In a Montana ghost town, a family must put aside their big homesteading dreams and attend to their more immediate survival needs. There's a mountain lion stalking them, and they have no livestock, water or food.

The Raney's attempt to help the Zabec family in Virginia. With pigs destroying the homestead, predators killing livestock, and a huge oak threatening their cabin, the Raney's must convince them that their free-range dream is killing their homestead.

The Deeters are dog-mushers with a homestead on the edge of disaster. Bears dine on the dog food and the forest around them is a deadly tinder box. The Raneys must push them to make drastic changes, but discover the Deeters don't trust outsiders.

In the Nevada desert, the Kondors homestead has turned to dust. The Raney's discover rattler infested trailers, searing heat and sand storms but when Marty finds the Kondors have no water, he gambles all to save the dying homestead.

Marty, Matt and Misty Raney help the Russell family struggling on a failing homestead in the forests of Pennsylvania. During the biggest storm of the century, the family faces a food shortage with no hunting skills and a cabin on the brink of collapse.

The Raney's rush to a failing homestead in Colorado where they find husband Don makes a 40 mile mountain commute each day, leaving his wife alone, terrified to leave the house because it's surrounded by bears and mountain lions.