October 27th, 2006 - A Small Farm in Maine
David recommended this book and I immediately checked it out (ILL rocks!) A Small Farm in Maine by Terry Silber. He was right–I did love it! Unlike most of the back to the landers, Terry and her husband Mark took things slowly and carefully and with a lot of education. In all fairness, this is more a book about building a small business (the farm and what it leads to) than going back to the land.
Education: When they didn’t know something or simply got interested in something, they learned all they could about. Books, friends, strangers, store owners, etc. In so many other stories, folks just did something, and when they didn’t know enough, it often turned to disaster. Terry and Mark, for the most part at least with the bigger issues, took the smarter route. This helped them become very successful!
Slowly: Terry owned the house and land before she met Mark (if I recall correctly). It was a vacation spot for a while, then a weekend spot, then a weekend farm, then a long weekend farm. Only after a few years of success with farmer’s markets did they move full time.
The book both inspired me (made we think again about growing enough of some things to sell at the farmer’s market) and made me realize that I’ll never do that (or at least, no time soon). I really am not interested in all it would entail and am content to grow what we’ll eat and a bit that I can give away!
Overall, an excellent book and I would strongly recommend it to folks looking to start their own small homebased business, back to the landers, and simple living folks.
One Response to “A Small Farm in Maine”
Leave a Reply
You must be logged in to post a comment.
August 16th, 2008 at 10:01 am EDT
[…] Hedgehog Hill Farm’s website is here, though Mark Silber closed it as a business in 2006 (.pdf). Terry Silber passed away in 2003. Paul Ukonis (?) recommends the book to people starting a homebased business. Here is a recommendation from aletheia. […]