From Josh Volk, author of the best-selling Compact Farms, these inventive tools and step-by-sep instructions for making and modifying them, help small, diversified farms simplify and streamline their operations for less wear and tear on human workers and for greater efficiency overall. Josh Volk, author of the best-selling Compact Farms, offers small-scale farmers an in-depth guide to building customised equipment that will save time and money and introduce much-needed efficiencies to their operations. Volk begins with the basics, such as setting up a workshop and understanding design principles, mechanical principles, and materials properties, then presents plans for making 15 tools suited to small-farm tasks and processes. Each project includes an explanation of the tool’s purpose and use, as well as the time commitment, skill level, and equipment required to build it. Projects range from the super-simple (requiring a half-day to build) to the more complex, and include how-to photographs and illustrations with variations for customising the finished implement. Along with instructions for building items such as simple seedling benches, a mini barrel washer, a DIY germination chamber, and a rolling pack table, Volk addresses systems design for farm efficiency, including how to design an effective drip irrigation system and how to set up spreadsheets for collecting important planning, planting, and market data. AUTHOR: Josh Volk is the best-selling author of Compact Farms and the proprietor of Slow Hand Farm in Portland, Oregon. He has been working on and managing small farms around the country for the last 20 years, studying the systems that make them efficient. SELLING POINTS: . Interest in compact farms and market gardens continues to grow. Small, diversified farms are seeing more support as consumers increasingly seek local alternatives to imported produce or produce grown at an industrial scale and shipped long distances. These farms sell produce at farmers’ markets, operate CSAs, and provide food for farm-to-table restaurants and local institutions such as colleges and hospitals. . Small farmers need tools that suit their scale and particular needs. With planting areas inside hoophouses and greenhouses, and with beds measured in square feet rather than fields measured in acres, industrial-sized machines are unwieldy and unsafe for small-farm operations. Size-appropriate and innovative tools are essential for efficiency and success, and many of them can be built on the farm.
