SONTA: You guys, we're going to be looking for duck eggs.
We'll be checking our wood duck nests and
we're going to be looking for punk, okay?
To keep the bugs away.
CHEVIE: With this high water, it just gives us access to
so much more area to be able to forage.
But it's going to go away.
We want to capitalize on this high water while it's here.
SONTA: Wow.
It's amazing we're able to cross right over this.
CHEVIE: Can't let a flood or some other natural disaster set you back.
(theme music playing).
SONTA: All right kids, I see the bird box.
CHEVIE: Big box on the water.
Whenever I come to them, I always knock on them first.
SYDNEY: To make sure there's no squirrels gonna eat your face off.
CHEVIE: The squirrels or weasels, or marten,
or anything like that,
that could bite your hand when you stick your hand in there.
No, no eggs in this one.
Let's go check the next one.
This time of year, right now, we're not really hunting
a whole bunch because everything's nesting,
but it's the time for we're gathering or foraging.
SONTA: I'm ready for some fresh eggs.
(knocking)
SYDNEY: There's a little piece of it in there.
CHEVIE: Nothing in this one.
Not even any grass or anything.
Oh, there's a feather right there, though.
Okay, ready?
SYDNEY: Yes.
SONTA: Wow. Good job.
CHEVIE: Can you reach in there?
SONTA: Anything?
SYDNEY: Broken eggs. SONTA: Broken eggs? Let's see.
CHEVIE: It smells old?
SONTA: Yeah, that might be last years.
EMERY: Look, ducks!
SONTA: They're like, why are you bothering our nest?
Watch your heads.
CHEVIE: Okay, knock on it Emery.
SYDNEY: No, no, this way. No, no run away.
CHEVIE: Okay. Go ahead and reach in there Emery.
Is there eggs in there?
EMERY: Yeah. SYDNEY: Oh!
CHEVIE: Eggs! Wow! EMERY: Here you go daddy.
CHEVIE: How many are in there though,
let me know how many are in there.
EMERY: Daddy. RYDER: There's only one more.
CHEVIE: There's only one more? RYDER: Yeah.
CHEVIE: So, there's only three in here to begin with.
Yeah, we might just want to leave them all.
This is a very new nest maybe.
Let them lay more because they could lay lots of eggs in these boxes,
and you don't want to scare them and pull all their eggs out
and have them go to another house.
RYDER: How many eggs does it have to have?
CHEVIE: So like at least like six or something, okay?
RYDER: Okay.
CHEVIE: Let's go to the next spot.
Maybe we're getting closer though, all right?
We have some more options to check.
KALEB: Bees are a fantastic way to harvest more resources from the land.
They're farmed in the lower 48 and shipped up here.
The most efficient way for me to get my bees is to just
fly out and bring it home.
Now that we've had those bees, we need to get them out of
the container and into their hive as quickly as possible.
KALEB: We need a good place to stick all of our beehives.
BRITTANY: I think we want somewhere high, like the shop.
KALEB: Like, yeah, we wanted up high where no bears can get to it.
In order to put a platform up there,
we have to put holes in the roof.
BRITTANY: Yeah.
KALEB: And we don't want the roof to leak.
BRITTANY: Yeah.
KALEB: I don't think that's a very good option unfortunately.
BRITTANY: Mmm.
Well, the next highest thing would be the Conex.
KALEB: Yeah, the Conex would be good and
I think bears will stay off of that.
Last year we had four hives.
This year I think we're getting nine and the biggest concern
I have is bears getting into my bees.
Bear would probably come over here and like he'd be,
uh, that doesn't work.
Maybe there's something over here.
He can grab, and maybe he can, do this.
You never know.
He might maybe get up here, but then it's like, now what?
(laughing)
I think this will be a good solution.
We'll put the bees up there.
BRITTANY: Okay.
KALEB: The problem is they have a really wobbly, uh, roof,
so we need to build some sort of platform across the top.
BRITTANY: Okay.
KALEB: Let's start making this happen.
Keeping bees is one more step in
the process of independence out here.
There's an ugly three-sided log that's not,
wasn't usable for the generator shed.
But it'll be great for the bees.
BRITTANY: Raising our own bees is another way of being able to
live off the land.
By having the bees here, they're going to create honey for us,
but they'll also help pollinate all around,
which helps our gardens, helps our trees.
Bees are amazing.
KALEB: There we go.
Log number one is done and loaded up and
ready to head over to the project.
