Summer, 2007 Vol. 2, No.

73 Publication of the Northeast Organic Farming Association 1077-2294

Inside This Issue
Features
Good Agricultural Practices for Whom? 4
Do We Really Need Honeybees? 6
Inside Organic: Appropriations & Farm Bill 8
Washington Report 9
Peak Soil 10
On Invasives 39
The Infation Fan Blues 43
Domestic Fair Trade Exploration 44
NOFA Organic Lawn & Turf Handbook 45
Taste! Organic Connecticut 45
Supplement on
Organic Minor Fruit
Lee Reich, Guru of Uncommon Fruit 11
Ground Cherries 20
Forest Fruit Gardening in Holyoke 22
Pawpaw and Hardy Kiwi at Northfordy 28
Lee, Soil, and Uncommon Fruits 32
Apple Growers Meet 38
Departments
Letters 2
Editorial 2
NOFA Exchange 4
News Notes 5
Book Reviews 40
NOFA Contact People 46
Calendar 47
NOFA Membership Information 47
by Susan Lewis
Its coming - the 33
rd
Annual NOFA Summer
Conference at Hampshire College on August
10-12. Get ready for some fun, excitement,
learning galore and much more!
Hazel Henderson Saturday night Keynote
Speaker
In our every deliberation, we must consider
the impact of our decisions on the next seven
generations. From The Great Law of The
Iroquois Confederacy.
Hazel Henderson, our Keynote Speaker on
Saturday evening, will offer the crowd an
inspiring talk on Beyond Economics: Growing
the Green Economy. Ms. Henderson has been
involved in changing the status quo for a long
time. In the 1960s, she started Citizens for
Clean Air. And she hasnt stopped since. Her
list of credentials is a mile long (check out her
website: www.hazelhenderson.com). Her most
recent focus is on establishing a new earth
ethics beyond economism.
So many of us associate Darwin with the
concept of survival of the fttest; a focus
on the individual as primary rather than the
2007 NOFA Summer Conference
A Celebration of Sustainable Living
community. Hazel Henderson hosts a link on
her website called The Darwin Project. There
actually are some lost facts. Did you know that
Charles Darwin, in his book The Descent of
Man, talks about survival of the fttest only
2 times, but love 95 times! Moral sensitivity 92
times, mutuality and mutual aid 24 times, and
the brain and mind 200 times. These folks are
looking at how we can change our lives and
our world for the better. Hazel uses the words
bonding, cooperation and altruism quite a bit as
what lies at the core of being human. Visit her
website for more information on The Darwin
Project.
The TV series she created and is the Co-
Executive Producer for, Ethical Markets,
focuses on green building, renewable energy,
community investing, global citizenship, fair
trade, socially responsible investing, and more.
It is viewed internationally and the Presenters
are also from various corners of the globe. She
and others are creating a new paradigm for
how our economies are viewed. For us, its an
opportunity to start thinking about different
ways of bringing in a new future, now. Hazel
Henderson is at the forefront, as a futurist,
talking with European and U.S. markets. A
(continued on page 39)
by Jack Kittredge
On March 30 Federal District Court Judge
F. Dennis Saylor IV ruled that while organic
certifcation organizations have standing
to represent their interests by fling suit in
court (which the USDA contested), they do
not have the right to appeal USDA decisions
overturning a certifers rejection of a particular
grower. The decision came in the case of
Massachusetts Independent Certifcation Inc.
(MICI) versus Michael O. Johanns, Secretary
of Agriculture. The MICI case originated with
The Country Hen, an egg farm in Hubbardston
Massachusetts that applied to MICI in 2002
for organic certifcation. MICI turned the farm
down because it did not provide the hens access
to the outdoors. The farm immediately appealed
the rejection to the USDAs National Organic
Program (NOP), which ruled in the farms favor
and ordered MICI to certify the farm. MICI
refused and appealed the USDA decision.
Jill Krueger, lead attorney for MICI in the case,
explained the decision in this way: The judge
recognized that certifers have a stake in the
organic program and therefore have the right
to bring suit to defend their interests. But at
the same time the judge said when certifers
carry our their certifcation function they act
Judge Rules
Against MICI in
Country Hen Case
(continued on page 39)
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 2
Advertise in or Sponsor The Natural Farmer
To the editor:
Nice topic!
It would be good to have a listing of nurseries for
minor fruit. I have a bunch that I like, including
some for nut crops like hazelnuts and chestnuts.
Burnt Ridge Nursery - www.burntridgenursery.
com/
Raintree Nursery - www.raintreenursery.com/
Hidden Springs Nursery - www.hiddenspring-
snursery.com/
Edible Landscaping - www.ediblelandscaping.
com/
St. Lawrence Nursery - www.sln.potsdam.ny.us/
Badgersett Research Farm - www.badgersett.com/
Oikos Tree Crops - oikostreecrops.com/
Nolin River Nut Tree Nursery - www.nolinnurs-
ery.com/
John Gordon--not easy to understand how to order
from him, but he has good stuff. If you want to get
anything, it would be best to call.
www.geocities.com/nuttreegordon/0Kgordon.htm
Grimo Nut Tree Nursery - http://www.grimonut.
com/
Thanks as always for your good work,
Brian Caldwell
Letters to the Editor
The Natural Farmer is the newspaper of the
Northeast Organic Farming Association (NOFA).
In most chapters, regular members receive a
subscription as part of their dues, and others may
subscribe for $10 (in the US or $18 outside the US).
It is published four times a year at 411 Sheldon Rd.,
Barre, MA 01005. The editors are Jack Kittredge
and Julie Rawson, but most of the material is either
written by members or summarized by us from
information people send us.
Upcoming Issue Topics - We plan a year in advance
so that folks who want to write on a topic can have a
lot of lead time. The next 3 issues will be:
Fall 2007 Climate Change and Agriculture
Winter 2007-08 Labor on Organic Farms
Spring 2008 Manure in Organic Agriculture
Moving or missed an issue? The Natural Farmer
will not be forwarded by the post offce, so you need
to make sure your address is up-to-date if you move.
You get your subscription to this paper in one of two
ways. Direct subscribers who send us $10 are put on
our database here. These folks should send address
changes to us. Most of you, however, get this paper
as a NOFA member beneft for paying your chapter
dues. Each quarter every NOFA chapter sends us
address labels for their paid members, which we
use to mail out the issue. If you moved or didnt get
the paper, your beef is with your state chapter, not
us. Every issue we print an updated list of NOFA
Contact People on the last page, for a handy
reference to all the chapter names and addresses.
As a membership paper, we count on you for
articles, art and graphics, news and interviews,
photos on rural or organic themes, ads, letters, etc.
Almost everybody has a special talent or knows
someone who does. If you cant write, fnd someone
who can to interview you. Wed like to keep the
paper lively and interesting to members, and we
need your help to do it.
We appreciate a submission in any form, but are less
likely to make mistakes with something typed than
hand-written. To be a real gem, send it via electronic
mail (TNF@nofa.org.) Also, any graphics,
photos, charts, etc. you can provide will almost
certainly make your submission more readable and
informative. If you have any ideas or questions, one
of us is usually near the phone - (978) 355-2853,
fax: (978) 355-4046. The NOFA Interstate Council
website is www.nofa.org.
ISSN 1077-2294
copyright 2007,
Northeast Organic Farming Association
The Natural Farmer
Needs You!
Frequency discounts: if you buy space in several
issues you can qualify for substantial discounts off
these rates. Pay for two consecutive issues and get 10%
off each, pay for 3 and get 20% off, or pay for 4 and
get 25% off. An ad in the NOFA Summer Conference
Program Book counts as a TNF ad for purposes of this
discount.
Deadlines: We need your ad copy one month before the
publication date of each issue. The deadlines are:
January 31 for the Spring issue (mails Mar. 1)
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Disclaimer: Advertisers are helping support the paper
so please support them. We cannot investigate the
claims of advertisers, of course, so please exercise due
caution when considering any product or service. If you
learn of any misrepresentation in one of our ads please
inform us and we will take appropriate action. We dont
want ads that mislead.
Sponsorships: Individuals or organizations wishing to
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feature the sponsors logo or other small insignia.
Contact for Display Ads or Sponsors: Send display
ads or sponsorships with payment to our advertising
manager Dan Rosenberg, PO Box 40, Montague, MA
01351. If you have questions, or want to reserve space,
contact Dan at (413) 863-9063 or dan@realpickles.com.
NOFA members and readers of this journal are
among the blessed few in this country who are
actively raising what we call Minor Fruit. By
minor we do not mean to demean its taste,
beauty, nutritional value, reliability, size, or other
characteristic normally associated with high-quality
fruit. No, by minor we mean only that it has not
been commercialized yet in this country. You cant
generally buy it in stores. For reasons of perishability,
bruise-ability, or diffculty in economically
harvesting them, these treats are currently reserved
for the homesteader, gardener, or edible landscaper.
Julie and I have successfully raised mulberries and
gooseberries for years, and have recently planted
hardy kiwi, persimmons, pawpaws, Nanking cherries,
elderberries, and goumi. We fnd these fruits easier
to raise organically than the fussy apples, plums and
cherries we frst planted years ago. Being a little
closer to nature, the minor fruits own defenses to
insects and disease have not been bred away yet, and
they dont need the protective sprays, pheromones,
and other paraphernalia modern orchards depend
upon.
Perhaps more importantly, the marketing channels
for these fruits are the very ones that organic growers
in the Northeast have already carefully developed.
CSAs, farmers markets, and farmstands are the
places where minor fruits can be successfully sold.
They dont involve long periods of shipping or
constant handling, which are the Achilles heel of
minor fruit. They do involve customers who care
about quality, are willing to pay for it, and have
the direct contact with growers necessary to learn
about these unfamiliar delicacies.
For anyone who sells directly, as well as for those
who love raising the unusual, we think minor fruit
is an opportunity worth trying. There are also
secondary benefts to these plants if you dont get
around to harvesting them for sale. Our gooseberry
bush is a habitual stopping place for kids who
come in tow to the CSA. They are totally absorbed
for a happy few minutes plucking ripe berries from
among the thorns defending them. Our mulberry
tree is the favorite of local birds, who seem to
prefer its delicious fruit to our blueberries which
we can then harvest all the more of. Our hardy
kiwis, trellised against the south side of the hay
barn, make an elegant vining frame which sets off
the bays of the structure.
If some of these articles entice you, remember
them in the fall. Leave spaces for minor fruit in
your garden plan, and come January spend a little
time reading the excellent catalogs and websites
of nurseries which are offering more and more
varieties. We think you, too, will be excited by the
possibilities of minor fruit!
Why Minor Fruit?
Advertisements not only bring in TNF revenue, which
means less must come from membership dues, they also
make a paper interesting and helpful to those looking for
specifc goods or services. We carry 2 kinds of ads:
The NOFA Exchange - this is a free bulletin board service
(for subscribers or NOFA members who get the TNF) for
occasional needs or offerings. Send in up to 100 words
and well print it free in the next issue. Include a price (if
selling) and an address, E-mail or phone number so readers
can contact you directly. If you dont get the paper yourself
you can still send in an ad - just send $5 along too! Send
NOFA Exchange ads directly to The Natural Farmer, 411
Sheldon Rd., Barre, MA 01005 or (preferably) E-mail to
TNF@nofa.org.
Display Ads - this is for those offering products or services
on a regular basis! You can get real attention with display
ads. Send camera ready copy to Dan Rosenberg, PO Box
40, Montague, MA 01351 (413) 863-9063 and enclose a
check for the appropriate size. The sizes and rates are:
B&W Color
Full page (15 tall by 10 wide) $300 $420
Half page (7 1/2 tall by 10 wide) $155 $215
1 / 3 page (7 1/2 tall by 6 1/2 wide) $105 $145
1 / 4 page (7 1/2 tall by 4 7/8 wide) $80 $110
1 / 6 page (7 1/2 tall by 3 1/8 wide), or
(3 3/4 tall by 6 1/2 wide) $55 $75
Business card (1 1/2 tall by 3 1/8 wide) $15 $20
Note: These prices are for camera ready copy on clean
