farming

jsizemore · Aug 24, 2003

Becoming A Hippie

Ok this is my second post in an hour but I have been saving up since I applied for access and I just got it tonight. I retire in 21 months. My pension will be $1500 a month. I am helathy and I will be 38 then. As you guessed military. I am from WV and I always wanted to retire back home to the hills and be a homesteader. I just hate cutting F***ing firewood all summer. To keep from freezing in winter.
Is it safe to assume that with my pension and some seed money homesteading is viable? I am not looking at a profit I am just looking at feeding myself and my future family without dipping into all of my pension.
I have a 30 day on 30 day off rotation job if I want it to pay for my house if i choose to get an otra trabajo after the Navy.

Kay · Aug 25, 2003

don't know

I don't know anything about the ag-ecconomics in DR. But the jungle looked lush. The campos areas looked like where i would want to retire. I don't know what your back ground is but i saw a wide variety of soils from the Black gold type to the stinking caeche clay, and even that was growing stuff. I had limited time so i saw only poor farms not commercial. They export coconuts, coffee, mangos, other fruit, and sugar cane. Are you good at being El Heffe? Poor people speak spanish and Hatian Sugar cane workers come in, i think illegally.
Good luck, k

jsizemore · Aug 25, 2003

background

I am only one generation from living as the poor Dominicans do. I have family who still have no electricity or running water. Half my time growing up was staying at reletives houses that had outhouses.
We canned every summer. We made our own molasses, Raised pigs, Chickens and milk cows. I am not interested in a comercial venture. I am just interested in keeping myself productive enough to roast a pig every weekend without dipping into my pension for anything other than El Presiedentes and Ron.
My mother grew up worse off than the Dominican rice field workers is offering to come down as long as I have a flush toliet and shower. She does not even care if we have electricity and she says she will bring her washboard. God I love being a hillbilly.
John

Hillbilly · Aug 25, 2003

First off, welcome to the board!

As the Resident Hillbilly Know-it-all, out of Kanawah County, WV, I will tell you straight out, farming in the DR is a no win situation.

My thesis is that the farmers have no friends: Not the government, not the markets, and certainly not the intermediaries..

Now, that said, if you want to find a nice little farm, invest in a well and solar powered pumps and inverters, you "Might" get Ma a nice place to stay.

East of where I am at is some of the most fertile, but expensive, land in the DR, and you can grow anything you want, and raise some pigs.

To the West of me is drier land that is mostly under irrigation and it, too, is extremely fertile.

Your choice of climates will be the deciding factor, since up in the mountains (just like home) there are valleys at over 3000 feet that will allow for onions, garlic and strawberries...

Just one other thing. While you can live on $1,500 a month, you sure can't start a farm on that amount...

Have you scouted out where you want to start? Any ideas of what you want to grow, besides pigs?

I can share your idea of leaving the hollows, but you have to admit that there is a certain charm in picking blackberries and dodging rattlers all the while seeing the rhoderdendron in bloom....

Keep at it, the more we know the more we can help you...

HB

bob saunders · Aug 25, 2003

If you have 100,000$US to pay for a small Finca, your $1500 a month will probably be enough to survive on. There are a number of real estate sites you can look at to get an idea of land prices, it aint cheap.

m65swede · Aug 26, 2003

Hillbilly said it best.

It ain't no bargain. The learning curve is steep at best and the locals are oftentimes the absolute worst givers of agricultural advice.

I spent my first 2 years in the DR working with the Dominican Dept. of Agriculture; mostly working on projects involving swine production and artificial insemination in cattle. What an eye opener! I then spent another 2 years managing a cattle ranch in southwestern DR, near San Juan de la Maguana.

Subsistance agriculture is certainly do-able if you go into it with both eyes wide open and a totally flexible mindset. The winters that you now detest actually tend to keep many of Mother Nature's most aggravating pest populations under control. You'll have to learn to control (or live with) diseases you may have never seen before and large populations of garrapatas and other parasites.

Texas A&M University has done extensive agricultural research in the DR. Maybe you can pester them for some of their data.

Swede

Hillbilly · Aug 26, 2003

Translation

Garrapatas = ticks....major pain

HB

jsizemore · Sep 6, 2003

Hillbilly

Hillbilly I am from Clay County. As far as starting a farm like I said not trying to make money. Just wanting to live in perpetual summer growing a few mators and tators.
As far as Cash goes I can always pull down a couple 100K in a few years in the merchant marines.
When we grew up our farming was not commercial it was strictly subsistence. You know the deal hard to sell to people when everyone buys out of Kroger on food stamps.

Hillbilly · Sep 7, 2003

Thing is

You can't grow 'taters except up in the mountains.

Now you can grow all kinds of stuff in the drier (irrigated) areas.
I mean like you won't believe!. Tomaters, cabbages, onions. every fruit you can think of (tropical fruit, not peaches and pears and apples), sweet 'taters, other legumes, that are similar to 'taters. Plus bananas, rulos and plantains which are great eating.

Not THAT can be done on a small plot...just depends on where you want to be.

HB

goatfarmnga · Sep 7, 2003

Farming.......

