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  • From: "Shoemaker, William H" <wshoemak AT illinois.edu>
  • To: Market Farming <market-farming AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: [Market-farming] time budget info for various field crops?
  • Date: Mon, 13 Jan 2014 02:47:03 +0000

I think the challenge is to have a set of data that is relevant to a large
audience. Production systems vary so widely, partly due to
site/climate/ecology, partly due to markets, but mostly due to management
choices. There is sooo much variability on the farm, and across farming
operations. Developing a relevant database would require a large, diverse
source of data, and you would still be left with the challenge of relevancy
to your own operation. I think Steve mentioned the discipline of Engineers to
take meticulous notes. In the end, that seems to be the real treasure chest.
That data is there in Winter and will open your eyes to your own successes
and failures. I'd encourage you to be a good documenter of your open
business. Besides, you don't want averages to refer to. You want to build a
superior market farming business based on the reality of your own experience.

Bill
William H. Shoemaker
Retired fruit and vegetable horticulturist
University of Illinois
wshoemak AT illinois.edu

________________________________________
From: market-farming-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org
[market-farming-bounces AT lists.ibiblio.org] on behalf of Kathryn Kerby
[kakerby AT aol.com]
Sent: Saturday, January 11, 2014 9:38 PM
To: 'Market Farming'
Subject: [Market-farming] time budget info for various field crops?

I am looking for something which maybe doesn’t exist. A table of estimated
or averaged manhours required for different kinds of veggie crops. For
instance, something which would list the approximate manhours required to
take tomatoes from seeding through harvest, on a per-plant or per-row-foot or
per-square-foot basis. I know there are a lot of variables, such as whether
stuff is direct-seeded vs transplanted, whether each step is done manually or
via machinery, and probably a lot of stuff I haven’t even thought of. But
maybe something like this exists? I’ve been doing Google searches on phrases
like “time budget for vegetable crops” but keep coming up with hits for
enterprise budgets, ie, how much money was spent on seeds and fertilizer and
so on. Not what I’m looking for.

I’m asking for several related reasons. First, we’re trying to decide
whether to add any additional crops to our existing work schedule for the
year. Also, we’re wondering if there is some kind of comparison between
crops, such that if we wanted to add a few more, we could choose based (in
part) on how much manpower they’d require, versus how much time we can give
that new crop. Maybe tomatoes would be too time-intensive, but perhaps
onions wouldn’t. I also would like to compare the limited manhours info I
have for crops we’ve done in the past, versus how much manhours those same
crops required other farms. See if we’re taking more time than is really
needed, on X crop. If we’re spending five times more man hours in the field
on squash, compared to some kind of national average, it would be nice to
learn that so we can figure out why.

Anyone have any resources they could point me towards? Thanks all………….
Kathryn Kerby
Frogchorusfarm.com
Snohomish, WA




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