by Paula Manalo
* * *
BY EVAN DRISCOLL
A father, farmer, and writer in Portland, Oregon, Evan Driscoll owns Sasquatch Acre, where he grows more than a hundred varieties of organic vegetables and raises thirty laying hens.
* * *
In one night they vanish: thousands of seedlings consumed a month before our first farmers’ market. Panic takes hold. I begin to sweat hard. Instinct carries me down the street to the feed and seed shop.
Waiting in the checkout line, I run into my farm neighbor, Nate.
“I think it’s slugs,” I suggest. “It’s weird, though, because they dug down and ate the seeds, too. How do they do that?”
“Well, they don’t,” he informs me. “Sounds like you have voles. Or mice.”
“Huh.”
I buy the fifty-pound sack of salt in my arms anyway.
Quitting an awesome desk job was a difficult thing to do. My hours were predictable, the work was predictable, and my mind was at relative ease. Post-work hours and weekends were dedicated to my infant child, times we spent at parks, cafés, and just wandering through neighborhoods.
But circumstances changed, and off we went — my girlfriend, child, and I — from Austin, Texas, to its northwestern equivalent, Portland, Oregon. My girlfriend was enrolled in law school there, and our new location held no prospects for me, few friends, and no connections. A trying time lay ahead.
I watched a depressed economy swallow hundreds of my job applications. I was left with little to do but childcare and thumb twiddling. Lots of thinking.
Thinking.
And such.
And nothing.
And then, eventually, something.
I f**king hate farming. It’s so stupid and I hate it, and it’s really hard and I don’t know what I’m doing and I’m not making any money (maybe breaking even) and there are all these things everywhere . . . these f**king things . . . why do I need all these things to farm? And all these people wanting everything, and I want everything, writing these words that try to mean something but mean nothing. I’m a failure. I’m twenty-five and directionless. Farming? What the f**k was I thinking? Back to grad school — no. F**k school.
Standing, I lean forward on my garden hoe, hard. It stabs me just under my shoulder in a satisfying way.
There’s a blue heron, gliding.
I have no idea what’s going on right now.
I do know I’m pulling weeds.
The decision was made: time to farm. It just made sense. This, I thought, would be the most direct way to have a positive impact on the environment. I sure wasn’t going to help develop cheaper and more efficient solar panels with my liberal arts degree. I don’t have a track record of being a charismatic activist, as I have considerable difficulty organizing even a potluck with friends. Then, farming. Environmental stewardship at its most basic.
I quickly found that, without experience, I would not be making any money working as a farmhand. I must have called every small farm within a twenty-mile radius of Portland. A typical conversation:
“Hello, this is ________ Farm.”
“Hi, there. I’m looking for farming opportunities, and I was wondering if you have any paid apprenticeships. See, I need to have some sort of income ’cause I have a kid and . . .”
“Nope.”
“Thanks so much!”
Luckily, more unpaid opportunities were available than I could shake a stick at. I found one that would fit my life: twenty hours a week of farmwork, on top of my current forty hours at moneyed jobs, and childcare to boot. Reasonable, I thought.
And there I was a month later, dropping peas into cold soil. Over the course of the next six months, I would learn to build a compost pile, make a greenhouse burst with vigorous seedlings, build and run a CSA, cook quick and healthy meals, manage volunteers, schedule plantings, identify plant diseases and problems, and manage nutria.
“Nutria problem,” my farm sensei tells me. “I know there’s a tax to pay to nature, but these nutrias might be taking more than their fair share.” They’ve eaten half a bed of lettuce mix, a considerable amount for a half-acre farm. My sensei called up some urban trappers, the kinds who use traditional, tried-and-true capturing methods.
“I think they eat what they trap,” she ventured.
Now all the tomatoes are dying. Beautifully poetic. The most symbolically important crop on the farm refuses to grow properly. It’s May, and they’ve been stagnant at two true leaves for almost a month now, and we are clueless as to what to do.
