Hobby Farms Magazine

I check out each current issue and buy it if it's pertinent to my lifestyle, but by and large my money is better spent on Countryside or Mother Earth News.

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There is a magazine/journal called Growing for Market that is geared to the small farmer and is just excellent. This is for people who are actually endeavoring to make a living on a small farm. It is very practical and contains many articles by and about people who are successful. I no longer have a farm (5 acres) but still read it cover to cover the minute it arrives.

www.growingformarket.com

Try it, you'll like it!

I have bought 2 issues of Hobby Farm and found it had some interesting stuff. I dont think it would ever be my first source of information but it does have some interesting ideas and articles in it.

Check your prices. They offer the subscription $24.?? for a 2 year subscription at trade shows and farm shows. I bout the subscription just a few weeks ago. I'd suggest calling the company and complain or some such and try to get that same price.

I worked for a company that sold subscriptions to their magazines and when people complained they would try to bend as much as they could. The name of the game is to keep people reading so their advertisers get response so they spend more money with them. The subscriptions pay for the mailing, the advertising pays the printing/employee/ overhead and profit. Both are important to the companies but a new subscribrer should be able to get a good deal.

Sounds like there are several nice magazines out there. I am going to have to see about getting them. Thanks for the ideas.

I will admit... I am half clueless. I grew up on the farm, raised my own animals some, gardened etc, but not on a scale like I am now. Isnt life always a learning experience?? Give the clueless a break, if you know so much maybe you should start sharing your knowledge so us clueless can get a clue. I've gotten a lot of good advice on this forum but have also had the "if you want to know something then you should go research it, not ask here" responses... those just kill me... can tell a lot about a person by their response

Well ..... we did put up a website .... but it was more to keep alive the old ways. There is so much we still want to do and have to learn, but as we do, we'll keep putting it on our website so others can learn from out experiences (and mistakes )

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I've been to your site MullersLaneFarm and I appreciate your efforts. It is a helpful site.

My response about being clueless or the response about people helping people wasnt necessarily directed at you. Have you ever told someone who posted a question that they should do their own research? I've gotten that response a few times and I've seen others get it also.

As for giving the clueless a help, I think you do through your website and through your reponses to their questions.

So to those who respond in a nice, informative, way, those who post links, ideas, advice, host websites, etc etc... <there are so many ways people help each other here> I give a big thanks. For those who prefer to not help.............................................. ...

We just recieved our 3rd issue of Hobby Farms and I like it. It leans more towards MEN than Countryside or BackHome (but not quite as environmentally focused as MEN). It is slick and glossy and I don't mean just the paper. It tends to show the "succesful" side of small farming while a lot of the Countryside letters and articles focus on the pitfalls.

It doesn't seem to have projects (such as: how to build your own chicken tracter, etc...), but it does have a tool review section, a few recipes, several different q&a articles (what is mastitis, how to attract beneficial insects, how do lightening rods work, what are blister beetles), and then several farming and/or animal articles. The Nov/Dec issue had articles about heritage turkeys, farming sea salt, an informative article on nut trees, a good article on tree farming, and a great article on using donkeys as livestock guardians, plus a few others. It also has a lot of ads, usually for very expensive things: alpacas, tractors, etc...

Now, I really love getting my Countryside and BackHome. You really feel like you know the people writing the letter or article and it has lots of useful info. But, I have to admit I also love the colorful photos of the animals and the picturesque farms shown in MEN and HobbyFarms. However, even the great article on guardian donkeys, while I loved it, was written not by some small farmer who uses donkeys but by a journalist. So its not quite the same flavor. You're not getting the info from Sally at FuzzyWuzzy Farm but from JaneDoe freelance writer, it just doesn't feel as personal.

I say get the free trial issue or buy one at a newstand to read before deciding on a subscription.

Just doing our part. There are so many variables that extra research IS required in most situations.

