Backwoods Mag. (Alternative Housing - Do-it-Yourself)

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I love countryside mag!! I came across another one that is real good to. It is Backwoods mag. I have gone to there web page but finly found the mag and they have a artical in the one I just bought telling how a couple in there late 40s early 45s built there home for 10,000. yep and I really like the look of it. Having 9 acres and no house on it yet its got me really thinking about just what I could do out there and not get into debt doing it. That is a big one with me, staying debt free.

-- Teresa (c3anch@socket.net), November 17, 2001

Answers

Response to Backwoods Mag.

I just looked up the price per year on their website, and, wow, they are a fairly high priced magazine! Sounds like one I would like to get, but am not totally sure it would be worth the $$. What does any other subscriber think? Is it worth the cash? Thanks!

-- Joe (threearrs@hotmail.com), November 17, 2001.

Response to Backwoods Mag.

I built my own home out of native hardood. It 2 story 2400 sq ft for about twice that. My outside walls are 11 inches thick and all windows are triple pane. No noise and very easy to heat. All framed out of yellow poplur with Coffie Tree and Cataba wood work. It took me 1 1/2 years working on it on weekends, evenings and vacation time. Monitor's Note: This is the same guy who pretended to be a 14-year old boy asking if chickens could get pregnant through the neck area by a rooster. Thus, give the above the non-attention it deserves. Hey, 209.240.222.131, I can read your damn cookie.

-- Mel Kelly (melkelly@webtv.net), November 17, 2001.

Response to Backwoods Mag.

I get Backwoods Mag and like it but don't love it. It's far more radical than CS (which is by far my favorite). Some good articles plus I do like the food articles by Jackie Clay. Lots of info about guns which is not my thing. My suggestion is to continue checking out the articles on their website for a while and see if they continue with subjects you relate to a lot before investing in a subscription.

Wishing you enough.

-- Trevilians (aka Dianne in Mass) (Trevilians@mediaone.net), November 17, 2001.


Response to Backwoods Mag.

I like the magazine,, I used to get AMerican Survival Guide,, till it turned yuppie,, Backwoods is a very good substiute,, wish I would have found that before ASG (wich is belly up), guns and survival belong on the homestead,, so I think there should be articles about it

-- stan (sopal@net-port.com), November 17, 2001.

Response to Backwoods Mag.

I agree with the person who thought the politics were a bit too radical. It became even more so with the absorption of the American Survival Guide. To each his own but that just isn't my cup of tea. I didn't renew my subscription. I was really only interested in the homesteading articles related to building/gardening/frugal living/personal stories of how individuals homestead in their own way. I too liked Jackie Clay's articles. It was my understanding that they have the entire magazine online as an experiment so you could check it out first before deciding to spend money on a subscription.

-- (dshogren@uswest.net), November 17, 2001.


Response to Backwoods Mag.

check out THE BACKWOODSMAN by Charley Ritchie, out of westcliff colorado. i don't subscribe to it, i just buy it off the news stand

gene

-- gene ward (gward34847@aol.com), November 17, 2001.


Response to Backwoods Mag.

I go to there web page and that is what made me go find the mag. I am not into guns or the kind of living off the grid compleatly but I love the house that was built for 10,000. It was beautiful inside and gives you alot of good idea about saving money when doing it yourself.

-- Teresa (c3ranch@socket.net), November 17, 2001.

Response to Backwoods Mag.

Teresa, I have been subscribing to BWH for about five years now, and I also have the first six anthologies. These are probably the most read of any of my books. I consider BWH a valuable asset to any homesteaders library. I do not always agree with everything that Dave Duffy and John Silvera have to say, I do admit that they both have given me quite an education on the matter of US History and Politics. This is where the magazine differs from Country Side....of which I have been subscribing to for about six months.(As it too is a valuable asset). The article you have mentioned was a wonderful article. I liked the counter tops that they made out of tomato stakes! However, the house I am building was done cheaper than them. Meli (my wife), and I built our A-frame completely, from basement to ridgecap ourselves. We used the stone on our land for the basement. We got all our windows and doors for $12.00 and a local auction. We are now finishing up the electrical wiring and our total cost has only be about $4000.00! I think anyone, whom scrounges around for some of the materials and does all the construction themselves SHOULD be able to keep their house cost well under $10,000.00. We figure with the paneling and flooring left to do we will not exceed $6,000.00 tops! If you are in relatively good physical shape and you have an extremely understanding spouse, (as I do). You can not only build a nice home but, pay cash for the materials as you go. Making your home completely yours without any mortgage. Good Luck, Ernest

-- http://communities.msn.com/livingoffthelandintheozarks (espresso42@hotmail.com), November 17, 2001.

i sometimes get backwoods home mag. I never read it from cover to cover. i find most of the articals very boring. on the other hand i can't put down my countryside mag. I find that countryside has the info i need while backwoods home does not. i found backwoods home mag first and was thrilled that there was a magazine out there that had some of the info i was looking for but i was even more thrilled when i found countryside and found that it had almost all the info i was looking for.

