@@sangha1486 naw what's happening now is different, most of the big fish are gone and the ones left are flopping on the bank . There's something else in the water now maybe an alligator
I enjoy your channel! As an FYI…I make my own mosquito spray. All natural. IT WORKS! I could send you a sample. Works in the swamps of Florida. It might be good up there.
Hi Chris! One big advantage grandpa had was he had help. If he didn't have several kids and grandkids to help him, he might be able to swap work with a neighboring farmer. When I was growing up, you could get local folks and school kids to help you. Now, if you don't have access to migrant workers or can do it yourself, you're just out of luck.
@@HomesteadingtheHardWay That's what brought my tobacco farming to an end. It got to where I spent more time running the roads looking for help than taking care of my tobacco.
@@shake_shells11 it's not but you have to pay 17.00 an hour and provide housing and transportation. Can't hire illegals so you have to get H2A workers and yes they come around and check
I've seen some really ambitious prices around here too. Disk , planters , corn snappers etc that are in really good shape are worth something but something rusted out on top of needing a complete rebuild is not . Like the twenty years old truck with 300k and a bad transmission for 18k
I agree with you on the "homesteading" terminology. It brings a sense of nostalgia and because people are finally starting to realize what's going on around them, they are seeking what they think was the olden ways. The problem is, it ain't simpler, at least not in the way they expect. It's more work for less pay but it's also more satisfaction with less bullcrap. People don't realize that the work that goes in from preparing the ground to finally hitting the plate is a lot and when you go to the store you're paying for all that labor but the work is still there and you either pay for it or YOU do it. What people really are looking for is self reliance and that's how it needs to be sold to them, not a glamorous "homestead" thing. You want it, you do the work...all of it. People need to go in knowing what they are really after and knowing what it takes to get there. That's what i like about ya'll on this channel. It's no BS or sales pitches, it just is what it is and we appreciate you for it. I tell people all the time that they can do it but it's got to be a lifestyle. I'd advise people to find a local farmer and help out in the evening or when you can and get a feel for what it takes before you go full blown Green Acres on this deal.
It's a complicated subject , for some it's a hobby some a calling some a traditional way of life . Too many people just don't realize what they're getting into
As a 20 year old farming 160 acres of mountain in Northwest Arkansas after being just lived at since my great grandfather worked it (died in 1998 born in 1914) years ago I have realized just the grit these old folks had was something that has been lost since the 1970s generation. Everyone else has just been grasping for it
@@HomesteadingtheHardWay You mentioned the huge increase in farm productivity that has happened. Yet, farm income has not increased commensurately. The Work Ethic isn't "work yourself to death for someone else's benefit." It's "work hard because that's how you get ahead and build a better life for your family " Kids today don't avoid farming because they are lazy. It's because they know just as well as you do that they can't make a living at it.
@@sangha1486 idk some of it's lazy being you brought it up . Everyone can't be a doctor or lawyer someone has to grow food , dig ditches , pave the road etc . all the trades are going out it's not just agriculture. Young folks graduate college ( after going way too long )with a degree in under water basket weaving or something equally useless then can't get a job except fast food all because they want easy. No one can be honest about anything anymore everything has to be a fairytale but everything is going to fold if the work force doesn't come back and I see young people struggling ( or living off parents until 30 ) everyday because they don't have a marketable skill or the work ethic to get one . Jobs you get paid to just take up space are scarce
$2000 priced in gold back then was 100 ounces of gold. Today, 100ounces of gold is worth 230,000 dollars. So that Super A cost 230,000 in today's dollars. I was off by a factor of 10 with my original example, it shows how much poorer they've made us since they decided to just print it like they stole it.
Thanks for just being honest and letting newbies know the truth. Governments job to keep food as cheap as possible, so as to keep folks from cutting up and showing out. Beef prices increase, government floods in imports to the market. Not informing citizens that the imported food is grown without all the restrictions that US farms have to operate under. Not just beef all imported products. Farmers have to love working for nearly nothing. The government propping up all the big farmer thru subsidies. Weren’t for government handouts we wouldn’t see those Million dollar machines out in the fields. I bet a lot those farmers with million dollar machines talk smack about people on welfare. What’s the difference? Taxpayers getting taken to cleaners all the way around.
When I bought my land out of college my dad told me I was going to have to fight to get my taxes lowered. I procrastinated for years and in 20 years, it’s gone from 3500 to 10k. Taxes are my biggest concern for the future. Even if I were to give a family member my land, it would be a burden.