Bees fascinate me.
They're such hard workers, which resonates to my soul
because as a resident of rural Alaska,
the work never stops.
There's always work to be done.
Honey is just this amazing golden liquid that pretty much
answers all of the problems in life.
JOHNNY: When you pull that trigger and drop an animal,
this is the time of year where having a plan with what to do
with that dead animal is super important.
And if you don't have a plan for the meat,
then you'll find yourself in trouble.
♪ ♪
JOHNNY: Kinda stretching this hide out a little bit,
'cause I'm about to cover this guy in salt.
The salt's gonna, kinda pause the rotting process.
It gets near 60 degrees.
Everything just wants to rot, everything wants to go bad,
everything wants to spoil.
So, I gotta kinda get at things quick.
Gotta get every little chunk covered in salt,
or it'll rot, and the hair falls off,
and it stinks, and once it starts rotting it's game over.
I can't use this thing anymore.
All right, cool so it's all salted.
Now, that's going to keep it from rotting.
Now, I can move on to the important thing,
which is the meat.
The wind's kind of not moving hard and I'm seeing these flies
and they're not able to get through the game bags.
But occasionally one is able to sneak in there and
then they lay little eggs, and then when they lay the eggs
they turn into larva and then they consume the meat and it's just,
it's all downhill from there.
I think I need to just kind of build a little smudge fire
right here, kinda keep flies off it.
Uh, bear meat is one of the most delicious meats.
One of my favorite things to hunt.
Uh, it's fantastic eating.
Okay.
It is crucial for me to have that food supply and
to get through the spring and summer.
So, I'm just going to cut this open and build a fire
right inside of this can.
That's how fast that stuff burns, man.
If I didn't have it in a can this whole place would be just ripping.
Look at that. That's what I want right there.
That big plumage of smoke and that's going to keep
the flies away from the meat.
Hell, it's keeping me away from it.
You know, you got to take care of the meat and
when you're off grid it's not that easy to do.
I don't have electric.
I don't have refrigerators and stuff like that.
One of the methods I like to use in the spring is canning.
Canning's a very practical solution.
If you do it right and I can preserve the meat
for a long period of time.
And before I can do any of the canning or the salting,
I need to process the meat.
Okay, so now I'm just going to break this down,
and this is the front leg, and,
and I like to just do it by muscle group.
I keep it pretty simple here.
Dad was a butcher by trade.
His brother had a butcher shop.
I believe their dad was a butcher and
then my dad's grandfather was a butcher.
It just must just be ingrained in my blood.
Look at that marbling in there, man.
It's just outstanding meat.
Oh, it smells good.
It's fresh.
All right, so all the pieces are cut up and the next thing to do
is just precook it all in the pressure cooker with the cans.
SAMANTHA: Getting off the farm with the kids
is really important for us.
There's so much to learn out there.
Hunting and gathering.
If you teach a kid to fish, you know,
they'll be able to feed themselves.
(rooster crows)
SAMANTHA: Gonna go fishing. AUTUMN: Going fishing!
(laughing)
NATHAN: Fishing season is upon us again,
and Samantha, the kids and I are going to head out to
a local creek and do some grayling fishing.
Ready to go?
SAMANTHA: I'm ready. ADRIEN: Yeah.
SAMANTHA: We'd like to get some fish in our diet.
Fish provides nutrients that we can't get from
our other animals quite as well.
So, it's the season for fishing.
It's time to get some variety going and we're going for it.
♪ ♪
This is a pretty spot.
NATHAN: Yeah.
It's important for the kids to, you know,
not just learn how to run the farm,
but also to get out to where it's fun and
exciting and new for them.
And so, it brings on a new challenge,
but also insights, learning, in that way.
SAMANTHA: This is like sand but you, yeah,
you'll just kinda sink in,
so I don't recommend playing right there.
I'm hopin' that, uh, the grayling run started and
its come up this way already,
'cause that would just be fantastic.
I haven't that grayling since last year so.
NATHAN: Yeah. If we're lucky, there will be grayling.
Okay, I think Autumn, I think this one's going to be yours.
AUTUMN: Can I see what hook? SAMANTHA: See what hook.
NATHAN: See? Is that a good one?
But be, hey, hey one thing, check your surroundings.
Make sure no one's right behind you when you're casting, okay?
Because you don't want to hook anybody.
Oh, here reel it in real quick, okay,
because we don't want to get snagged in these weeds here.
