Twenty Instructables illustrate just how simple it can be to make your own backyard chicken coop, or turn a wine barrel into a rainwater collector.Illustrated with dozens of full-color photographs per project accompanying easy-to-follow instructions, this Instructables collection utilizes the best that the online community has to offer, turning a far-reaching group of people into a mammoth database churning out ideas to make life better, easier, and in this case, greener, as this volume exemplifies.

    We need sustainable living right where so many of us are: in urban neighborhoods. But how do we do it?That’s where Toolbox for Sustainable City Living comes in. In 2000 the dynamic Rhizome Collective transformed an abandoned warehouse in Austin, Texas, into a sustainability training center. Here, with their first book, Scott and Stacy, two of Rhizome’s founders, provide city dwellers—those who have never foraged or gardened along with those who dumpster-dive and belong to CSAs—with step-by- step instructions for producing our own food, collecting water, managing waste, reclaiming land, and generating energy. With vibrant illustrations created by Juan Martinez of the Beehive Collective and descriptive text based on years of experimentation, Stacy and Scott explain how to build and grow with cheap, salvaged, and recycled materials. More than a how-to manual, Toolbox is packed with accessible and relevant tools to help move our communities from envisioning a sustainable future toward living it.Scott Kellogg a Stacy Pettigrew are co-founders of the Rhizome Collective, an educational and activist organization based in Austin, Texas, that recently received a $200,000 grant from the EPA to clean up a 10-acre brownfield that they are transforming into an ecological justice park. Toolbox developed out of R.U.S.T.—Radical Urban Sustainability Training—their intensive weekend seminar in urban ecological survival skills.

    in vegetable gardening with Ed Smith's amazing gardening system. By integrating four principles -- Wide beds, Organic methods, Raised beds, and Deep beds -- Smith reinvents vegetable gardening, making it possible for everyone to have the best, most successful garden ever. By following this complete system you cultivate deep, powerful soil that nourishes plants and discourages pests and disease. The result is fewer weeds, healthier plants, and lots of great-tasting vegetables. Plus, you'll enjoy gardening as you never have before. The Vegetable Gardener's Bible -- the last W.O.R.D. in vegetable gardening.Praise for the book:"this book will answer all your questions as well as put you on the path to an abundant harvest. As a bonus, anecdotes and stories make this informative book fun to read." - New York Newsday

    Compact Farms is an illustrated guide for anyone dreaming of starting, expanding, or perfecting a profitable farming enterprise on five acres or less. The farm plans explain how to harness an area’s water supply, orientation, and geography in order to maximize efficiency and productivity while minimizing effort. Profiles of well-known farmers such as Eliot Coleman and Jean-Martin Fortier show that farming on a small scale in any region, in both urban and rural settings, can provide enough income to turn the endeavor from hobby to career. These real-life plans and down-and-dirty advice will equip you with everything you need to actually realize your farm dreams.

    

    Faced with climate change, dwindling resources, and species extinctions, most Americans understand the fundamental steps necessary to solve our global crises-drive less, consume less, increase self-reliance, buy locally, eat locally, rebuild our local communities. In essence, the great work we face requires rekindling the home fires.Radical Homemakers is about men and women across the U.S. who focus on home and hearth as a political and ecological act, and who have centered their lives around family and community for personal fulfillment and cultural change. It explores what domesticity looks like in an era that has benefited from feminism, where domination and oppression are cast aside and where the choice to stay home is no longer equated with mind-numbing drudgery, economic insecurity, or relentless servitude.Radical Homemakers nationwide speak about empowerment, transformation, happiness, and casting aside the pressures of a consumer culture to live in a world where money loses its power to relationships, independent thought, and creativity. If you ever considered quitting a job to plant tomatoes, read to a child, pursue creative work, can green beans and heal the planet, this is your book.

    This book is, like its author, a unique achievement. Weaving a vivid portrait of her own life and her bees' lives through the seasons, Hubbell writes "about bees to be sure, but also about other things: the important difference between loneliness and solitude . . . the accommodating of oneself to nature" (Philadelphia Inquirer).