People have always told me you don't own land you're just renting it from the state . It's a struggle to pay they used to work with you here and you could pay when you got the money , now if it's a day late they start threatening
I too share your dream Chris but I’m over 60 working a day job and running outta time. It is also my dream to stay on the family farm without needing much from town, which is 30mins away. Hopefully one day. Really enjoy your channel. Keep it coming.🙏 That was funny what you said about being religious and praying. 😂 Also heard it said The Farmer is the biggest gambler there is.
Our family farm is on the border between homestead and commercial, It's about 70 acres that my grandad used to own and has been farmed by my family since the 1600s, but we now rent 4/5 of it off my dad's siblings. We've about a dozen cattle, a few chickens and ducks and 100 sheep and make hay. Here in the north-west of England we have many of the same regulatory problems you have, especially with the cattle. I'm 19 and want to farm, but struggle to see a way to make it pay - my dad has at times worked 2 jobs as well as running the farm. I will have to do something else while my dad is farming and will have to be smart in how I run the place if I do eventually get to farm.
Growing up, we always had it. I’ll be fine. worked out of town for 10 years. Getting more experience and more stable with my work and a better schedule, got back into it. I got a 50 x20 garden x2 and getting back some lifestocks it’s just a quality of the food. Doesn’t justify comparing what you’re buying at the grocery store.
We've officially started our first 3 feeders. You've been our "go to" for pig advice from day 1. You're a huge wealth of knowledge for this community. Thank you for sharing
Chris I really wish you’d put out more videos, your buddy Johnny came up here this weekend. You make a dang good point. They say a lady here back when my daddy was growing up and she cracked walnuts all winter one year a bought her farm with that. Try doing that now. A man has to have a heck of a job to even buy a small farm these days
I know of a woman told her husband if he'd buy her a sowing machine she'd buy them a farm and build them a house. She did it sowing dresses in just a couple of years. Our place costed 1.50 an acre now the taxes are 1000.00 a year
I come from a family of farmers in southeast Tennessee. Most of them moved to the city to make a decent living a long time ago. My parents recently bought 21 acres last year. We are now running cattle on it, we have been able to grow our beekeeping operation, and I've planted fruit trees and plenty of medicinal plants and I'm growing a huge garden with corn, multiple varieties of beans, melons, tomatoes. I'm experimenting with different varieties of other stuff as well. The time of factory farming is coming to an end. Everybody needs to start becoming more self sufficient you'll be happy you did in the next couple decades.
Large commercial farms will never go away but they might be a market share for small outfits to be profitable enough to make a come back . If the demand for locally grown food will keep growing down side is people are used to cheap food and imported produce . The trend of a few big farms and no replacement farmers might speed it along but a big percentage of our food isn't grown in America. I have had buyers tell me flat they could buy and ship from Brazil cheaper than it cost me to grow it and have it off season . I do think the trend of growing your own is going to gain more and more traction
My hats off to you and your family, sir. I grow some tomatoes and peppers and know how hard it is simply at my scale. I think everyone should grow something just to keep that tradition alive. It is the most practical knowledge we have.
I want to farm. I'm 33, married, and have 5 young children. We're saving money but don't have enough to buy a large farm and no one is selling small farm property around here. I currently have 1 acre with a single-wide on it. We grow produce and sell it locally and make a few thousand dollars a year profit. I also raise and sell a few hogs. That's what we can do for now, until we have the cash to buy 10 or more acres nearby. It'll come, it'll come.
Sir you're a breath of fresh air, I could listen to you all day. Just got 2.5 acres which ain't much but 1 acre is field, that field will be mine and my neighbors food for the years to come. Good food makes good people, great food brings people together.
Well said. The only thing that grows all year no matter the weather is Government regulation, and prices along with it. When we turn that around we will all be better off. Thanks for your insight.
@@HomesteadingtheHardWayif people grow their own corporate loses profits the egg shortage last year proves how far corporate will go to interrupt backyard farming
@@doomguy584 no doubt the corporate farm outfits don't want small livestock producers. I used to work for them , they claim it's because of disease but if they could outlaw backyard poultry they would . As for the government they're going to go with who writes the checks
@@HomesteadingtheHardWay I don't know if you heard about it but they purposefully took the protein out of the chicken feed about a year ago that was being sold to the consumer market so back yard chickens stopped laying eggs all across the country and then the corporate owned egg farms jacked their prices up once people didn't have access to back yard eggs
There's a lot of griping about government handouts in the comments But no one has a problem with agricultural grants from the government. Farmers are like everyone else - they will take what they can get because if they don't, someone else will. Big fish eat little fish
I wish we had some of our granddaddy's costs of land & such with the abilities of today. And my husband needs to listen to the of your message ... can't do anything just sitting on the couch talking about it.
