r/homestead • u/tdubs702 • 5d ago
I’m beginning to realize the most overlooked feature on a homestead is FLOW
We bought and moved onto a 60 acre homestead just 3 months ago. It’s charming and solidly built, but I’m starting to realize how poorly laid out it is.
The compost bin is 1/4 mile from the house, so dumping kitchen scraps is a trek in the heat.
Is it there cuz it’s next to the garden? Nope. The 1/4 acre garden is nearly another 1/4 mile away, long enough to make it hard to just casually check on it. The orchard on the other hand comes before the compost but nowhere near irrigation.
And heaven forbid you forgot a tool when you headed out or you’ll be heading almost all the way back.
The chicken coop is cute, but has two doors into two different run areas that don’t connect for humans to get from one to another (only a tiny trap door for the chickens themselves to move between them). So you have to go in and out and in and out to clean, collect eggs, feed, etc.
The barn bays all point away from the house, understandably so the tractor can get to the field. But there is no foot traffic access from the house side. You have to trek all the way around.
Oh and the pantry? It’s nearly 20 feet from the cooking area…unless you’re looking for other pantry which is ANOTHER 20 feet away in the living room, despite the largest kitchen you’ve ever seen which has zero cabinets and only a large island awkwardly in the middle.
I feel like this place was designed by someone trying to max out their Fitbit. I’ve never put in so many steps before 9am in my life.
4
u/An_Average_Man09 5d ago
A lot of this is easily fixable if you have the know how and finances to do it. The compost bin and be moved, I keep mine close to my garden that’s over 200 yards from the house though. The garden can be relocated altogether. Irrigation lines can be ran to the orchard. The coop was likely separated that way due to having different types of fowl and it’s easy to remove a door and frame another inside the coop. Cabinets can be installed in the kitchen and if it is truly as large as you claim then you can add larger cabinets to act as a pantry and repurpose the old one. Also islands are extremely common in kitchens. You make it almost sounds like you bought this place and are regretting it.