Financial Fitness for Farmers

Here is some information and resources that I gathered at the Financial Fitness for Farmers class that I attended March 11th.  Each of us were given a copy of this book:

Fearless Farm Finances.
This book will help you understand basic financial management for your farm. Includes instructions, tips and tools–plus real-life examples from successful farmers and sample data from fictitious farmer “Otto B. Organic.”

Financial Fitness for Farmers

This presentation was presented by Kathleen Painter.  She is an Extension Educator in Boundary County, Idaho.  She has a PhD in agricultural economics.  Here are the topics we discussed:

Balance Sheet - summarizes the financial condition of your farm at one point in time

Here is an example of a Balance Sheet

Income Statement - summarizes the revenue and expenses for a given accounting period

Enterprise Budgeting - the best way to determine profitability of a specific crop or livestock operation is to develop an enterprise budget. An enterprise budget is an estimate of the costs and economic returns (profit) for a particular crop or livestock enterprise.

Cash Flow Budgeting - a summary of the projected cash inflows and outflows for a business over a given period of time.

A "Statement" is history and a "Budget" is a projection into the future.

There are a lot of nice resources, tools and templates available at the Maine Small Business Development Center website.  Click on picture above to visit their Tools and Templates webpage.

One of the resources listed in our book is The Carrot Project.  I checked out their website and they have some webinars that cover using Quickbooks and Basic Accounting for Farmers:

Click to watch Part 1 of the Basic Accounting for Farmers.  

Julia Shank Food Consulting website has a nice list of short videos that explain all the accounting terms that I noted above.  For example, click HERE to view a short video on cash vs. accrual accounting.

Having good finances can help you make decisions on how to make your farm more productive.  

Star garnets and fruit tree pruning

Idaho is the Gem State

Here is some information about star garnets from www.gemselect.com:

Star garnet is an unusual form of garnet...Star garnets are so rare that to date they have only been found in two places in the world; in the state of Idaho in the USA and in India. The garnet varieties that occasionally exhibit asterism (aka "stars") are almandine and a mixture of almandine and pyrope garnet.

Star garnet gemstones are usually opaque and deep brownish-red or reddish-black. Like all star gems, the star effect is caused by inclusions of rutile. In order to display the star effect, the rutile needles must have the correct alignment to reflect light in a pattern forming a mult-rayed star.

Most star garnets display a 4-rayed star, but 6-rayed stars are sometimes seen. Some gemstone dealers claim that only the Idaho star garnets ever display a 6-rayed star, but this claim is difficult to verify since specimens with 6-rayed stars are very rare.

The people of Idaho are so proud of their star garnet deposits that star garnet has been declared the state gemstone. Star garnets are mined in Northern Idaho in a region that is northeast of Moscow and southeast of Coeur d'Alene.

The star effect in most star garnet gemstones is subtle and requires the correct lighting to be seen clearly. The best lighting is direct sunlight. However, a light source such as a narrow beam halogen spotlight or small flashlight will also work. The star is best seen by standing directly above the stone and looking straight down.

Each summer, our family goes out to look for star garnets.  It is important to know that not all garnets have stars.  Emerald Creek is only an hour and fifteen minute drive from Moscow.  I have about a dozen star garnets but have never had any made into jewelry.  Some day I will...

Anyway, after 5 years of collecting garnets, I decided to try and put them into a rock tumbler to make them look nicer.  The rough stones are not so pretty.  There are 4 steps to tumbling.  You start with a course grit and then the grit gets smaller and then there are 2 polishing steps at the end.  It takes weeks.  The first step takes 2 weeks alone. 

Here are the rough rocks...

  After the first tumbling...

After the second tumbling...

After first polishing...

After final polishing...

The final garnets are much nicer looking than the original rocks.  I am still looking for a nice way to display them.

If you are interested in going to get your own star garnets, click HERE to get information on when and where to go and how to get a permit.

Fruit Trees

A couple of weeks ago, I attended a stone fruit tree pruning workshop at Palouse Clearwater Environmental Institute.  It was sponsored by the Moscow Tree Commission and Moscow Parks and Recreation.  We were given a handout and talked about "heading back" to stimulate bud growth and "thinning" where an entire branch is removed back to the main stem.  We were also given a list of rules for pruning and helpful tools and then we headed out to the Rabbit Hills Orchard to do some hands on work.  The Rabbit Hills Orchard contains over 40 different plum trees!

