For acreage use zero turn mower is the way to go. Cows goats and sheep can turn around in their own body length or close to it
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Congrats Chris! Were you able to get it for less than what they were asking? You don’t need to answer, just curious. You’ve been talking about this for a few years. I’m glad to see it’s coming to fruition. I will need a lot of pictures and videos of your projects.
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Congratulations Chris
That is a huge step toward the American Dream
Now you will have lots of extra projects!
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I don’t mind. They listed it at 250, I offered 225 and they took 227. Pretty good deal in my book.
There will be pictures and videos. Just like I always do.
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Hi chris congrats on your great investment, now soon you may need some goats or cows too keep the grass and shurbs down.You should not have too buy any much food with the river right on the land, hopefully no factorys dumping in the rivers around there. As land keeps getting harder too find the value will allways have a value likely above your perchase price not counting servival factor senarial.Happy Homestedding.
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Great for you. Days are getting longer, summer is coming, you can work 16 hours a day and love every minute of it.
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Congrats!! It looks awesome. 
Best make sure your gasifier is smokeless, I was watching “moonshiners” the other day, and the authorities look for smoke! 
LMAO I can just see them trying to figure out what is going on a Chris is standing there looking at his truck doing a cold start with the cloud of smoke you can push out of the top of a gasifier.
Woop woop… congrats Chris
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Hello Chris.
Since you say that you are into water management, maybe this is old news:
The Soil Conservation Service can be reached through your county’s Extension Service which, is linked to your state’s land grant university. (here in Wisconsin, anyway).
They should be able to supply you with complete soils maps. These maps have been vital to us over the years.
I am not a huge supporter of government programs, but they helped us to develop and implement a soil conservation plan back in about 1974 that has benefits us greatly to this day.
Pete Stanaitis
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Congratulations Chris I will be looking forward to your pictures and videos .
I am glad things are moving your way Chris, time to do it is when you are young.Can’t wait to see what you there .
As for us , I guess we are going the other way,we just
Purchased a 100 x 125 foot lot in the city and plan to move the house on it. i don’ want to , age & health is against use.
Calvin
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Chris,
Haven’t read every word in this thread, and you may have already addressed this, but as a registered professional land surveyor, I recommend a few other things to consider:
Does your county require permits for septic systems? Big problem here if you are caught with an unpermitted system. It may work flawlessly for decades, but that is irrelevant - if it doesn’t have the permit, “Ist verboten!”
Does the nearest municipality exercise “extra-territorial jurisdiction” over your area? In Texas, municipalities are allowed to extend the reach of their influence some statutory distance out from their corporate limits, depending on the population. For Waco (population 100K) the ETJ radius is 5 miles. Within that radius, any dividing of land has to comply with their subdivision ordinance.
Around here, if you have more than one septic system per tax parcel, you have to sign an affidavit that the system is for a “guest house” or some familial arrangement where no rent money changes hands.
If you sell someone a part of your land off the public road, with easement access only, our county REQUIRES you to build a 22’ wide asphalt road across the easement, and a 45’ radius cul-de-sac at the end of it has no outlet. The price for such a road can approach $100/linear foot built to the required standards.
Make sure you check for transmission line or petroleum pipeline easements that can routinely be 100-200’ wide.
Despite all that, homesteading is DEFINITELY a worthwhile endeavor, especially for someone your age, with plenty of life and energy left to make a decent run at it. We all know you ain’t afraid of work . . .
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Septic already in place for the existing house. Anything further I do will be fully permitted etc.
No municipalities close enough to matter. Address is Owenton, county seat, small town 20 miles away.
Will be looking closely at easements, I think there is one (or needs to be), for the current driveway. Will know more when the survey comes back. No such pavement requirements here.
Land is free from overhead power lines, I will have to check for buried lines. Good call.
Now just waiting on the bank to make up their mind…
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Good news. Glad it’s workin out for you Chris…
Chris, congratulations on your acqusition of land. Yes, the saw mill comes up high on the list of priorities. You also need a lifting device. I built a boom truck because it has more reach than a forklift.