    Writing in a delightfully personal and down-home style, Green emphasizes the point that herbal medicine-making is fundamental to every culture on the planet and is accessible to everyone. So, first head into the garden and learn to harvest your own herbs, and then head into your kitchen and whip up a batch of raspberry cough syrup, or perhaps a soothing elixir to erase the daily stresses of modern life.

    Whether you want to dabble or immerse yourself completely in the do-it-yourself, back-to-basics lifestyle, Welcome to the Farm is a comprehensive, fully illustrated guide to growing the very best food right in your own backyard. Shaye Elliott takes readers on a journey that teaches them how to harvest baskets full of organic produce, milk a dairy cow (and make butter), plant a homestead orchard, can jams and jellies, and even raise chickens and bees. From her experience running The Elliott Homestead, Shaye provides all the how-to wisdom you need to know about: The benefits of a home gardenThe basics of seed startingBuilding your own greenhouseWhat belongs in the winter gardenCanning, freezing, and dehydrating techniques and recipesThe pros and cons of caged vs. free-change chickensKeeping a dairy cow and what to do with all the milkRaising animals for meatMaking your own cider and wineAnd so much more!Welcome to the Farm is aimed to serve homesteaders and urban-farmers alike, guiding them through the beginning stages of small-area farming and utilizing whatever amount of space they have available for optimal and delicious food production.

    This comprehensive guide, written in charming prose from the perspective of an organic farmer, will appeal to readers who are interested in raising chickens, or simply want the best knowledge about how to cook them. With this in mind, farmer and animal expert Jennifer Megyesi discusses all the basic details of raising the birds—general biology, health, food, choosing breeds, and so on—and she cuts through the smoke to identify what terms like "organic," "free-range," and so on really mean for poultry farmers and consumers.No chicken book would be complete without information on how to show chickens for prizes, and this is no different, but The Joy of Keeping Chickens also stresses the importance of self-sustainability and organic living, and the satisfaction of keeping heirloom breeds. Readers will appreciate the comprehensive nature of this readable, informative guide, and Megyesi's enthusiasm about keeping chickens. Coupled with Geoff Hansen's gorgeous full-color photographs, this text makes for an instant classic in the category.

    But as a series of weather-related crop disasters put Brown and his wife, Shelly, in desperate financial straits, they started making bold changes to their farm. Brown--in an effort to simply survive--began experimenting with new practices he'd learned about from reading and talking with innovative researchers and ranchers. As he and his family struggled to keep the farm viable, they found themselves on an amazing journey into a new type of farming: regenerative agriculture.

    This haven of ecologically friendly practices has been the focus of BBC Two's popular series It's Not Easy Being Green, a title at least somewhat belied by the simplicity of the practical changes suggested in Self Sufficiency for The 21st Century. (Hand-selling tip: It's important to realize that low impact living isn't generally a one-jump leap. The incremental changes recommended in this book can help people take their first major steps in that direction.)

    The Backyard Berry Book provided all the information that backyard gardeners need to grow strawberries, rhubarb, raspberries, blackberries, blueberries, lingonberries, currants, gooseberries, grapes, and kiwi fruit. Includes details on soil nutrition and testing; disease, pest, weed, and bird control; and trellis design. A trouble-shooting section and seasonal activity calendar will help ensure success.

    Stretch the resources of your small backyard garden further than ever before, without devoting hundreds of hours to canning! This informative and inspiring guide shows you not only how to construct your own root cellar, but how to best use the earth’s naturally cool, stable temperature as an energy-saving way to store nearly 100 varieties of perishable fruits and vegetables.

    What at first sounds pastoral and idyllic soon becomes a series of challenges as the realities of what it takes to run a farm come to light. From making the classic neophyte agronomist error of getting emotionally involved with her chickens to ruminating on the value of radishes, Hopkins's retelling of life on a farm in the modern age is engaging, even gripping. Through it all, Hopkins cultivates a sense of belonging, and with a lot of hard work and a little luck, she becomes quite a bit more than just a farmer's girlfriend.