girl.meets.farm: Help for New Farmers

Saturday, February 5, 2011

Help for New Farmers

Part of jumping into farming with two feet is that you tend to spend a lot of time treading water and not really getting anywhere.

We have been on this farming adventure for 8 months now - and while it feels like decades, our chequing account is slowly taking a beating. So we realized that we needed to get serious about the "business" side of farming.

A quick google search turns up tons of resources for new farmers. In the province of Ontario (where we reside, in the great country of Canada) there are the following places to start:

New farmer self assessment "Am I suited to farming?" (too late for us if the answer is no!) http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/busdev/newentrant/sec1.htm
Resources for new farmers http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/english/busdev/newentrant/sec9.htm
FarmStart supports and encourages a new generation of farmers http://www.farmstart.ca/
Farmlink - a farming network http://www.farmlink.net/new-farmers/
Ministry of Agriculture has everything from free podcasts to info sheets http://www.omafra.gov.on.ca/
Free courses and workshops http://www.ontariosoilcrop.org/default.htm
Ministry of Natural Resources http://www.mnr.gov.on.ca/en/

We are now signed up to take a workshop in Environmental Planning, and a Business Management for Ontario Farmers workshop. Out of this we hope to have two action plans, one for our environmental planning and one for our 3-year Business Plan. We have also been hard at work developing our biosecurity protocols. PHEW! Please remind me again why people call this a "hobby" farm?

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How it All Began...

In the beginning...

I am a girl, a city girl. A girl who has spent the last 15 years riding downtown city transit, and smelling exhaust fumes as I drink my Starbucks latte on my trek to the office. I am a city girl who loves the ballet, the opera, and the wonder of the theatre. I am a girl who adores the smell of hotdogs from street vendors, and the sound of buskers earning spare coins on the corner.

Quite sometime ago, I made the move to the suburbs. A land of station wagons and minivans. A world of neighbours who offer to help shovel your driveway, and grocery stores that still have bag boys. I became a suburban girl. I took the train into the city, caught up in the morning rush of commuters. I learned to like the big box stores, with their endless choices of merchandise, and the grocery stores as big as football fields with their promises of low low prices and their sea of colourful produce.

But then, almost 4 years ago, I met a boy. And deep in our hearts, we had a wee bit of country. It started with a shared love of country music, and cowboy boots. We took long drives in the countryside, and began to adore the tall maples which line country laneway's.

Over time, that wee bit of country in us began to grow. And so it began. The search for a farm. After a 2 year search, we found one. I am going to share our adventures with you here dear reader. So that you can laugh along with us on this crazy transformation to being farmers!