Ron:
It depends on what you mean by "accounting". If you just want to account for your income and expenses any accounting program will work fine. Even Quicken for just receipts and disbursements.
Unless you really understand accounting, which you won't completely in a short course, I highly recommend you concentrate on receipts and disbursements and your bank balance. This means you don't try to track fixed assets and such in the balance sheet accounts, but rather run every thing (including purchases of assets and cost of building barns) through expense accounts, and let your accountant deal with the depreciation and such. Believe me, he can do it faster than he can straighten out your mess.
For your chart of accounts, just use schedule F categories, and add any other kinds of expenses not listed.
I am assuming you are a cash basis farmer.
If you raise livestock, and want the accounting software to keep up with that in detail, you might want to consider a dedicated farm package. Most small farmers will find such a vertical package too difficult.
For livestock you need to keep up with which were bought to feed out and sell, which ones were bought for breeding, and which ones were raised. You keep an inventory of the ones you buy and feed out and reduce your gain on sale by the amount you paid, and deduct the feed and other expenses as you go. The ones you buy for breeding are like equipment - you depreciate those. The ones you raise don't have a tax basis (cost) because you deduct all the related expenses as you pay them (if cash basis). There is no need to separate expenses for one class of animal versus another, unless you have an internal reason (management) for doing so. It would probably be too difficult to track. Give your accountant how many head of each class you sold during the year and for how much, and how many head of inventory or breeding stock you had on hand at yearend. When you sell raised animals the entire amount is income.
Section 179 applies to livestock as well as equipment. Does not apply to real estate. The current year section 179 deduction is limited to net income from trades or businesses. Salary income is considered trade or business income, so you could conceivably have a farm loss and still have a 179 deduction, if you have a salary or another busines that is profitable.
I am not a Quickbooks fan, but am certified for it and it is sufficient for most small farmers. Peachtree is better (in most cases), but usually not necessary for a small one-computer operation. Quicken is not accounting software - it is checkbook software. It is probably sufficient although quirky for the accountant to deal with.
Whichever software product you use just don't try to set up and operate a full general ledger unless you know what you're doing. Keep your bank account reconciled and properly identify your bank account transactions, then send the backup to the accountant. He will thank you for not biting off more than you can chew.
