Home

Is Self Sufficient Living Right for Me?Believe me we have all asked ourselves this question one time or another. Some ask in the beginning when they find out how much it actually costs to feed and house animals or how much time it takes to prepare, tend and harvest a garden, while others make it further down the road to a point where it is midnight and they are out in the pasture digging out a trench so that their beloved cows don’t get wet and freeze to death in the middle of winter.

My family has set out on the journey of self sufficient living and we still occasionally scratch our heads and ask that question. Hopefully, through this website we will be able to give you enough information to get you started and possibly help you to side step some of the many life lessons we have learned along the way.

At the Big Bear Homestead, we started out small with just a dozen quail eggs, an egg incubator and a homeschool science project. Against the laws of probability, our son was able to hatch out all twelve eggs. Little did we know that Japanese Coturnix Quail start laying eggs at seven weeks old. That’s great! Right? WRONG!

As soon as the quail started laying eggs, our son decided on his own to continue the incubating project and in less than six months we were surprised to find over 200 quail in the cage. It wasn’t until we brought him a dozen chicken eggs to incubate that we realized it was time to build a bigger cage.

Once again, probability was on our side and we hatched out 2 roosters and 10 hens. Six months later we had fresh chicken eggs, and we were hooked. From that moment on it became a family goal to find a better, healthier and more self sufficient way of life.

The great news is: Self sufficient living doesn’t require a lot of land and money. It can be as involved as you want.

Imagine the opening scene of Little House on the Prairie. The music plays and here comes the covered wagon looking out onto the shanty that Charles built himself. Firewood from the trees he cut down, the barn with one cow and a team of horses. Simple living according to Hollywood.

Now completely erase that image and let’s talk reality here in the 21st century. Although our economic hardships are not much different, our resources and mankind for that matter are. That is why we started our life long goal of self sufficient living. We are not experts in self sufficiency, just good folk who try their best to work the land so that it will work for us. So join us on our journey from the barnyard to the kitchen and everywhere in between!