Joe, Author at SelfSufficientPath

Car Starting Hard After Fuel Fill Up / 5-Minute Fix

January 23, 2022 Joe DIY, Tools, Uncategorized Leave a comment

If your vehicle is starting hard, sounds like it’s flooded, or just won’t run after filling up, chances are there’s a quick, easy fix. It will take only two minutes to diagnose the problem, and only five minutes, one tool, and less than $30.00 to repair. If you car was manufactured in the last twenty years or so, the problem could be your evaporative purge valve. The evaporative purge valve (or just purge valve) is part of your vehicle’s evaporative emissions systems. If the valve fails and sticks open, it can cause some serious, but easily fixed problems. TOOLS NEEDED 10mm socket, ratchet, and extensionsmall scrap of paper TIME TO COMPLETE < 5 minutes COST: About $30(as of Jan 2022)

Making Corn Shock Decorations

October 4, 2021 Joe Gardening, Harvest, SSP YouTube Channel (videos), Uncategorized Leave a comment

It’s that time of year again. Time to get the homestead spruced up for Fall get togethers, for Halloween, and for the family visits for Thanksgiving. With just a few corn stalks, a tee post, and about ten minutes of work, you can put together these corn shock decorations. Add a few pumpkins and other seasonal ornaments and you’ve got the perfect holiday decoration. Good luck, and happy Fall!

Extracting honey, without an extractor

September 22, 2020 Joe beekeeping, Harvest, honey Leave a comment

Extracting honey without an extractor using the crush and strain method.

The Chicks Have Arrived!

July 3, 2019 Joe SSP YouTube Channel Leave a comment

Raising a laying flock was something we’ve wanted for a long time. Naturally, it was one of the first enterprises we wanted to start on our new homestead. Well, we’ve started. The chicks arrived today, and we’re ready to go. We’re putting together a mixed flock of Buff Orpington, Speckled Sussex, Dominques, White Cochin, Blue Orpington and Easter Egger chickens. We had them shipped from the hatchery, and today they arrived via the U.S. Mail (yes, you can get mail order chickens). Today we’ll introduce you to our chicks, get them into the brooder, show you we’ve got our brooder set up, and show the care required to get your poultry flock started right (or at least how we’re doing

Setting Up the Bee Yard (Apiary)

June 5, 2019 Joe SSP YouTube Channel, Uncategorized Leave a comment

Today we’re setting up the bee yard (apiary). Okay, apiary might be a bit of an overstatement, given that we’re putting one nuc into one hive. But this is the start of a bigger effort for us. We hope for beekeeping, and bee-related products, to be a key element in our homestead’s productivity. I’ll start by saying that I over-engineered our apiary (big surprise). What I’ve done here is not in any way necessary to get good results with your bees. But I really wanted this to be an effective, efficient, low-maintenance place to put my first four or five hives. And I think I’ve succeeded. Doing the Work to Establish Our Hive I started by marking out the boundaries

Cutting Firewood in the Wild and Wonderful

May 6, 2019 Joe SSP YouTube Channel Leave a comment

A couple of my buddies have been extremely helpful as we moved into our new home. Many hands make light work. And I can tell you from experience, without those hands we’d have been in real trouble moving my machinery. One of my buddies has a cabin down in north central West Virginia (Wild & Wonderful), my home state. It’s right on the river, and it’s drop dead gorgeous. We, most frequently I, visit that cabin several times a year. So when he called me to ask for help clearing some downed trees and putting up firewood for the year, well, I don’t need a lot of convincing to go run a chainsaw in one of my favorite places on

The Truth about homesteading

April 18, 2019 Joe SSP YouTube Channel Leave a comment

Homesteading is hot right now. There’s no denying it. YouTube, Facebook, Instagram, and all if their social media brethren are flooded with the glamour that is homesteading. RIght? Online homesteaders are always smiling, wearing clean clothes, and undertaking smooth projects that always turn out right. Oh, and the projects are always cool, interesting, and life changing. Right? C’mon! That’s all good and well. But it’s not reality. Homesteading is exhausting. It’s often dirty work. And believe me when I tell you things don’t always go right. In today’s video we’ll give you a glimpse in a typical (hahahahahahaaaa!) day of real homesteading. Bringing in some firewood rounds from the field to the splitting area, installing a range hood in the

The Best Way to Cut Firewood to Length

March 18, 2019 Joe SSP YouTube Channel Leave a comment

Reviewing the Mingo Ultimate Firewood Marker As much as I love cutting firewood, I hate measuring and marking firewood. Yet, I’m obsessed about a neat, orderly stack of firewood. Isn’t it ironic? Don’t ya think? So I started searching for the easiest, quickest, most efficient way to mark firewood. My goal was to put away my measuring tape and chalk and get on with the cutting. What I found was the Mingo Ultimate Firewood Marker. This plastic tool uses a can of inverted, landscape paint to accurately mark your cut points at 14″, 16″, 18″, and 20″-24″. It really is handy. Here’s the scoop: PROS: Fast Accurate Works in snowy / wet conditions No measuring tape CONS: A little pricey

We’re Back!!!

March 18, 2019 Joe SSP YouTube Channel Leave a comment

We’ve been getting a lot of questions lately. “Are you quitting Self Sufficient Path?” “Is your channel closing?” “Why have you stopped posting?” Fact is, we haven’t stopped. In fact, we’re doubling down. We’ve spent the last four months moving from our suburban home of twenty years in the western suburbs of Pittsburgh, to a 22 acre farmstead in the far southwest corner of Pennsylvania. It’s only about sixty miles as the crow flies. But it may as well be on the other side of the world. What this means for the channel is that you’ll be getting more content more often. We’ve only been here for about four months, and we’re already into wiring our shop, taking care of

It’s Almost Time

September 1, 2018 Joe SSP YouTube Channel Leave a comment

It’s almost time, and I couldn’t be more excited. Pennsylvania’s archery season is less than a month away. And, we have the most deer, the most bucks, and the biggest bucks of any year I can remember. Most years, if I’m lucky, I have one three year old eight point to target. This year I have at least three legal bucks on the property, and two that could qualify as the biggest buck I’ve taken on this property. We’ve really upped our buck-to-doe ratio, and even have a great bullpen for next year. If it sound like I’m excited, you’re right. The only downside is that I’m still recovering from shoulder surgery a couple of months ago, and I’m just