Chris I live in south Alabama and I get a kick out of all these new homesteaders. I'm 58 and that's always just plain old survival for us. We did that because we didn't know anything else to do. I've been raising hogs since I was five years old following my pop around. I build it up and have to sell it off sometimes. But I will always do it on some scale. Wouldn't be right without it. Thanks for your video and God bless you and your family
"All these new homesteaders" weren't blessed in the same ways people like you were. You learned at a young age from family. That's great! They are learning as adults on their own and/or from strangers. Good for them! They need all the help they can get (and not ridicule, as I've seen so many do) as One could argue that it's STILL survival.
@@katie7748 I am sorry you misunderstood me I was not trying to ridicule anyone that is trying to learn. That's why I like what Chris does with his channel by trying to help people out. There is a lot more to this way of life than a fancy new name for it was all.
Granddaddy didn't have the foreign owned federal reserve charging interest on paper script, or being misidentified as a corporate entity instead of lawful man and being charged taxes on private property. We have to end the FED. We have to end the BAR.
Thank you Sir for your words of wisdom. Grandpa raised baccer, sweet taters, peanuts; my father swore off farming but the bug was in me when grandpa let me ride on the fender of the 'red belly'. But I still only grow enough for my family to eat on throughout the year and even then, its not completely self-sustaining.
Hit the nail on the head with the difference in today’s farming and years past. Old adage of corn being “knee high by 4th of July” you definitely have beat! Place is looking good buddy
Down here we hope to be disking stalks on sweet corn by first of July , that behind me is a staggered planting to extend the season wish I had her turn around and show that in front it's four foot tall
I can honestly say more people now are going back to raising & processing their own meat. It has changed so much from my childhood….it was so much simpler then . I sure miss those times. God bless those who keep farming !! 💕🙏👍🏡
Totally agree, I only have a small garden right now but tell people they need to start growing something, anything. Big farm is already too big. College is the same way, the prices and out of control, so the solution solves both problems, dont go to college, stick around to farm. Colleges would be begging in two years
Hey Chris, just found your channel and been watching all your videos. You remind me of my wife’s grandfather the way you explain things. I’m 34 years old, me and my wife we started the small farm journey back in 2019. Covid came along and I had so much time I got my 5 year plan done in 2 years ha We only have 4 acres but we do commercial blueberries and that pays the bills on the livestock. We raise our own beef, take 1 cow to butcher each year, sell a little to family. We’ve got some egg chickens and will raise a pig out every now and then. We structured everything to where we either make a little money or break even but come ahead on the price of meat. Your right, it’s hard work but there’s no other way I’d want to live. As much as I’d like to expand and get bigger I’m just not willing to go into debt to make that happen. I enjoy your videos!
@@HomesteadingtheHardWay We certainly don’t have it all figured out yet but I like to think we doing a few things right. Definitely couldn’t do it without me and the wife both being committed.
My great grandpa farmed 600 acres, he lost it during the Depression due to taxes. He had the crops in the field and the Judge would not let him sell his crop to pay the taxes.
You definitely got to have a love for it to do it. I do enough to put some in the freezer and can and I sell enough to pay for the seed and plants and fertilizer and give the rest away to the family. I’m the only 1 out of both sides of my family that has any interest in growing anything. It’s a magical thing to plant something and tend it and watch it grow and I love my farmalls lol. It’s just a hobby for me. I’m gone 12hrs a day Monday through Friday logging and trucking. I was raised on milk cows and tobacco so I have a passion for it. I just do a summer crop. I tried the fall thing last year and the rabbits and deer got all the lettuce and cabbage all of it lol so I’m done with the fall garden but yea some garden talk will be great. Your garden looks amazing
My grandfather started a diary farm with three cows, and a borrowed bull in the 1930s, and made enough money in five years to build a new barn. Today ? Impossible !
