat from an approaching fire can ignite materials within the home without any embers or sparks entering the dwelling! windows, vents, screens etc. = primary ignition pathways! Fire Shelters - why if you live in a fire-prone climate it's a good idea to have one! WEEDS fire sprinkler system - a counter-intuitive way to set up home sprinklers that makes them WAY more effective at protecting your home during a fire than typical roof-mounted impact sprinklers. Show Resources Video of a family narrowly escaping the Paradise Fire in Paradise, CA. Fires hit fast - if you have a fire-safe shelter sometimes it can be safer to stay put and not risk getting caught out in the open! Living With Fire - Part 3 - Home Construction And Retrofit Suggestions For Fire Survivability - full blog post WEEDS Sprinkler System PDF - Wind-Enabled Ember Dousing UC Berkeley Home Fire Risk Assessment (2 minute assessment)   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

Today we dive into the nitty gritty of regenerative firescaping following Living With Fire - Part 1 in Episode 33. We will cover: Using Zones & Sectors to plan out the landscape around your house with regards to fire resilience. Regenerative Fire Resistant Landscaping Principles - the basic do's an don'ts to apply when designing a fire resilient landscape and homestead. Fire Safety Buffers - two different buffers around you built structures and other valuable property. 0-30' - the intensive zone 30-100' - the moderate zone Post-Fire Remediation - why you've got to get on it quickly following a fire to steer things in a healthy direction during recovery AND reduce future workload and fire risk.   Show Resources Living With Fire (Part 2) - Regenerative Firescaping: Protecting Your Home With Good Design   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

Today's show is the first episode in a series of shows that I'll be putting out on designing, building and managing a homestead in a high-fire risk climate. So much energy in the form of human labor, tax dollars, and lost ecological integrity is expended each and every year for the purpose of reducing fire risk - and yet many of these interventions don't actually reduce the risk of home damage or loss that much, AND they create a treadmill that requires mowing, chipping and spraying toxic chemicals year after year after year - with no end in site... ...sounds like a few other government programs I can think of. The solution is temporary, and actually ensures there will be greater fire risk and ecological harm next year - which means we always have to do MORE and pay MORE for fire mitigation and prevention each year - and the results show it isn't working! It's time for a fresh take on living with fire, and that is what this series is going to be all about. In today's show we will lay the groundwork for the rest of the series as we cover: The concept of regenerative firescaping Why you first must accept that Fire WILL happen, and then that WHAT YOU DO MATTERS. The Two kinds of fire risks: Those you can control/influence Those you can't Basic Fire Science - the mechanics of how wildfires are fed and powered, and how understanding the nature of wildfire is a huge step toward designing, building and maintaining a firewise home that is also regenerative and an ecological positive (not a detriment!) Show Resources Living With Fire (Part 1) - Basic Fire Science, Personal Responsibility and Home Site Selection Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

Today's show is inspired by the Ayn Rand quote “We can ignore reality, but we cannot ignore the consequences of ignoring reality.” We (the larger collective of society, government etc) have been living in ignorance of reality for quite a while. Right now, a multitude of the consequences of this multi-generational ignorance are coming home to roost. Our financial system and the debt-backed fiat currency at its center is crumbling and headed for a crack-up reset. The broader, planet-wide ecology upon which we depend for everything that sustains our existence is fractured, diminished and producing a mere fraction of the abundance that it could. Our economy is run by oligarchs for oligarchs, and the gap between rich and poor has grown to ludicrous proportions. Our social well being is in shambles after 3 years of plandemic insanity, and mental unhealth has never been so widespread. The larger spiritual house of the nation is in disarray, and everywhere the evidence of hopelessness and purposelessness are evident. And yet, despite the state of things, we have more opportunity before us than ever before to create beautiful, abundant, healthy lives. I posit that homesteading is one of the BEST ways to raise and develop whole human beings. An intentionally designed homestead and the lifestyle that goes with it has the three things that ALL people need in order to lead meaningful lives: Community - Living rooted in place and connected to the ecology that sustains us. We take care of things that take care of us Identity - Individual identity as belonging to that place and the people that call it home. This is healthy tribalism! Purpose - Individual AND shared group purpose of being needed by that place, its people and one's future descendants. A healthy sense of obligation to contribute to making the world better for those that will inherit it yet have no say in the decisions of today. A sovereign homestead is so much more than a collection of things and organisms that puts food on your table or money in your pocket or a roof over your head. It can literally be the foundation for becoming the best version of you possible and - perhaps the greatest legacy we can hope to leave behind - raising whole, intact, fully-actualized children that know and own their own power. Show Resources The 7th Generation Principle: Designing Systems For Continuity Through Time   Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

