yes, that is plenty to start with.

There are questions that you will need to ask yourself.
How will you sell? farmers market or roadside? If farmers market, how far away is it? Roadside, is there rules in your area regarding this?
What to grow? What grows well for you? Flowers or veggies? With your shorter growing season, I'm not sure exactly what to recommend. I have purchased rhubarb and zucchinis from Michigan. I know there is a pickle farm in southern MI.

If you have gardened before on your land, choose something that you would grow for yourself and then increase the amount by at least 2x. That is how I started out at my farmers market. The second year, I added items and increased year1 2-3x. Third year, found out what did not sell (I always give things 2 yrs), deleted some items and incresed others. After 9 years, we are still figuring out what we want to grow from year to year. Some things, we will always have, others are still in a testing stage.

Good luck, and start planning and planting. If you grow what you would eat, worst case is that you will have plenty for yourself to eat this winter.

Thank you for the good advice hanselmanfarm. My friend is preparing the land for planting. We are going to start with some green arrow peas and Oregon stir fry peas, some bloomsdale spinach along with some early lettuces. Also a bunch of different onion sets.Some of the white onion sets we will use for for young green onions. In a couple of weeks some Detroit dark beets & some champion radish. (sounds like all the ingredients for a may salad)

We feel if we can hit the first farmers market in mid-May with some of this fresh early produce we will be one up for our-selves and get our feet wet in the market! sally

Hi Sally. Do you know for sure that your market will be open in mid-May? I'm in northern Michigan too, and our small market doesn't usually open until mid to late June. Last year, it was the first week in July.

At our market heirloom tomatoes make very good money for the couple that sells them - a lot more than standard tomatoes. Also, it's hard to go wrong with green beans.

ThinMan

Hi thin-man, were north of Lewisville, in northern thumb.
port austin opens it,s market may 23, also the Amish open market starts in April in Argyle.(auction format)
We will plant warm weather crops around june 3-- (tomato,s,cukes green-yellow beans & peppers. I have a small greenhouse (125 flats only) to start my tomatoes & peppers).
Good luck thin man.

Grow what you love to grow.
Have you scouted out this Market ? Attended any meetings to learn the regulations ? Talk to other vendors and find out what they grow.
Will you need a license? The MSUE agent for your County is a good person to get to know.

Hi Grannymarsh, we signed up on the vendor list last fall in anticipation of this plan. I also helped out my sister in law at both sales for the last couple of years,so i know mostly everybody. This will be my first-year with my own booth.
The rates are 10.00 for Saturday from 8-1pm
(my sister in law and brother sold hay and straw bales and did really well).
All of the veggie people seemed to sell a lot of stuff in a short time.
What scares me though is production quota, if we get the right weather and all of the stuff grows like are plan predicts we well be all-right. If thing go hay-wire we could be in a hurt to provide for the market!

Hay and straw, what a GREAT idea.
We pay by the year, and I do cut flowers & perennials. There is a slight lag between when the perennials quit selling and the flowers kick in. I doubled my flower production last year and would still sell out by noon. hours are 9am to 2pm.
Stuff is going to happen, don't worry about it. Sell the best and take pride in it. Let your enthusiasm show thru. You'll find your niche. Don't be afraid to take a chance on a new product.
I think that this is going to be a banner year for all of us !!

Don't worry about trying to supply the market. You won't be able to produce enough. Maybe for the first few weeks until people start to tell other people. Just grow what you can and when you run out, put a sign up saying sold out. Tell the customers that are too late to come earlier. I started out 10 years ago, thinking I needed to grow enough NOT to run out. Now I can sell everything that I grow and what 2-3 families can grow also. One year, I sold 1/3 of the produce that was produced on 28 acres by a man that had been growing produce for 30 years along with my own. I soon ran out of energy, and cut back to what my family and 1-2 other families can produce. Our market runs from May 1 thru Oct 31.

I also think this will be banner year. More people are wanting to buy fresh and LOCAL. I'm thinking about displaying a map, marking where the market is and where my farm is. We are only 15 miles away, and one of the closest vendors.

Also keep in mind that the early crops may be able to be harvested late in the season also. 2 crops in 1 year, 2 chances to "hook" those customers. Just buy your seeds early, it's hard to get seeds later in the year. I buy seeds, enough to last 2-3 years on some things. NOT onion seeds.

We are starting our tenth year as market gardeners and grow blueberries, vegetables and some cut flowers on between 1/3 and 1/2 acre plus a 14x48 hoophouse and some 4x8 coldframes. We grow our vegetables on 30" beds with 1 foot aisles and do multiple plantings so we can get a lot out of a relatively small area. Our goal was to gross at least $20,000 annually which we finally attained after getting some experience under our belts. We found the books by Eliot Coleman and Shepherd Ogden to be a huge help. Also check out "Growing for Market" magazine. Networking with other growers is also a good way to learn the ropes. One experienced grower was particularly helpful to us and let us work a couple times at their farmers' market booth so that we could see what we needed in terms of supplies, equipment, etc. Good luck