Ditto re expensive hobby!! Praying for Sun and heat so the grass will dry and can get my hay done! Was planning on just 3 acres this year but due to wonky weather grass is reaching for the sun and 3 acres is now around 6 acres looking beautifully green with heads!! Tup due in at the weekend for 5 sheep and cattle and sheep being strip grazed all over the place and I'm running out of fencers!! But take deep breath and remember how lucky we who have land are and the "pleasure" (at times through gritted teeth) we all feel when we see bales of hay stacked in shed, home grown produce looking just like it does in the catalogue (yeah right!) and the chirping of birds in the sky yadda yadda yadda! My spuds have gone demented, something has eaten my runner beans and my lettuces have bolted due to the weather! But other than that, it's just another day with a very expensive hobby, that i WOULDN'T give up for ANYTHING!!
Ps - for me income from the land is selling excess lambs at auction (we eat most of them) and selling finished pork after buying in weaners, customers are sister and cousin, the same with beef. Finding customers who will pay can be a problem as another smallholder in my area found out. He told me that people no longer wanted to buy half a pig, only wanted the choicest cuts or would pay only so much. As a business he couldn't afford that. That's why I only ever sell to family now. People passing comment about the cost of proper meat yet thinking nothing about buying the latest gadget, I can do without! Good luck with whatever you do!