- Location
- Limousin/Charentes toad land
or,
i started out with only a few acres and grew courgettes, leeks and pumpkins, surrounded by sheep farmers, so not exactly the norm for the area
I’m a small farmer but I just can’t do it all myself anymore.
- Thread starter DrWazzock
- Start date
or,
i started out with only a few acres and grew courgettes, leeks and pumpkins, surrounded by sheep farmers, so not exactly the norm for the area
- Location
- Limousin/Charentes toad land
or,
i started out with only a few acres and grew courgettes, leeks and pumpkins, surrounded by sheep farmers, so not exactly the norm for the area
with the benefit of Google, I can look down on those fields now… and now they ; have sheep
- Location
- LINCOLNSHIRE/KENYA
Yes something niche. The best farming business I know in UK was started by a bloke working as rep for either a drainage company or something. He used to mix chicken feed in a shed on an airfield nights and weekends. Then got some land and started farming chickens and milling corn borrowed lots of money expanded massively. Now the son and grandsons farm several thousand acres with a massive feed mill and millions of chickens several times they were literally minutes from bankruptcy. Whenever they took on another farm they’d just knock everything down an rebuild. I wish I had that courage.or,
i started out with only a few acres and grew courgettes, leeks and pumpkins, surrounded by sheep farmers, so not exactly the norm for the area
- Location
- Ceredigion
Not now ,Google Is 3 years out of datewith the benefit of Google, I can look down on those fields now… and now they ; have sheep
- Location
- somerset
time passes by, and things change, that's the way of the world. And as much as we would like to, we can't go backwards.
A lot depends on how you want to farm, and match it to your farm size.
200ac arable, is def p/time, 200 acres, with a 100 milkers, is def not. And 200 acres of veg, is multiple jobs.
But, one has to be flexible, and adapt to what is possible, rather than keep on going, with a system that is going nowhere, due to changing mkts or times.
If we look backwards, farms were more 'mixed', which gave stability, as one enterprise, could cover the loss of another. Today, we are more specialised, and have to take things as they come. As the way forward, it could mean more mixed farming, could occur. Animals on totally arable farms, might be abhorrent to some, but, if it is a benefit, plenty of wanabee farmers, who could work with you, with their stock/risk and work.
We have been looking at alternatives to how we run our farm, outside pressures may mean a change, we don't know, yet. And it really isn't an easy thing to do, but if the dairy goes, a p/time job, will be needed, but there are alternatives out there, might mean a huge mindset change, and probably scare you, but if you can get it right, the farmer, and his family, could end up a lot better off, financially and mentally.
Farmers on the whole, are highly skilled people, might not have the right ticket/training for a job, but we can usually 'make do'. There's a lot of people out there, that wouldn't have a clue, to problems we solve on a daily basis. We underestimate ourselves.
Life doesn't owe us a living, we have to earn one, and one thing we are not, is lazy. Stubborn perhaps, which could easily be our worst trait, as the inclination is to soldier on, when we should adapt.
- Location
- Fife
No.
I simply wouldn't pay the rent and would do something else. I've only once rented land by the acre.
Almost all my 7yr farming career I have grazed sheep around other people's land, fitting in around their main enterprise and paying a weekly headage rate. Why couldn't I continue to do that if there was no sub system?
- Location
- Fife
Starting any business from scratch requires capital. That applies even more to ag, with it's low margins and long returns on investment.
Trading will give a quicker turn around, but requires a further skill set.
- Location
- Lincolnshire
A 200ac farm really should be considered a top-up to a "real" job, unless you have intensive stock....
You could find it benefits you because the landowner could be more willing accept a lower payment rate.
It could also go the other way because the land might be sold to an owner with a different financial profile.
The Common Agricultural Policy was a Common Market policy designed to even out the particular disparities in the different national and regional farming peculiarities, one of which would be cost of land.
With new gear, and a modern grain store, yes. How many 200 acre farms are blessed with this. And forget about selling straw, which requires you to be on tap 24/7 for 8 months of the year loading bales 2 at a time into horse boxes. A good relationship with the merchant too. No good an artic turning up in the yard if you're 40 miles away on a job..........
