Javascript is not enabled in your browser.
This may prevent some of our website from working properly.
Please enable scripting for the best web browsing experience, and review
our Privacy Policy to learn about the use of browser cookies and user-submitted data.

Page updated/verified: Sep 30, 2011 Update: 9/30/2011

Farm Wisdom: Managing Risk on Small Farms Video Series

A diverse set of small-scale producers served as farm hosts for WSDA’s 2009-2011 mobile workshops aimed at helping farmers reduce risk in their businesses. Production practices, direct marketing strategies, business planning, energy conservation practices, regulations for raw and processed products are all featured in this video series. More than 100 Washington farmers participated in nine workshops and found the information to be so useful, that we began filming them in order to reach more farmers with this invaluable, practical information.

While Washington has 39,000 farms and ranches, and all face multiple business and production risks ranging from rapidly changing markets to increasing occurrences of natural disasters, it’s the small-scale farms and ranches that are more likely to face additional challenges to being profitable.

The farmers featured in this series are leaders in utilizing innovative and viable business and production practices to manage risk, and to build and maintain sustainable small-scale farms.

Farm Wisdom Video Series

	Microdairy Production and Marketing: [External Link] Always wanted to start a farm business? And stay in business? Maximize your dream and minimize your risk by getting the tour at Wild Harvest Creamery to see how their mission, business and finance plans daily shape and define their production and marketing decisions. These farmers spent more than two years carefully planning how to open commercially without debt. See how they re-purposed materials, made low-cost equipment selections, and put a unique barn design to work for them. Learning from and adopting elements from their operation can save you time and money and let you do more of the things you love - like milk goats, make and sell cheese without the worry! 4 min 35 sec
	Direct Marketing, a bilingual production in English and Spanish [External Link] Direct Marketing/Mercadeo Directo, a bilingual production in English and Spanish Have you always wanted to set your own prices for your fruit? Visit Barrett Orchards and learn how they have shifted from wholesaling their fruit to selling direct to the consumer from their own farm store. Technical details on crop selection, researching and understanding the market, finding the right location, infrastructure requirements, u-pick tips, and on-site marketing strategies can help you transition to a successful direct marketing business. Mercadeo Directo, una producción bilingüe en inglés y español [External Link] ¿Usted ha querido siempre poder poner sus propios precios a su fruta? Visite Barrett Orchards y aprenda como ellos han cambiado de vender su fruta al mayoreo para venderla directamente al consumidor desde su tienda en el campo. Detalles técnicos en la selección de la cosecha, investigación y entendimiento del mercado, localización del sitio correcto, requisitos de infraestructura, sugerencias sobre los productos colectados en la granja por el consumidor mismo, y estrategias para el mercadeo local le puede ayudar a hacer una transición exitosa de su negocio hacia al mercadeo directo. 5 min 8 sec
	Alternative Energy on the Farm [External Link] “Better for the animal, better for the environment, better for you” is the motto of Crown S Ranch. From simple 1930’s extension wisdom, to high-tech prototypes walk through the full circle of this farm’s innovative energy and input savings. Essential energy savings are realized in this pastured beef, pork, chicken and turkey operation through unique systems like a passive walk-through flytrap for their beef cattle, rotational grazing aided by solar powered chicken trains, solar powered fencing and hen house doors, composting, and gray water catchment from their poultry processing facility. 4 min 30 sec
	Solar Hot Water System in a Microdairy [External Link] Contemplating a solar hot water heating system or gray water catchment system on your farm? Join Sunny Pine Farms and see their water resource systems at work. Used daily in their micro dairy and cheese making operation, specifics include weather requirements, equipment investments, pay-back period and cost savings estimates. 3 min 2 sec
	Alternative Energy on the Farm [External Link] Take a look at the ways Pine Stump Farms, a diversified farm complete with timber and goat micro dairy, conserves and uses renewable energy. Highlights include a passive solar cheese making room, gray water collection for irrigation, solar powered electric fencing with chargers, battery and fence transported on a lawnmower spool, methane gas production via a WSU pilot small-scale bio-digester, movable passive solar chicken houses. Their innovative solutions abound! 4 min 26 sec
	WSDA Licensed Poultry Processing Facilities [External Link] Kummer Farms and G & H Pastured Poultry. What does it take to be a small-scale commercial poultry producer and processor? Two farms share the business planning that led them to build the licensed food processing facilities where they process and package poultry for retail markets. Each farm has a unique set of practices that will inform your own enterprise planning.
	Poultry Processing Rental Equipment [External Link] Colin Barricklow, Kirsop Farm in Tumwater, WA shares his diversified farm’s practices for cultivating row crops and small-scale poultry production for direct to consumer sales of up to 1,000 birds allowed for in the WSDA Special Poultry Permit. Food safety, animal husbandry, and predator control are essential components of Kirsop’s whole farm system. Kirsten Workman of WSU Mason County Extension walks tour participants through on-farm poultry processing including how to use rental killing cones, scalder, and plucker that Kirsop uses in their commercial production. Al Kowitz of the Community Agriculture Development Center (CADC) and poultry farmer Cheryl Templeton present the Mobile Poultry Processing Unit (MPPU) operated by CADC out of Colville, WA that meets WSDA poultry processing facility licensing requirements for processing up to 19,999 birds annually.
	Small-Scale USDA Inspected Meat Processing [External Link] Scott Meyer of Sweetgrass Farm on Lopez Island, WA is able to market his Wagyu Beef direct to consumers by using the USDA inspected Island Grown Farmers Cooperative (IGFC) Mobile Meat Processing Unit (MPU). Scott shows us the unique MPU-compatible site he designed and built on his farm. See his innovative farm management and animal handling practices that his customers value and have come to expect. Did you know the IGFC was the first mobile slaughter unit in the U.S., beginning operations in 2002?
	Small-Scale USDA Inspected Meat Processing [External Link] Colville, WA is fortunate to have a dedicated USDA cut & wrap facility in Smokey Ridge Meats. Smokey Ridge works closely with Community Agriculture Development Center’s (CADC) USDA-inspected Meat Processing Unit (MPU) that serves small-scale producers of beef, pork, lamb and goat. This facility combination makes direct and retail markets accessible to small-scale regional red meat producers. Brent Olsen of Olsen Farms shares how and why he began using the USDA cut & wrap facility, and how valuable it has been to his business and to the community to have access to a local USDA-inspected MPU.
	USDA Risk Management Agency (RMA) Programs [External Link] How do you minimize business risk on your farm? Join Dave Paul, RMA’s NW Regional Director, as he introduces this agency’s varied services, and highlights Adjusted Gross Revenue-Lite (AGR-Lite), one of the best insurance programs available to owners of diversified small farms. Formerly the Federal Crop Insurance Agency, RMA now works with private insurance companies to offer products that support farmers’ economic viability over time.
	Flood Preparation and Recovery [External Link] Are you farming in a flood plain? “Assume it will happen every year”, even if it’s called a hundred-year event. This is the advice given by farmer Jennifer Belknap of Rising River Farm in Rochester, WA after having been through several major floods on her farm. The aftermath can be less damaging to your farm’s bottom line if you have adequate flood insurance and a well laid-out plan that includes creating storage for equipment, livestock, and crops that will protect them from floodwaters.

This project was made possible by a USDA Risk Management Agency
Community Outreach and Partnership Assistance Grant

[Top of Page]