Good job Autumn. That was a good cast.
SAMANTHA: Dang, you're like a little professional fisher.
NATHAN: Well, if there's fish in there,
I think you're going to catch them.
Just like that, let it float a little bit and
then start reeling in, okay?
And just do it over, and over again, and hopefully
the fish will come along and think, hmm, delicious meal.
SAMANTHA: I caught a fish. NATHAN: Caught one?
ADRIEN: Don't forget, you're supposed to yell fish on.
NATHAN: All right.
(laughing)
SAMANTHA: Is that the first fish that we've caught all year?
NATHAN: I think so.
SAMANTHA: I accidentally caught a fish,
I was just trying to figure out where to cast for Autumn.
NATHAN: This is a pretty good size for a grayling.
SAMANTHA: That's not a bad grayling, I'm pretty,
I'm pretty stoked about that.
NATHAN: The water should keep it a little bit cold.
See how the water kind of hits up along the bank?
ADRIEN: Yup.
NATHAN: And just kinda slows down here and
it's really deep right there?
ADRIEN: Yeah.
NATHAN: Try to get a cast right in there because
I think this is about where mom caught it.
And that makes sense because it looks like perfect grayling habitat.
It feels great to kind of break in the coming year and
the coming fishing season.
Give us the fish fever, so we wanna get out and do
more fishing and catch more fish and put some more on the table.
SAMANTHA: You're pretty good at this.
NATHAN: I know the girls are... SAMANTHA: The girls are awesome.
NATHAN: Pro casters.
SAMANTHA: Adrien you're awesome too.
NATHAN: You're great at catching those trees.
ADRIEN: The biggest tree I've caught.
SAMANTHA: Oh, you really got stuck, didn't ya?
Ugh.
I'm just gonna do this.
NATHAN: It's pretty deep there.
SAMANTHA: It is pretty deep there.
But if I just.
NATHAN: Just pull, I think it's gonna come...
SAMANTHA: Got it!
My knees are cold.
(laughing)
ADRIEN: Sorry!
SAMANTHA: Let it be known that I love you, very much!
KALEB: Growing up out here I've learned to pre plan projects
before I ever cut a single piece of wood.
And so far, things are going great.
And hopefully I'm not getting hit with huge,
unexpected surprises.
KALEB: I'm going to try handing these up to Brittany.
See if we can do this without anybody getting hurt.
Go put this one on the other side.
Just stick it with the round over facing out and line it up
right to the very edge of that big block up there.
BRITTANY: Okay.
KALEB: I really like it when Brittany helps me with these projects.
Oh, this one here probably weighs like 80,
60 to 80 pounds maybe.
It's green so it's heavy.
It takes the jobs that are difficult to do by myself
and just makes everything easier.
Last one!
(grunting)
It's also the heaviest!
Good thing you're all buffed up from carrying the other five up.
Now, I can start squaring and handing you the two by sixes.
All right, here you go.
BRITTANY: I am not a great builder.
I'm still learning how to do very basic things.
There's a little bit of stress there, but for the most part,
eventually I get over myself and learn.
All righty, first one down, 500 to go.
Careful.
(drilling)
That board ain't going nowhere.
KALEB: Yeah, this worked out better than I thought.
BRITTANY: Stepping up here, you're like,
you're not wobbling.
Wow.
KALEB: Yup. Next thing to do is get our deck on and this will be done.
BRITTANY: I don't like ladders.
Watch out. Dad's got it.
ELOVIE: Could I screw one on?
KALEB: Yeah. ELOVIE: Yeah.
Oh yeah, that's far.
KALEB: Something that instills pride into me,
knowing that my children are taking an interest in
the projects that we are doing around our homestead and
it's instilling a self-reliant, I can do this attitude.
BRITTANY: Ellie, come on.
Getting our little pile all cleaned up.
KALEB: Alrighty, guys, this is all done.
BRITTANY: Are we done? KALEB: Toss my screws here.
BRITTANY: Woo-hoo. KALEB: So cool.
This is good.
BRITTANY: Look at that! KALEB: It is very, very strong.
(dog barking)
BRITTANY: We're coming down, Piper.
CHEVIE: Water is super swift here.
So, if a kid or something fell in the river,
it's harder to retrieve them.
This is not the place to fall in the river.
SONTA: We're gonna go check out where your great grandpa
had a wood duck nest.
