Efficiency Top 10
If you’re like me, you appreciate summaries. Things that cut to the chase. Boil it all down. Get to the essence of a thing. Not that the whole trip isn’t worth it. But I cannot tell you how many video clips I started watching about some kind of craft or artsy thing with a heading of “amazing” or “you’re not going to believe how clever this is,” goading me to painstakingly watch all the tiny steps to make this thing that they haven’t revealed yet on the video. Only to get to the end of the clip and discover that I’m not actually interested in the thing they made! Had they showed a summary in the beginning, it would have saved me all that wasted time. What was that all about (clickbait)?!? So sometimes having a summary is helpful so you know whether you even want to start. Or better yet, helping you get past the hesitation to start by giving you some timesaver tips.
Well in the spirit of summaries, I want to share my top 10 list of things we’ve found that help homesteading to be a bit easier around here. Things that help with every day efficiencies. And let’s face it, homesteading has an “every day grind” that can feel like a bit much some days.
Number 1 is definitely an automatic chicken door. This thing is such a timesaver that I often buy two just in case they discontinue it someday and I fear I can’t find another one. Like that perfect pair of shoes that they only make for one season. You fall in love and are SURE they will keep making them as long as people have feet, but alas, no. The automatic door opens and closes like a dusk to dawn sensor. It comes with a small solar panel and the light sensor. So at last light the door closes, securing your chickens in the coop for the night. And opens at first light, so that you don’t have to lumber out in your pajamas to let your girls roam free. The brand we’ve used for many years now is: Pullet Shut from Chickendoors. After we installed one in our chicken coop, we also installed one on the feeder we built for our ducks, out by our pond. We found a huge savings in our monthly duck feed bill, after we installed this door. Apparently, we were also feeding a variety of wildlife such as racoons, opossums, and mice during the night. This door put a big dent in that all-you-can-eat buffet.
Number 2 is a good sturdy coop. When we first began our chicken keeping adventures, my husband built a small coop from some plans he found online. And I guess it would have been ok for maybe 2-4 hens. But we quickly outgrew that coop design. And started expanding it, and expanding it, until it was ridiculously awkward. So let me encourage you to skip some steps and just invest in a good study coop right out of the gate. We bought our current coop from Overholt & Sons.
Their bread and butter are storage buildings. But they also manufacture solid coops. Now you may not have an Overholt & Sons near you, but check out the types of buildings they make, to guide you in your decision of what to invest in. “How does having a sturdy/solid coop create efficiencies?” you might ask. Because when you know that your flock is safe at night, and you have the freedom to come and go without needing to be at home to close them up (see number 1 above), then you don’t have to run around checking and re-checking, and looking for missing hens with a flashlight (been there, done that). Chickens naturally want to roost at dusk. And if they feel safe inside their coop, they will do their job to roost inside like clockwork. But if they have encountered predators, or vulnerabilities in there, it can be like herding cats to try and get them into the routine.
Number 3 efficiency is using gravity feeders. Most homesteads have a variety of animals. We do too. Chickens, ducks, cats, dog. Ours are all outside in the elements. And here in Kentucky that means that sometimes it’s hot, rainy, cold, snowy, maybe all in the same day. And with all the other chores, running around to feed everybody individually every day just isn’t going to happen. So, we use gravity feeders. Ones that you can fill up on a weekly, or bi-weekly basis. I don’t personally subscribe to the very large feeders that I see people using where it’s more like a monthly fill up. Because in my experience, feed can get moldy or soggy, or soiled with too much full-access time. But a weekly cycle seems to keep things humming along.
For our ducks, we use a large 4” PVC pipe that we fill up, with a trough-type hole in it for the ducks to feed from at the bottom. For our chickens we use a 30 lb. hanging metal feeder, like this one from Tractor Supply This lives inside our coop. Which means that at night, nocturnal rodents are not free-feeding on it, since it’s closed safely inside with the flock.
Our dog is a Pyrenees/Saint Bernard mix. He’s a big boy! And when he was a puppy, we did not give him full access to food all day. Because the vet cautioned us that if he grew too fast at that young age, his bones and joints would not be able to keep up with the weight as he developed. So we hand fed him back then. But he’s over 5 years old now, and keeps himself at a good pace with food. Since he’s 100% outdoors, the feeder needs to be one that has a door on it, so that scavengers won’t help themselves to it. This one from Walmart is a similar design to the one we use.
Our outside cats are utilitarian, in that their job is to hunt squirrels and mice and moles and chipmunks. We feed them, but only a little each day, to incentivize them to supplement their kibble with critters. That might sound cruel, but when you’ve tried to start your car, only to discover that a squirrel has eaten through your fuel line, you’ll understand my pain. So for the cats, they will only see a gravity feeder if we go out of town for a few days. Otherwise they would lay around fat and lazy.
Number 4 efficiency is battery or gas-powered tools. This might sound elementary, but when we lived in a metropolis city previously, I never even questioned corded tools. But as soon as we moved here to Kentucky, we quickly learned that almost everything we needed to do was more than 50 feet from an electrical outlet. My husband has a whole row of DeWalt battery chargers for the various interchangeable tools we frequently use. Leaf blowers, drills, nail guns, sawzall, hedge trimmers…these handy tools gotta have portable power. Which gives us the freedom to haul them wherever we need to use them, here on homestead. Inevitably there is something that has fallen onto our quarter-mile driveway and is now blocking our way in and out, just at the moment that we need to head to town for something. And yes, you guessed it, out come the tools to tackle that job, where there is no power outlet to be found.
