Articles

Straight talk on feed, space, planting dates, and harvest planning — with calculators you can run on your own numbers.

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  land

  How Many Animals Can Your Pasture Support?

  Stock pasture with animal units — 1 AU eats ~26 lb dry matter/day — take-half-leave-half utilization, and our forage classes of 1,000–3,000 lb DM/acre.

  May 2, 2026

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  bees

  How Much Honey Will Your First Hive Produce?

  First-year hives: plan on no harvest. Established surplus runs 25–60 lb by region in our data — plus jar counts from the honey yield calculator.

  Apr 29, 2026

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  rabbits

  Starting a Meat Rabbit Colony: Space, Feed & Realistic Numbers

  Plan does, bucks, cages, and kits with our data — 4.5 litters/year, 7 kits average, 7.5 sq ft doe cages — plus honest feed math from the rabbit calculator.

  Apr 26, 2026

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  preserving

  From Harvest to Pantry: Planning Your Canning Season

  Turn harvest pounds into jar counts with our lb-per-quart table — tomatoes at 3 lb/quart — plus lid inventory tips and the canning calculator.

  Apr 23, 2026

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  garden

  Mulching the Vegetable Garden: How Much Do You Need?

  Size mulch by area and depth — 100 sq ft at 3 inches is about 25 cu ft — plus straw bale coverage, wood chips vs leaves, and our mulch calculator.

  Apr 20, 2026

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  garden

  N-P-K Fertilizer Basics for Home Gardens

  Read the three numbers on the bag, then size product from nitrogen — 2 lb N on 1,000 sq ft with 10-10-10 means 20 lb of fertilizer in our worked example.

  Apr 17, 2026

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  garden

  Soil pH for Vegetable Gardens: Testing and Fixing It

  Aim near 6.0–7.0 for most vegetables, then size lime or sulfur by texture — loam needs 50 lb lime per 100 sq ft per pH point in our tables.

  Apr 14, 2026

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  garden

  How Many Vegetable Plants Per Person to Feed a Family?

  Plan a family-of-four garden from our yield data — tomatoes at 10 lb/plant, peppers at 6 — with spacing and canning calculators for harvest math.

  Apr 11, 2026

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  garden

  Vegetable Garden Spacing Cheat Sheet

  In-row and between-row spacing for 50+ vegetables from our crops data — tomatoes at 24×36 inches — plus links to the spacing calculator and crop pages.

  Apr 8, 2026

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  garden

  Compost C:N Ratio Explained (Without the Chemistry Degree)

  Hit the 25–30:1 carbon-to-nitrogen target with our feedstock table — leaves 60, grass 17, straw 80 — and fix smelly or stalled piles with the compost calculator.

  Apr 4, 2026

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  garden

  How Much Soil Do You Need for a Raised Bed?

  Cubic feet and yards for any bed size — a 4×8×12-inch bed is 32 cu ft ≈ 1.19 cu yd — plus Mel's mix thirds, bags, and cheaper fill options.

  Apr 1, 2026

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  land

  Rainwater Harvesting for the Homestead: How Much Can You Collect?

  Roof catchment math with the 0.623 factor and 85% efficiency, first-flush basics, and tank sizing from livestock daily water needs.

  Mar 28, 2026

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  chickens

  Incubating Chicken Eggs: Temperature, Humidity & Timeline

  Forced-air 99.5°F, humidity 45–50% then 65–70% at lockdown on day 18, and a 21-day chicken timeline — plus common failures and our hatch calculator.

  Mar 25, 2026

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  chickens

  How Many Eggs Do Chickens Lay? Breed-by-Breed Numbers

  Annual and weekly egg estimates by breed class — 300, 250, 200, or 150 eggs per hen — plus winter slowdowns, with our egg production calculator.

  Mar 22, 2026

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  chickens

  How Big Should a Chicken Coop Be? (By Flock Size)

  Size coops and runs with the 4 sq ft and 10 sq ft rules, nest boxes, and roost inches — plus flock-page links and predator-proofing basics for backyard keepers.

  Mar 18, 2026

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  garden

  Best Cover Crops for Small Gardens

  Compare clover, rye, vetch, buckwheat, oats, and field peas with our broadcast seeding rates per 1,000 sq ft — and size packets with the cover crop calculator.

  Mar 15, 2026

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  garden

  When to Start Seeds Indoors: A Zone-by-Zone Guide

  Use frost-date offsets to schedule indoor starts and transplants — tomatoes at 6 weeks, peppers at 8 — with links to all 13 zone pages and our seed calculator.

  Mar 12, 2026

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  goats

  How Much Hay Does a Goat Eat Per Year?

  Work the 3–4% body-weight hay rule for a 130-lb dairy doe, size a winter stack, and plan grain — with our goat feed calculator and pasture context.

  Mar 8, 2026

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  chickens

  How Many Chickens Can You Keep Per Acre?

  Pasture vs fixed-run math for backyard flocks using our 4 and 10 sq ft space rules, plus zoning and HOA caveats — with coop and stocking calculators.

  Mar 5, 2026

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  chickens

  How Much Does It Cost to Raise Chickens for Eggs?

  Year-one and steady-state costs for a backyard laying flock, using real feed rates (0.25 lb/day) and egg numbers — with calculators to run your own math.

  Mar 1, 2026