When I was a little girl, you guys age,
I went back there with your great grandpa,
and he showed me a wood duck nest and
every spring he'd go and check that same nest.
I really wanted you guys just to get an idea of
where it is in the woods.
Yeah, I think I remember this being the spot Chev,
right in here.
Looks like a heavy, dense area of cottonwood trees.
Watch out guys.
Let's go check it out guys.
'Cause I haven't been back here in 30 years.
We'll have to see if that nest still exists.
There's a hole right there, Chev, in that tree.
CHEVIE: Definitely the right height, but maybe,
I don't know, if a wood duck could fit in there.
That looks a little small.
SONTA: It's something else, maybe a woodpecker or something.
CHEVIE: Maybe, though.
SONTA: But that's what it would look like, but bigger.
But it's definitely interesting because, like,
the Cottonwood tree is hollow, you know?
And so, they put their eggs down inside.
You guys be looking on, you know,
one side of the Cottonwood and then when you're walking Emery,
look on the other side of the cottonwood tree too.
But you see they're all out there,
those birds are out there swimming around because
they have nests in these woods.
So, we just gotta find them.
Watch how their bark comes off.
It comes off in big, long strips.
Careful Sydney, that that's going to break.
CHEVIE: Like, there's gotta be a nest in here somewhere.
SONTA: Exactly.
CHEVIE: See right here there's a hole that goes down.
That's exactly what they do, they climb inside that hole.
SONTA: 'Cause it's hollow inside,
they just go in and lay their eggs.
SYDNEY: (inaudible) rock.
SONTA: It's kind of the easy way to do it.
RYDER: Oh jeez. Mom, watch out mom.
SONTA: I wonder if this is the tree.
This is where they naturally want to lay their eggs.
SYDNEY: You have to go further up.
EMERY: One, two.
(cracking)
RYDER: Oh, ha, ha, ha. CHEVIE: I told you.
SONTA: Ryder are you okay? RYDER: Yeah.
(laughing)
CHEVIE: If that top thing hit you in the head or
something it could hurt you bad.
RYDER: We wanted that to happen dad.
CHEVIE: I loved to breakdown Cottonwood trees
when I was your age too.
I, totally, I totally know where you guys are coming from.
EMERY: You got hit in the head?
CHEVIE: Yeah, I, I got hit in the head and I lived.
So, if somebody yells heads up or you hear something,
you put your arms over your head like this and
it might hurt your arms really bad,
but you always want to protect your head and your neck, okay?
SYDNEY: Heads up means heads down.
CHEVIE: Were heads up means heads down.
SYDNEY: Yeah.
CHEVIE: All right, let's get in the boat before you guys do
anything else crazy.
SONTA: All right. CHEVIE: Get, get in the boat.
SONTA: We didn't see or find the wood duck nest that
my grandpa had originally showed us and even though
we didn't see anything it's just special to be out here for sure.
And like, I'm not that emotional of a person,
but I definitely this pulls at my heartstrings just being back
in these woods where my grandpa brought us.
KALEB: Something that instills pride into me is knowing that my
children are taking an interest in the projects that we're doing
around our homestead and really having fun doing it.
KALEB: Oh man, do you hear that sound?
Sounds like 100,000 bees trying to escape.
BRITTANY: No kidding.
KALEB: Look at these little guys.
BRITTANY: Let me out. Let me out.
KALEB: I think we should get all the bases and lids up
to the top of the Conex, get that all laid out to
figure out where we want to put stuff.
Then we'll start getting all the bees up.
We'll separate all these buses because they're,
they're attached right here.
BRITTANY: Okay.
KALEB: And we'll set one with each.
And once we have everything completely ready to go,
then we'll put our suits on and we'll start dumping
these bees into the boxes.
BRITTANY: Sounds like a plan.
Bees are a huge part of the world.
KALEB: Need a forklift here.
BRITTANY: Without bees, there are so many things
that don't get pollinated.
I think raising bees will just benefit our community.
It'll make the whole area as a whole better.
Good job!
All four of us will feel very accomplished at how much we work
together and what we're able to harvest.
KALEB: Uh, the doorways on these hives always have to face south,
that way the early morning sun hits these hives,
and gets the bees stirred up,
and ready to work earlier in the morning.
Because the longer the bees work,
the more honey that will be made by the end of summer.
You just keep building the colony up until
everything's full of honey and there's lots of bees.
As much as 80,000 per hive,
and you just let them do their thing.
