EU English Edition

"John Seymour has made self-sufficiency feasible. This book gives you all the information you need and more! From planning your 1 or 5 acre plot to crop rotation, from making beer, bread and rollmops to building a furnace! Essential accessory to self-sufficiency, whether you need to remove a tree stump, butcher livestock, harness a ploughhorse, plan your dairy, brew beer, dress stone or even distilling! The drawings are stunning, exquisitely drawn and incredibly clear. It is also a sobering caveat for those planning to dream the dream ..."

"The Self Sufficient Life and How to Live It is the only book that teaches all the skills needed to live independently in harmony with the land harnessing natural forms of energy, raising crops and keeping livestock, preserving foodstuffs, making beer and wine, basketry, carpentry, weaving, and much more. This new edition includes 150 new full color illustrations and a special section in which John Seymour the father of the back to basics movement explains the philosophy of self-sufficiency and its power to transform lives and create communities. More relevant than ever in our high-tech world, The Self Sufficient Life and How to Live It is the ultimate practical guide for realists and dreamers alike."

EU English Edition

"Though I had heard a little bit about Fukuoka and his practice, I was not prepared in the least for the way that this book would touch me. Fukuoka does an excellent job of demonstrating how much extra work we have all created for ourselves, how our scientific solutions all require further solutions, and that it is an endless cycle as long as we are straying from nature and its example. This book managed to eloquently lay out a great many ideas that had been lying dormant in my head: the overemphasis on specialization vs. generalism in our society, the break between modern urbanized lives and natural agrarian lives, the definition of 'enough' and how desire leads us ever farther away from that baseline. Fukuoka discusses all these topics and more--and in a style that is far more effective than anything I can write to explain it. It is philosophy, agricultural method, and cultural criticism wrapped up into an effective unity."

EU English Edition

"If you love the joys of eating home-garden vegetables but always thought those joys had to stop at the end of summer, this book is for you. Eliot Coleman introduces the surprising fact that most of the United States has more winter sunshine than the south of France. He shows how North American gardeners can successfully use that sun to raise a wide variety of traditional winter vegetables in backyard cold frames and plastic covered tunnel greenhouses without supplementary heat. This story of sunshine, weather patterns, old limitations and expectations, and new realities is delightfully innovative. Four-Season Harvest will have you feasting on fresh produce from your garden all through the winter.

EU English Edition

"Whether one wants to live in the suburbs and be more self-sufficient or begin homesteading in the country, the comprehensive, hands-on, problem-solving information and highly illustrated 'back-to-basics' materials presented by 150 of Storey's authors on everything from home maintenance and animal care to gardening and cooking will be easily understood and readily applicable. Storey's Basic Country Skills presents the most up-to-date, practical, authoritative advice for every aspect of independent country living. Detailed illustrations to show the reader simply and easily how and when to do things in order to gain the most benefit from each project. Each chapter will include the following information: a) how to get started; b) common problems; c) check lists; and d) terminology."

EU English Edition

"This is a truly rare, charming and simple book capturing lost details of the lives our grandparents and ancestors lived closer to the land. Do not be misled by the title into thinking this is just about housekeeping. Much more is included than you would guess, inlcuding keeping livestock and bees, providing water, ale, beer, wine and cider making, cheese making, textiles, chimney sweeping, gas and electrical lighting, stoves, bathrooms - everything to do with home life in old times. Seymour, an expert in self-sufficiency, takes readers back to another age with this combination of the classic titles The Forgotten Arts (1984) and Forgotten Household Crafts (1987). There is something here for everyone: woodcrafts, basketry, soap making, food production, wool production, lace making, and more. As we have come to expect from DK, the illustrations are an attractive asset, featuring numerous period photographs and drawings."

"This concise book shows how the self-sufficient gardener can go one step further and generate income from excess produce. Waterman, a horticulturalist and journalist, stresses preplanning and target marketing, with practicial examples and suggestions. He covers individual vegetables, fruits, nuts, herbs, livestock, and nonfood plant sources such as woodlots. He also discusses greenhouse and hydroponic options, and dispenses advice on how to use edible landscaping to produce surprising amounts of food from small suburban lots. Each chapter ends with a short annotated bibliography for further reading on the topic. An appendix lists pertinent periodicals, associations, and seed companies. Of special note is a chapter discussing the use of computer programs and the Internet as gardening information sources."