“There’s not enough ventilation in here,” I tell Travis, my cofarmer. “We need to build a window on the other side of here.”
And we do, and the tomatoes go on stagnating.
These tomatoes sure are sassy. Maybe this is how they grow. Or maybe they’re taking a break before they freaking explode with growth in summer. That’s probably it. I’m confident.
Whatever. I hate farming.
And off we go to dump 432 tomato seedlings into the compost pile. That’s roughly fifty dollars’ worth of seed and a few bucks of potting soil — a large chunk of change to us.
“You throwing those out?” Victor asks. He’s our landlord’s farm manager.
“Yeah, they’ve got some sort of disease.” I say, on the defensive.
Victor takes a tray from the stack I’m holding. His eyes narrow. He tilts the tray, providing another perspective. Tilts it carefully in another direction. Brushes the tops of the seedlings roughly with his palm. Takes a pinch of soil.
“What’s the soil?”
“Equal parts compost, perlite, pumice, and coconut hull. Made it myself.”
“This is sawdust.”
“Oh.”
“Spray these with fish emulsion twice a week and see what happens.”
With fish emulsion, they blossom into massive, magnificent seedlings, begging to be transplanted.
Nitrogen deficiency. Huh.
I sat in front of a window that left no room for daydreaming — doing so would only bring about a dream that consists of both drizzle and gray. January in Portland is rugged. Not ice-covered-streets-freeze-to-death-blizzard-snow rugged, but drizzling and gray and constantly these two things at all times without exception. So I turned my eyes to the computer screen in front of me. I would be graduating from farm apprentice to farm owner in a short time. The first steps I took to prepare were the following non-farm things:
Build a website
Make business cards and a banner for market
Research and make seed purchases
Build restaurant relationships
Apply to farmers’ markets
Gather lots of physical resources
Make a farm plan
Make a business plan
Make a planting schedule
Crop profiles
Budget
Simply creating the farm plan put me in the mind-set that I was on the land. It helped me make as many decisions off the land as I could so that I wouldn’t have to make them on the land, where communication is both timely and costly. When all was said and done, the plan ran more than a hundred and twenty pages.
It was possibly the most valuable/worthless document I’ve ever created: Once finished, we rarely, if ever, referred back to it. Reality and planning are two very different things.
And then, holy sh*t, we’re selling our vegetables to people. And these people are happy, and we’re happy, and they love our salad mix— the edible flowers are a hit. I can’t believe the sun is out — it hasn’t been out in, what, two months? And now look, there it is. All the other vendors are just lookin’ so good. What a fine market — our first market, yes, but I know, I know we’re going to find something profoundly spiritual here.
I don’t live on my acre. I have this big metal box with a huge tank that holds something called “gasoline,” and this propels the box to a destination of my choice, within reason. I use it to get to my farm. This commute, however, is not by choice. My four-year-o
ld son requires most of my attention and time, as my girlfriend — his mother — is in law school. She’s present as much as she can be, but most of the time she can be found surrounded by crisp stacks of 8½-by-11 paper, highlighters, and little colored tabby things to mark special pages in obese books.
* * *
It was time to farm. It just made sense. I sure wasn’t going to help develop cheaper and more efficient solar panels with my liberal arts degree.
* * *
Food suddenly became a big thing in my life when I was forced, unwittingly, to cook the majority of my family’s meals. I guess I didn’t realize that having a girlfriend in law school would mean that I would become the primary caretaker of our child, and, thus, a responsible adult. Cooking, laundry, drop-offs, pickups, making sure he doesn’t wear poop-stained pants to school — these are worn only to his uncle’s house — ensuring that he consumes enough calories so as not to perish, ensuring that he consumes enough water so as not to perish, ensuring that he does not ingest chemicals, or bump his head on a corner, or follow my example as I scream obscenities at ten beds of potatoes, tomatoes, cucumbers, and squash that are all under-performing/dying. This helps them grow.