This one, lots of honey.
This side's empty, so as soon as the Queen's out,
she can start laying.
But we've also bought used hives that already have
all of the comb built up inside.
We have frames that are full of honey and pollen,
this entire frame.
ELOVIE: Wow.
KALEB: It's all really good food for the bees.
ELOVIE: Yes.
KALEB: All right. BRITTANY: All right.
KALEB: These are all ready to go.
The lids are all laid out.
Let's get these bees up here and start dumping them in.
Start from that side and work our way that way.
BRITTANY: Great.
KALEB: Bees will be happy as can be in here.
ELOVIE: Buzz.
JOHNNY: I live off grid.
I don't have a refrigerator,
but what I do have,
is a little bit of knowledge and I have to apply that knowledge
to preserve the meat otherwise it will go bad
and that's my respect to the animal.
There is an element of kind of racing the clock
and trying to work as efficient as possible because I just have
meat hung up outside, sun beating down on it.
Should be okay for a certain amount of time,
but once you start processing the meat,
you kind of just don't have the option to stop.
So, I need to just have these pieces of meat cut up into
sizable pieces that are going to fit in these jars.
Caning's an awesome method to preserve meat.
And because there's so much moisture content in meat.
You don't need to add any water and it goes right into the canner.
Java is that where you're going to help out or where do you,
where do you come in to help?
Let's go process these.
And it's a very delicate process to kind of just get everything
right so you don't spoil and waste the meat or
even worse, get sick.
Laid up in my cabin from a botulism or salmonella or
anything like that.
Who would know?
This sucker's full.
Sealed nice and tight.
I gotta keep it at about 11 pounds, no more than
15 pounds per square inch.
And if I go over, I risk breakage,
which is just a waste of time, waste of meat.
I've tried to do it over fire before and
it just doesn't work well because it's hard to keep it at
that 11 pounds per square inch over a fire,
so I have to uses this propane heater here.
(hissing)
Now I just need to let it go for 100 minutes and
it doesn't end until the meat's all preserved.
Yeah, I wear gloves when I do this because bear meat has
a parasite known as trichinosis.
And as long as you cook it properly,
handle it properly, you won't get it.
But bear meat's still wild.
You can't control what these bears eat so you still get trichinosis.
That's why I don't eat it rare or raw.
That's why I don't make jerky out of it.
Everything's thriving out here.
All the animals are thriving, including parasites.
That's pretty normal.
That's kind of a big gust of wind,
gonna make sure my flames going.
No, my flames out.
Man!
JOHNNY: That could have been bad.
It's hard to multitask, but I also have meat to process that's
just sitting in the sun, you know,
so it doesn't stop, man.
I remember when I first was off grid.
It was kind of like in the fall going into winter,
so it was really easy as far as preservation food goes,
I just had to keep things freezing and that was pretty straightforward.
And then spring rolled around and I just remember watching
my food kind of wilt and spoil 'cause every animal
kind of preserves differently.
Every cut of meat it depends the fat content,
the water content.
So it's hard to just have like one
hard, fast rule for every piece of meat or every animal.
So this is off.
All right, we're at zero.
Kind of open it away from you like that,
because steam will, man, that stuff will burn you real good.
Look at that. They're still boiling.
God, it looks great.
All that moisture in there and that's why you don't have to
add water 'cause so much moisture and bear meat.
This all looks so good.
Everything turned out really nicely.
That's why you gotta take your time and kind of do it right.
Yeah, that popping, that's the lid sealing down.
(tapping)
You want that high pitch sound.
(tapping)
It's just very dead dull sounding.
Versus...
this one might not be sealed properly.
I'll make sure that that one's eaten first.
Other than that, man, that's pretty good.
Pack all those in there and only have one of them
that is borderline good.
So, what do I need to do is just start the next batch.
Keep butchering legs, keep fillin jars.
It's just a very fluid program.
I don't stop until everything's safe and
preserved from nose to tail.
NATHAN: I think it's important to get the kids out
there fishing with us that way they kind of learn how to do it,
learn how to select the right lures,
learn how to fish in different waters.
It's important to be able to provide for yourself,
and at the end of the day, know you can count on yourself.
SAMANTHA: I think the girls and I are gonna go wander off
and maybe forage a little and see what plants
we can find for dinner.
NATHAN: Yeah.
'Cause if we only catch that one,
then we're gonna need something else to go with it.
SAMANTHA: I'd say so.
