[Seahawk]

I don't know your local market, so I'll write in generalities about my 16 years and 65 acres and the effort to make it profitable.

My wife and I both work full time so most of our decisions were influenced by the following factors:

- Taxes. The farm has been an excellent source of reducing our taxes. You do, of course, have to spend money to lose money.

- Time. All of our planning revolved around how much of our finite time we wanted to dedicate to the enterprise. As you know, any farm requires a substantial amount of maintenance to keep properly clean, organized, etc. What we wanted in the business was a complementary set of efforts that didn't require a huge additional time sunk. If you have to either hire help or exchange work for other considerations that must be planned for.

- Equipment and facilities. Again, we wanted to limit capital investment as much as possible.

- Lifestyle. Was there a business that fit our lifestyle goals...meaning, were we going to pay to do it anyway? Is it something we really enjoy?

- Diversification. I wanted to spread the risk as much as possible. . The first 10 years here we were strictly a crop farm: corn, wheat and soybeans in rotation. Since my farm is so small, crop insurance is simply not practical so the $6k in seed, fertilizer and weed repellent for each rotation was all or nothing. We were completely at the mercy of rain and commodity prices. Is was an absolute roller-coaster.

Some of alternatives we explored are very similar to yours.

- Cattle. Not enough land to make it profitable without putting nearly all the farm in cattle. Cattle failed the diversification test as well as the time sink. Cattle require an amazing amount of work.

- Vineyard. Still looking at this for retirement. Putting ten acres or so in vines would be an excellent revenue stream and diversification exercise. We have been approached by the Maryland wine growers many times and they offer financial help to get established. I simply don't have the time now.

- Additional crops. Since we currently use, "machine hire" or share-cropping (we partner with a farmer that has all the combines, semi's etc. to get my crop off) we wanted a crop that we could do ourselves. We settled on hay, hay that works in Maryland. The market for hay has grown dramatically in the last ten years so all our hay is spoken for in advance of pulling it out of the field.

- Horses. We settled on horse boarding. It met all our criteria except the additional facilities. We had a stable built but we did all the fencing and additional infrastructure. Our start-up costs we small since I had all the tractors and rent all other equipment required for hay, which is a huge cost in boarding. My daughter is a very accomplished rider so we had the cost of boarding our horses regardless, we trade 1/2 board for help with one of the really squared away boarders, and my wife loves the lifestyle.

So, we have ten acres in hay, 12 acres in horses and the rest in the same crop rotation we had before. So far, so good. Best of luck...I know you will, but make sure you really vet all your ideas in a business plan format, get input from the local ag organizations and the local farm agents. They were invaluable to me.