[porkandapples]

Hello 
I've spent quite a while browsing this forum and learning lots so deceided it's time i dived in and got involved! We currently rent 3 acres which is home to our 3 ponies 10 chickens and a small orchard. I had a baby 14 months ago and when my maternity leave ended i resigned from my part time job and have decided to try to live the dream and make a small profit from what i enjoy doing. I have been doing a lot of reading and have just asked the landowner we rent from whether we would be allowed to keep pigs on the land as well and am waiting to hear from them. If not i will be hunting for more land to rent locally. From my research so far i am hoping to get some british lop pigs and have identified some local breeders to contact and hopefully one will be kind enough to spare a bit of time to talk to me about my plans. I'd like to build up to breeding the pigs on a small scale as well as keeping for meat in order to make a small profit. I am also planning on increasing our chicken flock and concentrating on Lincolnshire Buffs and hopefully breeding those also as we have had successing breeding our rhode island reds previously as well as selling the eggs which we already do. I am also hoping to get a few laying ducks on our pond. Along side this i will be growing all or our own veg which we are getting better at! and am looking to extend the orchard with more lincolnshire variety fruit trees. Husband is also looking into beekeeping and has made contact with the local bee keeping society.

Obviously this will be a gradual process and we won't be diving in and doing it all at once and i anticipate it being a steep learning curve but i think it will be totally worth it. Husband is employed first time so this will be my 'job' as well as hobby and as i say i hope to bring in a small income.

Feel free to tell me my plans are ridiculous but i hope to make friends here that i can learn form and hopefully help others one ay that are trying to do the same thing by sharing my successes and failures.

I look forward to getting to know everyone.

Sian

[Rosemary]

Hi and welcome to TAS! 

No-one on here will tell you your plans are ridiculous - many of us here are trying to do the same thing in many different ways and hopefully we'll all be able to help each other along the way. The reason we started the website was to help others avoid the mistakes we've made  BIG website!

If you're hoping to pay for three weeks in 5* luxury three times a year from your smallholding activities, you may be disappointed  Anyway, you won't be able to leave your pigglies for things like holidays. There's a thread in Coffee Lounge with a report on 8 case studies making a living from under 10 acres. It's quite interesting. All depends what you define by a living, I suppose. Our 12 acres wouldn't support our family, but we can produce a lot of our own food so reducing our outgoings and make a small cash income. We'll need an external income for some time to come though.

Enjoy - and we'll look forward to sharing your adventures.

[porkandapples]

Hello Rosemary and thank-you for the warm welcome 

We're definitely not looking for 5* holidays! Just as you say to reduce our outgoings and produce a small income to supplement my husbands wages which will allow me to stay at home bringing up my daughter and to give her a fantastic life that i would have loved when i was young! I'll check out that thread it sounds interesting and continue to learn from the wealth of experience here. Wish the landowner would hurry up and get back to me with a yay or nay on the pigs!

[Hilarysmum]

Hi welcome, I think if you really do your  homework (read everything on this site) and have a bit of luck, your ideas of reducing your costs and making a small amount of money from your stock could work well. 

HOpe the farmer says yes to pigs, they are very, very addictive.

[chrispy4949]

Hi welcome from Bulgaria  All the best chrispy .   

[faith0504]

hi and welcome from moray, good luck living your dream 

[supplies for smallholders]

Hi, Welcome, We are in Lincs as well...

While you are waiting for a reply from the Farmer, spend time trying to source feedstuff for pigs at a reasonable price - this will make the difference between profit and loss.

If you need any equipment then I know a good supplier 

[darkbrowneggs]

Hi there and welcome to the forum from Sue in Worcestershire

[porkandapples]

Thanks all for the warm welcome. Learnt such a lot already here!