College Hill Farm

  So far we have talked about fencing hogs, goats, and sheep. Today we are going to talk about fencing in cattle. I will not be talking about fencing in horses in this blog because I simply do not have enough experience to give you any knowledge when it comes to horses. But cattle are pretty straight forward. The average cow weighs between 600 and 1500 lbs. They are skittish and willing to run over stuff. But, as with most animals, if they are given sufficient room and food they are mostly content to remain within the confines of the pasture as long as you are not planning to go anywhere. Then they will roam wherever they want so you will come home to put them up. It is a rule, get used to it. In yesteryears farmers used 3 or 4 strands of barbed wire in order to keep cattle in. It is a very effective method of containing cows but can be worrisome when it comes to vet bills. Today the modern homesteader has a world of other options. The first of which is the old “stand by” field f

  Goats and sheep represent a great farming option for the farmer without the dangers of the cow. A 1200 lb cow can break ribs with just the shake of its head with no malice intended and even worse when intended. Sheep and goats can pose a safety risk too but not nearly that of cattle. Sheep are the easier of the two to contain. However, any fence suitable for a goat will also be suitable for sheep. I have a friend who raises milk goats, Saanans to be exact. He keeps his goats in a small pasture with just 3 strands of electric. Starting about 24 inches off the ground and ending about 5 feet. He moves their fence every couple of weeks as the grass gets worn down. He uses a livestock trailer as a shelter and moves it with the fencing. He has plenty of property and few neighbors so if a goat gets out it does not go far. When they kid in the spring the babies are forever running in and out of the fence, squalling as they hit it, but they don’t get far from mama and go back in. His goats

  When I was a kid the hog lot was a wooden structure about 16 feet by 16 feet square. It had sides that came up about 4 feet and a roof about 3 feet above the sides covered in corrugated tin roofing and a wooden floor. At one end was a trough made of just two boards and fastened to the floor. There was a shoot that lead from outside the pen into the trough so no one had to walk up and pour the food over the pen. The back wall was removable for that fateful day but it was fastened shut for the full life of those hogs. This was the way it was done in Appalachia. Even as a kid I thought this was cruel but it was not what I was doing so I didn’t dwell on it much. But as an adult I see it for what it was. It was the cheapest way that homesteaders could put meat on the table with the least work. The pigs never escaped nor did they see anything but the sides of that pen, not even the homesteader, except for us kids who used to climb up on the side and look down at them at feeding time. The

  Water is an essential on the homestead. It is actually one of the first considerations you have to tackle. Remember before you have anything else Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs says that first and foremost living beings need some basic components to be successful. He proposed a pyramid for humans and the basic of needs filled the bottom of the pyramid. We need to work on the basics at the bottom pyramid for our homestead: Air, Water, Food, Shelter, Sleep, Clothing, and Reproduction. Well, for the most part, as we consider homesteading I really can’t help you with Air, Clothing, Sleep or Reproduction. But, so far we have discussed Water. So what is left: Food and Shelter. So we are going to start on Food. I would like to start off talking about Animal food sources first. Then later we will discuss Gardening – One of my main passions. Animal Production requires fences. It is a basic infrastructure on your homestead. Without fences there will be few animals and definitely not enough an

  Water is an essential. You cannot survive without it. Having a source of water and a backup source of water is so important. So far we have discussed Gravity Fed Stream systems and Cistern water catchment systems. Today we are going to talk about wells. In Appalachia the water is very close to the surface, if you live in the river valleys. The first type of well we are going to talk about is a surface water well. Surface water is just that – water contained above the bedrock of your property. There are several ways to get at that surface water. When I was a kid we had an 18 foot deep hand dug well. The well was located about 150 feet from the Clover Fork of the Cumberland River. The river was running approximately 15 vertical feet from the top of the well. So the well was actually 3 feet below the river level at the bottom. The well had been hand dug years earlier than I can remember. It had a pitcher pump and a foot valve in the bottom of the well to keep the pump from losing it

  We are continuing our series about what homesteaders need for a successful homestead and whether or not you should buy a functioning homestead or start from scratch. Today we will be discussing water and in particular Cisterns. Most homesteads will not have tremendous rises on which to build a “gravity feed” system that will have a 300 ft head. In Appalachia where I am from there are plenty of mountains and streams from which to gather water and use gravity to create massive amounts of pressure. However, our homestead here in central Kentucky has some rises but not sufficient to generate the kind of pressures like municipal water. When we bought this homestead there were 2 old dilapidated barns that were too far gone for us to save. But one of the features of these old barns is that they had concrete cisterns that was there to catch the water that ran off the barn and utilize it for the homestead. One cistern is 10 ft wide by 14 ft long and 8 feet tall. Just so you know that cist

  Should we buy and already operating homestead or start from scratch? Well, I have had eight years to dwell on this question. It would have been so much easier had we been able to purchase an already established working homestead outright.   It might even have been easier had we purchased a prefabricated home and put it on raw land. But, we got the homestead we were destined to have. There are some real considerations that most people who have not lived this lifestyle or lived rural just never considered. I think I will do a multi part series on just this topic. There are so many aspects that can be explored. Today we are going to explore WATER, Mountain stream water to be exact. First things first, when you are considering a homestead and you have checked all the boxes on the location that fits what you and your family needs, the first thing to look for is water. No homestead in existence can function without water. Fresh, clean, potable water is an essential. Living in eastern Ken