Program teaches "Farming 101"

One-hundred Red Star and ISA Brown layer hens search for food in the grass on the Kyle Rustic Farm in Roane County, Tennessee. The former tobacco and hay farm has been branching into new lines of business after classwork at the New Farmer Academy, a resource provided by Tennessee State Extension.

Susie Kyle, Kyle Rustic Farm:

“Wow. I dabbled in farming. I dabbled in agriculture. And when we set out to do this more on a full time basis, it's like we're going to do it. We're going to do it right. So I found this great program called The Beginning Farmer Academy. And I joined up and my eyes were opened big after that.”

The first major hurdle for many beginning farmers is determining if their farm plan can be profitable. The New Farmer Academy, created and operated by Tennessee State University, helps budding farmers understand the ins and outs of a business plan by estimating input costs and potential revenues.

Jenni Goodrich, Tennessee State University Extension:

“So it's an eight month series. It goes March through October. and it's a really neat program because it's kind of like AG 101 for grown ups with lots of great field trips. We, we start every series off with farm planning and goal setting. So that we can kind of get a feel not only for the clients that are coming in and what their goals are for the class, but also to kind of help them get rooted in what they want to do long term so that they can kind of decide what they want to be learning from the program.”

Many of the students enrolled in the New Farmer Academy are looking to farm from 5 to 50 acres of land. The Academy has found producing non-commodity crops and animals can be a viable way to get started.

Susie Kyle, Kyle Rustic Farm: “Traditional farming is plow, till, plow, till, mono crop. So we we don't do that. We do regenerative agriculture. We do minimal soil disturbance. Our soil disturbances are chickens and our pigs. Pigs plow chickens till that's their job. We grow multi species. We want as many grasses, as many legumes, as many brassicas. We want as many plants as possible.” 

The Kyles move their chicken coop every few days as grazing conditions allow. The grasses on their pastures are not managed but are the plants that have emerged from the soil as the poultry scratched the ground. Each growing season reveals an increase in the variety of plants in the pasture.

A large part of the coursework at the Academy is discovering ways for new farmers to capitalize on productive niche markets. 

Jenni Goodrich, Tennessee State University Extension:

“Hopefully by the time they come out at the end, they've maybe put a few new things on their list and taken a few things off their list and, and had a better idea of economically what it's going to cost to get started and what they can expect long term.

The New Farmer Academy enrolled its first class in 2014, and a USDA grant helped to expand the Academy to three other parts of the state.

Finis Stribling III, Director of Small Farm Programs, TSU: “Our inaugural class, we had nine participants. And from there it's taken off every year. This year we're going to graduate 122 new beginning farmers across the state of Tennessee.” 

Another building block for beginning farmers is simply learning the services that are available.

Finis Stribling, Director of Small Farm Programs, TSU:

“Just knowing about the resources. If if you're for myself, I'm a third generation farmer. Well, I know about county extension. I know about the USDA agencies and things of that nature. When when you come into farming for the first time, you have no clue who they are, where they are.” 

Students spend half of their course time on field trips to working farms in their region of Tennessee. 

Finis Stribling III, Director of Small Farm Programs, TSU:  “Well, they get an opportunity to go talk to a farmer first hand, first and foremost, they go out on the farm. They actually see a working farm because here again they're new to it. And then you get the hands on because here's the beauty about New Farm Academy. You have that classroom instruction. A lot of times it's morning time depend on the time of the year. And then afternoon you go on field trips. Like say for example, we were talking about soil testing. We come in and do a program on soil test and then we go out into the field and actually take soil samples and show a lot of the participants how to actually take a soil sample. If we're talking about drip irrigation, we classroom instruction, we go out and actually hook up an irrigation system. So you get an opportunity to touch it, feel it, and you can see how they work together.”

Tennessee agriculture is varied. While the west end of the state can support row crop farming, the Central and Eastern sections are better for grazing and specialty crops. Eighty percent of working farms in Tennessee are less than 180 acres. 

Along with eggs, the Kyles raise Thanksgiving turkeys, heritage beans, honey, and elderberries. Early sales began at farmer’s markets, but growth required the building of an on-farm store, which now sells products from the Kyle farm as well as neighboring operations in the valley.

While the Kyles had access to land, that isn’t the case for many students at the Beginning Farmer Academy. The economics of renting or purchasing land make commodity farming difficult for the beginner. Having a profitable business plan from the beginning can make the difference.

Finis Stribling III, Director of Small Farm Programs, TSU: “So with that, we come up with this managed extension professionals to help them work through the feasibility and the numbers of whether or not this is feasible or not. And a lot of times we realize that, you know what? Maybe I need to look at some other aspects of agriculture and help them figure out, you know, the pros and of cons prior to really getting involved in whether or not even even profitable to get into. So a lot of time, that's the beauty about going through the class. So we link them up with those resources to help them with those pitfalls early on.”

 Despite the challenges of entering farming, the annual waiting list for slots in the Academy’s classes are a sign that interest in starting a farm remains high.

For Market to Market, I’m Peter Tubbs