paper, or electronically in jpg or pdf format. If you want
any changes we will be glad to make them - or to typeset a
display ad for you - for $10 extra. Just send us the text, any
graphics, and a sketch of how you want it to look. Include a
check for the space charge plus $10.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 3
Please help us thank these
Friends of Organic Farming
for their generous support!
Socially Responsible Investing
Douglas J. Calnan
Financial Consultant, Vice President-Investments
douglas.calnan@agedwards.com
(800) 543-8010 Norwell, MA
Member SIPC 2007 A.G. Edwards & Sons, Inc.
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Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 4
Blow Your Own Horn!
The Natural Farmer seeks an advertising
representative. Yes, after many years our excellent
ad rep is moving on. The job requires contacting
new and existing advertisers about space, copy,
and payment for TNF ads. Work your own hours,
from home. For a well organized person it takes
approximately 15 hours per quarter, or 60 hours per
year. Paid on commission basis, last year the rep
earned slightly over $2000. Help support not only
yourself but an important resource for the organic
community. Email tnf@nofa.org.
NOFA
Exchange
Maine 110 acre organic self-suffcient homestead
looking for serious interns. Contact Paul Bernacki,
207-342-5052 or write Wayback Farm, Box 144
Line Rd., Belmont, ME 04852
Sat. July 21, 2007 ~ release of two elderberry
cultivars, Coomer & Berry Hill, from stock of
Lewis Hill. The elderberry has a long history on the
Vermont homestead, and is used for plant medicine,
stream bed erosion control and food for birds. The
two cultivars are planted near each other for cross
pollination and fruit set. $12/plant. Please reserve
plants ahead. Pick up at the honey house is 10 AM
2 PM, Honey Gardens 5335, Route 7 Ferrisburgh,
VT. Questions? Please call 802.877.6766
2007 Farm Manager - for multi-site farms
(20+ acres) in Dracut, MA, serving immigrant
and refugee beginning farmers. Manage feld
preparation, irrigation management, crop
production, equipment maintenance, supervision.
Provide training, technical assistance to farmers in
areas of crop production, equipment management,
and irrigation. 28 week position, mid-April through
mid-November. Experience in agriculture required
including 3+ years in tractor operations. Experience
working with diverse populations preferred.
Flexible, up to 30 hrs/week, $15 - 18 / hr. Send
resume and cover letter to: Jennifer Hashley, New
Entry Sustainable Farming Project, 9 Central Street,
Suite 402, Lowell, MA 01852. 978-654-6745 or
email jennifer.hashley@tufts.edu
Professional Gardener sought for a Fairfeld, CT
landscape company at the forefront of organic/
ecological design, installation and maintenance.
3 yrs experience in annual, perennial, roses,
shrubs, expert pruning skills, general maintenance
& primping high-end residential landscapes,
knowledge in organics a plus. Benefts: health
insurance, 401K, paid vacation, sick/personal days,
uniforms, modern equipment, interesting, state-of-
the-art, ecological projects and a safe and friendly
work environment. Cover letter and resume to
president@plantscapesorganics.com or fax: (203)
382-0777.
Farmer/s Needed: To take over established CSA
farm northeast of Philadelphia in 2008. Applicant/s
must have experience managing a CSA, and must
be available to move to the farm by December.
Rental housing on the farm, established core group,
beautiful area. 160+ CSA member families with
room for expansion.
More info: www.anchorrunfarm.com, Contact:
talyon@juno.com, 215-598-1519
2007 Harvest Awards: Nominate Someone Who
Inspires You! Glynwood Centers 5
th
Annual
Harvest Awards will recognize innovative farmers,
organizations, and businesses from across the U.S.
that are doing an exceptional job of supporting local
and regional agriculture. Please help us recognize
outstanding work from around the country by
nominating someone whose work you admire. This
years nomination categories will be announced
on June 4, 2007. The deadline for nominations
will be July 17
th
. To receive nomination forms and
fnal award categories when they become available,
please contact Kim Vargo at kvargo@glynwood.
org, (845) 265-3338 or visit www.glynwood.org for
more information.
D Acres of NH is a non-proft, farm based service
organization that promotes SustainAbility through
practice, experimentation, workshops, tours, and
community outreach. In our tenth year, we are
celebrating the Northern Forest. Our annual Farm
Day celebration will be on August 18 at 3pm.
This event will include tours of the farm, food, and
music. All are welcome! We are also looking to fll a
Kitchen Specialist position. The Kitchen Specialist
will organize our organic bakery, coordinate
preservation, and manage purchasing. Details
and directions to the farm can be found at www.
dacres.org or by contacting us at info@dacres.org
603.786.2366
Seeking transfer and succession at our lowbush
blueberry farm. Dont be daunted if you have
considered us before! We wish to partner with a
nonproft corporation, plus residents and/or farmers
to protect this property and build its future. These
beautiful 38 acres include farmhouse, barn, guest
cabin, second house site, and an ecological business
with strong ties to the local/regional community.
Help us craft long-term sustainable farm tenure,
supply folks with wonderful products, and diversify
our offerings. Visit www.gis.net/~benplace or
contact The Benson Place, Box 89, 182 Flagg Hill
Road, Heath, MA 01346 (413-337-5340) benplace@
gis.net
Not using that hoop house anymore? Want to
see it put to good use? We cant pay you what it
is worth, but will take it off your hands and thank
you with a gift basket of our seasonal home-made
products: organic wines, garlic braids, meats,
vegetables, and fruits. Many Hands Organic Farm.
Call Jack at 978-355-2853 or Email him at Jack@
MHOF.net
by Russell Libby
Executive Director of MOFGA
Responding to last falls E. coli 0157:H7
contamination of spinach in California, the U.S.
Food and Drug Administration (FDA) recently
issued Final Guidance for Safe Production of
Fresh-Cut Fruits and Vegetables, which includes
recommendations for good handling practices at all
stages of the food production system. The FDAs
goal is to minimize bacterial contamination of food.
The U.S. Department of Agriculture (USDA) is
working closely with the FDA to implement these
guidelines. The USDAs interpretation is called
Good Agricultural Practices or GAP. USDAs
goal is to have all farmers supplying major markets
GAP-certifed.
To become GAP-certifed, each level of the
food system, from farm to packer to processor
to distributor, will have to be certifed for the
appropriate set of Good Agricultural Practices or
Good Handling Practices. A total of 122 farmers
and distributors across the country are certifed.
USDA requires GAP compliance for all processors
who supply publicly funded school lunch programs.
Other large buyers, such as the U.S. Department of
Defense Produce Procurement Program and many
large retailers across the country, are instituting
similar requirements for their suppliers. Processors,
in turn, are requiring their suppliers (i.e., farmers) to
meet the GAP farm standards.
Here in Maine, some certifed organic growers are
fnding it nearly impossible to get their greens onto
the shelves of supermarkets. Meanwhile, every
potato farm supplying a larger processor has to go
through the certifcation process this year.
While the guidelines include many common sense
practices, such as handwashing and cleanliness
around processing areas, GAP standards for farms
also:
suggest a 2-mile separation between crop and
livestock production areas. The GAP program
evaluates processors and suppliers with a scoring
system that penalizes farmers who integrate
crop and livestock production. This could have
a disproportionately negative impact on organic
farmers who commonly use an integrated approach
to farm management;
discourage the use of manure or compost on crops
for human consumption; and
require monitoring of: livestock and wildlife near
irrigation water; compost nutrition; wildlife activity
near crop areas; and other factors that, often, are
beyond the control of the farmer.
USDA uses Food Safety and Inspection Service
workers who currently perform grading services
as on-farm inspectors. These people are trained to
evaluate whether fruits or vegetables meet color
and size requirements, not how a farm functions.
This may explain why USDA is using a Pass/
Fail scoring system to grade farmers. To become
certifed, farmers will pay annual GAP certifcation
fees of up to $1000 per farm.
Neither FDA nor USDA uses these guidelines or
the certifcation process to address root causes of
this specifc E. coli problem. The bacteria E. coli
0157:H7 is most often traced to contamination from
manure produced in large feedlots. Additionally, the
program asks only whether farmers have a license
to spray pesticides. It does not ask what kinds of
pesticides are used or how often.
If we are going to have a food safety certifcation
program, we should have one that addresses all
aspects of the problem, not just one.
USDAs Good Agricultural Practices --
Good For Whom?
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 5
compiled by Jack Kittredge
Talks Under Way to Speed COOL Meat Labels
in Trade for Animal ID - Its been fve years since
Congress passed a law requiring meat to be marked
with the country of origin, but the food industry
has succeeded in repeatedly delaying that labeling
requirement. Its currently put off until the fall of
2008.
But an end to that delay could be in the works.
The chairman of the House Agriculture Committee,
Rep. Collin Peterson, wants to marry the labeling
program to a plan to require livestock producers
to participate in a national animal identifcation
system. Tying the two programs together could win
support for both from the packers, producers and
other groups that dislike one of the programs but
like the other. At least thats what Peterson is betting
on.
Bottom line is that country-of-origin labeling
is the law. Its been delayed. It will not be delayed
anymore. We are going to fgure out how to
implement it, says the Minnesota Democrat, who
has been meeting recently with representatives of
key interest groups. Meatpackers and others who
oppose the labeling law have good reason to sit
down with Peterson. Republican leaders once could
be counted on to keep putting off the requirement.
But Democrats are now in charge of Congress, and
there could be a Democrat in the White House after
2008.
Packers also would get a chance to alter the
labeling law and get something they want and many
farmers oppose - a mandatory ID system. ID tags
would not only make it easier to determine the
native country of a hog or steer, but they would also
allow investigators to quickly track down the farm
where a diseased animal originates.
That Peterson wants to address both the labeling
and ID issues is welcome news, says David Ray, a
spokesman for the American Meat Institute, a trade
group that represents packers such as Tyson Foods
Inc. and Hormel Foods Corp. Both organizations
would like to change a requirement that excludes
animals born in Canada or Mexico but fattened
in the United States from being labeled as a U.S.
product. Pork producers also are unhappy that
chicken is exempted from the labeling requirement.
Supermarket chains like Wal-Mart or Hy-Vee
have a lot at stake in Petersons plan, too. They
are unhappy with the size of the fne - $10,000
- they face for violations of the law, and they
want Congress to let them try a voluntary labeling
program for fruits and vegetables. (Produce also is
covered by the 2002 law.)
source: Des Moines Register, March 18, 2007
Pet Food Contaminant Fed to Farmed Fish
Farmed fsh have been fed meal spiked with the
same chemical that has been linked to the pet
food recall, but the contamination was probably
too low to harm anyone who ate the fsh, federal
offcials said Tuesday. The Canadian-made meal
included what was purported to be wheat gluten, a
protein source, imported from China. The material
was actually wheat four spiked by the chemical
melamine and related, nitrogen-rich compounds
to make it appear more protein rich than it was,
offcials said.
Federal health and food offcials have said some
20 million chickens and thousands of hogs also were
fed feed contaminated by melamine. After pigs and
chickens, the farmed fsh mark the third food animal
given contaminated feed. Melamine, a chemical
found in plastics and pesticides and not approved for
use in pet or human food in the U.S., contaminated
pet food that either sickened or killed an unknown
number of dogs and cats. Since March 16, more
than 100 brands of pet food have been recalled
because they were contaminated with melamine.
source: The Associated Press, May 8, 2007
News
Notes
Conception Date Affects Babys Future Academic
Achievement