NATHAN: Guess Adrian and I'll stay here and try to add
to the one grayling we got, hopefully catch another.
SAMANTHA: You ready?
NATHAN: Pick some good food for dinner, okay?
SAMANTHA: We'll try.
All right, let's go.
AISLYN: Catch us some more fish.
SAMANTHA: Looks like there's a lot of different plant life that
we haven't seen near our farm.
I'm thinking that this would be a perfect opportunity to go see
what we can find, if there's any new plants and
what we can do with it.
AISLYN: I know what that plant is, it's, um, fireweed.
SAMANTHA: That's right.
This is a fireweed shoot.
I don't know if we want the bigger ones,
because they're kind of tough.
AISLYN: We want it to write it down.
SAMANTHA: Usually see, we like to collect the little ones when
they're just kind of fresh and they're still red like this.
You see like this one because they're nice and tender
and they don't like when they're bigger
like this they're really kind of tough.
And it's harder to eat them, and so we like to collect them
when they're like this.
So let's keep looking for some other areas with fireweed shoots.
When I was a kid, some of my best childhood memories were
doing something with my parents.
I was always camping or swimming.
Nature teaches you so much and it's something
I definitely want to share with my children.
NATHAN: You can actually let a little bit of slack here if
you hold it and it gives you a little bit more control,
like when your lure hits the water.
If you need to adjust it just slightly,
you can kind of pull it towards you a bit,
or you can let loose a little bit more and
it kind of helps you guide it.
If you wanna give this a shot, you can.
Just try not to get it tangled.
SAMANTHA: I love plants and I want to give that to my children as well.
I want them to be able to identify poisonous plants or
medicinal plants or edible plants.
I want them to know the difference between food and
medicine and things that you can't eat or touch or
you don't wanna get on your skin.
This stuff right here, this is wild rhubarb.
This is an edible plant.
You cannot eat the leaves, though.
The leaves are absolutely toxic, but the stems you can take,
the stems, cut the leaves off,
and then you have to cook the stems really good.
AUTUMN: What happens if you eat the leaves?
SAMANTHA: You'll get really, really sick.
We definitely wanna just be kind of mindful and careful.
Don't just go out and eat wild plants ever
without talking to me first, okay?
NATHAN: Oh. We got one.
NATHAN: Got one little guy, a little grayling.
Might be little, but I bet you that will feed Aislyn.
Maybe Aislyn and Autumn.
Hey.
SAMANTHA: Hey. You got another one.
NATHAN: Yeah. I got a small grayling.
SAMANTHA: Nice.
NATHAN: If we could get one or two more, that'd be awesome.
SAMANTHA: Hello, Hungry Fish.
Come eat our hooks.
(laughs).
NATHAN: Almost had a decent sized one.
SAMANTHA: Oh. Try it again, do it again.
NATHAN: Yeah.
Got one.
SAMANTHA: It's a good day.
Look at you go. Nice.
NATHAN: Geez, that fish is almost as big as you, Aislyn.
SAMANTHA: We'll have a decent meal.
JOHNNY: Everything that I'm doing now is coming from
the land, my food, the source cooking this food,
the greens, vegetation, what grows together goes together.
(buzzing)
JOHNNY: Yeah, that's a lot of pressure.
(hissing)
Getting a little too high, just waiting for this to cool down.
And once it gets to zero, I can pop that lid off,
get these cans out, and um, that's the second round, done.
And canning is complete.
And now I'm gonna cut these shanks up into discs,
crosscut across the bone, and I'm cooking 'em in the oven.
Shanks are a little harder to preserve because
there's just a lot going on with them.
Fat, sinew, tissue, bone, susceptibility to rot.
So, this isn't meat that I wanna salt.
It's not meat that I want to can,
this is meat that I just want to eat right away.
So, I call it peasant food.
And to me, peasant food is the best.
It's the food that's, most people would consider
it lower grade, lower quality.
It's tougher, more grit, and I would say nutritious as well,
because there's so much sinew,
and tissue cartilage and all that stuff is good.
You need to have that for your own kind of growth and
development of your own body.
This is my great-grandfather's bone saw.
Pretty cool to be using right now.
I never met him, but I do have a handful of his tools and,
and I really love using them.
Java, you gonna have a good dinner with me tonight or what?
It's gonna be a good dinner, huh?
So that's one shank there.
Done.
Just gonna pop him into this pot.
