Autumn colors the Drôme in beautiful colors. The wind and the rain did finally come, but there are still sunny and calm days. This summer
Mathieu and me worked a lot on the sheep farm as seasonal workers. Sweating in the sun, we made a lot of parks (mowing and putting electric mobile fences), but also taking care of the herd and participating in the lambing.
A job a little repetitive, but with all the same some learning points: on livestock and field crops. Every day, we lunched with the family which brought a lot of conviviality and discussions about agricultural (and its problems). Bernard, our boss, is a passionate farmer. Corine, his wife, works at the Chamber of Agriculture of Drôme, in charge of the farmers and agricultural facilities in the Diois (region around the city of Die).
This summer, we produced a lot of muscles! No space in the head and no energy to think about our agricultural installation. The farm of our dreams is still far away! Perhaps I was naive at the beginning of the year, to believe that it could go quickly. With hindsight I see well that it takes time. The time to better understand, better define, what we want and what we do not want. Because there are many questions to answer.
In September, we relaunched “our installation project” by posting a notice on the Terre de Liens website to find partners for the collectif. Result? Encouragement, proposals, nice reactions, long telephone exchanges and emails, and even meetings. But to know if, yes or no, it really sticks … our conclusion is that you have to live on the same territory, to see each other regularly, to share moments, to get really to know each other … And also that we need to start the project, people with fairly similar profiles (in terms of age, skills, progress in reflection, expectations …)
We also began to visit three potential sites of installation (others are coming), with each their positive and negative points.
The first is a farmer collective already existing in the Haut-Diois. A ‘GAEC’ with a lamb and beef production, a big garden and enough space to develop, after a test period, a goat branch .
The hesitations: an isolated place, a test year with work that is not in the field we want to develop, no collective living, hard work and “hard-working” people.
The second: a farm for sale on the Vercors, with an old construction to renovate, a large house and 12 hectares of land. We did the visite with Thomas, a potential future partner, who would like to raise sheep and make cheese.
The hesitations: the winter is harsh on the plateau, not enough land for an extensive agricultural system, many renovations and we don’t have a group yet to invest.
The third: a small collectif in the Ardèche, with magnificent buildings made by couple. Now three more people live there , all working outside the collectif. They are looking for people to use the farming facilities of this place (the stable, the cheese room and thirty hectares of land).
The hesitations: difficult to find a space in a place created and owned by others, a year of testing without agricultural activity, no other agricultural activity on the site, difficulties in housing (only habitat like a yurt), collective and agricultural part very close to each other (risky in case of misunderstanding).
Visiting places helps a lot to think, to refine our plans, to define our needs, to understand our blockages, etc.