Free Agricultural Services for Land Owners | Our walk-through with the local extension office

What a wonderful gentleman to share his knowledge with you. You guys are smart by learning things the right way!

That gentleman seemed to know his okra about land and profitable plantings to help pay for stuff you need. I pray all good things come your way. Y'all have been so good in helping others I think it may be your turn to be the one being helped. I think one thing I would do, just from hearing your plans, is buy a whole lot of pink ribbon for marking trees. As you are out walking the land, tie a ribbon on a tree you think you'll keep and it won't take as long to do when you get someone out to start the process or if you do it yourself, part of that work will be done. Have a Blessed day.

Nate needs a tractor ASAP. Without the equipment. You can't start a farm. You got a lot of trees in your land that you need to cut. I feel sorry for you Nate. You got a lot of work to do. Too many projects for one man. Good luck. Blessings 😊

whatever you can find a way to do without getting the gov'r involved (USDA, certified organic, etc) that is to YOUR advantage. Having done quite a bit of reading on the subject, I've come to realize that sadly, our gov't is not out for the best interest in the little guy-- their pockets are well padded by big AG, so the gov't makes things just about as difficult for the little guy as they can with inefficient rules and regulations that don't do much but annoy the small farmer. :)

Milton had some great advice. A couple pieces of advice that I would give that you can take or leave as it doesn't affect me, its just advice. With regards to equipment. Buy a brand that you can get great service for. You might like brand x but the nearest dealer is 200 mile away and brand y is 15 miles away. You might want to go with brand y even thou you may like x. Tractors break and when you need parts or service you need them now. Next buy right buy once. Don't buy to small or to big. My suggestion of a tractor for you (I will use JD as an example as its what I know but buy the brand you want) would be a 3 or 4 series I would lean more towards the 4. With a loader, CAB and 4 wheel drive. The CAB does cost more but you can work more comfortable and as a result work longer. With a CAB there are no BUGS, or weather you can't keep working in. If its raining you can keep working, if its 100degrees and high humidity, you can keep working, and so on. As for attachment Milton was spot on. 1. brush hog, 2. grapple, 3. tiller, 4. pallet forks (for bulk deliveries of feed or palletized items/supplies) 5. post hole digger, 6. box blade or land plane for land leveling after clearing and for maintaining trails and roads. These can be bought over time and as the need arises. Another piece of equipment to get is a trailer of some kind. Get one that will work behind the truck and tractor and not necessarily a cattle trailer as that is limiting. A dump trailer or flat trailer that you can put sides on would give you the most bang for you buck. You will need to get supplies (ie fence posts, lumber, compost, gravel, feed, animals, etc.) Possible get one big enough to put your tractor on. Hope this is helpful to you Nate and Katie.

One important thing to know about buying tractors is that older tractors are more expensive because they are easier and faster to repair and have parts available as newer ones have to many restrictions on what you can personally do to it with out bringing it in to the dealer. It’s a right to repair issue and is a big issue these days where companies intentionally program tractors and other electronics to where if you work on it they will disable the tractors so that you are forced to bring it in to the dealer.

What a great resource! It's so encouraging to be reminded that there are resources available AND they want you/us to succeed! I'm so glad he was willing to be on camera and openly share his knowledge/experiences. You and Katie are demonstrating the benefits of being patient and pulling in a variety of experts to help determine your 5, 10, 15+ year plans. (PLUS we are probably all thrilled with his huge endorsement in stressing the critical need in purchasing a tractor asap....way to much work for 1 man to do safely (plus you need to protect your back and knees to ensure you can still do a lot in your 80's :D)

Nate, Katie, listen to Melvin, as he is parroting everything I have been suggesting you do as far as a tractor. I am glad you have been pricing Kubota as they are high quality machines. Go see the local dealer and make a deal. Be sure to buy 40 hp at least. He makes a lot of sense. Go for it!

I hope tons of ppl watch this. It was incredibly helpful, and I live in a city!

Yes, with Black Walnut you need to research what can grow near them. We have one on our property line and had to see what would grow in our backyard. We found that cherry trees are tolerant to the jugalone. It’s easier to find a list of what can grow than what can’t. I did find that apple are not tolerant. We really wanted apple trees so we placed them further away from the walnut with a cherry tree between.

Just a thought, I don't know if you follow "Just a few archers farm", but the way he takes care of his pigs might be a good thing for you to look into. He is in upstate New York and sells at farmers markets 2 days a week. He also offers information on running a small farm every Sunday usually. He enjoys explaining and comparisons and bad dad jokes. Check out his channel, he might have some good ideas for you. Bless you in all your endeavors.

This gentleman is quite the expert on your property and has great ideas for you to grow! He’s an awesome resource.

Mahindra 6075 front and louder with grapple Outbeats and outweighs everything else With the most impressive front end loader and grapple power and better warranty Everything is heavy duty still no cheap plastic No diesel exhaust Fluid

What a knowledgeable man. I really enjoyed listening to him.

Nate & Katie, in our area we have a publication that comes out weekly called The Farm and Dairy. It has all kinds of info for those types of interests as well as real estate and upcoming auctions for sale. That’s where you may have better luck finding the farming equipment that you need. I bet Tennessee has something similar. Good luck!

So glad you video document. My head is spinning with all this info. I do sense though, that the more info you have, the more doable this becomes .

I've watched so many homesteading videos and the people always cut all the trees and burn everything, bad idea. Then they all say the same thing, I wish I would have saved some firewood. Cut the trees debranch the trunks and store the logs for later, maybe buy a bandsaw mill and make some lumber but don't push everything into a pile and burn it, big waste of money when it gets cold out. Besides use some of the logs to build a smoke house for your hams and maybe a pier at your pond and stock it with good size fish and charge for leisure fishing and supply a few BBQ grills around the pond. Maybe even a small camping area next to the pond for tents.

While he was talking about breeding pigs I wondered if you had watched Just a Few Acres Farm YouTube channel. They breed pigs for selling meat at a farmers market, plus chickens. They also have Dexter cattle they breed and slaughter the steers. I was thinking their setup for pigs might interest you. Hi from Australia.

Yeah, happy to see you with a USDA county extension agent, or extension representative. Ask him about Master Gardner program. It’s a 12 week course, 3 hours a week, only cost is the manual for the course, that you keep. You learn a lot, a lot more than garden knowledge.

“Blah blah…. You need to get a tractor soon… blah blah.” 😉 Just kidding, loved the way he explained things and the options he gave.