Well here we are in the Ozarks where, after searching for a couple of years, I found a property we liked. That was a year ago and since then we've camped in a trailer while cutting a road in to build a cabin. Spent summer in a mobile home up the road for A/C Then came back here and spent winter in the cabin. We're on solar, harvesting rainwater and making humanure. (for the flowering dogwoods) Most of the work has been clearing of; current zone one, electric to be brought in (gotta have my welder), future zone one and some of zone two. Most of what I'm cutting is white oak and I'll be putting as much as I can to good purpose. Building timbers, fence posts, shittake media etc. I put this together yesterday to start some shittake. Still needs a few branches added. Bought 1kg of sawdust spawn which is supposed to do about 20 small logs and I'll be inoculating logs tomorrow. Cloudy day with light wind. Once the trees leaf out, the shittake logs will be moved down to a ravine for a natural spot for them. This is just temporary shade. Trying to get an early start. If mushrooming goes well this year, I'll probably build a more permanent setup. Plenty of oak around here. When I run out on the property, I can just follow loggers around and cut the tops that they leave. Seems there's always someone within a few miles logging their place. View attachment 2465 I'll keep adding here as things get done. Might take a few years. Doing all the work myself including a house dug into the SE facing slope. I'm leaning towards an earthship. My neighbor has an old Allis Chalmers tractor shovel. Basically a bulldozer type chassis with a front end loader bucket instead of a blade. Little 2cyl Detroit Diesel but with the gearing, I guess it'll knock over pretty good sized trees without a problem. It hasn't run in a couple of years so I'm going to get it running for him and I'll get to use it for my earthworks. We've got 8 acres and will leave a few as woods so this will be 5 acres of abundance on a real tight budget. I made a water level so I can make up a site plan. Once I get the plan, I'll post it here for opinions.