heritage ranch
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Registered: 05-2009
Location: central colorado rockies
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a lil madness sent me this way
would that be texas madness?
hello from heritage ranch, i followed a lil madness from another homesteading site just to see what you had going on over here.
my name is kenny and my lil homestead www.heritageranchcolorado.com is located in the rockies around 8000 ft. just now breaking ground on the garden. i guess i have acknowledged my paganimity since i was around 12 and i wish i had been a homesteader for as long but have only recently returned to the land. my main reason for the homestead way would be avoiding the nasty frankenfoods that seam so unavoidable other wise. my dietary thought run similar to those found here www.westonaprice.org i currently have goats pigs chickens meat/eggs and about 1.5 acres going to garden i hope within another year to be 99% food self sufficient probably pushing 70% right now.
well now i am off to check out your lil site here.
peace out
kenny
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5/28/2009, 3:44 am
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Firlefanz
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Re: a lil madness sent me this way
Hi Kenny,
welcome in this little realm off the main road of the web.
Your lil ranch sounds really great. 
Hope you'll enjoy your stay here.
--- - Firlefanz
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5/28/2009, 7:26 am
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TexasMadness
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Re: a lil madness sent me this way
That's a big garden! Mine is about 1000 sq ft (0.02 acres!) and it's all I can handle right now. Of course, I am helping with the family farm garden and all of it's livestock as well as a full time job. So it's not like I have a bunch of spare time! 
My husband's family is from Colorado Springs. I visited for the first time over the winter holidays and it was beautiful. We went down to Pueblo too for a visit. I have to say, your homestead is in a great part of the country! But it must pose entirely different challenges then here in Texas!
Welcome to the forum! I look forward to hearing more about how you've managed so much self-sufficiency. I'd put mine close to 25% right now. All the dairy and eggs I can stand, plus about half of the vegetables. No grains, no meat (I'm a vegetarian but my husband is not) and not enough to store over the winter!
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5/28/2009, 4:12 pm
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Saijen SilverWolf
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Re: a lil madness sent me this way
Hey there, Kenny, and welcome to our cozy corner of the internet!
I'm glad you followed a lil madness to find us. Texas is a gooood person to be followin 
You sound like you're well on your way to where you wish to be in your homesteading. I know that has to be very pleasing. We will never get to that point where we are now, but one never knows what the future holds!! 
Enjoy poking around, and posting.
I look forward to getting to know you better and learning from you!!
Again...welcome!
--- Blessed Be,
~*~ Saijen ~*~
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5/28/2009, 4:51 pm
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heritage ranch
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Re: a lil madness sent me this way
TexasMadness wrote:
That's a big garden! Mine is about 1000 sq ft (0.02 acres!) and it's all I can handle right now. Of course, I am helping with the family farm garden and all of it's livestock as well as a full time job. So it's not like I have a bunch of spare time!
My husband's family is from Colorado Springs. I visited for the first time over the winter holidays and it was beautiful. We went down to Pueblo too for a visit. I have to say, your homestead is in a great part of the country! But it must pose entirely different challenges then here in Texas!
Welcome to the forum! I look forward to hearing more about how you've managed so much self-sufficiency. I'd put mine close to 25% right now. All the dairy and eggs I can stand, plus about half of the vegetables. No grains, no meat (I'm a vegetarian but my husband is not) and not enough to store over the winter!
thanks all for the welcome, three admin responses in 1 day, should i be scared...lol
well that big garden is just what i am working with. i dont have it all planted, yet. i hope to get it all planted this year so i have some extra for farmers markets and locals. in reality it is not as big as you probably think, in numbers of plants. since things are quite dry here (round 10" per year and the water laws are not on my side. i pretty much have to rely on our few rains. i am working out different methods of dry land farming. my goal is to consume only the rain that falls on the footprint of the garden. for now my rows are 6-8 feet apart and plants are spaced 2-3 times the normal distance. forget about bio-intensive. an interesting aside is that plants grown in drier conditions will send roots out and down much much further to get the moisture they need, as long as their is no competition. a side benefit is that this wider root base absorbs more nutrients from the soil and as such have more nutrients in the plant and because the plant it's self will be smaller the extra nutrients are crammed into a smaller package, and the slow growth due to the cooler temps and higher altitude makes for some very nutrient dense foods. where a normal production for an irrigated potato plant might be around 10# (i know you can get much more with bio-intensive and things like stacked tires) my plants will get around 2# without irrigation and will be between 10-100 times higher across the board in vitamins $ minerals.
so far i only have about 50 potatoes up and ground preped for another 30. that is in 160'of row with the 6-8' space between rows i also have a row preped for about 20 sumer squash (80' of row) so even with the wide spacing i still have a lot of work in front of me. i hope to be ordering a row planter and a high/low wheel cultivator in the next week and that will speed things along. i do try to keep as small a carbon foot print as possible but i am researching and considering a small 2 wheel garden tractor to assist with rowing and furrowing till i can get a draft animal trained up to do the job. (fingers crossed for a milkimg red devon!)
well when you were in pueblo, if you looked to the west and saw those mountains, well that is where i am at. we had frost on the ground this morning
well this level of self sufficiency was easy  with no income it makes it easier to avoid buying food. i have a bout 100 laying hens and they share with me plenty of eggs to eat all i want and have some to sell in town even though i make them forage for much of their diet (you dont get a lot of eggs but they sure are golden). i butchered 4 goats in the fall and thined out the roo population slowly over the winter. there are a few creeks and lakes near by the supply the occasional trout and i forced some beet green turnip greens and green onions in window boxes. so the variety wasnt much but it workes this year with the garden and the addition of pigs and beef i should do well. by the end of july i should be at the point where the only outside food will be things like spices and a few exotic treats and the occasional meal out.
next step produce all my own feed for my live stock. but i think thats going to be tougher, give me an additional 2 years and no the "2012" "thing" does not play into my timeline...lol
i aplaud the no grain thing, that is something i am working towards for me and my animals, the goats and cows are forage only with hay, my pigs are tamworth and they do a large prtion of their diet foraging, i am considering ossabaws and or mulefoots as they can forage for an even higher %. not that it is hard for me to do, i go month with none but i sure do enjoy a good burger or one of my home made glueten-free beer brats or the ocasional wild rice side dish. do you try to use "alternative bread like things" or have you given up bread completely
were you the "madness" in the raw yogurt thread on that other homesteading forum?
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5/28/2009, 7:56 pm
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TexasMadness
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Re: a lil madness sent me this way
Yep, I'm that madness!
Interesting ideas about the dry farming. I thought we were dry here - usually about 35" a year, but we are in a serious drought. We pump from a sand aquifer at the farm and have plenty of water. I use city water at my house so I tend to be judicious with how densely I plant so that I don't have to use tons and tons of treated water. Rainwater collection is high on our list of projects!
And by "no grain", I meant that we GROW no grain! I haven't been able to give it up. Well, actually, I haven't tried. Thought about it, but boy that would be a fight. Hubby would have none of it, I know.
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5/29/2009, 7:18 pm
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