Strategies to Grow an ENTIRE YEAR’S Worth of Food on a Small Farm

Cal ran out of potatoes in March. This year he's doing the arithmetic before anything goes in the ground. Most people who quit homesteading don't quit because of a bad season. They quit because they did too much and burned out on it. In this video Cal Renner walks you round the whole place and lays out exactly what he's planting more of, what he's cutting back, and the planning mistakes that had him buying groceries two months early. You'll get the one number that completely changed how he plans a self sufficient garden, why calorie crops come before salad, and how much land it really takes to feed a person for a year (it's more than you think, and the reason why isn't what you'd guess). We go through potatoes, sweet potatoes, butternut squash, storage onions, garlic, carrots and tomatoes, the curing step almost everybody skips, and why a root cellar needs three completely different storage conditions if you don't want to lose half your harvest by February. Then it's out to the raised beds, the beehives, the family milk cow, the beef steer and the chickens for the honest maths on what actually saves money and what just pays in food. There's a national beekeeping statistic that will make anyone who lost colonies last winter feel a lot better, the three weights every beef buyer gets confused by, the small breed of cattle built for small acreage, and the crop Cal is ripping half of out because it's grinding him down. Whether you're planning a homestead, a hobby farm, a big backyard garden or you just want to know what food independence actually costs, this is the planning video to watch before spring. So how much of a year's food can a small farm really grow? And what's the one chore that ends more homesteads than any bad harvest? Watch to the end, because the last stop on the tour is the one that matters most.