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For the past six years my plans for farm growth could best be described as, “Whatever hits Ethan’s mind we do”! There is a major problem with that though as I have talked about in past episodes about my business plan (like this one and this one), and even though I’ve said it before … this year needs to be the year of progress on our farm. I’ve had a lot of fun learning, growing, and experimenting on the farm and now it is time to get to business. I’m not sure if that means our farm will grow a lot this year or if it means we will scale things back at the end of 2015, but I do know that we need to get moving. With that in mind I wanted to share some of my goals and vision for this coming year. Some of the things I want to share are 100% going to happen (the pig woodlot fences being expanded) and other things are pie in the sky sort of ideas (expanding to a new niche or product). Then there are the types of things that I really want to do, but I’m not yet sure how they are going to flesh out. On the top of that list is on farm classes and I’m willing to take ideas, suggestions, and thoughts on that one!
What do you have on your list for the coming year? What do you think … should I expand the sheep … are the on-farm classes in the future of The Beginning Farmer Show and Crooked Gap Farm? Join the discussion below!
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For winter protection, I’ve been trying to get a windbreak built for a while (still haven’t gotten around to it), and one of the reasons I’ve sort of justified spending the time and money building one is that it could also serve double duty as a shade in the summer.
Using a vertical wall as a shade structure means that cattle would get shade in the shadow of the structure instead of under some sort of canopy. That shadowed area would probably also cover a larger area during the day, and it would slowly move over a larger area as the sun moved overhead.
As a bonus, you’d also have a windbreak to use during winter.
You’d have to figure out how to build a rolling wall, but it can’t harder than building a rolling canopy.