In Search of Land

The winter time is a great time of reflection.  Once the poultry season begins in May, things get very busy.  Only this year, it may be different.  As I reflect on the coming year I'm at a loss for what may happen.  It's gray and distant from this vantage point.  I'm not scared though.  I've been here before.  Yet even though I may not be scared I must recognize that planning the rest of the year, at this point, is impossible. 

As you know, I have a whole passel of kids.  Right now we are a family of 7 wandering this wilderness together.  Come March we're looking at a becoming a family of 8 and right now we live in a 1,000 square foot house in the suburbs.

Yes, I double checked those numbers and there are no typos.

We're living in our starter home.  When we bought I didn't realize that we would be "starting" for the next 12 years.  But never one to move too fast, I've steadily paid down our mortgage.  My goal was to pay it down, collect some serious equity, and then put a big down payment on a bigger home.  Then the market crashed.  Like so many people I went under water for a while.  Fortunately I was in a position to get my head above water quickly.  That's primarily because I did have so much equity built up.  I also failed to mention that I never intended to raise livestock.  I always thought it would be very cool.  My grandpa raised livestock and I loved helping him, but it always seemed like a pipe dream to me; something to long for and never achieve.  That was my thinking until about 3 years ago.  It was then that God began to show me a life where our family would raise livestock.

My friend, of course, let me use his land and we began raising poultry.  It's been a great experience, but it's become very difficult to raise livestock at another farm.  Logistically it's challenging.  Each year I impose upon my friend and his family to help in the day to day care of the birds.  They never complain, and I think to some degree they even like it, but it can be a burden to care for several hundred critters at the time. 

And so I find myself searching for a house with a little bit of land in the country.

The vision I have is to set up a homestead with my family.  I'd like to have a home a bit bigger than the one we have now and seated on some acreage.  I'd like to grow a bigger garden than what we can today and plan to supply our table with as much of our homegrown fruits and vegetable as I can.  I'd like to begin raising chickens, turkeys, rabbits, and sheep.  Eventually I'd like to add cattle.  I'd like to do all of this with the hope of giving to my children experience in hard work, sustainable living, and running a business.  And then, I'd want to expand!

No, I'm talking about franchising or becoming a land baron.  Rather I have a vision to work with other local people in the pursuit of creating an agrarian network.  For instance, you might be shopping at your local farmers market.  You see a booth where they are selling seeds they have harvested from heirloom vegetables, and you ask about chicken.  The farmer let's you know that he can get chicken for you.  The next week at the market you see him again and he indeed has fresh pastured chicken for you.  What you don't know is that he doesn't raise chicken.  He got it from me.  But he's part of the "network".  He's your reliable farmer.  The people in the "network" trade and barter for fresh homemade/homegrown goods.  In this way no one person has to bear the burden of having lots of land and working in every facet of the farm.  Some may want to and I applaud them.  Many of us cannot.  But together we can create an agrarian community of producers and buyers alike, dedicated to preserving the past, feeding the present, and creating a sustainable future.  In short, live a simple life.

The Other White Meat

I was approached by a work associate who is originally from India about buying pasture based (or wild as he calls them) chickens.  I confess that I was a bit surprised, not because he is Indian, but because it was a question really out of the blue.  Do I know where to get chickens?  Is the Pope Catholic? So I gave him my business card.  I gave him several.  I told him to pass the word along.  Then he wanted to know if I sold something else.  Something he really wanted.  Something that was, for him, a treat.

Rabbit.

I said, "To eat?"

He said, "Yes, to eat."

I said, "I don't think I've ever had rabbit."

He said, "If you are liking meat, you are liking rabbit."

Well, that was something else out of the blue.  Who knew?  Now, I know people in the southeastern region of the country tend to have an affinity for rabbit.  It's just that I've never met anyone in Michigan who eats rabbit (unless they're from the south).  So, yeah, i was surprised.

But you know what?

My oldest son had just asked me the week before if he could raise rabbits and sell them for meat.  I told him I didn't think there was much of a market for that.

Wrong.

So I think we're going to raise some rabbits....although my wife is having a much harder time with this than with chickens.  Something about eating bunny foo-foo.

What about you.  Do you want to try any rabbit?