starting up in farming

madlad7530

Hi I am 13 and im feckin mad into farming.
I've wanted to farm ever since I could remember.
At the moment I work during harvest with a friend of mine down the road from me in Wicklow.
I was just wondering if you lads could give me some tips on how to become a full time farmer or am I better off working for a contractor or am I mad to be getting into farming.
All help and tips would be really

greysides

madlad7530 wrote: »

Hi I am 13 and im feckin mad into farming.
I've wanted to farm ever since I could remember.
At the moment I work during harvest with a friend of mine down the road from me in Wicklow.
I was just wondering if you lads could give me some tips on how to become a full time farmer or am I better off working for a contractor or am I mad to be getting into farming.
All help and tips would be really

Welcome to the forum. The future of farming will someday be in hands like yours. Many of the posters here will have young farmers of your age on their own farms and I'm sure they'll provide with good useful advice.

madlad7530

thanks very much

Greengrass1

What are ye most interested in to do with farming?
Tractors and machinery or cows and sheep?

uinsean

HI, I'm very interested in this post and how it develops. 20 years ago I spent a lot of my childhood on a family farm and as it turns out, the farm is essentially going to be mine in the next 18 months. I'm part of the rat race in Dublin and would love nothing more to be out of it. I'm sure farming has changed a lot in 20 years so like the OP, i'm wondering where to start. 65 acres or so, some in tillage some in grass at the moment. Current renters moving out.

I've no preference, I assume tillage is the easiest to get into for now, see how it goes? I would appreciate any help, even advise on where to start, Teagasc for example, the department..?

Timmaay

Neighbour of mine started out with nothing and is now renting 150 acres and running a 90cow herd, and making a very tidy living for himself. It most certainly wasn't easy, he was heavily borrowed and not long setup when 2009 hit. But the main thing is he has always treated it as a business, and is in a much better position now as a result than many other long established dairy farmers who would have got handed farms.

What part of wicklow anyways? Your best bet actually is go join the macra and find a nice young daughter of a dairy farmer ha

madlad7530

Greengrass1 wrote: »

What are ye most interested in to do with farming?
Tractors and machinery or cows and sheep?

I'd be mainly into tillage work

madlad7530

I'm from originally from Craanford outside gorey in Wexford but moved up to Greystones as the father works in rte

greysides

madlad7530 wrote: »

I'm from originally from Craanford outside gorey in Wexford but moved up to Greystones as the father works in rte

Know it well. Good land there for tillage or animals.

Greengrass1

madlad7530 wrote: »

I'm from originally from Craanford outside gorey in Wexford but moved up to Greystones as the father works in rte

Grassormuck here might be helpful for ye so. He's an Irish lad managing a big tillage operation in England.
He would have lots of info for ye.
Welcome to boards

larrymiller

Greengrass1 wrote: »

Grassormuck here might be helpful for ye so. He's an Irish lad managing a big tillage operation in England.
He would have lots of info for ye.
Welcome to boards

I was wondering where he was I was afraid to ask incase he'd get offended and close his account

Greengrass1

larrymiller wrote: »

I was wondering where he was I was afraid to ask incase he'd get offended and close his account

He has some gear up on the grain price thread.

larrymiller

Greengrass1 wrote: »

He has some gear up on the grain price thread.

Stop makes me feel sh1tty with me 3 sod reversible

Timmaay

The other thing I'd say is good get as good an education as you can, I did 8 yrs in total, in an area totally outside of farming ha. Now that I'm back full time farming it might on paper appear to be a waste, but I don't regret one day of it, and I'll probably return to that area in time, who knows what way farming will be in 5/10years anyways ha, the arse could be gone out of it!

Timmaay

uinsean wrote: »

HI, I'm very interested in this post and how it develops. 20 years ago I spent a lot of my childhood on a family farm and as it turns out, the farm is essentially going to be mine in the next 18 months. I'm part of the rat race in Dublin and would love nothing more to be out of it. I'm sure farming has changed a lot in 20 years so like the OP, i'm wondering where to start. 65 acres or so, some in tillage some in grass at the moment. Current renters moving out.