In short, my life is a balance between farm and family. It’s difficult to really dive in and make a go of it doing it this way. But at least I’m doing.
We’re doing our damnedest to not work wet soil. As first-year farmers, we’re doing everything by the book. We, in fact, know no other way of doing things. Don’t work the soil when it’s too wet, all the books repeatedly repeat. You will destroy your soil structure. You will destroy the diversity of the life within. You will destroy yourself and your loved ones.
And here we are, digging deep into sopping wet, heavy clay soil. It’s mid-May and our first farmers’ market is coming in a quick six weeks. We need to bring something. Coming to the first market shorthanded would be disastrous. We will be red-cheeked. Labeled amateurs SO FAST by customers. FIRST IMPRESSION RUINED. Mocked by vendors, spited by God himself, with his shining, massive, iron fist, gleaming brightly in the sky above. We must bring something.
The bed-building process is incredibly laborious. We’re digging into our sixteen-inch pathways a spade deep and flipping the soil onto our four-foot-wide beds. At seventy-five-feet long, and with the soil as wet as it is, our muscles are screaming at us to stop. What results is a blanket of gray mud bricks the length and width of our beds. At least the weeds beneath aren’t going to break through.
We’ve now dug in ten beds this way and are waiting for a day or two of sun to slightly dry the mud cakes. Those days eventually come, and we borrow a neighbor’s rototiller to break them up a bit. They now look like little pebbles, and we layer this with a good three to five inches of compost. We use a total of fifteen yards.
We drop some seeds directly into the compost, cover them, and pray for even the slightest amount of growth. And grow they do. And we bring head lettuce, lettuce mix, radishes, mustard mix, garlic scapes, and eggs to our first market. We sell out quickly, and folks are ultra-happy. One year later, we have yet to till these beds. There have been three successions of veggies in some, and counting. The soil is improving, and seems to be teeming with life — lots of worms and little buggers.
That said, I don’t recommend working wet soil.
I do advocate wingin’ it.
On his way out to the farm, Travis tells me he sees a bald eagle and two golden hawks having an epic three-way battle over a bridge. Three looming mountains comprise their background, he says.
My boy stands in the middle of our first successful broccoli patch. The air is silky warm. Gold sunbeams bounce off his soft cheeks.
I walk naked around the land in utter darkness.
You Are Not Alone
* * *
BY MEG RUNYAN
Meg Runyan runs Wild Goose Farm, which is part of the Farm Business Development Center at Prairie Crossing in Grayslake, Illinois. She sells her organic produce through a CSA and a farmers’ market. Meg farms 3 acres with an employee and a small crew of volunteers, including her parents.
* * *
I walk to the greenhouse in early-May sunshine.
The day is just beginning and already my mind is filled with tasks that need to be done. I’m anxious to start on my endless list. There’s just too much to do today. Before I open the door to the greenhouse, I pause to feel the gentle breeze, listen to the birds, and taste the cool spring air. A moment of pure joy before the work begins.
The warmth of the greenhouse greets me with the lovely scent of growing things. Quickly, I set up my seeding station, gathering potting mix, trays, and seeds. It’s lettuce and squash today, according to my schedule. I settle into the methodical chore of seeding. As I work, I think of those who, at this moment, are driving to their various jobs. My life must be so different from theirs.
Before I know it, my greenhouse time is up. I quickly water the new trays along with the rest of the greenhouse. I close the door and hurry to meet my fellow farmers for our monthly field walk. Today, we’re doing a field walk of all our farms, and will share our ongoing plans and ask questions. Matt is already there, waiting for us. He and his wife, Peg, run a well-established organic vegetable farm in Prairie Crossing. The rest of us are “incubator” farmers. We rent land, greenhouse and cooler space, and tilling equipment from the Farm Business Development Program at Prairie Crossing. Matt and Peg serve as our informal mentors.
