Hello All, hope everyone is still safe and the heat is not too much for people in the UK, the beaches have gone crazy once again !. i hope this video has helped people who are just beginning their self sufficient quest. If you have any questions please leave them here and i will get back to you with an answer. I will answer all comments, thanks very much for being a part of this channel, take care all.
Hello MissFamicom thats fantastic, your life is just about to become 100 times more fun ! there is never a dull moment, every day brings different challenges, good luck with your new life, it will be busy, but so very rewarding, the system is broken but as you get set up you will thrive , the weather becomes you best friend and enemy, chasing money drops lower down the list as time goes on, You have done the best thing for a safe secure future. thanks for popping by and leaving a comment take good care
Perfect Sunday morning entertainment lol. Great opening segment (almost Children of the Corn).. Nice bit of info re the pond filtration set up too. Sorry to hear about the delay on the van set up etc but it will happen in time. Thanks for a great video again with lots of really useful information. You all take care now.. and drink more tea!
Hello Barry, to be honest im glad they have run out of wood at the yard, its been non stop ! a good excuse for a little break, hope all is well at your end, cheers Barry take good care
Hello Lynn, wow ! 20 acres is amazing amount of land, we only have 3/4 of an acre here, all packed in tight to make self sufficiency work for us. I would love to have more land , especially my own forest, thanks and take good care
Hello, thanks for popping by, for me its all about connecting back to the land and nature. Understanding how food is meant to be produced and not just reaching to a shelf and picking up mass produced food wrapped in plastic with a sell by date on ! the modern world has lost touch with its food and nature, i think thats the wrong path. They are shaking their bloody heads upstairs ! ha ha , thanks, keep safe and well.
Hello, thanks Trev and Sue, its been the most busy summer ever for us here, but good things come to those who work hard, or so i keep telling myself ! happy safe travels, take good care
Hello Paul, its good to hear from you. Training is in progress, we let them have the run of the whole garden during the day now. ha ha, i will stop them, it would make a great video as well, the male goose is becoming very territorial ! thanks and take good care
I will get a pari of Chinese Swan Geese next year when I start my small holding. I am so excited as I always wanted them. I will also get some old breed chickens, white Campbell ducks and a pair of peafowl... but it will take a long time to save up the money to buy them!!!
Hello Jason, yes i know how you feel about trying to save ! but once you all set up the reliance for money drops low. thanks, good luck with your smallholding and take good care
Hello, the smell of goats is said to keep foxes at bay, but we no longer have them, so i was thinking of saving morning wees up !!! yuck and using it at the front very soon ! sounds really wrong though, thanks and take good care
I do huge pot of chopped upp potatoes. Carrots, onions, boil that and put some on a plate, salt pepoer, paprika, garlic granukes oregano, lasts me 2 days fir 5 chickens. Great animal, i cant jill them only eggs!
Good morning Gary! Lovely to hear from you. The weather is looking lovely. I love the geese! It's a very friendly peck he is giving you, shame they don't like Sophie though! We will hopefully see you soon, Jordan and Becky x
Hello Jordan and Becky, hope you and the chicks are doing well, Sophie does not really go into the garden much now with the animals, so the geese see her as a stranger. its very funny to watch though ! she runs and screams. i will try and catch it on video. see you soon and take care
Hi Gary. I hope you are all ok. Loved the 'horroresque' opening scenario! James hadn't been missed, lol! I hope you find wood soon, 'arf, arf! The caravan area will look great when finished, don't worry, I'll book it and bring my own wet wipes, lol! Great to see a 'beginner's guide to poultry. Good of to encourage people to keep them. I think your male birds were exercising their masculinity and I think the 'lazy' female was trying to have a dust bath. I'm with you, as you may know I very much enjoy keeping geese, they wander about like they own the place. I've always had them, I have this years youngsters (all spoken for) ready to go. Interesting as always to see round your place. We have had 26c and storms with hail. It has all cooled off now, thankfully. All well here. Thanks fr you latest vid. Take care, stay safe. Regards. Johnny. Northwest England.
Hello Johnny, its always good to hear from you, building materials seem to be running low, we gave up on the wooden shower hut and managed to get a second hand small conservatory on a trailer, an ex display advertising mobile unit that a window company owed, we paid just £200 !!! a complete steel ! I should have got into the goose business earlier like you, our boy goose is really getting territorial, very funny to see ! thanks Johnny, hold onto your wig ! and stay safe in the storm, take good care.
