Getting to Know Our Farmers

Q: Are you growing vegetables for our CSA that you have never grown before?
A: We usually try to grow something new each year, even if it is just a different variety of winter squash. We like to try new things to see what grows the best in our soil, sometimes we get a gem and start growing it every year and it becomes a staple variety, and sometimes we get radishes full of wire worms. We are always trying to learn to work with our farms ecology and continually improve it.

Q: What do you enjoy the most and the least about farming as a way of life?A: I enjoy the satisfaction of knowing that we can produce all the food we need to survive, that it is clean and fresh, and that we eat real food that hasn't been processed, or changed in some way, or shipped across the country. I feel blessed to be able to eat this well and hope that others will discover the same revulsion I now have for grocery stores and most restaurants. What I like least is the long hours, if you’re awake and it’s the growing season you’re working, because there is so much to do and not enough hours in the day to accomplish it all and it all has to be done now or - for instance- there are no carrots because they weren't flame weeded at exactly the right stage and the weeds grew faster than the carrots and crowded them out. Even though we work on the farm together, we are usually doing different jobs, (you only need one person to drive the tractor to cultivate the field, etc.) And quality family time is very hard to come by. This year we realized that we COULD take a short vacation, separately. Someone always has to be here to take care of the greenhouses, the chickens, and now the cow, not to mention keeping the employees busy