I've no preference, I assume tillage is the easiest to get into for now, see how it goes? I would appreciate any help, even advise on where to start, Teagasc for example, the department..?

All I'll say is 65 acres will not be enough to earn you a living. And tillage with rented land is very very marginal, combine that with your lack of experience and unfortunately the odds will be stacked against you for the 1st few years so thread carefully. Maybe I'm being harsh but I'd say there is an element of the grass is always greener, you might be stuck in a rat race in the city now, but when it boils down to it, the conacre market could be called one huge rat race also ha! By the sounds of it country life might well suit you better if it's where you grew up, but don't expect farming to be much easier. Would you not consider finding a job in a similar area local to the farm, and dip your toes into the farming slowly, maybe rent out the tillage part for afew more years and run afew stock on the grassland.

Zr105

Timmaay wrote: »

The other thing I'd say is good get as good an education as you can, I did 8 yrs in total, in an area totally outside of farming ha. Now that I'm back full time farming it might on paper appear to be a waste, but I don't regret one day of it, and I'll probably return to that area in time, who knows what way farming will be in 5/10years anyways ha, the arse could be gone out of it!

Id second this! 4year degree behind me and as much as i hated doing it and being stuck in dublin it was shall we say an education in an awful lot more than my course! Back home now for the moment but prob will have to go working at it for a while!

epfff

get 3rd level qualification first anyway for personal development if nothing else
very difficult to get started in this country with inheriting some land due to cost of entry and very few long term leases avaible
I only see an existence to be achieved from it unless you are large scale300 + acres or 130+ cows milking the way you can hire another labour unit for some time off

waalaa

Work hard in school, play sports, have fun, make mistakes, kiss lots of girls or boys, get a good leaving cert. If when you are 18 and still enthusiastic about farming go to college try earn a degree, it could be directly or indirectly related agriculture. Work hard in college, be active, have fun, make more mistakes, do stuff with lots of girls or boys, get your degree. If you still can't shake the farming bug, travel. See how the rest of the world produces its food, from the vast to the small and highly efficient farming industries.

If you're still up for it bring some eagerness, ideas and work ethic and put into practice what you have learned. Then come back to boards and complain about the factories.

madlad7530

waalaa wrote: »

Work hard in school, play sports, have fun, make mistakes, kiss lots of girls or boys, get a good leaving cert. If when you are 18 and still enthusiastic about farming go to college try earn a degree, it could be directly or indirectly related agriculture. Work hard in college, be active, have fun, make more mistakes, do stuff with lots of girls or boys, get your degree. If you still can't shake the farming bug, travel. See how the rest of the world produces its food, from the vast to the small and highly efficient farming industries.

If you're still up for it bring some eagerness, ideas and work ethic and put into practice what you have learned. Then come back to boards and complain about the factories.

Cheers lad

madlad7530

Appreciate the feedback lads

Reggie.

Im one to talk here but stay away from machinery unless someone else owns it
Bloody break your heart it will

adam14

I don't mean to be negative, but unless you win the lotto or are destined to inherit land you will never be able to start farming in north Wicklow. Land never comes up for rent - most of it is leased by about 3 big tillage/potato farmers. It might be different if you move back to Wexford. As previous posters said get more experience and go to college.

uinsean

Timmaay wrote: »

All I'll say is 65 acres will not be enough to earn you a living. And tillage with rented land is very very marginal, combine that with your lack of experience and unfortunately the odds will be stacked against you for the 1st few years so thread carefully. Maybe I'm being harsh but I'd say there is an element of the grass is always greener, you might be stuck in a rat race in the city now, but when it boils down to it, the conacre market could be called one huge rat race also ha! By the sounds of it country life might well suit you better if it's where you grew up, but don't expect farming to be much easier. Would you not consider finding a job in a similar area local to the farm, and dip your toes into the farming slowly, maybe rent out the tillage part for afew more years and run afew stock on the grassland.