Join me for a discussion of 5 Rules For Happy Homesteading from my own lived experience. Be crystal clear on your BIG Why - why are you doing your life the way you are doing it? Finish What You Start - obtain a yield and liberate your time BEFORE adding more projects, systems or things to take care of! Build in Management for every system you add - when you are designing, growing, building make sure that you account for the ongoing maintenance and management of systems on your homestead. A stitch in time saves nine! Show, don't tell - Let your actions and results do the talking to convince others of the value in what you are doing. Never gloat, and never say "I told you so". Make Beauty and essential function - design and build your homestead to be beautiful. This will feed your soul and make you fall in LOVE with your own life - which is entirely the point of sovereign homesteading. Show Resources The 4 Freedoms Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl  

Today's show is about homesteading being one of the best tools we have as sovereign individuals for creating freedom for ourselves and our families outside the Scope, Reach and Will of the state. The State, which I'll refer to as the Matrix here, has 3 aspects to it's control structure: Scope: “laws on the books” This is practically limitless. There have been approximately ~90,000 laws and regulations passed since 1995 at Congressional level alone. However, these claims of control are only impactful if the Reach and Will are there to back it up. Reach: “boots on the ground” Is enforcement physically possible? In the past, this always meant the government had to be able to put an ideologically possessed individual (the State Agent) literally within arms reach of its subjects to control them (or sword, spear, rifle, artillery range etc). We'll talk about a good example of this - Afghanistan - Graveyard of Empires, and how the terrain literally creates a fundamentally unconquerable environment and people. Today, we must also contend with Digital Reach - a.k.a. Technological Enforcement which is built around controlling ACCESS to services, goods, money etc. This is a relatively new aspect of State Reach. Will: “what exists in the heart of the State agent” Who are the enforcers? Are they known or unknown to you? Are they neighbors / community members or out-of-towners? The more personal our relationship with the enforcers, the less likely they are to be their worst around us. EXAMPLE: Sheriffs refusing to enforce unconstitutional laws. Where Scope, Reach and Will overlap is "The Matrix" - there is total control. Anything outside of the center is more free. If you can move from a 3/3 situation to a 2/3 situation, whole new horizons of freedom open up. Let's look at the different 2/3 overlaps. Scope & Reach, but no Will = unenforced laws, speak easies, “look the other way” culture This can be good and/or bad! Reach & Will, but no Scope = cutting edge industry, non-coercive legal activity, something that is too new (the State is slow to understand because it is not the innovator!). Example: Bitcoin Will & Scope, but no Reach  = off-shore accounts, jurisdictional & geographic arbitrage Move you (your talents, energy, skills etc) and your assets (8 forms of capital) to a place that respects them! Homesteading is the secret weapon for creating more freedom in our lives. They are all based on who we become while walking the sovereign individual's path. Homesteading is the ultimate human development regimen in my opinion. Let's look at three ways that homesteading helps us create more freedom: Become an excellent ecosystem manager: The basic inputs for creating an abundant living system are Light, Water, CO2 and Soil Minerals - and all of them are outside the Scope, Reach and Will of the State to control! With them you can manage your landscape to produce meat, milk, fiber, fuel, medicine, fodder, materials etc. - all the raw feedstocks for Primary forms of Wealth! By managing Light, Water, Soil and Life you can maximize these free inputs and yield sovereign production!  You can also create the “Wall of Green” that the taxman can't see the value in. How the heck do you tax a food forest? It doesn't fit the State Agent paradigm. He does not have "the eyes to see". Invest in learning and improving your SKILLS: Once you have a skill and know how to do a thing, the State cannot take that away. Invest your time and energy in building in-real-life, face-to-face, over-the-fence-post RELATIONSHIPS. Trusted neighbors are priceless in the times we are living into. REMEMBER - What you do matters. The State would have you believe in the inevitability of their control - but they are not inevitable. Practice discernment to take better action, and improve your discernment by dialing in your orientation. This is why all of my design clients must distill their Minimum Holistic Goal before we begin designing anything, and it is what I have to offer you on your sovereign homestead journey. Show Resourcesb The 4 Pillars Of Productive And Profitable Homesteads-  Managing Light, Water, Soil And Life To Create More Freedom In Your Life. 8 Forms of Capital Getting started designing your homestead? START HERE: Enroll in the Minimum Holistic Goal Creation Mini-Course today for free. This is the ONE THING that will make everything else easier or unnecessary on your homesteading journey! 100% Free Upon completing this course you will have a crystal clear idea of who and what resources you have to work with, your desired Quality of Life that your homestead has to provide for, and what you will need to produce and the conditions required to sustain that production to meet your Quality of Life needs.   Music by Alex Grohl