Does the time of year in which a child is conceived
infuence future academic achievement? Yes,
according to research by neonatologist Paul
Winchester, M.D., Indiana University School
of Medicine professor of clinical pediatrics. Dr.
Winchester, who studied 1,667,391 Indiana students,
presents his fnding on May 7 at the Pediatric
Academic Societies annual meeting.
Dr. Winchester and colleagues linked the scores
of the students in grades 3 through 10 who took the
Indiana Statewide Testing for Educational Progress
(ISTEP) examination with the month in which each
student had been conceived. The researchers found
that ISTEP scores for math and language were
distinctly seasonal with the lowest scores received
by children who had been conceived in June through
August.
Why might children conceived in June through
August have the lowest ISTEP scores? The fetal
brain begins developing soon after conception.
The pesticides we use to control pests in felds
and our homes and the nitrates we use to fertilize
crops and even our lawns are at their highest level
in the summer, said Dr. Winchester. Exposure
to pesticides and nitrates can alter the hormonal
milieu of the pregnant mother and the developing
fetal brain. While our fndings do not represent
absolute proof that pesticides and nitrates contribute
to lower ISTEP scores, they strongly support such a
hypothesis.
source: Indiana University School of Medicine press
release, May 7, 2007www.medicine.indiana.edu/
news_releases/viewRelease.php4?art=685
Regulators Slap Wal-Mart for Misleading
Organic Consumers
Consumer fraud investigators in the state of
Wisconsin released their fndings after a three-
month long investigation into allegations that Wal-
Mart stores throughout the state of Wisconsin had
misled consumers by misidentifying conventional
food items as organic. In a letter to Wal-Mart Stores,
Inc., based in Bentonville, Arkansas, the Wisconsin
Department of Agriculture, Trade and Consumer
Protection stated theyd found numerous instances
of conventional food products improperly labeled as
organic by the retail chain. Specifcally, Wisconsin
authorities told Wal-Marts legal counsel that use
of the term Wal-Mart Organics in combination
with reference to a specifc non-organic product
may be considered to be a misrepresentation and
therefore a violation of Wisconsin state statutes.
Although Wisconsin regulators opted to
send only a formal warning concerning the retail
giants organic marketing practices they said that
they had reached an agreement with the company
under which steps would be taken to prevent
future organic food misrepresentations. Wisconsin
offcials also said they would be continuing their
surveillance of the companys stores.
While Wisconsin regulators have completed
their investigation, the USDA has yet to formally
weigh in on the matter, despite being notifed of
the food fraud problem last November, two months
before Wisconsin offcials were contacted about
the same situation. The USDAs National Organic
Program has long been criticized as being too
cozy with corporate agribusiness, understaffed
and lacking strong management and effective
organizational direction to protect and promote
the organic industry. Two independent audits of
the program, conducted by the American National
Standards Institute and the USDAs own Inspector
Generals offce, were harshly critical of the federal
governments oversight of the organic certifcation
program.
In early 2006, Wal-Mart made a media splash
by stating that they would introduce 400 organic
products at prices just 10% over the cost of
conventional food. The pronouncement left many
organic and retail industry observers questioning
the feasibility of their initiative. According to the
Wall Street Journal and other authoritative business
analysis, Wal-Marts organic initiative, as part
of a larger integrated approach to attract upscale
consumers, has been a failure and is causing the
corporation to now reduce the number of organic
food offerings.
source: Cornucopia Institute press release, May 8,
2007
Switch to Organic Crops Could Help Poor
Organic food has long been considered a niche
market, a luxury for wealthy consumers. But
researchers told a U.N. conference on May 6 that
a large-scale shift to organic agriculture could
help fght world hunger while improving the
environment.
Crop yields initially can drop as much as
50 percent when industrialized, conventional
agriculture using chemical fertilizers and pesticides
is converted to organic. While such decreases often
even out over time, the fgures have kept the organic
movement largely on the sidelines of discussions
about feeding the hungry. Researchers in Denmark
found, however, that food security for sub-Saharan
Africa would not be seriously harmed if 50 percent
of agricultural land in the food exporting regions
of Europe and North America were converted to
organic by 2020.
While total food production would fall, the
amount per crop would be much smaller than
previously assumed, and the resulting rise in world
food prices could be mitigated by improvements
in the land and other benefts, the study found.
A similar conversion to organic farming in sub-
Saharan Africa could help the regions hungry
because it could reduce their need to import food,
Niels Halberg, a senior scientist at the Danish
Research Center for Organic Food and Farming,
told the U.N. conference on Organic Agriculture
and Food Security.
Farmers who go back to traditional agricultural
methods would not have to spend money on
expensive chemicals and would grow more diverse
and sustainable crops, the report said. In addition,
if their food is certifed as organic, farmers could
export any surpluses at premium prices. The
researchers plugged in data on projected crop yields
and commodity prices until 2020 to create models
for the most optimistic and conservative outlooks.
Alexander Mueller, assistant director-general
of the Rome-based U.N. Food and Agriculture
Organization, praised the report and noted that
projections indicate the number of hungry people
in sub-Saharan Africa was expected to grow.
Considering that the effects of climate change are
expected to hurt the worlds poorest, a shift to
organic agriculture could be benefcial, he said.
Nadia El-Hage Scialabba, an FAO offcial
who organized the conference, pointed to other
studies she said indicated that organic agriculture
could produce enough food per capita to feed the
worlds current population. One such study, by the
University of Michigan, found that a global shift
to organic agriculture would yield at least 2,641
kilocalories per person per day, just under the
worlds current production of 2,786, and as many as
4,381 kilocalories per person per day, researchers
reported. A kilocalorie is one large calorie and is
known as the nutritionists calorie.
source: The Associated Press, 05 May 2007
Federal Judge Orders First-Ever Halt to
Planting of a Commercialized Genetically-
Altered Crop
Judge Charles Breyer, in the Federal Northern
District of California, made a fnal ruling that the
U.S. Department of Agricultures (USDAs) 2005
approval of Monsantos genetically engineered (GE)
Roundup Ready alfalfa was illegal. The Judge
called on USDA to ban any further planting of the
GE seed until it conducts a complete Environmental
Impact Statement (EIS) on the GE crop.
In the decision, Breyer affrmed his preliminary
ruling that the crop could harm the environment
and contaminate natural alfalfa. The Judge also
ordered USDA to make the locations of all existing
Roundup Ready alfalfa plots publicly available as
soon as practicable so that growers of organic and
conventional alfalfa can test their own crops to
determine if there has been contamination.
In the decision, Judge Breyer found that the
USDA failed to address concerns that Roundup
Ready alfalfa will contaminate conventional
and organic alfalfa. In calling for a permanent
injunction, he noted that contamination of natural
and organic alfalfa by the GE variety has already
occurred and noted that: Such contamination is
irreparable environmental harm. The contamination
cannot be undone.
source: Center for Food Safety Press Release, May
3, 2007
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 6
Consumers Flood FDA with over 130,000
Comments Opposing Food from Cloned Animals
A coalition of consumer, environmental and animal
welfare organizations has announced the submission
of more than 130,000 comments to the Food and
Drug Administration from consumers who oppose
the Agencys proposed plan to introduce food from
cloned animals into the U.S. food supply.
Recent public opinion polls show the majority
of the American public does not want milk or meat
from cloned animals in their food. A December
2006 poll by the Pew Initiative on Food and
Biotechnology found that nearly two-thirds of U.S.
consumers were uncomfortable with animal cloning.
The comments submitted today strongly reinforce
this national sentiment. Food from cloned animals
has no place on our supermarket shelves or on our
dinner tables, said Andrew Kimbrell, Executive
Director of the Center for Food Safety. FDA needs
to heed consumer concerns and ban animal clones in
food.
In its risk assessment of cloned food, the FDA
claims to have evaluated extensive peer reviewed
studies on the safety of food from clones to support
its conclusion, yet a recent report issued by the
Center for Food Safety shows the assessment only
references three peer-reviewed food safety studies,
all of which focus on the narrow issue of milk from
cloned cows. What is even more disturbing is that
these studies were partially funded by the same
biotech frms that produce clones for proft. None of
the studies focus on the safety of meat from cloned
cows or pigs, or milk or meat from the offspring of
cloned animals, and there was absolutely no data on
milk or meat from cloned goats, all major issues
critical to determining the safety of the proposal.
source: Center for Food Safety press release, May
3, 2007
Raw Milk Victory in Ohio
Judge Jonathan P. Hein of the Darke County Court
of Common Pleas has ruled that an Ohio dairy
producer who had been operating a herdshare
program could not have her license revoked by the
state. The producer, Ms. Schmitmeyer, of Versailles,
had contacted the Ohio Department of Agriculture
(ODA) several times to make sure her procedures
were within the law. The judge found that the ODA
had not responded to her requests, that the law on
raw milk use was vague, and that properly drafted
herdshare agreements (where ownership of the
cow is clearly transferred to the shareholder) are
consistent with contract law.
source: Ohio Ecological Food and Farm Assoc.
newsletter, Winter, 2007
Judge allows private testing for mad cow
The federal government must allow meatpackers
to test their animals for mad cow disease, a federal
judge ruled on March 29. Creekstone Farms
Premium Beef, a meatpacker based in Arkansas
City, Kan., wants to test all of its cows for the
disease, which can be fatal to humans who eat
tainted beef. Larger meat companies feared that
move because if Creekstone tested its meat and
advertised it as safe, they could be forced to do the
expensive test, too. The Agriculture Department
currently regulates the test and administers it to less
than 1 percent of slaughtered cows. The department
threatened Creekstone with prosecution if it tested
all its animals.
Last July, the department cut its testing by
about 90 percent. The Agriculture Department
argued that widespread testing could lead to a
false positive that would harm the meat industry.
U.S. District Judge James Robertson said he
was concerned by that possibility but noted
that Creekstone sought to use the same test the
government relies on. Robertson ruled that the
government does not have the authority to regulate
the test. Robertson put his order on hold until the
government can appeal. If the government does
not appeal by June 1, he said the ruling would take
effect.
Tests are done on brain tissue from cows,
so animals must be killed before they can be
tested. Because of this, Robertson rejected the
governments stance that it has the authority to
regulate the tests because they are used in the
treatment of disease. He said regulation of the tests
might be appropriate through the Federal Trade
Commission or the Commerce Department but, as
the law is written now, the authority does not exist.
source: Associated Press, Mar 29, 2007
Livestock generate 18 percent of worlds
greenhouse gases
A new report by the United Nations Food and
Agriculture Organization found that domestic
animals are a major source of greenhouse gases,
producing 18% of the worlds total - even more than
transportation. Unless more sustainable techniques
such as controlling soil erosion, providing animals
with better diets, and using water more effciently
are adopted, the environmental impact of animal
production will worsen, as world production of meat
and dairy products is expected to double by 2050.
source: http://www.virtualcentre.org/en/library/key_
pub/longshad/A0701E00.htm

