threemealsfarm

Raising Mealworms for Chicken Food

Today we are going to discuss creating a self-replicating food supply for your backyard flock. Yes, we are talking about becoming worm farmers – mealworms, to be exact (not to be confused with our previous discussion about setting up vermiculture composting systems with red worms).

Mealworms are the larval stage of the darkling beetle, and they make a great treat and food source for your backyard poultry. With very little time and cost, you can have a simple setup in place that allows you to raise a batch of mealworms that will continuously reproduce and give you an excess supply to harvest and feed to your poultry.

Building a Cattle Panel Pallet Greenhouse

As any experienced gardener will tell you, having a greenhouse can be an invaluable tool in the food-growing toolbox. Having a greenhouse at one's disposal opens up many different growing possibilities and can be a huge season extender in areas where the number of good growing days is limited. Greenhouses make it easier to get new seedlings started and help to protect plants from spring and fall frosts. They are a wonderful addition to any resilient garden space. But they can be expensive to put in, and there are many things to consider before getting one set up. Check out the WSID articles on Selecting a Greenhouse and Winter Gardening to get a better idea of the styles and options available.

We put a lot of thought and planning into the design and construction of our DIY greenhouse. With cost being one of the number-one constraints for this project, we did a lot of web surfing and idea gathering. Our research gave us inspiration for materials, styles, and what the end result should be. We found projects that people had built for under $50. At that price, we could build three or four and still be under budget. But we didn't think they would last more that one season or that we would find our greenhouse plastic in the next county after a spring storm. Then there were far fancier and much more well-built ones, but our experiences with major construction and the added cost kept us from these higher-end designs. So we used what we had on hand…

Reflections on Using a DIY Fodder System

Growing fodder for animal feed is starting to catch on, and many homesteading families and small farm operations are exploring the possibilities of what this type of feed can do for the health of their animals and cost of feeding them. If you haven’t yet read the first two articles on growing fodder and building a simple DIY fodder system, you can find them here: https://www.peakprosperity.com/blog/growing-sprouted-fodder/72618 and here: https://www.peakprosperity.com/wsidblog/80359/diy-home-fodder-system.

It has been a few months since I wrote the DIY fodder system article for Peak Prosperity. It turns out that a lot of people are interested in growing their own fodder, as this article has been extremely popular. With the combination of all of the valuable feedback (thank you!) and a few more months of experience, we have some additional thoughts to share.

How to Start Sweet Potato Slips

Snow is beginning to melt. Temperatures are on the rise. Now is the time to start sweet potato slips. There are many ways to start sweet potatoes, but in this tutorial, we will show you a simple way that produces great results and can be done with resources already available in your kitchen.

Start with organic sweet potatoes from the store or from a previous harvest. If you purchase conventionally grown sweet potatoes, they may have been irradiated to prevent sprouting. A quick note about products labeled as yams – all products marketed as yams in the United States are technically still sweet potatoes. The “yams” you find in the store are usually a variety of sweet potato known as ‘Jewel’ – a selection with moist, orange flesh and orange-reddish skin. The other variety, which is marketed as a sweet potato, is usually either ‘Jersey’ or ‘Hannah’. Both Jersey and Hannah are characterized as having white or creamy, dry flesh, and creamy skin. If you are fortunate enough to have access to a decent organic food co-op or natural food store, you may find other varieties as well.

DIY Indoor Seed Starting Station

Starting seeds indoors is an excellent way to get a jump start on the gardening season so you can save money on the various foods you plant. Starting seedlings is a highly rewarding and enjoyable endeavor. We have been using the following growing system for many years now, and year after year it continuously produces reliable and excellent results. The components for this system are readily available at most hardware stores and can be sized to your specific needs and growing space.

The three main considerations when starting seeds indoors are:

Building and Using Seedling Flats

With Spring just around the corner, it is time to start getting prepared for planting your resilient garden. December and January have been spent looking through seed catalogs and placing orders for the new crops you want to try. Maybe you acquired some fun new varieties from a seed exchange or neighbor. Visions of a great garden harvest are clear in your mind. But how do you help to ensure that your seeds will become vibrant plants? In this article we will build a traditional seedling flat/box that allows for easy starting of seedlings and creates a sustainable, long-lasting container that can meet many of your garden needs.

Advantages of using wooden seedling boxes:

Soil temperature is maintained better than plastic pots
Durable and will last for many seasons with proper care
Multiple varieties of plants can be planted in a single box
Very efficient use of space in the beginning of the season (Start a lot of plants in a very small space; less area to water, heat, and light)
Once the seed starting season is over, can be used for carrying in the harvest or displaying at local sellers' market

Advantages of using wooden seedling boxes:

Soil temperature is maintained better than plastic pots
Durable and will last for many seasons with proper care
Multiple varieties of plants can be planted in a single box
Very efficient use of space in the beginning of the season (Start a lot of plants in a very small space; less area to water, heat, and light)
Once the seed starting season is over, can be used for carrying in the harvest or displaying at local sellers' market

DIY Home Fodder System

Many months ago, we learned about growing fodder for livestock (Growing Sprouted Fodder for Livestock) and how large-scale systems are being developed to reduce animal feed costs, provide better nutrition for animals, and reduce the amount of water needed to produce said feed. The small-scale commercial systems looked great, but the upfront costs and production level were simply too high to justify such a system for a small homestead like ours. We started to look for other options and ways of producing our own fodder at a lower initial cost.

This article details our current process and success at creating a system that can meet the needs of small backyard farmers and homesteaders. For less than $70 in initial setup costs, we have developed our own little home system that is surprisingly time-efficient and effective.

How to Harvest and Save Tomato Seeds

With the waning of the blistering summer heat comes the end of the life cycle for many of the summer crops planted in the garden and produce available at the farmers market. This means it is time for harvesting seeds for the next growing season and saving the promise of delicious produce for years to come.

How to Make Lacto-Fermented Pickles

This is a super easy and nutritious alternative to the vinegar, water-bath canning method of pickling cucumbers. It utilizes fresh cucumbers as they become available in your garden. This method is quick enough to make that during the peak of cucumber production, we make a small batch of pickles every day or so. The results are a tasty probiotic treat.

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