@@ESCAPINGTHEMATRIXFORGOOD Hi Thanks Gary. Shame about the wood, lol! However it sounds like you bagged an absolute bargain with the conservatory! There'll be a few advantages there. Well you are in the goose business now! As you know I'm just playing at it mostly, who else has a teenaged cow? I do enjoy my geese though, of no particular breed, white, grey and various combinations, seeing what you have done, I may get purebred pair- not sure which breed, they would have to kept separate unit they were an established pair I think, to stop any funny goings on! All well here, cooler and we have had more rain. Stay safe. Regards. Johnny. Northwest England.
Thanks for this video, I found it very informative and entertaining too. I'm thinking of keeping some poultry in the future and You gave me something to think about, how to approach the subject. I think I'm falling in love with geese ;)
Hello, thanks for your kind words Anka. Geese are good to keep, they mainly live on grass, so very little feed needs importing. This year we are going to open up our pens more and try and let the chickens free range so we also use less feed. The amount of feed we import is a small problem. thanks and take good care
Funny video, brightened my day. Thinking of getting a few chickens, we have sizeable garden with good fencing. I worry about them at night in the winter in the cold though… (I’m in Wiltshire so hardly the arctic…!)
Hello Susanna. Chickens keep fine in the UK winters if you keep 2 or more ( they huddle each other ) in a nice dry hut and with a perch higher up of the ground, also you could insulate the hut if worried which be very lovely for them. Just 2 chickens with give at least 10 eggs per week for at least 3 years, after that they will slow down on laying. Hens are also very quiet and only tend to make a little noise after laying. Thanks so much, keep safe and well.
Hi, got three acres smallholding in North Wales, watch loads of smallholding videos, yours are the best...to the point, show the good as well as the bad and full of laughs. Cheers. If you’re ever in North Wales call in for a cuppa
Hello thats very kind of you for the offer, thanks you, when i had my motor home many years back we travelled for just over a week in wales, its a perfect area for a smallholding, lovely part of the country. i will never forget the lovely drive of the A487. 3 acres is a good amount of land, we only have 3/4 of an acre. thanks for watching and commenting, take good care
Interrupting that poor hen - she was having a sun bath! Our hens really love that on a sunny day. We always give our hens spoiled veg from the garden and left overs. They do great with it. Obviously I try not to feed chickens left over chicken nor eggs. It is probably the easiest way to spread those pathogens. Duck eggs are best used in baking and making things like homemade noodles. Amazing! I no longer keep ducks. I got awfully tired of NEVER having a clean water bowl. I love your filtration pond area! The most successful way to hatch turkeys? Under a broody hen! My heritage Cornish (Indian Game in the UK) are wonderful turkey mamas! Geese are wonderful to keep in your fruit orchard. They keep all the fruit drops under the tree. They are used to weed strawberry plants and other well established garden plants as long as you don't keep them in when the strawberries are fruiting. We have tremendous hawk pressure here. Red tailed hawks used to take lots of hens each year. Now we have one goose that lives with the chickens. A lone goose will bond with the hens and protect them from hawks. Two geese?... well then they go off together and let the chickens fend for themselves!
Hello, its good to hear from you, hope all is well, thanks for all your information, i should have got geese many years ago. they are great to have. We do have birds of prey here, Buzzards and kestrels but they dont seem brave enough to snatch young birds, but we have seen buzzards snatch baby rabbits from the airbase next to us. thanks very much and take good care, happy homesteading !
Hello Rose, as long as you had a good laugh ive achieved ! a bit too basic vid i guess. Laughter and love makes the world go round. thanks for popping by, keep safe and well.
@@ESCAPINGTHEMATRIXFORGOOD I'm glad we found you. We have our own little journey towards self sufficiency but I've yet to convince my husband on a small holding 😉
haha, that is a forest of sweetcorn, poor James was lucky to survive. I use AD BLOCKER, it is free and I never see anyones adverts.... That was nice of the army guy to carry that black up the ladder. This is probably your noisiest vid, despite showing the odd aircraft!!!!! Looks glorious there, Mr Solar Face is loving you all x
Hello Bry, its the most veg we have ever had. i must look into the ad blocker thing. That was one of the Gurkhas, they a really kind polite people, they often buy the eggs here as well, i have to pass them over the fence, as they are smaller people they stand on the bonnets of the army vehicles to reach. Bry its getting too hot and too dry now !!! im hoping for the heavens to open up with some heavy rain. thanks, stay safe and take good care
I think the biggest shock and mistake the newbie small holders face is the commitment factor. Like dairy cows, you have to be there twice a day to unlock and lock your birds up. Unless you have a secure closed off pen with plenty of space. Chooks love to roam the garden and paddocks during the day and be locked up at dusk, otherwise, I guarantee you will find your birds headless and bled by morning. Foxes seldom eat the birds BTW, just after the warm blood. Good video mate. Stay safe.
