80 acres is pretty big though. I lived in the middle of miles and miles of stone fruits out in palisade Colorado. thousands of acres of conventional orchards, trees and fruit, but very rarely birds or bees, lots of mosquitos though! do you guys have issues with pesticides harming birds and bees? what other kind of agriculture happens where you are?
80 acres is big enough to need about 20 pickers to make it through harvest without fruit getting overripe. 30 is ideal to get it done the smoothest. The last three years we've had ~10. The border is getting shut down and its difficult. Americans are starting to make it this way; for the first time in my life last year, 5 out of 10 pickers were white. We cut some poorly producing trees down over winter so we can redirect.
We have TONS of birds where we live. Starling, sparrow, robin, king birds, goldfinch (state bird of WA), pheasant (a family nested in our orchard this winter and I nearly walked into the chicks this spring while walking my dogs), vultures, osprey, chicken hawk (a family nested IN our shop last year, pretty cool), red tail hawk, and the occasional eagle. We also have a fair amount of coyotes and deer.
You mentioned the thousand acre style orchards and there is a company here that has one. They are the Gebbers. They own an empire. They flood the market with poor cherries and drop the prices for us medium sized guys. The smaller than us farmer usually sells at farmer's markets and makes their own price. We are stuck in a poor middle ground. Downsizing is possibly our best option at this point. Sadly we can't go organic if we wanted to because our neighbors are in close enough proximity that they would prevent our certification.
Bees: As long as I can remember, this whole area hasnt had many honey bees. We have a lot of hornets and wasps, mosquitoes vary from year to year. This year isnt bad, last year, within 10 seconds of walking outside, if you didn't get bit you were lucky. We always pull in honeybees from a bee keeper. The cool thing there is he gives us a few gallons of raw honey from the bees from our orchard.
Other agriculture: apricots and peaches are fairly big. Plums as well. I don't know who is organic or not by driving around, but one of my best friend's parents have been organic for 20 years and they grow apricots, nectarines, and peaches. Also, they raise alpacas and harvest the yarn. They are real naturey people. The mom is a vegetarian and has been since 14. She doesn't eat "anything with a face." I've had a bit of discussion with her about my raw paleo, and she said "eatin like a caveman?" haha I love them.
There is a fair amount of cattle raising too, but a lot that's grain fed.
The Gebbers also run a logging company, if you want to consider that agriculture. They are very well off. Their weekly payroll during cherry harvest is over $1 million. The employees they pay are Jamaicans they paid to get visas and flew them in. This is, again, due to the shortage of mexican pickers. So the little guy suffers while the big guy has no problem fronting a little more money to make even more. They are buying up almost every orchard around the area.
Since searching like crazy I've been able to find some smaller animal raising farms and am trying to make friends with them. (sheep, goats, cattle, all grass fed and hormone free etc.)
Although the area resides where 3 rivers connect, there is very little professional fishing.
I can't think of much else.
also when are you going to convince your family you are going to take over the farm, start planting nut trees, natives, medicinal herbs, asparagus and all kinds of mushrooms, get sheep, ducks, pigs, turkeys and chicken, and turn that shit into a legit farm?
haha, 80 acres changes slowly. Especially when the last two years have been nothing but loss. I have no interest in taking over, solely helping after a two year loss before committing to a career. You see, I graduated college and they needed serious help. So I took time to work the farm and try and help. I'm working on getting us away from the big corporate packing shed (that many others seem to think they are changing, caring less and less about the growers) and getting us plugged into farmers markets that can handle approx 400,000 lbs. of fruit.
IF I were to utilize this land, I'd keep the shop area for butchering/storage/general use/ etc. and have stables. Most of the trees would come out, leaving just enough that could be picked by no more than 10 people, preferably 5 or less, myself included, self pack the fruit, and the rest of the land which is on a steep hillside would grow grass/hay/alfalfa. I'd train my dog to herd (the one in my profile pic, a German Shepherd from East German and Czech lines, wonderful working dog) and I'd raise sheep, goats, and cows. My interest in pigs is minimal, it's my love of jewish things. And since going raw, my interest in farmed poultry has waned dramatically. I may get into it eventually, but for now, I want to find that pheasant living outside.
My brother has started a garden this year and he's the one more interested in plant foods. I've always been interested in animal foods. Any knowledge of the Hebrew view on Cain and Abel?
