I was having a discussion the other day with a gentleman I work with. We had been talking farming and the future of this precarious economy. During the talk, I mentioned a farm with eight acres. He said that is not a farm. A farm, to him, was a place with a lot of land that a person made his entire income from.
I disagreed. I think a farm can come in many forms. From your hobby farms, to a petting zoo, to big 1,000 acre places with row upon row of soy beans. I do believe that some sort of a salary or income should be involved to really be called a farm, but not necessarily all of that income. Many farmers work off the farm today. Especially with the mechanisms in place to make farming much faster and easier.
I call our small place a farm. No, we don't have 500 acres, (we own 5 and work about 8 with more in the future), we do have several small salaries generated from things we raise here and I do work a full time job. It is hard to keep up with, trust me. But I call it a farm.
So, I pose the question to you, the readers. What is a farm, in your view? Please find the poll at the right of this blog and cast your vote.
To all those that participated in the last poll, thank you for helping out. The poll was evenly divided 50-50, for weed whacking under the electric fence and just letting it grow. I will keep whacking the weeds, I can't stand seeing those weeds, so I will toil away. Thanks again.
2 comments:
The problem with most polls is you don't get to give your real opinion. You have to choose from the ones available. To me, a farm is a place (not necessarily measured in acres) where a human being is involved in growing something, whether animal, plant, fish, bacteria, ants, or worms, and not necessarily for income.
:-D
I call our place a farm. We have less than two acres, a large garden, and chickens. We don't sell anything (any more...), but we grow a lot of stuff for our own use.
Frankly, I agree, Ginny. I think I am leaning more toward "working" land, even if there is no income earned from it. Thank you. I will add that choice to the list.
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