Hello Moose, yes i agree, luckily we have never had a fox attack since we have been keeping poultry, but know plenty of people who have woke up with the heads missing and chickens all over the garden. Hope all is well at your end, thanks and take good care Moose.
Hi mate, very entertaining videos I have to say. I am thinking of creating a small self sustainable plot somewhere in the south. But all these regulations and restrictions make me bonkers. I would really appreciate it if you may do a video sharing your experience how you dealt with this in registering your smallholding. Thanks, Gary, stay safe and stay free.
Hello Gal, thanks for popping by, we only had to have a smallholding number issued when we had goats, we now no longer have goats so no longer need to be registered as a smallholding, registering can be quickly over the phone by contacting Defra. As long as you keep under 50 birds/poultry and have no cattle/cloven footed animals no registration is needed as far as i know, we are no longer registered here, but also i have very little faith in Defra and dont want them poking their nose in, my animals welfare is higher than Defras poor standards ! If the land has no dwelling you will have to have some sort of permission for that to go ahead, i know nothing about dwelling permission/ planning permission on land. Good luck with your plans. thanks for your question. take care
Hello, the large duck pond was already there but i did re-dig it and put a new liner in, the goose pond we done ourselves with spare pond liner left over. thanks Elvis, hope your keeping well and take care
Hi Gary and James! Drew just released her ducks into the wild, some call it the front yard. They made a mud pit in the backyard no grass. A friend in Scotland said the same thing what is getting scarce for building. I think we're going to have to grow our own tree and harvest the wood ourselves soon that should be your next small holding it Adventure. Take care and stay safe XX Amy
Hello Amy, oh no not more jobs for me, growing trees for lumber ! the mainstream media has scared the life out of people on this covid thing and made people really paranoid, the uk is not running smoothly anymore ! things are running out, did you know that around 42,000 died of pollution related illnesses in the UK last year and sod all was done about this ! no one seems to care about that ! i just dont get it. Thanks Amy take good care.
@@ESCAPINGTHEMATRIXFORGOOD oh yeah same here, also if you look at other illnesses they have gone down, like death related to Pneumonia, flu, those types mean while virus keeps going up. I live in a hot spot, the only person I know that tested positive was told they had it but was never sick. " please no one freak, i do think it is real, i just don't trust those in charge!" Stay safe!
Thanks for the catch up, definitely get a rooster if we had chickens, to piss off all the dog owners in the estate, haha.. take care all and please stay safe.. hope you get timber soonest.. x
Hello, ha ha, yes it drives people mad with the constant barking and dog muck bombs everywhere ! glad your doing well, happy travels and stay safe Lindsay.
We are not allowed roosters in urban areas here in NZ, fortunately. I can hear our neighbours blingin rooster from three paddocks away. We are looking at 3/4 hens. Thank goodness we don’t need a rooster for them to lay. We have a a duck turn up in our creek, and Hubby wants geese foe security duty. We don’t have predators here that could attack our birds
Hello, sorry for a late reply. Yes the geese are great for security, mine are free to wander the land all day and night and they make plenty of noise when something is up. Good luck with your future plans, thanks for popping by, take good care.
Was expecting a remake of the Mel Gibson film "Signs" at the beginning seeing how your at Rendlesham.Good vid .Like the air lift pump idea,never thought of that.Only ever seen them used in aquariums.Burying the fence wire into the ground is a good tip too as round here quite a few have lost chucks recently to foxes and also Badgers which I hadn't heard of before.Will it be a traditional goose at xmas this year then? Take care mate.
Hello Mark, sorry a little late to reply, never heard of badgers doing that, but now thinking about it, i may have lost some quails to badgers in my old house, the whole was dug very fast in stony ground and was very large, larger than a fox ! also the same night i had lots of potatoes dug up to the surface, No goose for the table this year, but maybe in a few years time, but wrestling a goose could be tricky ! Hope all is good at your end, thanks and take good care
Hello Andy, yours is the last comment and im up to date with them all !!! i like to reply to all comments but the channel is getting very busy now, i have now had people subscribing who have been force into self sufficiency due to job losses to now make end meet, the system is getting bigger cracks appearing ! im very lucky to be out of that. As for the weather that has been a complete struggle here !!! way too busy keep the crops watered ! cheers Andy, hope all is well at your end take good care.
