Not all farms have full time workers. Some farms are run by families, couples, or in the worst of cases – an overworked individual. And, without full time workers you will not have anyone to leave behind when you go out of State or something. The solution – getting someone to do some farm sitting.

My wife and I have not done any “farm sitting” but we have asked family members to do it for us, on occasions. The need for such people is very both unavoidable, and also obvious, especially to anyone with critters that need to be fed, daily. That commitment means you can’t really go on vacation, or anything, without finding someone to (at the very least) feed the animals.

What do farm sitters do, while farm sitting?

1. These individuals need to be able to feed the animals, and keep everyone on their schedule. And, if need be… the farm sitter might also need to water some plants. Or clean some machinery at some point.
2. We would recommend that when getting a farm sitter, get one who has either worked on the farm before, or someone who has a decent understanding of how things work. If an emergency crisis pops up, they should be able to identify the danger and act accordingly
3. Contrarily to some belief, this duty (farm sitting) is not a vacation. Things can go wrong. And when they do, your farm sitter may be the one person that saves everything. So, always get someone you can trust.
4. In some cases a farm sitter might have to do certain chores. For example, on our farm, our goats need to be milked daily to keep the milk running. Which means, in our absence that daily burden falls on our farm sitter.
5. Another crucial skill needed by a farm sitter is – the ability to identify and resolves issues. Issues that are NOT on his/her list of duties/tasks. This is when you need someone with a little bit of farming experience. Or, at the very least – someone who might have seen how things work. Because, try as you may, you can not predict and list down all the possible scenarios which your farm sitter may face. The sitter is going to need to see and resolve some things on their own. You might have to consider “training” someone in advance.

Conclusion

This service (farm sitting) is 100% needed. Anyone who has ever ran a farm knows that its not easy to leave things unattended. And, nobody plans for it to ever happen.. things happen. And, when they do, you will wish you had a farm sitter. Thank you very much for visiting The Rural American Dream! My wife and I hope that you’ve enjoyed this blog post.