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Firewood moisture content decides your winter heat, not species. Get the 20 percent rule, the meter test, and how to spot wet wood before you…
Read More →Three field guides worth bookmarking — canning times, cellar storage, and safe cooking temps.
| Food | Pressure | Pint |
|---|---|---|
| Green beans | 10 lb | 20m |
| Corn | 10 lb | 55m |
| Tomatoes | water bath | 35m |
USDA/NCHFP processing times & pressures for common foods.
View full chart →| Item | Store | Keeps |
|---|---|---|
| Onions | cool, dry | 9 mo |
| Potatoes | cellar | 4–6 mo |
| Apples | cellar | 6 mo |
How long fruit & veg keep in the cellar, fridge and freezer.
View full chart → Network| Doneness | Target |
|---|---|
| Rare | 125–130°F |
| Medium-rare | 130–135°F |
| Well-done | 160°F+ |
Safe pull temps for steak & burgers, from Popular BBQ.
View full chart →Reader Favorites
The 50-state legal map of foraging: 15 states allow berry and mushroom picking in state parks, 29 prohibit it. Every state’s statute or code citation, federal-land rules, quantity limits, and a downloadable CSV — all verified against primary sources August 18, 2026.
Start a garden by working backward from your last spring freeze date, not a calendar month. A cited planting table for 36 crops, real NOAA freeze probabilities for 12 cities, and a companion-planting chart graded by actual evidence.
Homesteading has no legal definition – the word means three unrelated things in American law. Here is what each one actually is, what the 2022 USDA Census says about how common small-scale farming really is, and the cottage food, poultry and municipal rules that decide what you can do.
Short answer: Oregon State University Extension caps compost at 25 percent of a raised bed by volume. The University of Maryland Extension recommends 33 to 50 percent. Both are land-grant institutions, both published those numbers, and almost every soil calculator online quietly hard-codes one side of the disagreement without telling you it exists. This page…
A New Mexico Taos architect spent fifty years turning old tires into houses. The idea still has a following because it answers the same question every homesteader asks: how much of this place can we handle ourselves? Drive west of Taos on a high desert mesa and the houses stop looking like houses. They look…
What to plant in August for a fall harvest, zone by zone. Frost-date math, the crops to sow now, and how to protect a homestead fall garden.
Home canning safety starts with acid and heat. Here are the botulism rules for tomatoes, low-acid foods, and tested recipes to check before you fill a jar this season.
The vines won again? A quick triage plan for what to do with too many tomatoes: freeze, can, dry, cook, or share the glut without burning out.
Shrink a whole basket of tomatoes into a jar: how to make dehydrated tomatoes in a dryer or oven, store them safely, and use them all winter.
How to can salsa safely: why the tested ratio of tomatoes to peppers and vinegar is a safety feature, plus a step-by-step water-bath method.
Turn a heavy harvest into shelf-stable jars: how to can tomato sauce safely, with acidification amounts, USDA-based processing times, and an altitude note.
The fastest way to preserve a tomato harvest: freeze them whole with no blanching, then peel after thawing for soups, sauces and stews all winter.