"After 20-plus years of tutelage at the feet of Vermont's seasons, landscape designers and authors Joe Eck and Wayne Winterrowd have mastered the art of living in tune with the seasons. This means eating what's ripe in the garden--there's no freezing and very little canning at North Hill--when it's ripe. Eck and Winterrowd go into luxurious detail on the tiniest aspects of horticultural and barnyard life. These two are passionate and effective teachers--so much so that, by page 43, the reader fully understands their characterisation of pumpkin vines as "as wayward as vegetable guineas," a reference to the hen with a mind of its own. This book will captivate both the avid gardener-cook with its recipes and techniques for planting and seed selection, and the city-dweller searching for the answer to why it's impossible to find tomatoes that taste like tomatoes in January."

"Start living the 'Good Life'. Pick up this handy compact favourite from 'the grand master of self-sufficiency' ("Kitchen Garden") and discover how to enjoy a sustainable lifestyle. Easy-to-follow, this guide not only tells you what to do, but shows you how to do it. Follow practical know-how: from creating an urban organic garden and making wine and beer, to ploughing fields or harnessing natural energy. It is all the practical advice you need to make the break and get started. Teaching all the skills needed to live independently in harmony with the land, from harnessing natural forms of energy and raising crops to keeping livestock and preserving foodstuffs, this new format of John Seymour's classic is still the most practical guide for realists and dreamers alike."

"This reprint of the 1909 classic should be on the shelf of every serious homesteader. Farming is hard work, and this book will teach you how to save both time and money to get the job done. In this little gem you'll learn how to make your own tools for your workshop, how to build things for around the house, for the barns, and for your livestock, in addition to other devices for your garden and orchard, including a section that discusses fence-making and gate-making. You will learn to build a portable chicken coop, a stone boat (for moving stone), a lightweight orchard ladder, gates that don't sag, and a handy wood splitter, as well as rudimentary farm structures, well houses, bee hives, a baby's cradle, a cheese press and much more. Even those of us who'd rather pass on making a moveable brooder house for chickens of fashioning a baby cradle from an old barrel will find wisdom in this thrift-conscious and often environmentally wise celebration of self-suffiency."

"Deliberately ignoring canning and freezing techniques, the editors present techniques for preserving food that they believe preserve both more flavor and more nutritional value. Techniques detailed include drying; lactic fermentation; salting. In a foreword written by Eliot Coleman, the well-known gardener notes how the use of more natural methods serves to enhance the flavors as well as the nutritional values of foods. Contained here are 250 recipes that feature eight different ways to preserve fresh produce. In various instances, spoilage is prevented by using salt, sugar, oil, vinegar, wine, or alcohol. Some recipes preserve foods for weeks, while others keep foods good for many months."

"Root cellaring, as many people remember but only a few people still practice, is a way of using the earth's naturally cool, stable temperature to store perishable fruits and vegetables. Root cellaring, as Mike and Nancy Bubel explain here, is a no-cost, simple, low-technology, energy-saving way to keep the harvest fresh all year long. Root cellaring need not be strictly a country concept. Though it's often thought of as an adjunct to a large garden, a root cellar can in fact considerably stretch the resources of a small garden, making it easy to grow late succession crops for storage instead of many rows for canning and freezing. Best of all, root cellars can easily fit anywhere. Not everyone can live in the country, but everyone can benefit from natural cold storage."

"This classic of the back-to-the-land movement is packed with solid, timeless information. Written by a renowned horticulturist, it has taught generations how to make their land self-sufficient, with explanations of organic farming techniques and reliable advice on other topics, including irrigation, livestock, crops, greenhouses, fertilizers, much more. Provides practical information on selecting productive acreage, stocking the tool shed, and raising, storing, and marketing a variety of fruit and vegetable crops."

"This book contains easy-to-follow guidelines and plans for those who wish to free themselves from dependence on utility companies. With five acres and hard work, the author shows the reader how to live an independent lifestyle and be self-sufficient.A required read for those who still dream about living life as unfettered people."

"This inspiring handbook contains everything small-farm owners need to know, from buying land to organic growing methods and selling cash crops. Successful Small-Scale Farming introduces anyone owning (or planning to own) a small farm to both the harsh realities and the real potential involved in making a full- or part-time living on the land. Karl Schwenke's clear-eyed approach to the best farming methods covers a wide range of proven techniques and practical advice. With today's increased concern for the quality of the food we eat and the health of our environment, Successful Small-Scale Farming offers a unique and invaluable perspective on the future of agriculture. Karl Schwenke's message -- that small-scale farms can be cleaner, smarter, and more efficient than corporate agribusiness -- has never been so relevant as it is today."

