They only do this every 5 years and our lawmakers base decisions on these census numbers. If you haven't gotten the form in the mail... visit USDA Census
I thought we had til April or May to fill it out (I probably had that wrong). I sent mine in before the end of Jan. and received another one the first part of Feb. with a note that they wanted it by the 15th of Feb (or some such thing). I called and they said ignore it as they already had mine on file.
Talk about Govt. waste!!!
I'm new to this kind of thing, so they didn't send me any forms. I visited the website, where they have the forms, but they say that they are "for informational purposes only, please do not download and return". OK.
I'm sure I won't get into trouble, since I didn't try to make any money last year, but I'm wondering if there's anyone I need to contact. This year I hope to make some money (I should beat the $1K minimum, with some luck and lots of work), and next year I hope to really ramp up.
Only if they contact you. If you didn't get the census dont' worry about it. It also will usually only apply to those who were in some kind of govt. program for farming/ranching. If you aren't in any of those then you aren't required to send it in either. When you sign up for govt. programs either directly or indirectly they basically own you.
Richard, I'd be the first to admit that I don't know all the rules and regulations by a long shot, but I got those census forms and it said I was required by law to return them, and I was sure never in any government program, unless you count the fact that I did the necessary paperwork to buy "off road" diesel, bought some things for the farm without paying sales tax, and showed just a tiny bit of farm income on my income tax returns. At least I was never in any program that paid me. [img]/forums/images/icons/frown.gif[/img]
Yes you are right Bird, sorry guess I should have been more exact. That's what I was talking about when I said indirectly sign up for programs. If you take a tax deduction, don't pay taxes on fuel, get money for crp, ldp, etc. etc. then you have to fill one out. Even if you rent out land and the farmer does something like above you have to fill one out.