Farms & Gardens

When I got the press release announcing Gardens of Eagan's unique new Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program last week, I was excited. Was it possible that Gardens of Eagan had found a way to address customers' primary concern -- that they're signing up for a box of foods they don't know what to do with -- while still directly supporting the farmers who grow local food? Here's a look at the press release:

Gardens of Eagan - the popular organic produce farm in the south metro - is debuting a unique CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) program that enables shareholders to select their produce items at their convenience throughout the 2011 growing season.

It’s springtime, and the maple trees are dripping with sweet, pristine, beautiful sap. Sugarhouses across North America have billowing plumes of steam rising from their rooftops as maple sap is converted into maple syrup. Maple syrup is such a unique specialty product -- it’s only made in Canada and the Northern United States, and it is a crop that is only harvested for a few short weeks in the spring. The niche industry is made up of small entrepreneurs and hobbyists who eagerly look forward to this time of year, when the season transitions from cold to warm.

Every time the Farm Bill comes up for debate, there are numerous ideas about how to “fix” the commodity programs. Calls abound to add new programs, scale back existing ones, tweak the payments here and there, and even scrap subsidies entirely (this recent New York Times editorial caused a bit of a stir). Not all of these ideas are new, however, and some of them have been tried before. As more people become interested in the Farm Bill and its impact on what we grow and consume, I think it’s important to understand a bit of the history behind why these programs are they way they are in order to talk about how we might want to change them.

Coupled and Decoupled Payments

My husband and I first joined a Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program about 14 years ago. We shared a membership with friends and split the box of vegetables each week. It was the early days of CSAs in the Twin Cities, and the variety in the box was, well, not very various -- a three week stretch of nothing but bok choy pretty much ended our interest. But then, four years ago, circumstances conspired to bring us back into the CSA fold. Just when my husband and I were ready to reconsider, we visited some relatives in Madison and happened to be there when they received their CSA share from Harmony Valley Farm, located in Viroqua, WI.

I have always had a happy relationship with dirt. As a kid, I took pride in being perpetually filthy, and felt a strong kinship with the Peanuts character Pig Pen. Once I became a farmer, I discovered that dirt – or using grown-up farmers’ terminology, soil – is so much more than just the fun stuff that makes kids dirty. Soil is absolutely an essential ingredient in the food system, and it’s something that most of us just don’t spend a lot of time thinking about.

Thoughts of revolution were in the air at the Sustainable Farming Association of Minnesota’s twentieth annual conference, The Routes of Sustainability: Food, Farming & Fellowship, held February 18 - 19 at the College of St. Benedict. SFA MN is a farmer-led organization that works to connect farmers with eaters across the state.

From the PastureLand website:

PastureLand 100% grass-fed organic dairy products are handcrafted by artisan butter and cheese makers with the milk of cows that spend their days grazing the pastures on our farms in Southeast Minnesota.

Our organic Summer Gold™ cultured butter and artisan cheeses are known for their exquisite taste and quality, and get their outstanding flavor and grass-fed nutrition from the lush pasture grasses that the cows graze from April through November.

Last week, I attended a Farm Bill listening session held by the Community Food Security Coalition (CFSC) in Minneapolis. The organization was looking for input about what should be its 2012 Farm Bill policy priorities, but what it got instead was smorgasbord of ideas that would be difficult -- if not impossible -- to put into the Farm Bill as it is now. Because the Farm Bill directly affects the lives and livelihoods of all Americans (and many around the world), there are many stakeholders. But because it is both so broad and so complex, it’s hard to please everyone. It's even harder to get entrenched interests to agree to anything but incremental change.

This concludes our series of posts about small farmers and artisans in southwest Michigan. We featured stories about Local, Pat and Ellie Mullins's new retail business selling artisanal meats; Tabula Rasa Farm and its determined owners Bill and Greta Hurst; and the grass-fed beef Bob and Janet Schuttler are raising on Middlebrook Farm. In each case, their business is only a few years old, but growing under the impassioned care of dedicated founders. They represent just a few of Michigan's thousands of fabulous farmers and producers.

This is part three in our series of posts about small farmers and artisans in southwest Michigan. Earlier this week, we featured stories about a new retail business selling artisanal meats, and about a couple growing Chardonnay grapes. Today we profile the owners of another small farm. Tomorrow we will close with some observations about the future of small-scale agriculture in Michigan.

A Visit to Middlebrook Farm

Bob and Janet Schuttler didn’t set out to raise and sell grass-fed beef. Bob chalks it up to “dumb luck.” They had run out of projects at their vacation home near Lake Michigan and started driving by rural properties—including the 22-acres of land and 1844 farmhouse that comprise Middlebrook Farm. They bought the place in 2005, and two years later, Bob left his family-owned, Chicago-area construction business.