Small Organic Farms on Increase
When the National Organic Program took effect
in 2002, many predicted an exodus of small,
direct-market growers, assuming that they could
ill afford the costs and paperwork of certifcation,
and didnt need it because of their relationship to
their customers. It looks, however, like that has
not happened. Small certifed organic farms have
been growing throughout the country. In Maine,
they have seen a steady growth of 6 to 10 percent,
according to MOFGA. In Oregon, Tilth reports
that of the 35 new farms certifed in 2005, 15 were
under 10 acres. USDA statistics report the same
phenomena: nationally, the acreage of under-5 acre
farms increased 123 percent from 2002 to 2005.
Of course the growth overall of organic crop and
pasture land has been signifcant. In 2002 the total
was under a million acres, and in 2005 it was 4
million.
source: Growing for Market, February, 2007
Comeback for Quince
The homely quince, once as popular as apples and
pears, has been reduced to being grown on only 200
acres in this country. But thanks to an expanded
quince collection at the National Clonal Germplasm
Repository in Corvallis, OR. breeders now have
access to greater hardiness and larger, more favorful
fruits. They keep for up to two months and are
excellent in jellies and jams.
source: Growing for Market, March, 2007
Organic Retailers Start GMO Testing
Whole Foods Markets and United Natural Foods
have said they will start testing all their private
label products for GMOs. About 60% of the corn,
and 90% of the soybeans grown in the US are now
genetically engineered. Working with The Non-
GMO Project in Berkeley, CA, the frms will be able
to ensure that their food is not contaminated.
source: Organic Business News, March, 2007
NYC Settles 7-Year Old Lawsuit on Pesticide Use
For seven years, environmental groups have
battled the City of New York in Federal Court in
opposition to the Giuliani administrations massive
and indiscriminate spraying of toxic pesticides,
including Malathion. On April 12, a federal judge
signed a settlement agreement in which New York
City admits that the pesticides sprayed may indeed
be dangerous to human health as well as to the
natural environment.
The settlement agreement states that, contrary
to the Citys prior statements, pesticides
- may remain in the environment beyond their
intended purpose
- cause adverse health effects
- kill mosquitoes natural predators
- increase mosquito resistance to the sprays, and
- are not presently approved for direct application to
waterways.
source: No Spray Coalition press release, April 20,
2007
Do We Really Need Honeybees??
by Gus Skamarycz
To start a brief story of honeybees with that
statement seems crazy, and it is. However
no one ever sees what the honeybees do,
the only thing that you see is the results.