I join Matt at the washing station and watch the other people arrive from various parts of the farm. Jeff, a fifth-year farmer, drives his tractor in from doing some early-morning cultivating. Alex, a second-year farmer like me, walks over from another greenhouse. Eric, who manages a school farm, yells out to us from his group of students that he’ll catch up with us later. Nick, a first-year farmer, comes in to start his day with the field walk.
We start the tour with Matt’s fields. We pass rows of healthy plants. Off in the distance, we see his crew transplanting. Matt shows us his beets, a vigorous crop with few weeds. Then he turns to where his peas should be. He cringes as he shows us the empty beds. Hardly anything has germinated. Looking at the forlorn beds, I realize that even experienced farmers have crops that fail. I am both sad and comforted.
We move onto Alex’s fields, where he’s working on a movable hoop house. The ribs and base are up; he’s just waiting for the plastic, so he can start growing tomatoes inside. We’re full of questions, as we’re all in different stages of constructing our own movable or semipermanent hoop houses.
Jeff takes us to his fields next, which he has just cultivated with his tractor. Jeff asks Matt about his tractors and cultivating tools. This is Jeff’s third year with his tractor, and I think he’s finally enjoying himself. He’s struggled the past two years, spending more time adjusting and fixing the tractor than the time it was supposed to saved. It’s been a tough learning curve, but he’s come a long way.
Now it’s Nick’s farm. We visit his pens of turkeys and chickens. Nick is planning on selling meat and eggs, along with his vegetables, all in his first year. I’m curious to see how he fares with his turkeys: I’m interested in turkeys, too. Eventually, that is. I’m not ready for livestock just yet. The vegetables are demanding enough.
Finally, we come to my fields. I was anxious earlier about showing my peers the fields of crooked rows and somewhat weedy crops. But, touring the others’ fields, I discovered something: They have crooked rows and weedy crops, too. There’s no reason to be bashful.
I proudly lead them to my garlic, growing tall and green. I’m especially excited, because this is my first garlic crop. Planting them the previous fall felt like practicing faith. “All right, little ones,” I said as I tucked the cloves into the soil. “I’m trusting that you’ll come up in the spring.” Now, in May, I almost giggle every time I look at my garlic.
* * *
I laugh every time I stop with a hoe in my hand to text the other farmers to see if a tractor
is free.
* * *
As we walk around the rest of my fields, we talk about tilling. I’m more comfortable on the tractor now, but I still have a lot to learn. I’m curious about how others are prepping their fields and dealing with compaction. We beginning farmers share a tractor, a few implements, and a walk-behind tiller. As a result, we’ve become skilled in texting. I laugh every time I stop with a hoe in my hand to text the other farmers to see if a tractor is free. They’re always practical messages, though. I have yet to text anyone, “OMG! I h8 mosquitoes!”
While we’re talking, Jeff and I discover we both want the tractor this afternoon. We quickly work out a plan: Jeff will get the tractor first, while I do some fieldwork. Once Jeff is finished, he’ll drive over to my fields. He’ll take my truck back to the shed and I’ll put the tractor away when I’m done.
With the plan set, we all head back. I gather the flats of lettuce, kohlrabi, and scallion seedlings I need to plant today. Each tray is soaked with a smelly concoction of fish emulsion and water. I load the truck with the plants, row markers, and hoes for weeding. I take a moment to check off the tasks completed for the day, enjoying the satisfaction each tick brings.
The drive to my fields takes me past the others. I see Matt working with his field crew. Oh, I wish I had a crew helping me today! Maybe I wouldn’t be so dead tired and achy at the end of the day. Next, I see Alex with Alison, his wife, who will spend the rest of the day working in the fields. Jeff has joined his crew of two, continuing the weeding and planting they did during our field walk. I wave as I pass Nick in his fields. He’s alone today, too, but his girlfriend will come out later in the week.
I reach my fields. I grab the row markers and trays of lettuce. As I alternately mark the rows, pop out lettuce seedlings, and tuck them into the soil, my mind wanders to the others farming around me. My mind fixes on what they have that I don’t.