I also built a blade type of sawmill because it puts a lot more horsepower to the cutter. It has a 318 Dodge engine with a 4-speed transmillion. I put it in fourth for the small blade shown here. I put it in third for the bigger blade. It makes sawdust like nobody’s business.
As you already know, we are going into climate change, driven by the sun. I already posted a link to Suspicious Observers. You should read up on atmospheric rivers They carry as much water as the Mississippi river at the mouth. Santa Barbara got hit by 1/2 inch of rain in 5 minutes. Keep in mind that your flood plain may indeed get flooded. At least you have high ground to pull back to.
Best of luck.
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Hi ChrisKY,
To echo AlexT’s concern to research/look before you leap, two more things that have effected different friends/family living Rural here in Washington state:
- mineral rights reserved from way-back-when by the original registered title holders.
This hasn’t effected anyone personal here 'cause we ain’t got no minerals, gasses or coal. But Kentucky? These reserved rights are sell-able transferable and can later can allow the holder legal access to your land for exploration with no to minimal notification. - water usage rights are a very big deal our here in the far West states. Not just the above ground free lowing waters! Washington state and Oregon state this now applies to daily use allowances from sky falling rain too. WA we have a current 10,000 gallon usage per day without extensive allied for State/County/environmental(YOU-changing) permitting.
These are newer water use restrictions. Older existing ground water uses like dairies, with well drawing get grand fathered in. Property ownership transfer YOU must confirm that this water use right gets transferred too. Bare, put into new use property growing/raising out here and you can find that you end up a no-go if anyone would object or block you “new” well ground-water use (rainfall diversion) needed for farming. Even rainfall water capturing and impounding gets regulated out here anymore. Moving dirt/fill regulated/permit needed too. Roofs, driveways, even gravel roads now require extensive (expensive) made-made bio-swells water cleansing developing even on private properties here in WA state.
ALL of these mean it is much better/cheaper to buy existing property with pre-exisiting usages even if worn out broken down needing full rebuilding/restoring.
Next round of water use regulations winding through the legislators out here is mandatory added on radio reporting usage meters onto personal use water wells with taxes on usage of this “public” owned ground water.
These are why more and more Rural in WA/OR I know moved out to Montana and Alaska. Heavier, longer snows, shorter growing seasons and all.
Every place will have something(s). Tolerable only if it affects everyone in your whole region 'Ma Nature delivered. Man-made: if you still have a chance to voter box change it.
Regards
tree-farmer Steve unruh
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wow!..
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Yup Billy we don’t know how good we have it here on the east coast until you go west. The further west you go the more the gov kept for themselves when they gave the land to homesteading. Here in NH I own all the way down the only limit is with water flowing across my property as you are not allowed to block or disrupt water travel routes. Back in the time this land was settled they where the highways for transportation.
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Went out to meet with the property owner today. He’s got a bunch of equipment that he wants to pass along, so I told him to make me a price and we’d talk it over.
I ended up with more heavy equipment than I’ve ever had. But he made me some very good prices.
I wound up getting:
Ford 7000 tractor $4k
Massey Ferguson 150 tractor $3.5k
1960’s Caterpillar bulldozer, not running but fixable $4k
Ford dump truck $3k
Big Ford truck with a Cat engine, offroad gear transmission. Flatbed. $4k
Hydraulic discs $1k
2 bushhogs, rakes, plows, various other implements, $2k
This is a huge amount of equipment for me, but again the price was right. Some of it will make for a nice side hustle doing dozer work or hauling gravel. If that doesn’t pan out, I can resell some of the excess at a profit. I will hold it for awhile though, and get some serious earth moving done for myself.
Unfortunately for the woodgas side of things, these are all diesel machines. But that’s really your only option for some of this stuff. I may swap out one of the tractors for a gas burner at some point, so I can get some woodgas going. But for now, getting the work done efficiently is important. Time is of the essence.
These are the tractors:
The dozer:
Yellow dump truck and white flatbed, not the lowboy in center:
Closer shot of white flatbed. This one has a 3-range 15 speed transmisison. The log racks are gone now, the sawmill guys are putting a wood deck on it for me.
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