by Gus Skamarycz
To start a brief story of honeybees with that state-
ment seems crazy, and it is. However, no one ever
sees what the honeybees do; the only thing that you
see is the results.

Ive been keeping honeybees for 42 years now and I
have never seen conditions in beekeeping like they
are today. Im really at a loss of words. In writing
for The Natural Farmer I feel as if I am preaching to
the Choir.

I know you all have read by now about the Hon-
eybees disappearing and not returning to the hive,
and all the scientists and agriculture and apiculture
people are looking for answers.
Well the answers all lie with ourselves beekeepers
-- and farmers and the public.

The frst problem that we beekeepers have is that we
really stress the bees, by moving them all over the
country; secondly, we think we can keep them alive
by reducing mite infections by the use of chemicals.
If it doesnt work we give them more chemicals, and
sometimes not the approved dosage but stronger. (I
remember visiting a beekeeper in British Colum-
bia, Canada, and I saw tongue depressors soaked in
pesticides hanging between the frames in a bee hive.
I asked him what that was for and he said, Oh, that
is how I treat for Tracheal Mite. Well, what he was
doing was not the approved method. And Im sure
if he has done this, so have others.

Another Stress factor is after the bees have fnished
a crop in pollination, we increase the bees by split-
ting the hive in two. (This can be done with a strong
colony without danger, but not a weak one that
really needs help.) And we put a new queen into the
split hive so we have two instead of one.

Instead of breeding a better bee, which is able to
survive, we only think of chemicals.

Now where are we bringing these bees? Well, we
move them from the Northeast in the fall to the
South, and then in January move them to California
for the Almonds. (Almonds used about 1.45 Million
colonies of bees this year -- 2007). Then they come
east from warmer California to cool Mid Atlantic
areas for apples and other fruits, then to the New
England and New York area for apples. We split the
hive again, and now onward to Maine for blueber-
ries. They use over 50,000 colonies in the blueberry
barrens of Maine, where it is cold, damp, windy,
and snowy and there is always the threat of Black
Bears -- so an electric fence must be used. No splits
are made after the blueberries, as many times the
hives are moved from one blueberry feld to the next
and many bees are lost during these moves. Then
there is another move from Maine to pollinate the
cranberry area. The bees get very little nectar from
cranberries. As a matter of fact, the bees are some-
times fed syrup in the cranberries.

Now in the crops I mentioned the farmers protect
their interests with sprays and chemicals. Some of
these are very hazardous not only to the pests, but
also to pollinating insects and also to man.

The one chemical that has been getting a lot of
attention is a fairly new one in the neonicotinoids
group -- the chemical Imidacloprid, which is a
systemic and is design to kill sucking insects, This
chemical has a half life of 996 days, which means it
loses half its toxicity after 996 days.

The scientists tell us that there is not enough evi-
dence that this is the problem, but when this chemi-
cal under the name of Gaucho was used in France in
the late 90s on sun fowers, French beekeepers be-
gan losing their bees. After many demonstrations in
Paris and other French towns, (they brought out riot
police to break up some of the demos) the manufac-
turer Bayer AG pulled the product and settled with
the French government for a large cash payment.
After a few years now the bees are starting to come
Do We Really Need
Honeybees??
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 7
back. France was not alone in this problem. Spain,
Poland, Italy, Germany and many other countries
are having it as well.

Many beekeepers have been asked if their bees are
disappearing. If they say no then I guess they dont
have an immediate problem, but everyone should be
concerned -- not just beekeepers.

Remember that every third mouthful of food we eat
is there because of the work done by the honeybee.
Some basic questions that are asked: How long does
a bee live? Well, a honeybee worker will live when
the hive is collecting nectar. In warm weather they
live about 28-32 days. Now remember that after the
worker bee emerges from her cell after develop-
ing in 21 days, she has a division of labor; she is a
heater, keeping the hive warm and the temperature
not varying 1/2 degree. She is also a cleaner, clean-
ing the cells before the queen lays an egg in the
cell. She attends the queen, cleaning and feeding
her, then feeding the larvae with royal jelly or brood
food, then guarding the hive. After about 20-21
days of hive work the worker bee goes out for an
orienting fight, to prepare her for feldwork where
she will collect nectar, pollen, propolis, and water.
Now after she has worked for the next week, she has
really worked herself to death and she is of no more
value. She will not return to the hive. In her lifetime
she will collect only about one-twelfth of a teaspoon
of honey.

It is an amazing story but very important to what hap-
pens when a toxic chemical gets into the beehive.

When the feld bees bring back nectar and pollen, this
is changed to royal jelly or brood food, which is feed
to the larvae. If this material is contaminated during
their development and interferes with their brain and
messes up their navigating system, when they go out
on their orienting fight they are unable to fnd their
way back to the hive. Now the colony is unable to
maintain its integrity and dies.

To answer the title question, YES we do need Honey-
bees! As Einstein is widely quoted as saying, With-
out honeybees man could not live for four years.

In the United States, honeybee pollination adds over
50 billion dollars in value to agricultural crops. We
need the bees, but we have to manage them and not
stress them as we are today. We need our scientists to
give us the right answers, and not be held to who-
ever is giving out the research dollars. The state and
federal governments have to help the beekeepers out;
we do need more local beekeepers who can keep bees
without losing them every year.

