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Thread: Making Money in Wilderness Lifestyle

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    Default Making Money in Wilderness Lifestyle

    One of the challenges to living remote is how to make money. There are hundreds of ways to make money (Regretfully most entail a four letter word, WORK).

    Can you think of several.....? Panning for GOLD..? Writer, Artist, Guide, Some construction trades. Commercial fishing, Etc.


  2. #2

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    Quote Originally Posted by hopeak View Post
    One of the challenges to living remote is how to make money. There are hundreds of ways to make money (Regretfully most entail a four letter word, WORK).

    Can you think of several.....? Panning for GOLD..? Writer, Artist, Guide, Some construction trades. Commercial fishing, Etc.
    You can work in technology and telecommute to work.
    If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.
    Samuel Adams
    Dogs are not my whole life, but they make my life whole.

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    Senior Member Ole WV Coot's Avatar
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    Ginseng in my area. Getting close to $1,000.00 per pound. A few other roots like mayapple, redroot etc don't pay much but if you have a big patch close to your house it might pay to dig them. Canes & walking sticks. Big seller to tourists with Woodspirits carved into them, I make them myself for fun and lightly carved walking sticks since I depend on Bartitsu for self defense any place I can't carry my 45. Make working knives. I retired my 1960s K-Bar and Ek edge & 1/2 and made several others. Could sell a few but it's a hobby. Farm produce , money to be had at roadside stands & farmer's markets. Do whatever you know. I can repair lots of items simply because I can read a schematic. I am a terrible mechanic but I repair winches and fix electrical problems on ATVs just to help a friend in his shop. I could go on all day but you get the idea.

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    Off topic, but are you a practioner of neo-bartitsu, or did you learn from someone in the original lineage?
    If ye love wealth greater than liberty, the tranquility of servitude greater than the animating contest for freedom, go home from us in peace. We seek not your counsel, nor your arms. Crouch down and lick the hand that feeds you; and may posterity forget that ye were our countrymen.
    Samuel Adams
    Dogs are not my whole life, but they make my life whole.

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    Administrator Rick's Avatar
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    "Antiques". If you are near the coast, gather up any floats, nets, etc. and wholesale them out to designers. Inland, gather up hunting, mining and native AK items (not indigenous items!) such as sled gear, leather goods, anything native to AK and sell to designers. Just about every chain restaurant in the lower 48 uses that stuff to decorate.

    Craft items via internet.
    Tracks Across the High Plains...Death on the Bombay Line...A Touch of Death and Mayhem...Dead Rock...The Griswald Mine Boys...All On Amazon Books.

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    Quote Originally Posted by Rick View Post
    "Antiques". If you are near the coast, gather up any floats, nets, etc. and wholesale them out to designers. Inland, gather up hunting, mining and native AK items (not indigenous items!) such as sled gear, leather goods, anything native to AK and sell to designers. Just about every chain restaurant in the lower 48 uses that stuff to decorate.

    Craft items via internet.
    Is this true? About the restaurants...? It has been 10 years since I've been to America. Say what.....

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    Well if you have a large plot of land, you could always build a second cabin and rent it out to hunters, backpackers, fishermen, etc.. Kind of like this… http://www.logcabinhideaways.com/

    It would be a bit of an investment, but looking at the prices on that sight you could probably make back the cost reasonably fast. Now you would need enough acres of land to make the second cabin far enough away from your main cabin to give yourself enough buffer zone from idiot renters, but you could probably make enough for taxes, supplies, etc. with minimal work…

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    missing in action trax's Avatar
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    I like dlbdrew's answer, given what you've told us about your situation. Personally, it's a real conundrum (no it isn't, I've just always wanted to use the word conundrum) One needs to establish some kind of income for a lot of supplies that are more easily purchased than produced weighed against... I came out here to get away from civilization!! Anything making money involves some kind of interaction with (gasp) humans.
    some fella confronted me the other day and asked "What's your problem?" So I told him, "I don't have a problem I am a problem"

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    walk lightly on the earth wildWoman's Avatar
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    We wanted to rent out a cabin to paddlers and other wilderness-friendly folks at first, as well as offer survival, plant id, mocassin making courses. Even got the website up! The trouble is, the more costly the transportation to your remote wilderness home is, the more of an upscale market you're dealing with. We don't want to cater to the rich, and also aren't really prepared to share our wild solitude with holiday makers. You got to explain about the wood stove, not making big campfires when it's windy, what to do about bears, how to haul water etc etc We know quite a few people in the tourism business, inluding people who run a remote lodge, and the consensus is that it's one big babysitting job. So we scrapped the idea.
    I manage to get by with freelance writing, my partner does some ecotourism guiding and the odd contract job. I tried selling mocassins and wild herb teas over the net, but it's not worth the time and effort. Also when you live remote, getting things to the post office is difficult and for months at a time impossible.
    Personally, I think doing stuff over the net is the way to go. If you can work as a consultant, proposal writer, bookkeeper or whatever that requires only the odd meeting in person, you get to stay at home, don't have to bother with tourists wondering why the stove is smoking and still make some money.
    Actions speak louder than words