Number 5 takes us to one of my all-time favorites: the Kawasaki Mule. I’m a penny pincher at heart. It takes a lot to pry more than $20 dollars out of my hand at one time. So when the subject of purchasing a side by side came into conversation, I choked. I did not initially want to dish out for that kind of investment. We had been using a Honda 4-wheeler for all our off-road needs here on the farm. And that worked for a good long while. But when we started the Leto’s Meadows project, we knew that we needed more hauling capacity, in more weather friendly packaging. Immediately upon cranking that Mule up and taking it out for a day of chores here on the homestead, we knew that it was the perfect match for our everyday needs. It pulls, it hauls, it dumps, it drives us back and forth to the cottages. It’s truly a champ! My husband even uses it to stand on when he’s trimming trees, since the bed is much sturdier than a ladder. So many uses. It saves our backs and our patience.
Number 6 is a LOT of water hoses and spigots. Inevitably you will be in the process of fixing something, or planting something, or cleaning something, or tending to animals, and of course you need access to water to do it right. They say water is considered the most basic and essential requirement for life. And based on how many times I use a hose, that seems to be proven true. But most houses don’t come with 15 water spigots all over the outside. We’ve had to slowly add ones all over the place over the course of time that we’ve lived here. In fact, the quarter-mile pipe that runs from our county water main, down our driveway, probably looks like swiss cheese based on how many additional hydrants we’ve added to it over the years. But honestly, water makes almost any task easier. So plan where you can add access to water, so that your daily chores can have the added benefit of life-giving water.
Speaking of life giving water, Number 7 efficiency comes from Ollas pots. We learned about these on Pinterest. So just like any dutiful convert, we went right to the store and bought the supplies needed to make our own. And this is truly one of those Pinterest finds that proved to be worth the effort. Two simple clay pots, glued together, act like a tiny cistern or water reservoir. We probably all have that plant that seems to need more water than we have time to give it (think hydrangea). Here’s where the beauty of an Ollas pot comes in. You fill it up, and it slowly leaches out through the clay material that the pot is made from. Check out this video demonstration from our first attempt at installing one. We have since installed 4 of these in our garden around our fig trees, which fall outside of our sprinkler range. They are working fabulously! This summer and early fall has been extremely dry here where we live. But thanks to these Ollas pots, our fig trees have been giving us ripe juicy figs, despite the drought.
Number 8 efficiency is having a back porch for wet or dirty things. Think muddy shoes, rain gear, that pair of garden shoes that you take on and off 25 times a day, farm gloves. But wait, there’s more: coats, hats, sunglasses, neck wraps for mowing, and don’t even get me started on all the additional gear needed for winter. When we moved here from Florida, my husband and I didn’t really even own a proper jacket. Wind-breaker, yes. But actual jacket, no. So when that first winter hit, I remember being amazed at all the clothes it took just so we could go outside! And all the time it took to put it all on, and take it all off again. In Florida, if you had a pair of flip-flops and a hat, you were pretty much ready for anything the day required. And that could be packed into a grocery bag. Oh, not here! We quickly built a covered back porch during our initial renovations. Which turned into an enclosed space. We even call it the “mud room.” You gotta have a place that you can hang and house all that gear, ready to grab and go. Otherwise, you know it all gets piled up on the closest countertop or table. Or worse yet, near the door, only to be tripped over by everyone.
Number 9 efficiency was something I didn’t even know existed. Nor was I aware of the need for such a thing. I’ve mentioned how long our driveway is. It’s a quarter of a mile. Uphill. And it was gravel when we moved here. The question of how to get your big ol’ trash can down to the end of the driveway so that the garbage man can pick it up, was a conundrum. The can was too big (and stinky) to fit in the back of our SUV. But it was also too cumbersome to bungee onto our 4-wheeler to drag down the lane. At first, it took both of us to get the job done. One of us would drive the ATV, with the other one turned around backwards holding onto the can and the metal rack on the back at the same time. Fun a couple times. Not weekly. So we found this gem. This thing is genius (always have to look up how to spell genius- which reminds me I’m not)! It slides into the ball hitch on your vehicle. And then your city issued trash can, the one with that metal bar made into it, slides into this lever and bazinga! Easy-peasy. This thing is a must for most people who live out in the county, who like us, live a ‘fer piece off the road.
Lastly number 10. This one came into our lives very recently, but with such effect that it has easily earned a spot on the top 10 list. We have 21 orchard trees, and a fair-sized kitchen garden. All of which relies on good, fertile soil. They say that good soil is the living foundation of any garden or orchard. One of the best things you can do is to feed your soil. This year we’ve really started investing more in that. This spring we treated the soil with this nutrient kit from Body Electrician. Think of it as similar to a compost tea. You mix it up and spray the solution to apply it. The first application involved a 5 gallon backpack sprayer. It was late spring, it was hot and the process took over 4 hours. I came home to find my husband looking like somebody had poured him out on the ground. He was totally wiped! So when it was time to do another application last week, we decided to invest in this 25 gallon sprayer. No exaggeration…what took 4 hours the first time, took just under an hour using this sprayer. And half that time was mixing up the solution and testing out the sprayer for the first time. What a timesaver and relief it was! I don’t even think we broke a sweat this go-around. We hauled it in the back of our Kawasaki Mule (see number 5 above) and literally did the entire spraying process seated as we drove from tree to tree. Money well spent!
My goal in sharing these homestead efficiencies is to bequeath to you, dear reader, the benefit of the experiences we’ve had. If something you’ve read herein saves you time, money or hassle covering some of the same ground, then it was my great pleasure to help you with that. And hey, pass it along. Pay it forward to someone else who might find this useful as well. Spread the word. Share the love!
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