As long as it is not to make a commercial business Hillbilly etc are right. My mother in law in the DR has several 100 acres of Cocoa, all fruits imaginable etc..She has it leased to some farmer as she is 80 yrs old..But I intend to do like you and get a few acres for my own consumption and others who need food. My brother in law in the DR said no money in pigs etc as the feed etc will not make it cost effective but to raise for yourself would be great. I hope to do just that. I will check back to see how it is going for your farm!

Pam

Escott · Sep 7, 2003

I think if you have enough to build yourself a little home and have an acre of land you can hobby farm most of what you need. I have farmed on 1/10 of an acre and had incredible amounts of success even though I owned 100 acres in NYS.

1500 a month will go a long way if you are NOT a tourist every day and with the background that you have. Seek out Shad and ask him some questions. SJH i think is his current handle.

I have a lot in Sosua that is under 3/4 of an acre and I know I can grow more than I can eat there without a care in the world.
The land is lush going up into the hills. A well and a pump will give me all the water I would need.

I can't wait to get to it albeit it will be a couple of years or so.

sjh · Sep 7, 2003

you can do it, it just that everything is totally different here.

some things that are really cool about farming here:
Labor is really really cheap
fence posts grow where you plant them
really easy to sell surplus food, milk even in small quantities
stuff grows fast

some hard things:
all the plants and weeds are unfamilar
overuse of chemicals
people steal anything smaller than a cow, and sometimes those too

good luck, send me an email at shadley000@codetel.net.do if you like

edited to fix typo in email address

goatfarmnga · Sep 7, 2003

Theft of farm animals...

Is that a big problem there in DR? People stealing goats etc? Had an experience here but it is a felony I believe in the US. Is it just tough luck there if someone steals your cow? Serious question please.

Pam

m65swede · Sep 10, 2003

Re: Theft of farm animals...

goatfarmnga said:
Is that a big problem there in DR? People stealing goats etc?

Yup, it's a problem. One of the workers at our ranch was reputed to be able to snatch goats and chickens from horseback while at a full gallop!

They'll even steal your grass (as in pasture, not wacky weed). They usta cut a couple of wires in our fences and push a few goats into our pastures to eat the forage intended for our cattle!

I can't emphasize enough the learning curve here. You'll experience livestock diseases such as Leptospirosis, African Swine Fever, Cholera, Brucellosis, and Anaplasmosis. Ticks, fleas, Ascarids, Tapeworms, and Screw-worms abound. Grasses yield pretty well, but grains such as corn need more sunlight than what the DR provides. Legumes generally yield far less than in the US.

As I said before, it is do-able but you'd better know what you're getting into.

Swede

Kay · Sep 10, 2003

growing fence posts?

I saw some. I'm interested in them. What is it they grow into? I assume they need a lot of water, is it hard to do? I tried to buy some but that day my espanol was especially bad.
Not important, just curious...
[***spell ccheck]
-K [que]

goatfarmnga · Sep 10, 2003

Growing fence posts...hummmm

I have seen some of these fence posts but would like to know the name of the wood. Just put them in the ground and they somehow grow? I read that somewhere a while back but can not remember what that is called. Any info would be great. Also the diseases that the animals carry sound HORRIBLE..Do they not have vaccines or wormers or something to help combat CHolora etc..I know about feeding pigs slop..here the USDA stops by to check the hogs to make sure they are fed grains not slop..Had them stop by my place last year..I fed my hogs Corn and pasture (Ring in their nose..Dominican Husband does that!) Just wonder if it would be dangerous to try to have a few hogs, goats and horses..If they will be stolen..I may think twice..

Pam

sjh · Sep 10, 2003

growing fence posts is one of the most wonderful things about farming here.

the local name of the wood is pinon, but i am most likely spelling it wrong. to plant them you cut off a branch of an existing tree, sharpen it into a point and drive it into the ground. then you attach the barbed wire with staples and it should take root and sprout in 3 months. It is best to plant right before rainy season.

There are also various beliefs here about the time of the month in which they must be planted.

Chris · Sep 10, 2003

a dream!

sjh said:
growing fence posts is one of the most wonderful things about farming here.

I saw the growing fence posts some years ago in Costa Rica. It became a dream - "to live where the fenceposts grow!" Now, I drive on a farm road with growing fence posts every day. Never thought someone else would also consider this a wonderful thing. It simply lifts my spirits each time I go by.

We had a major clean-up in the garden a few weeks ago as the jungle kept overgrowing us - and I picked up a few cut-off pieces of every flowering plant I love, and stuck them in the ground. After a month or so, I despaired a little - but now, after 2 months, all of these 'stuck-in' pieces are showing signs of growth. 'Tis a wonderful place.

jsizemore · Sep 12, 2003

Hot climate

I was wondering how a teara relates to an acre.
Also just curiouss is there any native catfish in the D.R. that are close to the American Channel Catfish in flavor and size? A nice little fish pond would be cool I think.
Remember I used to run a trot line on the Elk River when i was a kid.

goatfarmnga · Sep 12, 2003

Hey Jsizemore..

OK I am interested in the measurements too. I had a chart that I found while researching land for sale in the DR..But went into DR1 and Ken says about 6 Tarea to an acre..someone else said 11..But if I can find that chart I will send it to you..the best info I have found...wrote it down my son takes my papers sooo I guess he got it!

Pam

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