ecofarm, farm tours
it’s almost too much to wrap my head around. too much intake. not enough brain space.
three full buses, four incredibly different farms, and about a thousand questions over one nine hour nonstop day. I have long known that visiting other people’s farming operations is one of the most valuable uses of my time, and today certainly lived up to that belief. over the next couple days I will share stories, videos, and photos from four very different farms, but for now I’ll just give the overview.
every farm is different, even when they might sound the same. a diversified, small scale, organic vegetable farm can come in every color under the rainbow—and every shade of every color—and every hue of every shade. it’s endless. a farm is a self portrait, and each individual is unique.
we visited a massive organic strawberry farm owned by a chubby, red faced businessman. we visited a super high tech green house operation run by an academic faced agri-nerd. we visited a small, mixed vegetable farm who direct-sells all his produce face-to-face at the market operated by a high spirited crack-up of a character. each farm is different. a self portrait.
an overarching theme that stuck out of the whole process was the concept that decisions you make—not just in business, but in life—can set you down a path where future decisions will be made for you, often against your will, and often by inanimate objects. for example, if you buy a tub of ice cream at the grocery store, chances are that the decision to get high and eat the whole thing was already pre-decided.
today at jacob’s farm we heard a common tale. one of their larger customers, a big box grocery store, told them that they would either have to start supplying them with product year round, or they would lose the account. for fear of losing one of their biggest customers, they made the right business decision and developed year round greenhouses. everything has tradeoffs, and they just had to roll with the punches. but what’s key to notice, is that this decision was made for them long before the grocery store twisted their arm.
there exists levels, and scales, and sizes, where these decisions would not arise. but once they reached a certain size, and sold to a certain grocer, it became inevitable that they would be put in this do-or-die predicament. nothing left to do but toke up and eat that chunky monkey.
the information, and wisdom, and insight I gained today could fill a book. there is nothing quite like the distilled knowledge of an experienced farmer. I look forward to writing all about it as the days go by, but for now, these east coast eye’s are falling heavy on a west coast pillow.
I'm High On Cooking
Reader Comments (1)
Your insight is always amazing. I love waking up to your newest blog.