Small Farm Side Hustles

If you have a small farm like us the chances are you might also want to stay there all the time. I mean, you have the home of your dreams. Why would you want to leave each day to go to work? Staying on your farm all the time, however, requires some kind of income. Even if you are lucky enough to own your property outright you will still need to pay for utilities and council charges. But don’t worry. There are SO many things you can do to earn an income from your farm. We are running a few of these side hustles while expanding and building on our ideas so that one day I’ll be able to stay home full time with Gavin. Here are some of the small farm side hustles you might like to try so you can work from home too.

The Easiest of Small Farm Side Hustles: Eggs

One of the quickest and easiest ways to make money on your small farm is to produce eggs. We have both chickens and ducks that lay for us on the farm and often we have so many eggs we cannot use them all. The obvious thing here, is to sell them. The rules around selling eggs vary so make sure you check with your local council about what is required. We have to stick to guidelines and have a personalised stamp for our eggs to show where they are produced.

In the beginning, we used to swap our eggs for coffee! Because the eggs were not stamped we could not sell them and the cafe owners could not use them in their kitchen. But if you love to go to the local cafe like us, a dozen free range eggs is worth the price of two coffees. It was a win-win as far as we were concerned.

Sell the Poultry

Hens and ducks have a LOT of babies. So another way to make income on your farm is to sell them. Last spring we had sixteen ducklings at the farm and six ducks. That was way too many. So we sold them as mother and duckling bundles to locals. This meant the ducks, who like to be with friends, would not fret or be lonely. We were very fussy about who we sold too as well, making sure the ducks and their babies went to good homes.

Honey

Another simple small farm side hustle is producing and selling honey. We’ve had our hives for around eighteen months now. The first season the bees produced about seven kilos of honey for us. Last summer we got over thirty kilos of honey. As much as love honey, and we use it in the farm kitchen a lot, there is no way I can eat that much. The simple solution was to bottle and sell what we don’t want.

To do this, we had to make sure the honey jars were sterile and write the batch and type of honey on our label. The honey sold very quickly and this year we plan to get it tested to find out the grade of Manuka. If we have a high quality Manuka we will be able to sell for more. It costs us the price of jars and hiring a honey extractor. The rest is profit.

Farmstay Accommodation

This is a great one to do if you have a space that’s unique. Imagine waking up to the sound of birds or the animals bellowing for their breakfast. How about sitting by a campfire and toasting marshmallows and seeing a night sky you don’t see in the city. City folk will pay very good money to leave the hustle and bustle behind for a few days. You could convert an old outbuilding, set up a glamping site, or rent out part of your home. Some sites even advertise places for people to park their caravans. You don’t have to provide anything but space!

We’re planning to introduce an accommodation arm to our business later in the year. We’ve dabbled in it before and enjoy hosting. Which is important. You have to like setting up a room and greeting people. If you want peace and quiet all the time, doing an AirBnB might not be your thing but if you’d like to show guests a bit of country life, it could be a good way to make an income without leaving home.

Small Farm Side Hustle: Crafts

Do you have a skill you can share with others in the form of online sales or workshops? One thing I’m starting this year is to start an online shop selling handmade things from the farm such as linen products and candles. If you have a skill or pastime you enjoy you could make things to sell. You won’t make a killing but it’s a way of diversifying and providing customers with pieces that are unique to you and your farm. You’ll also be working at something you enjoy.

You could also run workshops to share your knowledge with others. We’d love to host workshops like this, so that visitors to the farm could learn and have something to take home.

Events

One of the most labour intensive small farm side hustles, but also the most lucrative, is to hold events at your farm. Rustic charming outbuildings make perfect venues. A heritage garden surrounded by trees is the stuff made of dreams. The kind of event you hold will depend on the size of your farm, the amount of involvement you want to have and things you enjoy doing. If you are creative you could plan entire weddings or parties. If not, you could simply charge a hire fee for renting your garden or barn and let the person having the event plan it all.

You’ll need to think about toilets and cooking facilities events if this is the road you wish to go down. You will also need to upgrade your insurance to cover any accidents guests might have while on your property.

You might like to be like us and open your farm to tours and school excursions. Small farm side hustles that involve people visiting a working farm mean you need to keep everything tidy in the event visitors arrive unannounced but it’s a good practice to be in anyway. We love having visitors to the farm and sharing our vision with them.

Selling Livestock or Produce

If you raise livestock or grow vegetables on your small farm you could make money by selling the things you have produced. Our lamb and beef are sold to local restaurants and as boxed meat to customers. Clients will pay a premium for chemical free, ethically-raised produce. It tastes fresher, has a lower carbon footprint and people like to know the animals have a good life until the day they leave the farm.

Hiring Out Your Equipment

When you live on a small farm, you accumulate equipment for certain jobs that you don’t use all year round. It’s easy enough to hire out a ride-on or tractor to another small farmer who does not have one. We hire out our ram, Terry! He goes to visit other farms, stays for a few weeks and we get paid in the form of a lamb or two of his offspring. A honey extractor and fruit press cost hundreds of dollars to buy, so why not hire them to others for a small cost that will mean the equipment eventually pays for itself?