Magazines (and Websites) About Homesteading and Self-Sufficiency

When I was a boy, my father used to buy Mother Earth News from the grocery store. The magazine was filled with stories about self-sufficient country living, the sort of thing my dad aspired to. I’d read the magazine after he was finished, but never really understood the appeal of building your own greenhouse or raising goats. Now, as an adult, it makes a little more sense.

Kris and I are not radically self-sufficient, but we do enjoy growing our own food. (And she recently agreed that we could get chickens!) The content at GRS reflects my interest in the DIY lifestyle. Besides frequent articles on gardening, in the past I’ve shared stories like these:

• Frugality in practice: Home canning
• An introduction to homesteading, a guest post from Phelan of A Homesteading Neophyte
• My review of Back to Basics: A Guide to Traditional Skills

Though our own adventures in self-sufficiency are limited, they’re edifying, and I admire those who do even more. I’m a strong advocate of the DIY ethic. I believe there’s real value in traditional skills, such as gardening and sewing, canning and carpentry. As a bonus, most of these practices save money.

After spending last Saturday planting peas and pruning fruit trees – and contemplating where to put a chicken coop – I took some time to research the current state of homesteading magazines. Turns out there are half a dozen that seem interesting. Most of them have a companion website with excellent information:

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Mother Earth News
Mother Earth News is “the original guide to living wisely”. Its content leans left, and includes articles on subjects such as renewable energy, green homes, organic gardening, green transportation, and sustainable farming.

The Mother Earth News website is polished and filled with content, with stories on:

• How to cut your food bill in half
• Keeping the stimulus bill green
• And, just for me, raising chickens and building a chicken a coop

BackHome
BackHome is “your hands-on guide to sustainable living”. It covers topics like owner-built homes, backyard livestock, rural heritage, green building, and country skills.

The BackHome website isn’t very useful, but it does offer a taste of the magazine. You can see the table of contents from the most recent issue, and view PDF versions of articles like:

• Mortgage-free building
• Edible weeds
• Biodiesel

Backwoods Home
Backwoods Home, is like the first two publications in this list – but with guns. Backwoods Home leans right (or libertarian), and offers “practical ideas for self-reliant living”. Like BackHome, it offers how-to articles on owner-built housing, independent energy, self-employment, and country living. And there’s a regular column on gun ownership.

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July 13, 2009

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