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    Senior Member Ole WV Coot's Avatar
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    Thumbs up Ot - Alpine Question Answer

    I make a walking stick out of hickory and use the natural rootball as I don't trust any connections. I see too many holes in Goju-Shorei for me, don't care for McNeill's system. When I was younger(40 yrs ago) I was taught Kali by a guy that worked with me. I prefer the old methods of Cunningham and E.W. Barton-Wright back to the guy in France that also taught. I use Dim-Mak training for striking points and everything someone my age can handle. I consider my style strictly offensive and rather direct. I make a few canes to sell but nothing I use because I consider the crook more for non-lethal and defense at my age I don't play defense. The carved walking sticks with Woodspirits are too long for my use. I guess I could say I have my own system, works for me.

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    They just today arrested a man in Anchor Point, Alaska for Farming. He is a small farmer with no government subsidy. He had over five hundred Marijuana Plants, and 25 firearms, Wow, I wonder if he had any neat firearms........?

    They always make a big deal about the firearms, like Daa, show me some drug dealers, who lobby for "GUN CONTROL".......

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    Ole' Coot, I have "ATTACK" Geese, and I carry concealed Goose Food, I just throw the Goose Food on the bad guy and laugh my butt off.

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    Senior Member Ole WV Coot's Avatar
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    Talking Attack Geese

    Quote Originally Posted by hopeak View Post
    Ole' Coot, I have "ATTACK" Geese, and I carry concealed Goose Food, I just throw the Goose Food on the bad guy and laugh my butt off.
    I posted about putting one in a guy's work van so I have a great respect for them. I have always wondered how brave you would have to be to get caught by one of them wearing a goose down jacket(might be a relative). I could hide behind my "attack" beagle, all 30lbs of him. We put any animal we could catch in someone's truck. I sat on a blacksnake one morning that was in mine so I caught one later in the day, nice one. Tied it up to a pole until I finished working and just as the boss came out to check on us the snake came down the road with 20 or so feet of telephone wire stopping traffic. He didn't say anything to the other men just looked at me and told me I was fired if it was in somebody's truck the next morning.Don't know how he knew it was me.

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    Neo-Numptie DOGMAN's Avatar
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    Working as year-round Wilderness Outfitter and Guide pays the majority of my expenses...Rafting, Canoeing and Fly-Fishing in the summer, Hunting in the Fall, Dogsledding in the winter.

    However, I have to routinely supplement my income with "town" work such as working the occassional bartending shift (30 minute drive each way), teaching a class one night a week at the University (1 hour drive each way) write a few freelance articles for regional magazines a year, and do some web design. Also, been known to sell firewood, morels and huckleberries to restaurants and do some snowplowing.

    Basically- I do whatever it takes
    The way of the canoe is the way of the wilderness and of a freedom almost forgotten- Sigurd Olson

    Give me winter, give me dogs... you can keep the rest- Knud Rasmussen

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    Quality Control Director Ken's Avatar
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    Musher, I may need heart surgery some day. Will you be available to operate?
    “Learning is not compulsory. Neither is survival.”
    W. Edwards Deming

    "Live free or die: Death is not the worst of evils."
    General John Stark

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    Quote Originally Posted by Ken View Post
    Musher, I may need heart surgery some day. Will you be available to operate?
    Oh yeah, I'll operate. But we may have different takes on what constitutes success.

    Question: What do you call the person who graduates last in their Medical School class?

    Answer: Doctor
    The way of the canoe is the way of the wilderness and of a freedom almost forgotten- Sigurd Olson

    Give me winter, give me dogs... you can keep the rest- Knud Rasmussen

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    Quality Control Director Ken's Avatar
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    Cool

    Where I come from, the correct answer is Defendant!
    “Learning is not compulsory. Neither is survival.”
    W. Edwards Deming

    "Live free or die: Death is not the worst of evils."
    General John Stark

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    Neo-Numptie DOGMAN's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ken View Post
    Where I come from, the correct answer is Defendant!
    LOL...Very nice...
    The way of the canoe is the way of the wilderness and of a freedom almost forgotten- Sigurd Olson

    Give me winter, give me dogs... you can keep the rest- Knud Rasmussen

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    I make a living guiding bear hunters in the fall. In the winter and spring I run my trapline. I also write homesteading skills articles. There is a lodge about a mile from us that wants my wife and me to teach bush skills to their clients. We are pretty limited like wildwoman we live an 40 minute ($900.00 round trip ) flight from the nearest post office so that shuts off ebay stuff.

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    Administrator Rick's Avatar
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    Guiding bare hunters?! Too kinky for me....oh, wait...you said bear. My bad.
    Tracks Across the High Plains...Death on the Bombay Line...A Touch of Death and Mayhem...Dead Rock...The Griswald Mine Boys...All On Amazon Books.

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