I know NOFA is trying hard to stop this merry-go-
round of chemicals. I always remember Rachael
Carsons book, The Silent Spring. Well, we now
have a new version called the Silent Honeybee, or
The Vanishing Pollinators.
Call for the location of your
nearest wholesale distributor
Depot Street
Bradford, VT 05033
Ph. 802.222.4277
Fax 802.222.9661
info@norganics.com
www.norganics.com
Fertilizers:
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Cheep Cheep 4-3-3
Chilean Nitrate 16-0-0
Greensand
Greensand Plus 0-0-17
Kelp Meal
Natural Sulfate of Potash 0-0-51
Organic Gem 3-3-.3
Phosphate Rock 0-3-0
Phosphate Rock and Greensand Mix
Pro-Gro 5-3-4
Pro-Start 2-3-3
Stress-X Powder
Livestock Nutritionals:
Redmond Trace Mineral Conditioner, Salt
Blocks & Granular Salt
*
Pest Controls:
Horticultural Oil
PowderGard
Pyganic
Seacide
Surround
*
*Many of our products that are not OMRI listed may be allowed for use on a
certifed organic farm. Check with your certifcation representative to be sure.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 8
by Roger Blobaum
A series of recent developments strongly suggest
that organic farmers and others in the rapidly
growing organic sector have gained new political
access and support that will enhance their ability to
infuence both annual organic program funding and
the 2007 farm bill process unfolding on Capitol Hill.
An unusual amount of work on organic initiatives,
more than can be described here, has been underway
in the organic community over the past year. There
may well be lingering differences of opinion about
organic sector priorities and support level requests
as the farm bill process moves forward. But overall,
organic organizations are expected to make a
special effort to get along and to rally and, to the
extent possible, present lawmakers with both new
approaches and a united front.
Probably the most important new political
development is a result of the November elections,
which changed the control of both houses of
Congress and their agriculture-related committees.
The four most important committees handling
organic legislation and appropriations in both the
House and the Senate, as a result, are now headed
by members of the House and Senate from states
with large numbers of organic farmers. Three of
these states, Iowa, Minnesota, and Wisconsin, are in
the upper Midwest.
Important Committee Members
Senator Tom Harkin of Iowa, a strong and active
organic agriculture supporter on both the agriculture
and appropriations committees, is the new Senate
Agriculture Committee chairman. Senator Patrick
Leahy of Vermont, the Senates leading organic
advocate for nearly 20 years, takes over as chair of
the Senate Agriculture subcommittee, responsible
for legislation dealing with organic agriculture.
Senator Herb Kohl of Wisconsin, also a consistent
and reliable organic agriculture supporter, is the
new chair of the Senate Agriculture Appropriations
subcommittee. Kohl, Harkin and others will shape
organic funding levels in the Senates version of the
U.S. Department of Agriculture budget.
The new chairman of the House Agriculture
Committee is Congressman Collin Peterson of
Minnesota, who represents a rural district where
organic farming has become increasingly important.
The new chairperson of the House Agriculture
Appropriations subcommittee is Congresswoman
Rosa L. DeLauro of Connecticut, an organic
caucus member from the region where Northeast
Organic Farming Association (NOFA) organizations
successfully infuence organic politics.
Also important is the signifcant increase in the
way important lawmakers have been reaching
out to organic farmers at home. Senator Kohl
pledged support for organic provisions in the farm
bill during a brief presentation in late February at
a plenary session of the Upper Midwest Organic
Farming Conference. The annual La Crosse
conference attracted more than 2,300 participants.
Kohl told the conference attendees, and members
of the press at a news conference that followed,
that he strongly supported helping farmers convert
to organic systems. Im a huge fan of the organic
movement, he noted during his conference
presentation. I think its great for America and I
think its good for you.
Chairman Peterson sponsored a Home Grown
Economy conference earlier this month in his
home district that included many organic farmers
among its 300 or more participants. The conference
Organic Farmers Make Gains in
Political Access and Support for Organic
Appropriations and Farm Bill Organic Initiatives
also featured Robert Marquese of Sioux City, Iowa,
director of a county organic conversion plan that
provides tax incentives for farmers transitioning
from conventional to organic.
Peterson noted that the House Agriculture
Committee had, for the frst time, acknowledged
organic agricultures importance by creating a
new subcommittee on Horticulture and Organic
Agriculture. It is chaired by Congressman Dennis
Cardoza of California, an organic caucus member
with politically active organic farmers in his district.
Peterson stressed the rural development potential of
the growing market for local foods and noted strong
consumer support for new opportunities in the
production of both local and organic foods.
Having some indication of support for organic
farming from the House Agriculture Committee
represents an important change from the past.
Fortunately, every single member serving on the
committee in 1990, when it made an unsuccessful
attempt to keep the Organic Foods Production
Act from reaching the House foor for a vote, is
now gone. This membership turnover provides an
unusual opportunity for the organic community,
and this important committee, to make a renewed
effort to develop mutual respect and a good working
relationship.
Another important turnover was the election in
November of organic farmer John Tester of Montana
to a six-year Senate term. Tester, a former national
OCIA director, is not on the Senates agriculture or
appropriations committees. But, as the frst certifed
organic farmer to serve in either house of Congress,
he provides Capitol Hill lawmakers with an instant
source of organic farming policy guidance.
House Organic Caucus
There also are indications the Organic Caucus,
made up of more than 40 House members from
both political parties, will be much more involved
this year in supporting organic appropriations and
farm bill initiatives. This years caucus co-chairs
are Democrats Peter DeFazio of Oregon, Sam Farr
of California, and Ron Kind of Wisconsin, and
Republicans Wayne Gilchrist of Maryland and
James Walsh of New York.
The years frst caucus meeting on March 5 included
a presentation by Administrator Lloyd Day of
the Agricultural Marketing Service, the agency
responsible for the National Organic Program.
Representatives of the National Organic Coalition
(NOC), the Organic Farming Research Foundation
(OFRF), the National Campaign for
Sustainable Agriculture (NCSA), the Sustainable
Agriculture Coalition (SAC), the Organic Trade
Association (OTA), and the National Association
of State Departments of Agriculture (NASDA) also
made presentations.
All of these organizations are pushing well-
developed organic farm bill agendas in this session
of Congress. They include increased funding levels
for organic initiatives within the Rick Management
Agency (RMA), Economic Research Service (ERS),
Agricultural Research Service (ARS), Natural
Resources Conservation Service (NRCS), Foreign
Agricultural Service (FAS), and other USDA
agencies. Their emphasis may be different but, for
the most part, there is general agreement among the
main organizations with organic legislative agendas.
MOSES Farm Bill Priorities
MOSES Executive Director Faye Jones, who was
in Washington participating in NOC and SAC
meetings, attended the caucus meeting and urged
support for three MOSES farm bill priorities during
follow-up visits to House and Senate offces. The
priorities, frst presented at the conference in
LaCrosse, are support for signifcant expansion of
funding for organic agriculture research, education
and information; for a signifcant increase in organic
certifcation cost-share funding, and for full funding
and implementation of the Conservation Security
Program (CSP).
More than 500 attendees signed blue cards at the
MOSES conference to indicate their interest in
receiving emailed farm bill and appropriations
alerts that call for specifc House and Senate action.
They also received names and phone numbers of
key Midwest Congressional contacts. This is the
frst time MOSES has organized an effort to help
facilitate direct involvement of organic farmers and
others in the national legislative process.
Although MOSES has collaborated with SAC and
NCSA on CSP and other legislative initiatives in
the past, it is participating this year for the frst time
in a national organic coalition. MOSES has joined
several regional organic farming organizations, the
national co-op grocers organization, and several
national consumer and environmental organizations
that support organic farming in the new National
Organic Coalition. Steve Etka, who represents the
coalition on Capitol Hill, works on appropriations
and farm bill issues as well as on oversight of
USDAs National Organic Program.

