Newbie venturing into farming

Dear all,

I have prepared a brief road map for my dream farm project. I would really appreciate all your valuable feedback, do’s and don’ts.

I am currently working as a IT consultant in a well paid Financial Technology company in Chennai. Iam 31 years now and financially independent till date. I have a savings of around Rs.15 lacks, which i have decided to purchase an agricultural / farm land near Kanchipuram, Tamil Nadu.

I narrowed the location because it is within the radius of 100Kms from Chennai and the land lies exactly on road, so its well connected and accessible.

The land which we identified is of 2 acres and costs Rs.9 lacks / acre. Some what it exceeds my budget. However, I have decided to take a loan from my parents and proceed purchasing the land. Initially, I can work in the farm during weekends and other holidays as for me travelling from Chennai to Kanchipuram is extremely easy.

Here are the following steps which iam planning to implement in the coming months, may be years.

  1. Get the land Cleaned and leveled
  2. Fence the property using barbed wire and also planting some live plants which will also act as a live fence.
  3. Apply for Electricity Connection
  4. Build a small house and appoint a trusted family / couple to stay in the farm.
  5. Bore well, Motor shed and tanks.
  6. Plant trees such as Coconut, Mango and trees which grows easily in that area. Not more than 20 trees each.
  7. Dug a small rain water pond of 60,40,10 (length, width & height) before the monsoon as it is extremely useful to harvest rainwater and also good for percolation.
  8. Start fish rearing in the pond. Rohu & Katla to start with.
  9. 4-5 ducks which will feed the fishes.
  10. Start a country chicken poultry. 20 Country chicks to start with.
  11. Goats - Initially 5-10 within a confined area of 3 grounds.
  12. Small area for vegetable for our own consumption.

I know it is not a cakewalk to make an income using agriculture. My primary goal now is to start the ball to roll and once everything works out normal, I will purchase additional lands adjacent to the farm.

Iam expecting all the experienced contributors in this forum to suggest ideas, tips and your valuable guidance to me.

Thank you

hi

Welcome to the world of farming, it is indeed a good step taken by you. I’m sure you will be doing lot of research and talking to various experts. I will only give you one suggestion… there is nothing called as waste in the world of farming, one waste is other’s need. For example the waste for chicken (poop) is an excellent feed for fish. So plan your farm in such a way that you utilize absolutely everything :slight_smile:

Good luck… :slight_smile:

Dear Nitin,

Thank you so much and will surely take guidance from all of you.

Let the learning phase starts :slight_smile:

Please read topics from the beginning of each section. You will get all answers and you will have more questions to ask.

Your integrated farm’s blueprint looks just fine.

Every step you have mentioned is itself vast and wide involving lot of things.

Its going to be a huge learning curve and you would need answers for various questions at every stage.

As Sri pointed out, most of the things are discussed here on FN under various topics. For questions which you dont find an answer for, you can always seek them out fresh.

Good luck with your project.

Regards,

Saravana.

See my comments inline.

Hi ,

I am not trying to discourage you, to being with just go with plants. Having livestock on the farm for absentee farmers will end up as a night mare. There is nothing like trusted labor unless you are very very very lucky, animals need 24x7 attention and you should not expect proper care for them, they will not treat animals like you do.

Plants should be fine, you can manage them remotely and you can manage with a trip on 10-15 days.

ALL THE BEST.
Hari Devarapalli
amruthafarms.blogspot.in/

Thank you very much for your valuable suggestion. Will always seeks advise from you.

Dear Hari,

Thank you for the suggestion. Yes. I too though the same but we have few trusted people who works for us in our different business. And that is why iam thinking of housing them in the farm. They will be happy to take care of the farm like theirs as we are helping them in schooling their children.

My doubt is that whether a couple of people is enough to water the trees, plants and take care of few livestocks ? They are couples around 38-40 years of age and hard workers. But their knowledge about livestock is very limited.

Thank you

Hi,

On the laborers part: If you are helping their children with education why don’t you do it for them too :sunglasses: I mean there are lot of government training centers for learning about animal husbandry - cows, chicken, duck, quail, fish and so on… send them for the training, they will learn and take care of the animals. Personally I would suggest you attend too…

As for watering the trees, gone are the days of watering them, just go for drip irrigation - it saves lot of water too and labour for it is just to open the tap in the right time.

Good Luck

:smiley: :smiley: Yes Nitin, Iam too planning to join some kind of basic courses which will give me an idea. But time is a big constraint for me. I will have to check if there is any classes during weekends.

For them, Since they are from rural background they must be having a basic idea on agriculture and livestocks. So just need to guide them about when and what.

Drip irrigation is a good idea which will save time and water. But will have to see if its viable for my project as iam just going to plant few trees and vegetables and not actually for commercial purpose.

Thank you

Hi,

Training: It will only be a week long course I guess, (I attended dairy farming in Bangalore - 6 days) which is necessary as people from entire rural background use old methods and usually not aware of developed technology.

Water: Since you will be borrowing water from your neighbour’s farm, the lesser you take the better (cost wise) and using drip, I’m told we save 75% of water wastage. Other method is to make small channels and let the water flow in them. The point to notice is, however big the farm, no special labor required for watering purpose :slight_smile:

Also do some research on Aquaponics, it is in my personal opinion best for an absentee/weekend farmer.

Hi,

Congrats for your farm & wish all the success in your new venture.

Though I don’t have any experience in this field, your plan fits in perfect as mine.
The only change would be - I would prefer to start of with dairy first and then extend to the things you listed because the advantage you get trough one single native cow is immense & you could also save quite a lot on enriching the soil.

I am also in look out for the agri land with 100km radius near Chennai, hope will find one soon. Cheers!

hi sg farms at what stage ur farm is now any updates?