The Homestead Add-Ons

So after you've found your land and built the home, you're going to want to create a sustainable landscape.  When you begin designing the gardens, leave room for the add-ons.  Below are a few ideas for a sustainable way to add to the land.

Don't forget the Greenhouse:

 

 

For the Beekeeper:

The Trellis:

We previously built our own grape trellis out of logs.  Here is how it turned out.  The only problem we had was with the carpenter bees.  This is a temporary example of greener building.

 

 

Chicken Coop:
Now most homesteaders and minimalists are going to raise an animal or two.  The most sustainable and low maintenance animal to raise is a chicken.  They need their food and nutrients and a warm hen house to sleep at night.  We have previously built a chicken coop of our own that turned out very sturdy and desirable.  Mainly because it was tall enough to walk inside and had all the necessities.  A warm place to lay with an accessible door to gather eggs and plenty of space to roam inside the fenced in building.  Here are some photos.  It wasn't quite as inexpensive as we hoped, but it was worth every penny.  The photos are before it was completely finished.

 

 

Rain Barrel:
For the sustainable gardener you're going to need some way to collect water.  If you have a shed or, in our case, a chicken coop you should definitely consider adding a rain barrel.  We used an old raison barrel with an attached water spicket.  To collect the water, we put a gutter on the back side of the chicken coop and attached a pipe at the end which was put into the top of the barrel.  We had to cut a hole into the top of the barrel lid, so to keep mosquitoes out we added a screen underneath the lid.  We had no running water here, so it was a big help to take care of our gardens.

If there's anything else I should add, feel free to share.  We are still coming up with new and exciting ways to maximize the homestead.

The Dancer