'Cause I gotta go start the fire in the oven and
get that thing ripping hot.
So these can cook nice and good.
Gotta send this sucker in there.
All right, Java.
Those shanks are cooking.
What do you say we do a little foraging, huh?
Go find some plants to eat since we only get a few months of doing that.
You wanna go find some?
Let's go lazy bones.
Come on.
Fireweed here.
That's a young tender leaves.
And, uh, know, they're good to eat.
They're healthy, they're tender.
And they call them fireweed because usually when there's
a fire, the first thing to grow is fireweed.
Just keep on foraging Java girl.
It's early spring, so you know,
there's just a lot of different things you can walk around and pick and eat.
I take advantage of that when I can because I don't always have
greens to pick and forage on so.
Here's some good dandelion greens.
Let's find some more.
CHEVIE: About this time of year,
the bugs are gonna start coming out.
Mosquitoes in your eyes, mosquitoes in your nose,
mosquitoes everywhere.
And the only way to really keep 'em down is by having a smudge.
And the best smudge is punk.
SONTA: Ooh, easy.
We haven't found any duck egg.
So for now we're gonna be looking for some punk.
This fungus that grows on birch trees,
and we use that for mosquito dope to get the bugs away,
just look around and grab what we need.
We're going to our own local store here.
This is a one stop shop.
Hopefully.
So kiddos, you're gonna be looking around for that punk,
and some of it you can get with your hands,
but some you might need like a stick to bam it with.
SYDNEY: What about an axe?
SONTA: Let mommy and daddy carry the axe in the woods.
Okay girls.
SYDNEY: Ooh, I see some. SONTA: Check out this one.
There's a couple on this one.
We might need the back of the axe for this one though.
You don't go at it like this, otherwise you're gonna break
that in half and it's dangerous swinging an axe like that,
so you just tap the top.
Good job.
RYDER: I'll hold this up when you fill it up, okay Emery.
EMERY: Okay. SONTA: Good teamwork.
Gonna make a basket. Swish.
Fill it up.
CHEVIE: Nice one.
I think behind you, there's a couple small ones too, buddy.
RYDER: I know.
CHEVIE: In the dark, thick areas the wood is where the fungus grows.
So we're in the right spot.
Punk's down low.
Big punk. Low punk.
High punk. There's punk everywhere.
SONTA: There we go.
Good. Good. There's a lot more.
I see one up there. Maybe dad could get with a pole.
We're a family of six, but we've put in the work to get out here.
The payoffs are huge.
The payoffs are in moments like this,
so it's not only just looking for punk.
Woo. Good job daddy.
But it's looking for those family times that...
Ah, one more!
Really bring us together that are the really big payoffs.
CHEVIE: We found the motherload tree over here.
SONTA: Are we doing like a boys against girls thing?
EMERY: No. SONTA: Wow.
I think we got the big one over here, guys.
We're gonna have to compare our sizes.
CHEVIE: I think ours is bigger.
Holy smokes Ryder.
SONTA: Woo. CHEVIE: Whoa.
SYDNEY: That's bigger. Bigger, bigger.
SONTA: This is like deeper.
Good job.
We're back out on the Innoko River and
we have another bird box that we wanna get a chance to look at,
and we're hoping that this one has some eggs.
CHEVIE: No eggs yet. SONTA: No eggs yet.
CHEVIE: I haven't been able to find a good nest.
SONTA: It's tipped over a little bit.
No self-respecting bird will try to go in that nest.
CHEVIE: Natural leaner.
SONTA: Maybe they like those natural leaning trees, huh?
RYDER: There's feathers. SONTA: Oh, that's a good sign.
CHEVIE: Might have to help you.
RYDER: There's a bunch of feathers!
SONTA: Careful Ryder, standing right there.
RYDER: Oh, there's eggs. SONTA: Oh, for real?
SONTA: No.
RYDER: There's so much more in there.
EMERY: Oh, daddy, daddy, I want to get some.
SONTA: Wow. EMERY: One and two.
RYDER: But at least we got eggs. SONTA: Yeah.
CHEVIE: Those are big eggs. SONTA: They're big eggs.
They're so pretty. Yeah.
They keep coming in there, laying eggs.
They lay lots of eggs.
EMERY: It's like Easter.
SONTA: I was gonna ask you if it felt like Easter.
CHEVIE: Don't pull on it too hard, Sydney.
You'll break that box right off.
It's so heavy.
SONTA: How many more are in there?