Thanks for that, yes I thought the 65 acres would not be enough, but I'm going to meet up with Teagasc and so on and will be thread carefully for the next few years. I fully appreciate that farming is pretty much a rat race as well, but its probably the only rat race that would actually motivate me. I also look at farming as a hard way of life, I had enough uncles slaving over land to prove that. BUT I'm not the first that is drawn to it and won't be the last I feel. If I can earn a supplementary income from it I would be happy. Thanks for the feedback.

micraX

waalaa wrote: »

Work hard in school, play sports, have fun, make mistakes, kiss lots of girls or boys, get a good leaving cert. If when you are 18 and still enthusiastic about farming go to college try earn a degree, it could be directly or indirectly related agriculture. Work hard in college, be active, have fun, make more mistakes, do stuff with lots of girls or boys, get your degree. If you still can't shake the farming bug, travel. See how the rest of the world produces its food, from the vast to the small and highly efficient farming industries.

If you're still up for it bring some eagerness, ideas and work ethic and put into practice what you have learned. Then come back to boards and complain about the factories.

Or the supermarkets or facilitators. Farming isn't just about lads complaining about factorys..

arctictree

adam14 wrote: »

I don't mean to be negative, but unless you win the lotto or are destined to inherit land you will never be able to start farming in north Wicklow.

Incorrect, I did it. But I will never really make a living full time from farming. You need another well paying job to subsidise you while you pay for fencing, buildings, machinery and stock.

adam14

arctictree wrote: »

Incorrect, I did it. But I will never really make a living full time from farming. You need another well paying job to subsidise you while you pay for fencing, buildings, machinery and stock.

Hi arctictree - he's into tillage , not sheep. Unless you have big scale, you will need an off farm job. A 200 acre tillage farm made €3.7 million in Newcastle last month. Land to rent for tillage is simply not there and the margins are too tight unless you have the scale.

arctictree

adam14 wrote: »

Hi arctictree - he's into tillage , not sheep. Unless you have big scale, you will need an off farm job. A 200 acre tillage farm made €3.7 million in Newcastle last month. Land to rent for tillage is simply not there and the margins are too tight unless you have the scale.

True, the economics don't really make sense.

Farmer Pudsey

waalaa wrote: »

Work hard in school, play sports, have fun, make mistakes, kiss lots of girls or boys, get a good leaving cert. If when you are 18 and still enthusiastic about farming go to college try earn a degree, it could be directly or indirectly related agriculture. Work hard in college, be active, have fun, make more mistakes, do stuff with lots of girls or boys, get your degree. If you still can't shake the farming bug, travel. See how the rest of the world produces its food, from the vast to the small and highly efficient farming industries.

If you're still up for it bring some eagerness, ideas and work ethic and put into practice what you have learned. Then come back to boards and complain about the factories.

I agree with all the above except one piece of advice do not get an agri related degree if you intend farming as in farming not agri related work. The reason one of the real advantages that loads of part time farmers is that they do not consider it a struggle as it is differen to there daytime jobs. Nothing worse to dealing with farmers all day and going farming that evening. Also all your eggs will not be in the one basket no point in being farming during an agri downturn and your day job wages under pressure as well

Willfarman

If farming is your passion it's never work. There is money in farming. And agri related business is a huge industry. You will never starve and you will spend your days doing something that you love.

Reggie.

Willfarman wrote: »

If farming is your passion it's never work. There is money in farming. And agri related business is a huge industry. You will never starve and you will spend your days doing something that you love.

+1

madlad7530

Timmaay wrote: »

All I'll say is 65 acres will not be enough to earn you a living. And tillage with rented land is very very marginal, combine that with your lack of experience and unfortunately the odds will be stacked against you for the 1st few years so thread carefully. Maybe I'm being harsh but I'd say there is an element of the grass is always greener, you might be stuck in a rat race in the city now, but when it boils down to it, the conacre market could be called one huge rat race also ha! By the sounds of it country life might well suit you better if it's where you grew up, but don't expect farming to be much easier. Would you not consider finding a job in a similar area local to the farm, and dip your toes into the farming slowly, maybe rent out the tillage part for afew more years and run afew stock on the grassland.

ya sure i was thinking i might be better off working for a contractor