I wish there was a comment to not only love it but go above and beyond for all these people, man,woman, boy, or girl that are out here doing the best they can with the options they have and they put all they have into into it because it’s their dream and they are struggling to make it and trying to understand why their hard work doesn’t seem to go anywhere, hats off to you this is hands down one of the top 3 “speeches” I have ever heard in my life if you need garden ground I’m in very southern ohio you come get some you have the same thoughts I do and people like us need to stick together to make it through and prove we can do it and society will realize, it’s just a matter of what lifetime?
Having a job to pay for land and equipment is the route I'm going to farm. In the meantime my home is surrounded by fruit and nut trees and garden to get experience growing and satisfy genetic desire to farm. Growing specialty mixed grain corn and specialty sweet corn. Also elephant garden. In 3rd year of saving seed for those cash crops. Renting land as well. Bootstrapping is taking years.
Farmers need some sort of union , representation to stand up to the companies, state , and the feds . The farmers in this country are far too important
Sage advice. Figure out what you can sell first. I would also add when "getting up off the couch" at least start where you are at. Containers on an apartment balcony can teach a lot about growing things/farming (but think how you would do the methods for many acres, like you won't buy a bag of this compost or that popular fertilizer when you need to farm a hundred acres). No new equipment loans, buy auction or private sale for cash and put a little into repairs.
Woodchucks and rabbits are on an opposite cycle. Woodchucks build dens and then rabbits move in. Then the cycle swings back to woodchucks. Woodchucks were bad news in the horse days so there was only ever one found on the farm before the 1950s. By the 70s/80s they were a scourge that either eat a whole row of beans or take two bites out of every pumpkin/melon in the patch so you couldn't sell them.
The problem is money always money , the public wants cheap convenient food . Small scale is more expensive probably always will be so it's going to take changing the whole system and people being willing to pay for better .
I've been market gardening/farming (whatever you wanna call it) here in Aiken, SC on and off for about a decade. I lost money the first seven years, but now I've got a customer base up and I am growing crops no one else here grows (carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, and lettuce). I'm pulling in around $1,600-$2000 a month and finally looking to go all in and expand. The price of land right now is outrageous. I'm actually a math professor by day and my wife is a nurse and we are priced out of the damn market and we make about $100,000 a year before taxes. Mind you I have three kids and a lot of debt from college, but the farm actually pays my and her student loans. I actually got introduced to farming doing mathematics research in graduate school related to agriculture. I've been addicted ever since. It truly is in the blood. I still teach math to pay the bills, but I really just want to farm fulltime. I'm going to make it happen no matter what it takes. Great video boss.
I read some of your comments . I am dixty six .i greww up in michigan and watched prime farm land gobbled up for subdivision . Then the ranch land went to malls .it horrified me as a kid . Do you think the schools promoted farming or agriculture . NO .they promoted not even basic life skills . And my parents went slong with it . Aslleep at the wheel . Its a travesty I saw as a kid but fidnt understand . I went to a agricultural school but studiedy art . I left after two years . I look back . I was st yhe right school for the wrong yhing .but didnt know . Now Tv has made us lazy and uneducated. Thankyou for this talk .very good talk .
The bad thing about tv is years ago it started normalizing things that didn't work , like comedians making fun of any kind of blue collar jobs. So a whole generation though having a job that accomplished something was something to be ashamed of
I wish I could but I don't know the answer to that . Things are changing too fast so the only advice I could give would be stay diversified and adaptable
I know he told you the story of his first new car. His Daddy told him not to finance it and if he couldn’t pay for it in full he didn’t need it. He told me he bought the car and came by the store and one of the Farmers said who is that on that fine brand new car and his Daddy said that’s Mr Charles Pelletier. He had some good stories from the good old days!
@@charmainevandiford6622 here's the rest of the story. Daddy loaned his sister and her husband some money to buy a house and they were going to pay the car note to settle it . Granddaddy was mad at the whole crowd he didn't hold with buying anything on credit
Land in my area of SC has gone through the roof.your gonna pay between $500,000 - $1000000 for a hundred acres, if it's good Land. Half acrea lot's anywhere from $10,000 in.bad neighborhoods, to $85,000 in nice area's.
Farming is a business, business models change with the economy and farmers are very hard headed when it comes to change. Learned that growing up farming and seeing everyone go broke doing the same thing.
I need to do a video on this , you are correct most farmers can't quit or change until they're bankrupt. I've watched them try one more year and lose everything when they could have gone out on a good year and retire . Unfortunately markets can cut off overnight .
