What is a good cash crop?

Question

I am getting a couple of acres in southern Maine and would like to try a small farming operation. I grew up in a small farming community and I know it is a very difficult to succeed, but I thought if it were small enough I could manage it at least as supplemental income.

Would a small operation be best suited to specialty crops-- aromatic, culinary, medicinal? Any advice would be most appreciated. Thanks!

Answer 1

Berries might be an option. Herbs and vegetables if you can sell locally.

Answer 2

Read The New Organic Grower, by Eliot Coleman, he lives in Maine and has a basic plan he has layed out in the first book and a plan he lays out in the second book, The Four Season Harvest where you can be growing something all year long.

I would suggest the same thing the book is going to suggest, find out what the people around you are willing to buy and who your market is, there is no point to growing cranberries when the Ocean Spray co-op will run you out of town or $50.00/lb specialty crops when your public doesn't know what they are.

Grow what people are willing to pay for and then introduce the new stuff once they get to know you.

Good luck and happy farming

Answer 3

Depending on climate and the fact you don't have a lot of acreage, I'd try either aromatic or culinary herbs.

Answer 4

strawberries-asparagus

Answer 5

build a greenhouse and start growing california avocados.

a good illegal cash crop would be marijuana

Answer 6

Good Luck, you are entering a life of a lot of hard work and low pay. But it is very satisfying.

In Maine I would do something like blueberries. Fruit is about the highest profiting crop. And it does well sold direct to the customer which is how you will make the most profit

If you want to do aromatics or medicinals make sure you have a whole sale market to sell to as this likely will not make a lot if sold direct unless you have herbalists as customers.

The first thing you need to do is see what the market is for your area.

You also should check out http://growingformarket.com

there is a lot of information on that web site for small growers. I also highly recommend subscribing to the magazine

Answer 7

Sounds just like the thought that my wife and I have wanted to do for a long, long time.

First, it is going to really depend on the land and climate.  What do you have naturally that you can use if anything?  Meaning, if you have a bunch of maple trees, why not harvest syrup?  If there isn't anything, your options are pretty open.  I had thought about ginseng, but it takes a long time to grow.  I have thought perhaps specialty mushrooms (of the legal variety).  The key is to have a niche.  The only way to make a bit of supplemental income doing farming part time is to have something that the public is really going to want.  It isn't going to be potatoes or beans.  

Good Luck!

Answer 8

Before you try to grow aromatic, Medicinal and/or any other specialized plants, locket and fix your 'buyer and rate' on the regular basis.

I will suggest leafy Vegetables for fresh regular supply, if you are near a fairly big town. This is paying but time consuming.

Potatoes, tomatoes, asparagus etc can be sent to distance markets.

Alternatively, grow some crops like cotton or sunflower. These are less paying but you spend less time after it.

Decision really depends on local demand and market. Don't do anything unless you carry out a small market survey before hand.

Answer 9

about the only thing which will grow well in Maine is greenery, such as spinach,and potatoes. I'd suggest you forget about a two acre operation.

Answer 10

I would do black raspberries or red raspberries.  But getting them picked before they all fall off is a struggle.  My father and I used to grow a few and made money at 20% of what they charge today.  

black raspberries have come into the medical news lately and they are hard to get.  Maybe a medical company would buy a lot.

pulling out the old stalks in the fall is also a lot of work.

http://www.foxnews.com/story/0,2933,2689...

http://www.disabled-world.com/artman/pub...

http://www.lsuagcenter.com/en/food_healt...

We grew them in New Hampshire and Oregon grows them so I am pretty sure they would be ok in Maine.  I think they ripen early in the season.  I wrote to a grower in Oregon and he said end of June, first part of July.

They are soooo good.  I'll buy some from you.

EDIT  I just googled <black raspberries maine>  I guess some parts of Maine it would be too cold

http://www.umext.maine.edu/onlinepubs/ht...

Answer 11

Christmas trees or mushrooms.

Answer 12

You need to sit down with a pen a paper and make a list (and be honest with yourself).

First off, do you have any mechanical skills, gardening skills, fencing skills, ect.

What are you willing to do?  If you have milking animals you are tied down nearly 365 days of the year, every 12 hours around the clock.

If you raise U-cut Christmas trees, your holidays, starting about the week before Thankgiving, through Christmas eve will be forever taken up with your business.  

If you grow berries, your summers will be forever taken up with farming.

Are you honestly willing to make those kinds of comitments?

You need to research your local market BEFORE you get started. Where will you sell your product, and to whom?  

I live in Idaho, in the very heart of potato country.  I raise meat goats.  I have a booming business selling to the students at the local University.

Do you have a local University, no more than 40 miles from you?  Then you may have a HUGE ethnic crowd willing to buy  some unusual stuff from you that nobody else near you may be growing.  In other words, you could have a booming business with zero compitition from other farmers.  Not just growing meat animals that people from other countries desire, but you can grow a wide range of vegtables they are missing.

One thing that nearly always does well at farmer's markets are cut flowers.  They are universal in their appeal.  Many small farmers have gone with fruits and vegtables, and as an afterthought taken a few cut flowers from their garden....only to find the flowers sell like hotcakes, and the fruits and vegtables not so well.

Are you friendly and engaging?  Then you may do very well at a farmer's market.  If you prefer not to speak with people, or interact with them, you need to find something to grow that you can sell all at once to a market, or a middleman.  Sounds easy, but it's not....that means your product has to all be ready at the same time, and you HAVE to meet the dedline, or demand.  So if you find someplace to sell 50 dozen eggs all at once every weekend, they are not going to put up with it, nor care if the neighbors dog got in with your hens, and killed half your flock, and you only have 9 dozen eggs now.

Do you have a tourist trade you can tap into?  Tourists love to buy "local flavor."  So you might do very well selling blueberry jam, and syrup they can purchase and take home.

Do you own any equipment?  Tractor, manure flicker, quality shovels, hoes, pitchfork, ect?  Will you need equipment for your product, and if so, how much will it cost?

Do you have fancy resteraunts near you, that you could supply a product to?  That could be anything from herbs, fresh edible flowers, to meat rabbits.  Again, it's all about researching your possible local markets.

I also sugest reading my reply to a small farmer question:

http://answers.yahoo.com/question/index;...

It may give you some ideas of the pitfalls.

What-ever you do, start small, and learn from your mistakes.  In 1999, I started out with three goats.  I now have over 100, and I'm successful with them.

A local lady near me took out a $16,000 second mortgage on her house to buy 120 meat goats.  She lost her rear, has sold all the goats off in the past two years, and now fights to try and save her home with the huge debt she racked up (it's way over $16K now).

~Garnet

Homesteading/Farming over 20 years