One of the most interesting things I learned was about the age of the wood that will flower.  For example, peach fruit flowers only on 1 year old wood.  Plums fruit on 2 year old wood.  So, you would not want to take all the 2 year old wood out of a plum tree or you would not have any fruit!

Honey!!!

Beekeeping

As I had reported a few weeks ago, the bees did not make it through the winter.  The big question was "Should we take the honey?"  I really struggled with this decision.  I tried to read about what to do, I make phone calls, and asked on top bar forums and got mixed answers (no surprise there...).  I went into the hive and started cleaning things out.

I could tell that the bees were not located close enough to the honey.  That is probably one reason they did not make it.  Live and learn...

The good news is that there is lots of nice brood comb all ready for the new bees.  Once I got in there, I decided that we would take the honey and feed the bees with sugar water to get the new bees started. I kinda figured that the last bees started with absolutely nothing and they were quite prolific.  At least the new bees will not be starting from scratch.  Making beeswax for the comb is labor intensive for the bees and now they have at least 10 bars of brood comb to get them going so they can immediately start concentrating on stashing honey.

In addition, we might be moving the hive soon (hint, hint) and it would be easier to move an empty hive than one full of 30 pounds of honey.  

Here I am getting started with collecting the honey.  When you have a top bar hive, you have to collect the honey by crushing the honeycomb and then straining out the honey.  I am using the yellow buckets on the left for this.  The top is lined with a cloth strainer and it has holes in the bottom to allow the honey to flow through into the bottom bucket.

Here I have separated the bars.  All the bars on the right are being saved for brood comb for the new bees.  The bars on the left will be harvested for honey.

Here is some comb that I melted down to save for beeswax.

Here is the inside of the top bucket.  I used a potato masher to crush up the comb to release the honey.

 We let the honey drain for a week.  Then, put it into jars.

Here is the crushed comb that I melted down for beeswax.  I knew there was going to be a little more honey left in the comb but I ended up getting 3 more pints of honey out of the wax!  

Here is some of the honey we collected.  We got well over a gallon of honey!

Last weekend, Mark and I went to the arboretum at the University of Idaho for a walk.  This heath was blooming and we saw some bees there!

Sustainable Farm Law 101

The past couple of weeks, I attended 2 workshops that were sponsored by Rural Roots.

Rural Roots mission is to support and enhance sustainable agriculture and local food systems in the Inland NW and beyond.  The first presentation was about Sustainable Farm Law 101.  I will be discussing this one today.  The second presentation was about Farm Finances.  I will talk about the Farm Finances presentation in a future blog...

Farm Law

The Sustainable Farm Law presentation was presented by Farm Commons.  

 

Farm Commons believes strong, resilient, sustainable farm businesses are built on a solid legal foundation.  Farm Commons has a good amount of free training's on their website.  Just click on the "Tutorial" tab.

Our first point of discussion was Entities.  The focus of the discussion was on the differences between a sole proprietorship, a limited liability company (LLC) and a corporation.  There is a nice tutorial called "The What, Why and How of Choosing and Organizing a Business Entity for the Farm" on the Farm Commons website.  

Next point of discussion was Land Matters and leasing versus buying farm land.  We discussed what to look for in a lease and to make sure to know any zoning regulations that might limit what you can do on the property.  There is a tutorial about lease issues called "Farmland Leases Built to Last: Content and Legal Context".

Sales and indemnification was the next topic.  This included discussions of selling wholesale versus direct sales and doing a Community Support Agriculture (CSA) model.  Most importantly is negotiating the sales agreement.  Sales Contracts for Farm Produce: Why and How is a tutorial with this information.  

Next topic was workers.  This included discussion of interns, volunteers, employees and contractors.  Another tutorial addresses this issue:  Making Employment Law Work For Your Farm.  Employment law is probably the single most complex legal concern for farmers so it's important to get it right.

Food Safety was the next topic.  Food Safety Liability And Regulations For The Farm is a tutorial that addresses these concerns.  Each state has different regulations about food safety so it is important to know what regulations are for your area.

Lastly, we talked about agritourism.  Having on farm events is a great way to promote your farm but there are lots of legakl issues to consider.  Hosting Safe, Legally Secure Farm Events provides some direction about how to legally host a safe event.  

