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[Bill Jones <billj AT harborside.com>]

That would be just about the whole of the West.

A typical farm here wouldn't even pass muster back east.  It's bone-dry 
and people feed hay in the summer even more than in winter.  My friend 
has a typical big ranch on a logged hillside, one she inherited, and 
it's no wonder that she doesn't see farm ownership as leading to 
self-sufficiency.  My God, the feed bill she has!  I'm lucky to have an 
underground water flow down the middle, so I can keep almost as many 
sheep as she has without feeding them.

Otherwise, it's better just to leave it in trees, but they can still be 
useful ones.  Conifers aren't very good for multipurpose agriculture 
because they shade everything out and toxify the soil; wherever two 
conifers grow near each other, the grass in between dies.  But deciduous 
trees allow our winter-adapted grasses to thrive, letting light through 
in winter, keeping it shadier in summer, and softening the impact of the 
first freeze, when the ground is sometimes still dry.

Bill
S. Oregon coast

> Two caveats---don't buy land without running water on it, and don't
> build on a hillside that will move downhill with wet weather or
> earthquake.
>
>