The Day the Hen Crowed

I should be working on a spread sheet right now.  But... here I am, reviving a blog I haven't touched in months.  Why?  Well... a little back story.  My mother in law, Alma, has been on a liver transplant list for over a year.  What this means is for the past 6 months, we have been waiting for "the call" - at which point, we pack up our lives and head to San Francisco until she is out of the woods... 3, 4, 8 weeks?  Who knows.  Well, the night before last... it happened.  Guillermo (my husband), flew down on the next flight - and I have been working for the past 24 hours to make all other logistics happen so that our farm plot, home, two dogs, 50+ chickens, and grad school work are covered during this transition.   This - is why community is amazing. 

Yesterday morning, I was up at 4 am with my head spinning with details.  And then... around 6 am... I heard the strangest noise.  I opened my window to be sure.  Yes. That was certainly a crowing noise coming from inside our chicken coop.  Of the eight egg layers we have living in this coop behind our house, 3 of them are nearing three years old, and the rest at least a year.  I KNOW they are all females, I have seen each one of them laying in their boxes.  But there it was, the sound of a young rooster that hasn't fully mastered the Cock-a-doodle-doo... more like... Cock-a-doo!  Rhythmic, with the morning sunrise, and definitely coming from inside our chicken coop.

Growing up on a farm that was open to the public three months a year, we became accustomed to suburban folk dropping off poultry in the middle of the night when the cute experiment started shitting all over.  So I approached the hen house thinking... is this some kind of joke?  Did someone really put an adolescent rooster in our coop?!  But no... the same eight ladies came flying out when I opened the door.  None of them telling on each other.

So. There it is. Nothing is as it seems.  Life is full of mystery.  A liver found a second chance at life, and so did Alma.

I best get to my todo list if we are going to hit the road in the morning.

Sub-urbia

So, its obvious from my blog title that I can live comfortably in the country or in the city.  But there is this middle ground that I have never really felt like I could exist in.

The suburbs freak me out.  My experience growing up in Michigan was that suburban living required standards of materialism that I could never keep up with.  I mean, the lack of cable access where I lived alone made me irrelevant.  The seeming obsession with comfort and ease makes me want to dig holes and fill them back up again.   

Well, this Thanksgiving - we packed up the turkey my husband raised, slaughtered, butchered, brined, and marinated into a box and checked it in on Alaska Airlines for a one way trip to Long Beach - the suburbs of Los Angeles.   While the general demographic is significantly more Latino than the suburbs of Detroit, the rest is the same as Anytown, USA.  There is presumably a beach there, however I never saw it.   Instead, I buckled down for three days of culture shock: "Black Friday" sales, fast food, and excessive television.   Locked in miles-upon-miles of strip malls, 1960's ranch homes and palm trees.
 

We have returned all that more appreciative of the beautiful state of Oregon and grateful, that the space we straddle between farm and city living is not so vast here.

Yet, I have to say - the fruit they can grow there is enviable.  Walking the neighborhoods I saw pomegranates, guava, citrus and avocados.   I wanted to fill that turkey box and bring it all back with us - but I didn't think the neighbors would appreciate me hopping their fences to harvest the sun.

Why I love Selma.

So, if I could sing from the mountain tops about this group of farming do-gooders... I would!  I mean, not only is their URL longer than mine... they are making Ann Arbor an undeniably cool place to engage in local food.

The leverage point for change is the "hoop house."  Clearly, in a climate where the ground is frozen 5 months of the year, eating locally can be pretty challenging.  But by building high quality hoop houses, Repasts is enabling farmers to do more.  But not only that, they are stimulating demand by feeding goodies from these hoops to their ever growing collective of supporters at the home of Jeff McCabe and Lisa Gottlieb every Friday Morning.  This is the amazing Selma Cafe, with new volunteer guest chefs every week.  Delicious, community-centric and so much fun!  Just so that it all goes full cycle, the money raised at these weekly celebrations is used to build more hoops.  Full cycle, just like any good organic farming project should be.  Infused with volunteer energy every step of the way.

So, if you find yourself in Ann Arbor on a Friday morning, don't miss your chance to get engaged.  You too can fall in love with Selma.

Four Door Farm

So, I have made a few mentions in previous posts about this collective farming group that I am involved in.  Time to get more specific.   In February of 2009, my husband Guillermo came up with an idea.  Why are we all just waiting around for the right opportunity to grow a significant amount of our own food?   As he likes to say, it was time to "get off the fence."  So the meetings began.  Anyone and everyone was invited to discuss a vision of growing 100% of our annual produce needs.  At one point, we had over 40 people in the conversation.  The result, was the Small Scale Farming Project or SSFP.  The basic concept was to share in the cost, the labor, the knowledge and skill without any one person coordinating or managing.  This wasn't a service, but an opportunity.

