Farm Small Farm Smart

In this episode, podcast host Diego interviews Alec Smith from Crop Culture Farm, a farmer starting his farm. Alec shares his experiences and challenges in balancing his farm startup with working part-time at another farm, the steps taken to set up his farm, improvements made over time, and their plans and expectations for their farm business. He also dives into the compromise between perfection and practicality in farm setup, constraints, and challenges such as time and resource management, recent achievements, and positive feedback that motivate and validate Alec's efforts.

Get time and labor-saving farm tools at shop.modern grower.co

Listen to other podcasts on the Modern Grower Podcast Network:

• Farm Small, Farm Smart
• Farm Small, Farm Smart Daily
• The Growing Microgreens Podcast

Check out Diego's book, Sell Everything You Grow, which is only $0.99 on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Sell-Everything-You-Grow-Homestead-ebook/dp/B0CJC9NTZF

Megan Neubauer from Pure Land Farm joins me to discuss her revolutionary you-pick farming model. The model is extremely profitable and gives her a lot of extra time each year to do things off the farm. Megan goes through her strategies for sales, marketing, and crop planning. You can learn more in Megan's book: Pick-Your-Own-Farming

Get time and labor-saving farm tools at shop.modern grower.co

Listen to other podcasts on the Modern Grower Podcast Network:

• Farm Small, Farm Smart
• Farm Small, Farm Smart Daily
• The Growing Microgreens Podcast

Check out Diego's book, Sell Everything You Grow, which is only $0.99 on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Sell-Everything-You-Grow-Homestead-ebook/dp/B0CJC9NTZF

Paul Dysinger, co-founder of Seedtime, joins me to talk about his journey to build the best farm and garden software ever. He shares lessons that have helped him manage time, prioritize tasks, and balance work and life.

Learn more about Seedtime [Affiliate link]

Shop all of our farm tools and equipment: https://shop.moderngrower.co/

(0:00) Thanksgiving food talk. Is the food better the next day? Top 5 sides. Pumpkin pie is gross.

(0:31:56) Farmer Mark DeRespinis describes how he has built a very successful no-till farm raising high-quality vegetables and selling them to restaurants in the Boulder, CO area.

(2:05:35) Drunk Ideas - The Michelin Star guide for produce.

Mark's farm: https://www.instagram.com/esoterraculinary/

Check out our Black Friday Sale: https://shop.moderngrower.co/

(0:00) Be careful who you take an opinion from.

(0:24:00) Farmer Ian Jerolmack talks about how they are crushing it on their farm and will do $500k in sales.

(1:27:15) Listener Q&A - Cut expenses or grow revenue?

(1:39:47) Drunk Ideas - The Auto Warner

Check out my new book, Sell Everything You Grow - only $0.99 on Amazon. https://www.amazon.com/Sell-Everything-You-Grow-Homestead-ebook/dp/B0CJC9NTZF

Adding additional crop rotations is one way to increase profits without adding more land. You can add rotations by extending your season into the spring and fall. You can also add rotations by turning crops faster. Additional rotations bring in more income, keep your customer base engaged, and live roots in your soil for longer. 10:30 Farmer Jodi Roebuck @roebuckfarm discusses how he manages winter growing on his farm. Kwik Hoops are eligible for NRCS low-tunnel grants. Protect your valuable crop from rain, wind, cold, and insects using Kwik Hoops and InsectaNet. Learn more about Jodi: https://www.roebuckfarm.com/ @roebuckfarm

We often discourage ourselves by comparing our achievements against others to those we have no business comparing against. Set your own goals and measure against those, not others. 13:15 Farmer Jodi Roebuck @roebuckfarm discusses their steps to perfect growing beets on their farm. They now grow all beets using the paperpot transplanter, which gives them a higher success rate while reducing labor. Kwik Hoops are eligible for NRCS low-tunnel grants. Protect your valuable crop from rain, wind, cold, and insects using Kwik Hoops and InsectaNet. Learn more about Jodi: https://www.roebuckfarm.com/ @roebuckfarm

In the first part of the show I try to simplify farm accounting by giving you an easy way to measure the profit per bed: Total Revenue - $225 = Profit per 100-foot bed. If you used this formula on most of your low-labor crops (not tomatoes), your profit margin will be fairly accurate. 14:19 Farmer Jodi Roebuck @roebuckfarm talks about how they grow Salanova on their farm: direct seeding, soil preparation, amendments, and harvesting. Kwik Hoops are eligible for NRCS low-tunnel grants. Protect your valuable crop from rain, wind, cold, and insects using Kwik Hoops and InsectaNet. Learn more about Jodi: https://www.roebuckfarm.com/ @roebuckfarm

The metric Dollars Per Day (DPD) is a quick and easy way to determine if one crop is more profitable than another. DPD is the revenue generated by a single crop in a single bed divided by the total days that crop was in that bed. 17:30 Farmer Jodi Roebuck @roebuckfarm talks about how they grow amazing carrots on their farm: direct seeding, soil preparation, amendments, and harvesting. Kwik Hoops are eligible for NRCS low-tunnel grants. Protect your valuable crop from rain, wind, cold, and insects using Kwik Hoops and InsectaNet. Learn more about Jodi: https://www.roebuckfarm.com/ @roebuckfarm

In Episode 16 of The Profitable Mini-Farm, farmer Jodi Roebuck @roebuckfarm discusses how he uses the Jang seeder on his farm. He also brings up several mistakes people make when using it. Get the Jang Seeder: https://paperpot.co/product-category/jang/ Learn more about Jodi: https://www.roebuckfarm.com/ @roebuckfarm Protect your valuable crop from rain, wind, cold, and insects using Kwik Hoops and InsectaNet.