Another underlying message of the day was the importance of having appropriate insurance to protect your farm.  Insurance for the Farm: Policies and Principles to Efficiently Manage Risk covers common insurance options and how to navigate them to find the right policy for your farm. 

So, if you took the time to watch all these tutorials, you would pretty much have all the information that I got that day.  Each tutorial is about 1 hour 30 minutes long. 

Sunflower seed order!

In the Field

Well, obviously, I am not in the field yet but getting ready for it.  I placed my sunflower seed order today.  I will still be growing at Meadowlark Heritage Farms this summer.  I have 6 - 100 foot rows there.  I am going to only plant single stem varieties this year and I am going to try and grow 3 rows of flowers in each larger row.  So, I am really packing them in because I want to see how "dense" I can plant and still get a good harvest.  I will be planting all direct seed into the soil this year.  Last year, I tried some transplants but I did not see enough of a difference to justify the transplanting (it was a little bit extra work...).

I went to the Johnny Seed website to place my order and found that there have been several new varieties out this year.  So, here are the "new" ones that I am trying this year:

Sunrich Lime - New!  Bright, lemon-yellow petals surround a lime-green disk.

Sunrich Limoncello - New!  Lemon-yellow petals with a ray of bright yellow at the center. The bicolor petals give the blooms an enhanced three-dimensional appearance.

ProCut Plum - Exciting new addition to the ProCut series.  Muted plum-to-cream bicolor blooms combine well with soft or vivid colors.

ProCut Red - It took years of breeding efforts to produce this impressive red ProCut sunflower. Early blooms are produced on long, strong, single stems. 

Sunbright Supreme - Blooms more quickly than Sunbright under short days.  More rounded petals and shorter, more rigid stems with reduced lower leaves make this an excellent variety for bouquet work.

ProCut Peach - Peach-colored petals with a dark disc.

I had no idea there were so many new sunflowers being introduced so this was a pleasant surprise.  I am most excited about the red.  In the past, the only red available was a branching variety which is not so great for cut flowers.  I am also planting 7 other varieties that I have planted in the past that are reliable producers.  I am so excited to be introducing some new sunflowers again this year!

Sad bee news...

Beekeeping

As you can probably guess from the title of this blog, our bees have died.  I know they were alive in December because we saw some dead ones outside the entrance of the hive.  This may sound contradictory but seeing dead bees is actually a good sign because it means that the bees are keeping the hive clean (and throwing out the dead bees).

Last Saturday, Joshua's 4-H beekeeping group had their first meeting.  Our leader, Alison, said she had 12 hives going into winter and that 4 were still alive.  Another family had 4 hives and 1 made it through the winter.  So, it seems that about 25% of hives were successful in our little group.  

The silver lining is that the bees did not get around to eating a lot of the honey so I think we can go in and harvest some out.  It looks like we will be starting over and I have already placed an order for new bees that should come in April.

We are not sure why the bees did not make it.  I don't think we did anything wrong.  It is just how it goes with honeybees.  It has been one of the coldest and snowiest winters.  That may have had some effect.  I just love this picture that Henry took of the beehive with all the snow.  

Business Plan...

Business Plan...

This is going to be a short (or long) post...I guess it depends how you look at it.  I am posting the business plan.  If you take the time to read the Business Plan...I guess that would make it a long post.  

This is our first draft.  I have gotten some feedback from one of my friends but I have not even had time to look at it.  I think we are going to take this year (2017) to perfect the Plan.  

I have sent the plan to the Small Farms U of I Extension personnel but they have not had time to get back to me.

I was at a meeting a couple of weeks ago and met someone from SCORE.

SCORE Spokane volunteers are real-world professionals with time- tested knowledge who donate thousands of hours to help small businesses like yours succeed. Counselors are experts in such areas as accounting, finance, marketing, technology, management and business plan preparation.

Services offered by SCORE include: 
Free face-to-face business counseling/mentoring -- by appointment only
E-mail counseling/mentoring
Workshops

He said I could send him the Business Plan and they would assign a Counselor to work with me through all the details of getting a business started and it's all free!  So, I am going to wait and get feedback from the Small Farms Coordinator and then make those changes and send to SCORE.

Here it is:  Business Plan

Constructive criticism is appreciated...happy reading!