It is signifcant that SAC, for the frst time this year,
has included certifcation cost share funding and
several other organic initiatives in its 2007 farm
bill agenda. SAC also provides overall leadership
in efforts to strengthen the CSP, the Environmental
Quality Incentives Program, and the Conservation
Reserve Program. SAC has worked for several
years to raise the priority of organic production
systems in EQUIP and, last June, urged the NRCS
to establish an EQUIP national priority for farmers
and ranchers making the transition to organic
production systems.
There have been strong suggestions that having
the Democrats take control of Congress and its
committees as a result of last Novembers election
will translate into big organic gains this year. A
review of the past, when Democrats controlled the
hostile House Agriculture Committee that tried in
1990 to derail the Organic Foods Production Act, or
when the Democratic-controlled USDA put out the
frst proposed organic rule in 1997 and was forced
to take it back after a storm of protest, suggests this
change does not necessarily translate into better
results.
The smart course for organic farmers in this
important farm bill year would seem to be
pressing all members of the House and Senate,
Republicans and Democrats alike, to become
familiar with the organic agenda and to support it.
This includes meeting with lawmakers when they
are at home out of sight of Washington lobbyists,
as well as supporting MOSES, NOC, SAC, and
other organizations working on behalf of organic
agriculture on Capitol Hill.
Roger Blobaum is an agricultural consultant
providing professional services to organic
and sustainable agriculture organizations and
institutions. Comments on this analysis can be
directed to Roger Blobaum at RJBlobaum@cs.com.
This article was originally published in the May-
June issue of the Organic Broadcaster, a publication
of the Midwest Organic and Sustainable Education
Service, MOSES, PO Box 339, Spring Valley, WI
54767. 715-772-3153. www.mosesorganic.org. All
rights reserved.
Inside Organic:
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 9
NOC, NOC, Knocking on Congress Door &
As Montana Goes, So Goes the Nation
Washington Report
by Steve Gilman, NOFA Policy Coordinator
The way the process works is that Congress awards
winners of taxpayer dollars on the basis of political
muscle rather than a projects merit, Steve Ellis,
vice president of Taxpayers for Common Sense
This springs NOFA policy activities somewhat
paralleled the seasonal conditions. As early March
roared in like a lion, I joined a fy-in to a snowy
Washington, DC to take part in a National Organic
Coalition (NOC) farm bill blitz in the jungle mazes
of Capitol Hill. And I made a return trip during
the lamb-like cherry blossom time near the end
of the month to attend part of a staid National
Organic Standards Board (NOSB) meeting. That
trip was enlivened, however, by a meeting of the
Organic Committee of the National Campaign
for Sustainable Agriculture beforehand and a
surprise open invitation to an after-hours industry
reception, complete with up close and radical
remarks from the new organic farmer Senator from
Montana. More about that in a minute.
In the halls (and basement) of Congress
NOC is lean and green and fairly new on the
scene as a novel organic partnership organized to
protect the integrity of organic standards, ensure
the viability of family farmers, and provide a
voice in Washington. Starting up in 2004 with a
small core group, part of NOCs hybrid vigor is
that it represents a widely diversifed assemblage
of grassroots farmer and rancher organizations,
alternative food advocates, animal welfare activists
and seasoned environmental groups. The farm
roster includes all the NOFAs as well as the ODPAs
(Organic Dairy Producers Alliance) organized
into separate northeast, midwest and western
associations and MOSES -- the Midwest Organic
& Sustainable Education Service. The membership
is open to expansion by a group vote. The Maine
Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association has
recently joined and Equal Exchange, the fair trade
advocacy group, is in the process of becoming a
member.
NOC is lightly administered by RAFI, the Rural
Advancement Foundation InternationalUSA,
centered in North Carolina, a group working to
strengthen family farms and rural communities with
a focus on fair trade and social justice issues. In
the food sector, the National Cooperative Grocers
Association represents over 100 food co-ops across
the country. There are also some very effective
environmental groups with extensive scientifc
and legal expertise on board. Beyond Pesticides
has been in the forefront of identifying the risks
of conventional pest management practices and
promoting the organic alternatives since the 1980s.
Fresh from legal victories halting the release of
genetically engineered alfalfa and turf grass, the
Center for Food Safety is also active in recent
biotech, aquaculture and animal cloning issues, as
are the Union of Concerned Scientists and Food and
Water Watch.
The farm bill activities on Capitol Hill were
organized by NOCs part time Washington
legislative coordinator, Steve Etka -- an astute
former Senate staffer well experienced in ag and
environmental matters who set up our appointments,
shepherded us through security checkpoints and
congressional corridors and skillfully led our
presentations of the NOC agenda, meeting after
meeting. Over two days we met with members
and staffers in 10 offces, 1 hallway and a packed
basement cafeteria (when a veterans group
superseded our conference room.)
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Hard on our heels over the next few days was
a larger group of organic and sustainable ag
farmers fown in by the Organic Farming Research
Foundation (OFRF) and the Sustainable Agriculture
Coalition (SAC). The Organic Trade Association
(not part of the NOC group) was also in town to
participate in an organic caucus held in the Rayburn
Offce Building that we all attended. OTAs new
Executive Director, Caren Wilcox, is an experienced
former Hill staffer in her own right. Despite this
organic onslaught, its fair to say that overall, amidst
all their usual business, Congress barely knew what
hit them.
Just the same, with the new Democratic majority
refecting the discontent registered in last
Novembers midterm elections, there are fresh
breezes blowing across Capitol Hill these days. That
a considerable number of eaters are voting with
their dollars for organic food in the marketplace
has signifcant repercussions in the political arena.
While the big food industry has weighed in for
a piece of the pie with more and more processed
products, the organic community remains populist in
nature. From the beginning, the organic movement
has presented a counterpoint to the industrialized
food system that transcends party lines and politics
as usual. And despite a highly diverse and largely
disorganized grassroots constituency, the organic
infuence is gaining steadily, from the bottom up and
(sometimes subversively) from the inside out. One
congressman we met with, for instance, remarked
that thanks to his wife their family is a member of a
CSA and organic food has been a mainstay at their
table for years.
All this is refected in a major shift in how organic is
regarded politically. This year the House Agriculture
Committee has a newly constituted Subcommittee
on Horticulture and Organic Agriculture. Chaired
by Dennis Cardoza (D-CA) the committee even
includes two members from New York State,
Kirsten Gillibrand (D-NY) from my upstate
Hudson Valley 20
th
District and John Randy
Kuhl (R-NY) from the Rochester, Finger Lakes
region. The majority chair of the House Agriculture
Appropriations sub-committee is Rosa DeLauro
from CT. Seasoned members of our NOC entourage
said that in the past they had regularly received
frosty to downright hostile ag committee receptions
under previous congresses. The fact that we got a
good hearing everywhere we went this time around
is signifcant -- and encouraging.
Fair share
Beyond direct subsidy payments to the big
commodity farmers, the farm bill has a host of
other, more beneath-the-radar provisions supporting
conventional agriculture practices (and conventional
ag professional career paths) that generally exclude
organic growers. One of our talking points is that
were only asking for a fair share of resource
allocations. In agricultural research and education,
for example, current resources specifcally directed
toward organic projects amounts to $25 million --
just 0.6% of the federal agricultural research budget.
Thats not even close to the organic sectors portion
of the marketplace, which stands at 3%. And as U.S.
consumer demand continues to double every 3-4
years, this trend is projected to reach a 10% share by
2012.
As the fastest (and in some food divisions, the
only) growing sector of the food system, the
organic market is currently typifed by the lack of
supply, however. To fll the demand, lots of dubious
certifed product is coming in from China, for
instance, without comprehensive National Organic
Program oversight because the program has been
chronically under-funded from the beginning.
Research and education provide a critical role for
transitioning farmers, as well as established organic
growers, and the lack of funds is clearly stifing
expansion.
Add to this a lack of federal record keeping for
organic products. At this point there are no specifc
import codes designating organic goods, so all
fgures are guesstimates. And domestic organic
farmers are hampered by the lack of U.S. organic
production and market data, even though provisions
requiring USDA data collection agencies to compile
organic records was included in the 2002 farm bill.
To help U.S. farmers meet the internal organic
demand, NOC is asking for the creation of a
well funded National Organic Conversion and
Stewardship Program to provide fnancial and
technical assistance for transitioning farmers to
help them get through the three year conversion
process. Half of the proposed $50 million a year
would go to technical assistance, some of which
could be provided by the NOFAs and other non-
governmental experts. At the same time, the
recommendations ask for an increase in cost share
monies from $500 to $750 per farm, primarily
to help small-scale certifed farmers cover the
increased annual certifcation costs.
Over and over we heard the same thing, however
-- Pay-Go, or pay-as-you-go, is the operating
by-word for the 2007 Farm Bill. Starting from a
reduced baseline, any increase in one sector has to
be met with budget cuts in another, pitting advances
in organic spending against the insider interests that
have prevailed in every past farm bill. With all the
intense scrutiny the legislation is receiving from
farm and food advocacy groups this time around,
however, the 2007 Farm Bill might just break the
mold.
NOSB after hours
The NOSB meeting at the end of March turned into
a marathon session for the hard-working members
who also put in huge amounts of between-meetings
hours working on committee and sub-committee
issues for no pay. In addition to clarifying board
policy, they adopted organic pond aquaculture
recommendations prohibiting net pens and fshmeal
as feed. The Livestock committee also strongly
clarifed their stance on animal cloning with a
recommendation to classify cloned animals and their
progeny under the Excluded Methods category
completely prohibited under organic standards.
They also conducted a lengthy review of a backlog
of over 60 food coloring and handling substances,
voting to approve or deny petitioned materials,
while deferring a few for future discussion.
With all the diverse and sometimes conficting
organic interests gathered around the table, theres
an undercurrent of intrigue at these public hearings.
For example, a buzz was circulating about an
exclusive after-hours reception for the NOSB
members sponsored by OTAs high-powered
lobbyist law frm, Covington and Burling. But in a
surprise announcement later on, in an effort to avoid
any improper appearances, all of the meetings
attendees were invited to the expanded event, now
co-sponsored by Organic Valley and the local Whole
Foods Market. There, at the prestigious Cosmos
Club mansion on Embassy Row -- industry reps,
NOSB members and grassroots types rubbed elbows
in ornate Beaux Arts splendor around an open bar
and tables laden with glistening organic fnger food.
Serving to ground the event later in the evening,
a sturdy man with a fat top buzz cut entered the
room and was soon introduced as Jon Tester,
organic farmer and the new democratic senator from
Montana. He wasted no time in describing how
going organic in 1987 saved their 3
rd
generation
family farm (which raises wheat, kamut, lentils and
barley), keeping it from going under. Long active in
local and state politics, he was also an early organic
leader, helping to develop the Montana Organic
certifcation program and serving on the board
of the international Organic Crop Improvement
Association.
Having won a long shot senatorial race against a
long-term, well-funded opponent on the basis of
personal integrity and by rallying the rural vote,
Tester also pulled no punches about conventional
agriculture saying the only reason it is in business
today is due to the huge subsidies that keep it
propped up. Despite his background, or more
likely because of it, Senator Tester has not been
appointed to any agricultural committees as yet. But
its becoming more evident there are some major
winds of change blowing through Washington these
days.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 10
by Alice Friedemann
http://www.energyskeptic.com/Peak_Soil.htm
The nation that destroys its soil destroys itself,
President Franklin D. Roosevelt

Theres growing public attention from the people, all the
way on down to the President, about biomass potential
for energy. Theres been a public discussion about many
aspects and what the problems might be. But theres one
aspect of all of this that is conspicuous by its absence
- a national discussion of anything about the soil science
- the effect growing row crops like corn and soy have on
the land and water.