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It is doing well and here is BACK HOME website.http://www.backhomemagazine.com/

I was at BooksAMillion today looking for tracks for my son's Thomas Trains and picked up a copy of BackHome magazine because some of you seemed to like it. I like it too. The issue I picked up has an article I'm excited about focusing on an offgrid singlewide trailer. I also picked up a copy of HobbyFarms because their feature article is on Heritage Turkeys. I'm extremelly disappointed in the article. There's a nice article about using donkeys as livestock guardians and there are pages upon pages of alpaca ads in the back but little content elsewhere. My opinion of course.

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We have subscriptions to Backwoods Home, Countryside, Mother Earth News, Small Farm Today and Hobby Farm. Yeah, Hobby Farm's pages are shiny, but I've seen some good articles in there. I don't always use every article in every issue of the other mags either, so I feel it is just as valid. (For example, that homeschooling issue of Countryside was a wash for me.) I really like the product comparisons they have each issue on equipment, this month it's table saws, in the past it's been chippers, rototillers, etc. It's not an opionion comparison, they just line up 4-5 brands and tell the hp, size, volume, etc of each one so you can sort of "see" them side by side. This last issue, as someone else mentioned, did have a lot of good articles. I also enjoy the Q&A section. Somebody said HF is for those who have a 9-5 job, but I don't know anyone who is making a full-time living off of their farm without one or both people holding down an outside job, so I feel that's a moot point.

I do agree that Countryside seems to be redundant a lot. I really don't need yet another recipe for goat milk soap. And it does have a lot of opinion. I mean really, 5 pages devoted to what people would put in their kitchen IF they had the space, money, whatever. And a lot of times, the way people say they do things in there to save money...I mean, I like to save money too, but there's always pictures of places that were built for a song or whatever, and we think, "Gee, I wouldn't have that monstrosity sitting on my property, it would pull the value down!"

Backwoods Home has been getting so political, I was about to cancel my subscription to them. I can make up my own mind about who to vote for, tell me how to do country things better. But their last issue was better, so I'll hold off on cancelling a bit and see if they got themselves back on track.

Mother Earth News is put down by a lot of people, but it has gotten much better in the last few years. And what people need to keep in mind is that MEN is not a homesteading magazine, per se, it's an environment conservation type of magazine focusing on things you can do more natural to help the environment, not necessarily for hardly any money.

So, to make a long story short (too late :haha: ), I find articles in each magazine each month that I find helpful, but never every one, so I feel each is as valid as the next. I would at least try a year of any magazine that I was curious about before I made the decision whether or not it was for me or not. One issue is just not sufficient, as any mag can have an off month.

Have a good day, Laura

I sometimes pick up a single copy of Hobby Farms. There's some good articles but many times I have to scratch my head. I picked up the latest issue (Nov/Dec) on Wednesday and saved it for reading while down at the farm this weekend (spent 3 days so I could try and catch up on stuff aafter all the rain we have been having).

The cover story about Heritage Turkeys caught my eye. Unfortunately, like many of their articles it was long on sizzle and short on steak.

The article on Nuts wasn't much use and their info about Black Walnuts was incorrect. After accounting for fluctuations, the amount of nuts being processed is pretty much at near record levels. What they don't mention (or don't know) is that most nuts being processed are not collected from plantations. Also, black walnut tree nut production is highly variable. Last year the ground was carpeted by nuts. This year we will be hard pressed to collect enough off our own property to justify processing them.

They mention that only one or two commercial processing plants are still in operation. This is because of industry consolidation. The equipment to process black walnuts is pretty expensive. The 800 lb gorilla in the industry is Hammon and they buy nuts in 16 states. Last year they processed 32 million pounds.

Anyways, back on track! I guess what I'm trying to say is that I don't trust what is written in Hobby Farm as much as I do other publications or here.

The impression I get is that many of the articles are written by people who aren't doing it themselves....they are simply reporting what others have done (or say).

When they review products they never give a price or price range. One of the reviews was about the 4000 twenty line of John Deere Tractors. They never mentioned the horse power range of this line.

Even though I've made negative comments, I'll still pick up a copy but I really think it is geared towards the hobbyist. Makes me think of the joke....know how to make a small fortune in farming? Start with a large one!

As usual, just my 2 cents.

Mike