Great beginning to your film Gary, I was totally afraid when James who had been lost for over two weeks encountered that ghostly figure. Thought it strange that you had now joined the Capitalist elite and like Branson were making loads of money from advertising. Please tell James to do some bodybuilding exercising if he’s going to show off his muscles on screen. Cheers Mike
Hello Mike, for the first day that video was up i actually earned £3.60 because of the many adverts ! ( that equates to roughly 2 cans of abbot ale ! ) , but we all hate adverts !! i also like to work in tenants super currency, a little bit more expensive per can but double the strength, it also taste better when you have a brown paper bag wrapped around. I saw you last video, i feel its not time to exit ! you will be much missed by your youtube fan club. its like a big happy family on here. thanks Mike i will tell James to get training ha ha, take care Mike.
Loved the video, great to know your all well and safe. Would love to get a couple of chickens but not sure I have enough room, we are cramming in as much growing space as we can in our small garden, including planters on fences. I do have an area at the far end how much space would you say 2 would need and what breed would you reccomend. Take care x
Hello Deborah, its good to hear from you, thanks for your questions, i would put 2 chickens in a spaced of fence no smaller than 5 by 10 feet. the best breed for eggs are the Rhode island red or the Sussex, both easy to obtain in the UK. If you think about it most very small garden during the war also managed to keep chickens. You can let them out of the pen under supervision every now and then for a peck around when veg has all been harvested to clear the bugs. thanks Deborah, good luck and stay safe.
Thanks Gary as I thought I don't have enough room at the moment but we have put our name down for an allotment so when we get one and I can grow more up there I can for go some growing space at home and will defo be investing, I would prefer to keep them at home, keep them safe. Thanks take care x
Hello Mark, i would have no problem in keeping mine in the same enclosure. In fact i do sometimes put them in with the ducks as they geese keep the grass short . Thanks for popping by, keep safe and well.
Hi I’m buying 3 Canada geese for my small lake. Would they need to be kept in a pen near the lake for a few weeks to no it’s there new home. Or do we just release them and let me be free. These cannot fly. Thanks be great to hear back.
Hello Jason, i would pen them in for a while, but im sure Canadian geese can fly they might fly away ! , i would stick to a domestic breed as these do not fly due to there weight. we have provided ours with a hut, but they hardly ever use it and choose to sleep outside in all weather ! but now the bird flu is hear Defra recommends them to be locked in there hut, which i do not agree with and doing reluctantly. Thanks Jason take care
first time here, im looking to move to the uk (england to be exact) im from switzerland, to live with my partner. ive always wanted a garden and chickens or ducks maybe lots of veggies too. though i have no clue on any of it as i come from a country where living in flats/apartment buildings is the norm. renting is the norm here too. so my question is is it ok to have chickens or ducks in a rear garden in say a town? in a semi-detatched house? or do you have to go somewhere more rural? and what garden size is best for a veggie garden with chickens or ducks and still a patch of grass for a dog? thanks in advance
Hello, thanks for popping by, i know many people who are " urban smallholder " , which is living in a town in semidetached homes owning chickens and growing veg, we used to also do the same as well before we moved to the country. Most towns there are no restrictions on owning a few chickens, except i would think twice about a cockerel crowing ! just stick to hens. We had about a 25 by 35 foot garden and grew lots of veg and also had a small chicken pen with 3 chickens. plenty of eggs as well ! but in a perfect urban smallholding a garden over twice that size would be very good and easy to find in the UK. If you want to keep ducks and chickens i would go for 3 times the size and ducks need more space and a nice sized pond to keep healthy. Good luck on what you decide, thanks for your questions, take good care
@@ESCAPINGTHEMATRIXFORGOOD oh wow, i honestly didnt expect a reply! thank so much for the detailed answer! does having a cockerel have any advantages? is a 150meter square garden a good size? im not too good with feet. i read that the average uk garden size in 2018 was 164m^2. which are easier and cheaper to keep? ducks or chickens? i read that chickens get ill and die a lot more and that while ducks need more space their eggs are supposedly bigger and more nutritious than chickens. thanks again for the answer! and heart too! ive been watching a few of your videos and im happy to subscribe for the content you create, its funny and very informative!