"This book describes the philosophy and methods of a holistic approach to limited space gardening that produces so much food that, within three years, you will be able to produce 85% of the food needs for a family of four on less than a quarter-acre, plus earn over $10,000 in cash annually - and you will be able to do this in less time than an equivalent job would require, netting the equivalent of $50/hour for your labor. Even if you have never been a farmer or a gardener, this book covers everything you need to know to get started: buying seeds, saving seeds, starting seedlings, establishing raised beds, soil fertility practices, composting, dealing with pest and disease problems, farm planning and much more. Since self sufficiency is the objective, subjects such as raising backyard chickens and home canning are also covered along with numerous methods for keeping costs down and production high."

"The complete illustrated guide to planning, growing, storing and preserving your own garden produce from 'the grand master of self-sufficiency' ("Kitchen Garden"), John Seymour John Seymour's classic guide gives you the knowledge and expertise to create your own self-sufficient garden and produce what you need. Whatever the size of your space, discover how to garden organically and maximise your harvest, without the need for radical changes to your lifestyle. From cultivating vegetables to making cider, keeping chickens to training vines, you'll garden in tune with the seasons, growing for the year, eating for today and storing for tomorrow. No specialist knowledge required: just clearly explained principles and practicalities ideal for any gardener."

"The decline of cheap oil is inspiring increasing numbers of North Americans to achieve some measure of backyard food self-sufficiency. In hard times, the family can be greatly helped by growing a highly productive food garden, requiring little cash outlay or watering. Currently popular intensive vegetable gardening methods are largely inappropriate to this new circumstance. Crowded raised beds require high inputs of water, fertility and organic matter, and demand large amounts of human time and effort. But, except for labor, these inputs depend on the price of oil. Prior to the 1970s, North American home food growing used more land with less labor, with wider plant spacing, with less or no irrigation, and all done with sharp hand tools. But these sustainable systems have been largely forgotten. Gardening When It Counts helps readers rediscover traditional low-input gardening methods to produce healthy food."

"The updated ninth edition of this compendium of food production information is the hefty result of over three decades of intelligence-gathering by Emery, whose initial encyclopedia project was designed to help newbies in the "back to the land" movement of the early 70s learn self-sufficiency. Tasks Emery covers run the gamut from the simple to the complex, and from the common to the strange, and include how to: bake bread, make seed milk, sew a cornhusk bed, dry flowers, prune kiwi vines, culture yogurt, plant beans, keep bees, build a fish pond, artificially inseminate a turkey and help a cow who's eaten nails."

"As consumers become ever eco-conscious, many people nurture a dream of living a 'self-sufficient' lifestyle. "The Self-Sufficiency Handbook" provides an introduction to the possibilities and methods involved in setting up the different aspects of a greener way of living. Authors Alan and Gill Bridgewater recently moved to a smallholding, so they are well-positioned to answer all the fundamental questions that anyone considering a similar lifestyle shift might ask. Subjects covered in the book include: the self-sufficient house, the organic food garden, animal husbandry and the pantry. The book runs the full ecological gamut, from geothermal heating through to crop rotation and making your own soap. It emphasises the positive aspects of adapting to a self-sufficient lifestyle, such as cutting living costs and eating well, and the sheer fun of rolling your sleeves up to get things going. Packed with informative illustrations and diagrams, and a wealth of useful advice, "The Self-Sufficiency Handbook" is the perfect guide for the increasing number of people who are keen to join the green revolution."

"Provides readers with detailed information on self-sufficient gardening. Regardless of whether it is 5 acres or a window box, there are ideas in this book for everyone. Self-sufficient gardens are beautiful: a ramble of productivity and a profusion of smells and colours. We've forgotten how beautiful edible plants can be: fat red apples and tendrils of grapes; beautiful red-flowering perennial beans and soft feathery fennel; the wide, bright blooms of passion fruit and the scent of orange blossom on a summer night. It's like a Garden of Eden in your own back yard. This thin book is so full of helpful, permacultural advice you'll throw away practically every other book on gardening you have. She teaches you how to make olive oil, tofu, homemade shampoos, how to grow all the vegan food you would ever need right in your backyard, including grains and beans, fruit trees, nut trees, how to make flour of nuts and even pumpkins."