A Farm Master Plan

Since posting a picture of the rough layout of the farm, several people asked me for more details and about my master plan for the farm. I bet they all must read Leigh's blog too, since Leigh just recently chatted about her master farm plan. 

My farm plan is not based on some magazine or book. Originally way back when we first bought the land, it actually was but reality quickly set in and I discarded those initial plans. Frankly, a lot of the stuff I've seen published turned out not to be applicable to my land or climate. Good thing I chucked out those ideas early on. Otherwise I might have denuded my land of trees, gotten committed to spending lots of money, and still have ended up with something that didn't work very well for us. 

So....... My farm plan is now based upon my observations of the sun, wind, water, shade, trees, and taking into consideration the hills & dips, and ergonomics of the whole thing. So is my farm laid out perfectly? Nope. I started out using a plan I saw in some book then changed horses mid stream. So the farm still shows signs of that early aborted attempt. Gradually the remnants of the original plan may morph or perhaps disappear over time, but for right now the glitches are still visible. They don't annoy me though. I view them as future projects for making changes and twerking the plan. 

Since the farm is 20 acres, I'll break it into segments in order to talk about it. Things I'll talk about will be the pastures, the orchard trees, the food gardens, the fodder gardens, the water system, the livestock plan. I'll talk about what I've completed so far and what the future plan is. 

In fairly busy right now, so I won't be getting through this farm dissertation quickly. But if you bear with me and you'll end up with a pretty good picture of my homestead farm. Keep in mind that nothing is set in stone. I tend to meander with ideas and projects, and I love to start new experiments at the drop of a hat. Gosh, if one can't play while going through life, what's the sense of living? I did the drop dead serious stuff in my previous career. Now it's time to enjoy life.