Is that all she wrote?
SYDNEY: Now there's four.
CHEVIE: So there's four in there.
How many do we have, Emery?
SYDNEY: 14. EMERY: 14.
CHEVIE: We have 14 eggs. EMERY: And then 15, 16.
CHEVIE: 15.
So you wanna get two more out there and
leave only two in there?
SYDNEY: Yeah. EMERY: Yes.
CHEVIE: Okay. Let's just pull one out because then we'll have 15.
I think 15's a good number 'cause you guys are kind of
like three little eggs right here.
EMERY: Okay. Got it. SONTA: Wow.
I'm so glad that the last one that we went to had eggs in it.
EMERY: Now we have 15. SONTA: Good job kids.
CHEVIE: There's nothing like seeing how fresh those eggs are
and the color of those eggs.
These are some organic foraged, Innoko River eggs.
You just can't get much better than that.
KALEB: Let's get these bees in the hives.
In you go to your new home.
They are ready to be freed.
BRITTANY: Four pounds worth of bees, anywhere from
13,000 to 15,000 bees.
KALEB: Keeping bees is really useful for the kids.
Wow, they've got a lot of comb in this one.
They get to learn about being consistent and hard work.
They just go crazy.
Look at that wax down there.
ELOVIE: Where? KALEB: See the bottom?
ELOVIE: Oh yeah, that's nice.
KALEB: And they get to learn about being patient and
waiting to reap a reward at the end of the season.
Oh yeah, bees are coming out. Now I gotta...
ELOVIE: Hi.
BRITTANY: Carefully get the queen.
KALEB: I could not have asked for a better hiving experience.
There's the queen cage.
She's ready to go to work too.
ELOVIE: They are everywhere. BRITTANY: Oh yeah.
They're about to be even more everywhere.
KALEB: And by the end of the season,
we're gonna have amazing honey.
Well bees work hard, make us lots of honey.
Time to do the next one.
JOHNNY: Ooh-hoo-hoo-hoo.
Just pulled the bone right out.
Oh yeah, it's still bubbling,
deliciousness, man.
This is what it's all been about right here, man.
Look at this.
Fresh greens, fresh meat.
It's a fresh start at, uh, my spring camp.
It's what it is.
Spend a couple months here and then go back up north.
Ooh-wee.
The meat's really good.
A lot of good flavor.
The greens are good, but a lot of what I'm tasting is just
the hard work, sweat equity,
and that's what I'm tasting, man.
And that's what makes this lifestyle so rewarding.
It's like this food seasoned with blood, sweat, tears.
I've never gone into a grocery store,
bought some off the shelf and felt as good as I do on
something I worked so hard on.
You have a choice, do you work for money?
Trade that money for food.
Or just go out and get your own?
ADRIEN: Time to cook and eat fish.
NATHAN: Yeah. Ready to eat our harvest?
SAMANTHA: Are you guys excited to eat some grayling?
ADRIEN: Yeah.
SAMANTHA: I'm excited for grayling though.
It's been a long time.
It's sizzling.
I got a couple of spruce tips.
We got some plantain.
We got a few fireweed shoots.
NATHAN: I think we're at the point where we got the farm
dialed in enough where we can start doing this more
and getting out more.
SAMANTHA: Yeah, I think the fish is about ready.
Knowing how to collect or grow or gather your own food or
hunt it or fish for it, is so important.
And I think there's something so special that
we had the opportunity to do this together as a family.
Olive's just over there like licking at the spine.
We're gonna have to go grayling fishing again very, very soon.
Mmm.
SONTA: Ooh, you smell that? Come smell it guys.
Smells punky.
Maybe that's how I got its name.
So this is just gonna smolder and then keep the bugs away.
Put it over the pan. It's dripping.
I think any time that we could eat from the land is
the healthiest option for our family.
I would prefer this food over store food any day.
Look how bright orange those yolks are, guys.
You guys are growing and this is gonna make you grow strong.
CHEVIE: Hm, hm.
You can just feel the power.
They're so creamy.
SONTA: Mm-hmm.
CHEVIE: When you're walking in the woods,
getting something with your hands,
you're triggering something inside your mind that goes,
this is what I should be doing.
It's something super instinctual that
those natural things just feels gratifying.
SONTA: Where's Chevelle?
CHEVIE: She's in here taking a nap.
She's my little egg. I gotta keep her warm.
Captioned by Cotter Media Group.