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Depends where you are SOME of my farm is 18 months old... the rest 4 years???
- Location
- Lincolnshire
Stick It all in Fallow, and see if someone will rent some/all on a 1 year cropping agreement.
Thats where i am, you might think you will get short of money, but go and have an add up of expenses that disappear or shrink to very little (EG water bill) if you dont start a tractor engine, it will shock you.
Ok i moved a land sale money into houses a few years ago as I couldn't roll it over, I now have way more cash stacked in the bank than ever in my life, and grows every month.
It does concern me that although I thought I was a half decent farmer (others opinion) the bottom line profit had in recent years nearly become irrelevant to the work and turnover of modern farming.
- Location
- LINCOLNSHIRE/KENYA
Everyone needs a return on their labour and investment. Even if your investment is paid off there has to be an opportunity cost on your labour. If you can't make minimum wage working at home you might need to consider doing something else to make up. As you say times change in the seventies and eighties we had two brothers farming 94 acres down our road 30 acres potatoes 30 acres beet the rest corn. We reckoned they were lazy because they had no livestock but they had 4 newish tractors their own combine that was less than 5 years old. There were loads like that in the fens. They could keep themselves busy because they harvested and carted their own beet. Stored and riddled their own potatoes and didn't have a tractor bigger than 80 hp. It's all corn now less than a weeks work a year
- Location
- Essex
Yes tenant farmers round our way used to wear clean clothes as all the work was done by the men. Smart cars too.
- Location
- somerset
farming isn't the b-all and end-all, of a farm.
it's a beautiful piece of highly adaptable, multifunctional property.
you just have to decide what you want to do with it, which is the really hard bit. And you need to be capable of doing, what you decide on. And be happy doing it - very important.
The options are massive, subject to planning approval, in fact you can do almost anything, on a piece of land, if legal, (or not ) subject to pp.
Over the years, we have run a livery unit, meat sales.
other things we have looked at, are fishing lake, animal boarding , cats and dogs, other pets. Setting up an airgun/bow and arrow, trail, with set 'targets' en-route, the last 3 met with l/lord resistance, as did caravan storage.
Let workshops, utility units, offices, all fit into farm buildings, with a bit of forethought.
It really depends on what YOU want, most of the above, will leave you land, to continue 'farming', but the income/profit, may well come from a source outside of 'farming'.
- Location
- South Wales UK
Mid life crisis or early old age crisis we all start wondering possibly, what ,when ,why etc etc. with it all .
Aspiring Peasants
Member
- Location
- North Pennines
What I’m really trying to say is that government policy is making returns from not farming land better than farming it. This will have a knock on affect to your system and any new starter. There are very few starter farms available at agriculturally viable rents.
But knocking landowners for taking the “king’s shilling “ is not going to help. It’s the system that is wrong, most farmers would rather have land farmed but as a man I bought some sheep from said, “when English Nature come back 3 times with an improved offerfrom a business standpoint I’m mad not to take it”
He also said he was nearly in tears selling sheep as there had been a flock on the farm since 1948. He also said he would be using the payments to buy land. From a business point of view why should he not?
He’d much rather be continuing to farm sheep but that’s not what government policy wants
- Location
- Fife
I thought you had 800kg suckler cows? Have they gone very recently?
- Location
- LINCOLNSHIRE/KENYA
If you've got a farm then you're very lucky if you can make a living off it you're doubly lucky. Luckily for me I've got a farm.
- Location
- Fife
The man you bought the sheep from could have found someone to share farm the flock and pushed efficiencies so that profit exceeded the English Nature look. Scale is what stops many businesses being efficient and profitable. Which is dictate to access to large contiguous areas of ground. And the biggest obstacle to that is subs and schemes. See @Bossfarmer idea about a beef co operative.
Unfortunately I've found that many landowners can't bear the thought of someone else making money from their land.
Option A) I have a business idea. I will provide labour and capital. You provide land. We will each make £500/ac.
Option B) Natural England will pay the landowner £300/ac, and I get nothing.
In my experience to date, the majority of the landowners will take option B. Or even worse, take option A, then find a way to cheat their partner out of his profit.
When they find their land massively devalued by NE through the back door (see NE knows best thread) they may come to regret it.