Whether you’re looking to start your own small farm business or want to grow your current operation, there are many important steps to take.

Starting a farm requires an extensive investment in land, equipment and the necessary improvements to your operation. Before you begin, make sure you have an accurate idea of your startup costs.

Patricia Garrick’s love for agriculture continues to blossom through her meticulously maintained fields, where she nurtures fruit trees.

Despite walking with a limp for much of her senior life as a result of arthritis in the ankle joint, Garrick, who is better known as ‘Aunt Pat’ still manages to use a hoe or pitchfork to till the soil for sowing seeds on her eight-acre property in Leith Hall, St Thomas.

But she maintains the land with the help of a few workmen, whom she employ when her arthritis becomes unbearable and she need to sit and rest her ankle, which appears to be permanently swollen.

“But y’know what? I don’t let this stop me to do what I have to do. I cannot do it fast like before, but I do everything. I clean my house, my yard, I work in my beautiful flowers garden, and I tend to my farm as it keeps me active,” she told The Gleaner last week.

Aunt Pat spent nearly four decades working in the United States before returning to Jamaica on her retirement.

The octogenarian began farming in 1991. Her first plot of land was bought by her husband, who would often listen to her voicing aspirations of owning a farm.

“I was born in Kingston, but I was raised in Mount Zion, St Ann, with my grandmother and I always wanted a farm. So, when he came back and told me that he got a farm, I was so excited and I couldn’t wait to come home to see this farm,” she said.

She jokingly recalled the day when she finally got the opportunity to visit the location. When she laid eyes on the area, it was all just woodland.

“I said, ‘Weh you go buy this fa? How we a go clean up this? So much guinea grass and big trees and stuff’,” Garrick recalled.

But over time, what once seemed like an impossible area to clear to use for crop production is now a beauty to behold.

Aunt Pat added that with the help of locals, whom she paid $300 daily at the time, the land was eventually cleared using machetes.

“When I started planting the mangoes dem, me never know say the mangoes did a go sell or anything. Me just plant them,” she told The Gleaner as she reflected on the journey through the years.

“I love farming and I love to watch things grow,” she stated.

“Farming is like when yuh pregnant – you go through the different processes – and I enjoy every minute of it,” she added, proud of the fruits of her hard labour.

Garrick continues to provide the local market with ackee, soursop, and apples, while also selling east Indian and Julie mangoes to local buyers for export.

asha.wilks@gleanerjm.com

Source: jamaica-gleaner.com