-- george (bngcrview@aol.com), November 17, 2001.

It appears there's a mixup here. BackHome and Backwoods Home are two very separate and distinct magazines. BackHome, with its home in North Carolina, represents the loving struggle by ex-staffers to continue the ideas of John Shuttleworth as set forth in the original The Mother Earth News. Backwoods Home is the Oregon-based effort of Dave Duffy that began in his garage with a staff consiting of only he and his pre-teen daughter.

Vern M.

-- Vern M (modeland@runingriver.com), November 17, 2001.



Which backwoods magazine? There are three with similar sounding names? Backhome, Backwoods and backwoodsman? Each have there own distint outlooks.

Backhome, http://www.backhomemagazine.com/ is more like the old MEN magazine. Offering hints and tips on sustainable, self-reliant living

Backwoods, http://www.backwoodshome.com/ is more a self reliant magazine. Less polictal than the now defunt American Survial guide/Selfreliance magazine.

Backwoodsman, Are they still in business? There webside is now gone. This is/was a coonskin hat and living off the land type magazine.

A very nice companion I have found to Country side is Small farm today, http://www.smallfarmtoday.com/

-- Gary (gws@redbird.net), November 19, 2001.


Yea gene, you definitely read my mind.

The Backwoodsman is a really great magazine, definitely a world apart from the gun / hunting magazines only interested in selling equipment to the readers. They offer low tech living techniques, and offer some great advice, like Countryside, that is reader written articles. I love that magazine.

I also subscribe to Backwoods Home magazine. So far, I'm still on the fence. Love the political articles by Silveira ('The next dictatorship', available on their website to be read for free), but still . . . its not Countryside.

Being a hunter and gun owner, I am not put off by the Libertarian approach by the writers at Backwoods Home; I find it refreshing to see other opinions on politics. Both magazines recognize each other as greats in their fields. I guess it is just another perspective on living simply. It just seems to me sometimes that Backwoods relys more on 'THINGS', rather then ATTITUDE. Just my opinion

-- j.r. guerra (jrguerra@boultinghousesimpson.com), November 19, 2001.


I too LOVE Countryside Magazine. I just recently found this magazine (approximately 8 months or so ago) and devour each issue as soon as it comes.

I also have a subscription to MEN (Mother Earth News) and the only reason I still have this subscription is that I paid for several years at one time (back when it was still a decent mag) and have since become disillusioned with the yuppy attitude, articles and slick advertising I see in it now.

I liked the Old MEN and will definitely be checking our the Back Home Magazine website . . . thanks all!!!

-- wolfie (wolfiequinn@hotmail.com), December 20, 2001.


Yes, The Backwoodsman is still in print. I see it around here more often than Countryside, which I don't understand. I like it well enough. Being a girl, I'm not into the gunpowder and such stuff in there, but I really love the little articles they've had on constructing cheap cabins and permanent shelters, and the series they had awhile back on building a backwoods woodstove. I pick it up at the store, so I can skip the issues I don't like. They have a new web address now, backwoodsmanmag.com

Backwoods Home is neat, have a lot of good articles. I prefer Countryside a lot more though. They allow longer articles that give really detailed how-to instructions. I just think it's better, because the each article is a subscriber trying to teach or help other subscribers. The Backwoods Home articles tend to be too vague for me. They are definitely a libertarian magazine, though. I'm pretty conservative so I like a lot about what they say, especially about guns, but there's a lot of editorializing, and once they had a series about evolution, etc. You either have to overlook that, or not get the magazine. So far, I prefer to buy off the shelf.

Back Home Magazine is good, but seems to be getting more boring lately. I'm not sure what it is.

American Survival Guide seemed decent when I first started reading it. The last year or two was junk, though. It was nothing but advertisements for its advertisers. They would "test" a new product, and it got nothing but raves. They never critiqued anything. It was nothing but a catalog of expensive "survival" toys I could never afford. Too bad, I'd love to see a real survival magazine take its place.

Countryside, of course, rules! It's one of the cheaper magazines, but has so much more in every issue. I've gotten more valuable info from one issue of Countryside than a year's worth of any other magazine.

-- Sarah Smith (anonymous@excite.com), February 16, 2002.


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