Hello mate. Great video as always, entertaining and informative. I have a question for you if you don't mind. We want to buy a smallholding and be as self-sufficient as possible. We live on the Isle of Man, and land is so expensive here. Just to give you an idea, a 4 bedroom house with 2+ acres costs £700k+. So we are thinking that it might be best moving to mainland, but we are not sure where. We don't want an extremely isolated place because our daughter is diabetic, so we need to be fairly close (no more than 30 minutes drive) to a hospital for checkups, etc. A quick search showed bigger properties with more land for significantly less money, all over UK. But I have never lived there and I'm sure there are many factors that I wouldn't take into account, so I thought it would be good asking you. Would you be able to recommend a few areas so we can start looking? It would be a great help for us. Thank you!
Hello, a good question ! personally i would not go too far north as the growing seasons becomes too short, i would stick to the south. we are on the east coast of Suffolk. i do know that Norfolk and Lincolnshire are very cheep and have fertile land, Suffolk prices are rising sharply ! it was cheap when we moved here, places in wales are also very popular with good fertile land at good value, a gentle south facing sloped property in wales would be fantastic. Please check out flood maps before purchasing, a good map for this is here ----> flood.firetree.net/ , the last thing you need is flooding problems which will get worse in the future ! , Lincolnshire and parts of Norfolk can be in low lands. We paid £330,000 for our cottage and land, 3/4 of an acre, 6 years ago. we are half an hour away from a main hospital. we found our property on right move, happy hunting and good luck, thanks and take good care
@@ESCAPINGTHEMATRIXFORGOOD Hello! Thank you so much for your reply. It's very helpful information, we never thought about floods! Wales sounds good and there are many properties at a good price. We will start looking in those areas first. Many thanks from both me and my wife, we really appreciate it! Keep up the good work, we are always looking forward to your next video. All the best to you and your family. Take care 😊
Did you get wood in the end? I used to live in Walsham Le Willows and Clarkes of Walsham might have what you are looking for if you are prepared to drive that far.
Hello Амбер, we now have had a change of plan, we have brought a upvc conservatory on a trailer bed to now convert into a shower block instead of building a wooden shower hut, no concrete base or wood needed. We have often used Clarkes in the past, a good company for cheap good quality galvanised roofing, i will be putting another order in soon for my large animal hut/barn to be fixed up, thanks very much and have a great weekend.
@@ESCAPINGTHEMATRIXFORGOOD They are not bad for having a great range of things, that is for sure. I would never known about them if it was not for living in that village for the years I did :). Like the idea of a mobile unit. There is ( or was 4 years ago) a mobile toilet and shower company based on Stanton Industrial estate. I bet they would sell the older ones to you if you went up there and had a chat...they are about 3 miles from Clarkes if you go up there.
Hello Kasie , its good to hear from you, we have not run sprinklers on the ducks, but when i get my water well pump set up we will give it a go, but last week i did point the hose at the geese and they loved it. thanks and take good care
The reason you can't feed them scraps that have been through your kitchen is so it doesn't get contaminated with processed food, that's what caused foot and mouth disease. We don't want that again, better safe than sorry. I just peel veg outside but I doubt you have a lot of processed food in your kitchen.
Hello, we have only 3/4 of an acre, i think a perfect amount would be 2 acres , 1 of them being a wooded area for fuel, thanks for popping by take care
Hello, its great to hear from you, hope all is well at your end, our geese chase of pigeons, crows and magpies ! they really are a great thing to keep ! you should have told me to get geese way back ! ha ha thanks Elizabeth, have a great weekend and take good care
Hello, im afraid the ducks and geese might kill the fish, but i want to build a large raised pond in the future next to the polytunnel to keep tilapia or something similar. the reason for it being next to the polytunnel is i want to incorporate a system that collects the many flies that get trapped in the polytunnel to help feed them. It would be great to produce our own fish for the table ! thanks so much for your comments Elvis, take good care and keep safe.
Hello, we live in Suffolk and we will be breeding these when they start laying. A goose really needs a friend, they also mate for life so i would think about getting 2 geese, we only have one breeding pair, so that would be a brother and sister off spring ! not a good match ! cheers for popping by, keep safe and well.
Hello, thanks for clearing that up, im not the cleverest of people ! ha ha im using most of my brainpower to grow veg ! ha ha thanks and take good care