We have a slight bit more than ten acres and so far we're growing most of our own food. Sometimes we sit down at the table to eat and besides spices we're eating 95% of our own food. Not bad for building in 22. The food chain is unreliable at best in my humble opinion!
I've got fifteen sows over 250 pigs a year .Selling twenty finished hogs a year plus a thousand chicks and nine acres of produce . We can barely put fuel in the trucks we already have. That's with being established we bring in a pretty good cash flow but the profit margin is low
It's getting a little harder every year Chris but like you I just can't quit. When your kin has done it for generations it's just in your blood. Send me some of that good dirt! Ya'll have a good day.
takes two or three generation yep payment plan damn bank seed money just sign that paper and pen ink on paper some people word and hand shake it freedom you can't buy take great pride in that sign private property that gate
Good stuff. We have just been getting started 'homesteading'. I understand the bad taste in your mouth with that word because it's like watching a blind person trying to put together a jigsaw puzzle. But we wanted to make the change and learn about life for real. The first rule of farming animals is that death is certain. It's a sickening feeling to have an animal you're trying to protect and keep alive to have it fall to a predator or some freak thing. We aren't doing this to sell to yuppies or even sustain ourselves today, but to make a change and learn and prepare for harder times which are coming. Our problem in Georgia is they're taking the farm land and building huge warehouses anywhere there is 100 acres together. Farmer can't pay taxes on that once the county says it's worth warehouse grade land.
If you can get visible by Verizon 25 to 30 a month for unlimited everything. I go to Sam's Club and buy a 180 dollar smart phone. I'm a 5th generation in S.C. my wife we don't know how many generations from Ohio, but her dad studied livestock all over the world for different universities like Kentucky, West Virginia, and Clemson
Some of it is large livestock companies don't want small producers and get laws passed for " food safety and disease control" some is something else maybe control the food control the public. Best one I heard lately was home gardens were adding to global warming .
Until after WW2 very few farmers relied on gas or diesel, bagged feed, synthetic fertilizers, spray poisons, etc. Now most farms would shut down if they couldn't get those expensive inputs. Too many farmers are basically addicted to the corporate supply chain and can barely operate at all without it. If you have to buy all that stuff every week or month, plus payments on trucks and tractors and all that, you're facing a huge uphill battle just to break even. So you end up with bigger and bigger farms owned by fewer and fewer people, trying to play the volume game. And they still usually need gov't handouts to make it work.
That's why I wish the market would shift back to locally produced but it's a hard sell . You get a low price per unit with anything agricultural so only way to increase income is to increase production which in turn lowers the unit price . Then with fewer farmers on less land they have to be super productive to feed everyone add the fact that it's a lot of work for low pay but absolutely vital and you have to subsidize to keep them going . Kinda a vicious cycle
Some around here will if they know you really well , but to many people get burnt like that on both sides . I've cleaned up a couple of pieces myself then once it was usable they wanted it back . " Oh my nephew wants to tend a garden" then you find out they rented it out
If you need another truck, buy an older truck that you can work on. You can’t work on a new one. And there are to many things that will go wrong. Like the damn coil packs on the Ford.
First time viewer and I hate to admit you are dead right on the money. You are Taxed to death, regulated up the wazoo and certified to death. You need a Masters Degree in reading and understanding Contracts whether you are buying Land , Farm Equipment or Loans for your Farm. The "Farmer's Almanac" is no longer the farmers Bible but you have to follow the Co Op in your state which in my state is the Clemson Extension Co Op and is funded and regulated by the South Carolina Agriculture Commision. I remember the days when you could plant and grow Food and people would want to buy it now days they think you should give it to them because they can get at Food Lion cheaper and the Farmers Market has become a Jockey Lot of hagglers trying to get it for free and/or want to know your refund policy. You have to have Heart and Blood to be a Real Farmer today so I tip my hat to you.
@@HomesteadingtheHardWay Man that's awful. Those commercial chicken houses came through here in the 90's when a lot of dairies were quitting. For many of those folks, their fortunes went from bad to worse.
I bet you're uncle never got over that, probably felt guilty and depressed for the rest of his life. My father, who had a good job, but loved to spend money on himself, sold everything, lots, great grandmother's house, guns, you name it. @@HomesteadingtheHardWay
The deer and other game were Hunted to extinction the only reason we have dealer today elk moose Bear it's because of fishing game enforcement to keep the poaching under control
asked your self does land own you or do you own land it was brown it was down if you could eat it you did ax and skillet nothing like homemade soap any thing home made