The first year was challenging to say the least, we were developing the model while existing in it.  We veered towards an abundance of rules and group agreements.  We took on two acres with no real equipment or experience.  By the middle of summer we were engulfed in weeds.  But somehow, 9 of us made it through to the end.  We learned amazing amounts and packed away drying beans, carrots and potatoes for the winter.

For our second go around, we made great improvements.  We went away from rules and more towards community building. We planted only one acre. We started our seeds on time for bushels of tomatoes in the summer.  And, we named ourselves - Four Door Farm.  The name is because of our iconic shed.... well, watch the video and you will see.  It hasn't been all perfect, but I for one am proud of us.  We faced a challenging growing season due to terrible weather... but I will save that for my next blog post.  For now, envision the possibilities when 21 people come together and commit to co-learning.  This is an experience where agriculture isn't just supported by the community, it is enabled by it.
 


  

Grounded Finance

The fact that the "value" of the land is no longer connected to its ability to produce, but rather as a place upon which other things are built is fundamentally off.  Woody Tasch has spawned a movement that is bringing many people together around the idea that our wealth should grow only as fast as our food.  Poetic.

"The problems we face with respect to soil fertility, biodiversity, food quality, and local economies are not primarily problems of technology. They are problems of finance." – Woody Tasch

 http://blog.slowmoneyalliance.org/

Filling the Freezer

We need a truck.  This became so obvious last week when my husband returned home with 20 chickens in the trunk and 4 ducks in the back seat of our silver Jetta.  I am sure the guy who did the 24-point inspection on my car two days later was dying to ask about the chicken shit and feathers that remained in the trunk.  It seems the first step to owning a farm, is owning a truck.

The poultry who lost their lives that day were part of our "community-enabled agriculture" project.  A group of five folks raised 60 birds to be butchered for meat.  They lived on the acre leased by a larger group who is farming it for vegetables. 

Now, let's just say, if you are going to perform decidedly rural activities in the city - it's best if you get along with your neighbors.  We are blessed that ours are willing and even proud of us for this work - being that it would be difficult to count the number of code violations.

We are self taught, and consequently slow.  It took 14 hours to catch, transport, kill, de-feather and gut the 24 lovelies that were divided up among the 5 members.   However, at least two of those hours were spent sharing meals - an essential part to any collective project. 

Also, the big learning this year is that ducks are probably considered a gourmet food because their little downy feathers make plucking an absolute night-mare.  You see, we believe in learning the hard way.   Next we will learn what turkeys have in store as the five beautiful birds enjoy the pen all to themselves for the next few weeks. 

There and Back again

All over the world, farmlands are being left for the big city. From India to Indianapolis the educated, the poor, and the upwardly eager are saying good bye to a life where success is tied to the land on which they live. The consequences include a multi-cultural shift away from fundamental know-how that has given humans the ability to live on the earth thus far. Food. Shelter. Water. These are now relegated to specialists in our global economic engine.

While its easy to sit back and judge the world's farm youth for having bigger dreams than the cow barn. I have to admit that for me it was Solid Gold (for those under 30, that was a dance show that was popular in my formative years) that made my future too bright to fit on the 100 acre apple farm in Michigan where I was raised. A trip to New York for a dance competition, and another to Washington DC to study civics whetted an appetite that sent me around the globe. I always did well in school and never doubted college. I went as far as my parents would allow from home to the University of Colorado, then on to Seattle and eventually New York City for four years - a place I often referred to as Urbanity.

Yet, for the past 4 years, my husband and I have been trying to figure out how to get "back to the land." This return trip is harder than one might imagine. Several macro-level phenomenon have arisen since my parents started their farm in the 70's. #1. Land is expensive. In our case we would like to live within an hour of a major urban center because that is where the market is. Well, here in Oregon, wineries and wealthy mcmansioners looking for farm tax subsidies by having 10 cows for lawn ornaments to their 6,000 square foot homes have made real estate values so high, that no discerning vegetable or poultry operation could dream of paying the mortgage. #2. We love urban amenities. From options for educating our son, to relishing an exquisitely poured espresso - it is not easy to look at small towns without seeing a bit of sacrifice.

Joel Salatin in his book "You Can Farm" strongly encourages a new farmer to have a few years of living expenses saved after the investments in buildings and equipment needed to run an operation. It seems I will either have to win the lottery or launch the next hottest iPhone app to have the money to live on what I can grow or raise. Or..... we can get smarter. Living in the food mecca of Portland, OR we are studying the markets and food trends that might sustain a farm operation in the future. We are also working with friends and potential co-creators to teach ourselves how to farm on a significant scale, and potentially share the cost. Also, code be damned, we are finding ways to live a rural lifestyle in an urban center.

In the weeks and months ahead I intend to quote Wendell Berry, noodle on the technical know how and business savvy that will enable us to be relevant, successful and connected to the land, and even try to make some sauerkraut. Lucky for me there are lots of small farmers who are finding away to make a decent living in the face of agribusiness, global produce markets, and land prices. There is a place for our dreams out there somewhere and I won't rest until I find it.