Five acres and independence
a practical guide to the selection and management of the small farm.
by Maurice Grenville Kains · first published 1948
67% recommend33% neutral
Those eagerly embarking down the path to self-sufficiency might find "Five Acres and Independence" - first published in the 1940's a good step in the right direction. Granted the information is dated, yet you'll be surprised at the amount of useful information the book contains. I have it on good authority that this book was used as a textbook for farm families into the '70's. In economic times where many of us are actually considering moving back toward simpler times... "a world our grandparents pioneered", it's interesting to see what they did, with what they had.
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You underestimate the number of people who view such living as a laudable goal. Frugal living is quite satisfying. Read Walden for starters, then something like Five Acres and Independence, or Foxfire. It's a major paradigm shift.
on “Living on $5,000 a year, on purpose: Meet America's 'intentional poor'” ↗You have to feed the animals, too. Check out the famous book, “Five Acres And Independence”. That was the basic size of a family farm in the USA a hundred years ago.
on “Most 16-year-olds don't have servers in their rooms” ↗I've been interested in permaculture and sustainability for a while, and also self-sufficiency, or at least local food production. There's an old book called "Five acres and independence" which I think is a reference to the amount of land you need to sustain a family. I don't know anything about the subject, really, but I just jumped off that number. I'm not in America, but we can use…
on “Why I am building permapeople.org” ↗