Question????

[ForrestFrank]

First off let me say that my wife and I are planning on buying a farm with about 20 acres in a year or so. What I need to know is there any web sites out there with good free floor plans for out buildings. Also if anybody has any tips or hints on things that might make it easier for first timers. Any help would be gratefully appreciated.

[A'sta at Hofstead]

Hi, someone had asked this last week, for a link to the extensions, can't find the thread but I bookmarked this one, nice pdfs and I think they are FREE!

http://www.cerc.colostate.edu/Bluepr...lueprints.html

Darn it, that is not the free one, have to find that thread! There was a really good one.

[mpillow]

http://www.ag.ndsu.nodak.edu/abeng/plans/index.htm

[rambler]

Midwest Farm Plans, the N Daktota web site will get you onto that stuff.

As to advise, where are you locating, & what is the plan - garden crops, grain crops, hay for sale, pasture with livestock (what kind), forest management.....

What do you want to do? Are you hoping to take care of your needs, or are you hoping to sell some stuff & raise money. Will you be by a big city to sell garden crops, or way out in the sticks with less taxes & hassles but less customers.

Probably a little bit of everything, right?

--->Paul

[Explorer]

One of the best single source I have found for homesteaders is:

'Build It Better Yourself' by the editors of Organic Gardening. Copyright 1977. Should be less than $10 at Amazon.

[ForrestFrank]

Thank you so much for all of the great information! Like I said I am new to this and any tips are helpful.

Rambler
As for what we are planning, We are just looking to be a little more self relient. Not really out to make any money. We plan on raising crops, maybe a few animals eventually. small orchards. We are at this point just planning to produce our own food.

[CindyOR]

Frank - 10 years ago my husband and I were where you are now. We moved from town to 20 raw acres where there wasn't even a house or any utilities. Ended up being our own general contractors (not planned) and learned a lot. Although both of us had lived on farms as children, our high school and young adult lives were spent in the suburbs.

What we learned:
Make sure the first year you watch the water flow patterns on your land when it rains -especially hard rains. Run off can be a real pain. Our property is very hilly, with plateaus, and we ended up having to put in french drains to keep water from pooling behind our house, and behind the barn.

Plan for good traffic flow:
Think through what you want to do on your farm and plan for trucks coming in and getting turned around, animal care flow, parking your cars etc.
Some things to think about - if you put your chicken house far away from the house so you don't have smells, is it too far when there are 2' of snow on the ground to get out there to feed. If you put your parking for personal cars in front of the shop - is that too far to haul groceries in to the house?

When you put your house in:
Plan on one entrance/exit for mud. Build a mud room and keep your shoes and boots in there. You will want a separate entrance for guest arrival, with an area for them to leave their shoes too if you have people take off their shoes. We do, because we've found it really saves on our flooring wear & tear. Our mud room is always a mess of rain gear, boots, mud, wet dogs etc, so we don't want our guests to come in that way.

Also, if you have dogs & cats that are indoor/outdoor - is there a place for them to dry off and leave all the dirt before they bring it in?
In the country, we don't find pet doors work well because "pet" raccoons also love them - and squirrels, rats, mice, feral cats etc, etc. So we built a back covered porch with shelves where the cats can sleep safely while waiting for us to come home. Then they are dry and clean and can come in. And our mud room leads in to the laundry room, which we carpeted for the wet dog. We have a gate at the door to the family room, so the dog can dry off in the laundry room before joining us in the rest of the house.

Live on your place for a year or two - through all the seasons - before you build any outbuildings if you can. You'll see where the leaves fall (more gutter cleaning the closer you are to those trees), where the water flows during the wet seasons, how far to put your animals from your house and which way the runoff from their pasture goes), and which way the wind blows most of the time (smell control). You'll learn a lot just living there for a year about where you want to put things.

And, when you put in fences, put them in to last. Some people who live in the country feel they can let their dogs run free. If you plan on having animals, have the best fences you can for those animals, or you may come home to find you have only dead animals. Our neighbors let their dogs run free and although we started out with chickens and guineas, after their dogs have come through many times, our guineas are free ranging for their own protection and we have no other birds because the dogs killed them. (yes, we've been to court, they've been fined over 10 times - doesn't matter - their dogs WILL run free because they want them to - we're just mean people for having a problem with it).

Good luck with your building and your new property.

CindyM in OR

[ForrestFrank]

Cindy M --- Thank You for your helpful advice. All of it made perfect sense but was things that i have not thought of yet.

[heritagefarmer]

Originally Posted by Explorer

One of the best single source I have found for homesteaders is:

'Build It Better Yourself' by the editors of Organic Gardening. Copyright 1977. Should be less than $10 at Amazon.

I agree.
If you have this and Carla Emery's book, you wil need no other.