Whatever the biomass were going to grow, there are
important issues about net energy gain and the carbon
balance, but we also need to deal with the root of the
matter - the soils, and water, and whether growing
biomass for fuel can be made sustainable.

The lack of any kind of input on this by soil scientists
- about how were mining our soils - suggests a voice that
needs to be heard. If you destroy the soil, you cant grow
biomass!

Part 1. The Dirt on Dirt.
Ethanol is an agribusiness get-rich-quick scheme that
will bankrupt our topsoil. Nineteenth century western
farmers converted their corn into whiskey to make a
proft (Rorabaugh 1979). Archer Daniels Midland, a
large grain processor, came up with the same scheme in
the 20th century. But ethanol was a product in search
of a market, so ADM spent three decades relentlessly
lobbying for ethanol to be used in gasoline. Today ADM
makes record profts from ethanol sales and government
subsidies (Barrionuevo 2006).

The Department of Energy hopes to have biomass supply
5% of the nations power, 20% of transportation fuels,
and 25% of chemicals by 2030. These combined goals
are 30% of the current petroleum consumption (DOE
Biomass Plan, DOE Feedstock Roadmap).

Fuels made from biomass are a lot like the nuclear
powered airplanes the Air Force tried to build from 1946
to 1961, for billions of dollars. They never got off the
ground. The idea was interesting atomic jets could fy
for months without refueling. But the lead shielding to
protect the crew and several months of food and water
was too heavy for the plane to take off. The weight
problem, the ease of shooting this behemoth down, and
the consequences of a crash landing were so obvious, its
amazing the project was ever funded, let alone kept going
for 15 years.

Biomass fuels have equally obvious and predictable
reasons for failure. Odum says that time explains why
renewable energy provides such low energy yields
compared to non-renewable fossil fuels. The more work
left to nature, the higher the energy yield, but the longer
the time required. Although coal and oil took millions of
years to form into dense, concentrated solar power, all we
had to do was extract and transport them (Odum 1996)

With every step required to transform a fuel into
energy, there is less and less energy yield. For
example, to make ethanol from corn grain, which is how
all ethanol is made now, corn is frst grown to develop
hybrid seeds, which next season are planted, harvested,
delivered, stored, and preprocessed to remove dirt. Dry-
mill ethanol is milled, liquefed, heated, saccharifed,
fermented, evaporated, centrifuged, distilled, scrubbed,
dried, stored, and transported to customers (McAloon
2000).

Fertile soil will be destroyed if crops and other
wastes are removed to make cellulosic ethanol.

We stand, in most places on earth, only six inches
from desolation, for that is the thickness of the topsoil
layer upon which the entire life of the planet depends
(Sampson 1981).

Loss of topsoil has been a major factor in the fall of
civilizations (Sundquist 2005 Chapter 3, Lowdermilk
1953, Perlin1991, Ponting 1993). You end up with a
country like Iraq, formerly Mesopotamia, where 75% of
the farm land is a salty desert.

Fuels from biomass are not sustainable, are ecologically
destructive, have a net energy loss, and there isnt enough
biomass in America to make signifcant amounts of
energy because essential inputs like water, land, fossil
fuels, and phosphate ores are limited.

Soil Science 101 There Is No Waste Biomass
Long before there was Peak Oil, there was Peak
Soil. Iowa has some of the best topsoil in the world. In
the past century, half of its been lost, from an average of
18 to 10 inches deep (Pate 2004, Klee 1991).

Productivity drops off sharply when topsoil reaches
6 inches or less, the average crop root zone depth
(Sundquist 2005).

Crop productivity continually declines as topsoil is
lost and residues are removed. (Al-Kaisi May 2001,
Ball 2005, Blanco-Canqui 2006, BOA 1986, Calvio
2003, Franzleubbers 2006, Grandy 2006, Johnson 2004,
Johnson 2005, Miranowski 1984, Power 1998, Sadras
2001, Troeh 2005, Wilhelm 2004).

On over half of Americas best crop land, the erosion
rate is 27 times the natural rate, 11,000 pounds per
acre (NCRS 2006). The natural, geological erosion rate
is about 400 pounds of soil per acre per year (Troeh
2005). Some is due to farmers not being paid enough to
conserve their land, but most is due to investors who farm
for proft. Erosion control cuts into profts.

Erosion is happening ten to twenty times faster than
the rate topsoil can be formed by natural processes
(Pimentel 2006). That might make the average person
concerned. But not the USDA -- theyve defned erosion
as the average soil loss that could occur without causing a
decline in long term productivity.

Troeh (2005) believes that the tolerable soil loss (T)
value is set too high, because its based only on the
upper layers -- how long it takes subsoil to be converted
into topsoil. T ought to be based on deeper layers the
time for subsoil to develop from parent material or parent
material from rock. If hes right, erosion is even worse
than NCRS fgures.

Weve come a long way since the 1930s in reducing
erosion, but that only makes it more insidious. Erosion
is very hard to measure -- very little soil might erode for
years, and then tons per acre blown or washed away in
an extreme storm just after harvest, before a cover crop
has had a chance to protect the soil. We need better ways
of measuring and monitoring erosion, since estimates
wildly differ (Trimble 2000). But soil is Americas most
valuable resource, so efforts to protect it should proceed
regardless of trustworthy measuring and monitoring.

Erosion removes the most fertile parts of the soil
(USDA-ARS). When you feed the soil with fertilizer,
youre not feeding plants; youre feeding the biota in the
soil. Underground creatures and fungi break down fallen
leaves and twigs into microscopic bits that plants can eat,
and create tunnels air and water can infltrate. In nature
there are no elves feeding (fertilizing) the wild lands.
When plants die, theyre recycled into basic elements and
become a part of new plants. Its a closed cycle. There is
no bio-waste.

Soil creatures and fungi act as an immune system for
plants against diseases, weeds, and insects when this
living community is harmed by agricultural chemicals
and fertilizers, even more chemicals are needed in an
increasing vicious cycle (Wolfe 2001).

Theres so much life in the soil, there can be 10
biomass horses underground for every horse
grazing on an acre of pasture (Hemenway 2000).
The June 2004 issue of Science calls soils The Final
Frontier. Just a tiny pinch of earth could have 10,000
different species (Wardle 2004) -- millions of creatures,
most of them unknown. If you dove into the soil and
swam around, youd be surrounded by thousands of miles
of thin strands of mycorrhizal fungi that help plant roots
absorb more nutrients and water (Pennisi 2004). As you
swam along, plant roots would tower above you like trees
as you wove through underground skyscrapers.

Plants and creatures underground need to drink, eat,
and breathe just like we do. An ideal soil is half rock,
and a quarter each water and air. When tractors plant and
harvest, they crush the life out of the soil, as underground
apartments collapse 9/11 style. The tracks left by
tractors in the soil are the erosion route for half of the soil
that washes or blows away (Wilhelm 2004).

Corn Biofuel (i.e. butanol, ethanol, biodiesel) is
especially harmful because:

* Row crops like corn and soy cause 50 times more
soil erosion than sod crops (Sullivan 2004) or more
(Al-Kaisi 2000), because the soil between rows can
wash or blow away. If corn is planted with last years
corn stalks left on the ground (no-till), erosion is less of
a problem, but only about 20% of corn is grown no-till.
Soy is usually grown no-till, but has insignifcant residues
to harvest for fuel.
* Corn uses more water, agrichemicals, and
fertilizer than most crops (Padgitt 2000, Pimentel
2003). Due to high corn prices, continuous corn (corn
crop after corn crop) is increasing, rather than rotation of
nitrogen fxing (fertilizer) and erosion control sod crops
with corn.
* The government has studied the effect of growing
continuous corn, and found it increases eutrophication
by 189%, global warming by 71%, and acidifcation
by 6% (Powers 2005).
* Farmers want to plant corn on highly-erodible,
water protecting, or wildlife sustaining Conservation
Reserve Program land. Farmers are paid not to grow
crops on this land. But with high corn prices, farmers
are now asking the Agricultural Department to release
them from these contracts so they can plant corn on these
low-producing, environmentally sensitive lands (Tomson
2007).
* Crop residues are essential for soil nutrition,
water retention, and soil carbon. Making cellulosic
ethanol from corn residues -- the parts of the plant we
dont eat (stalk, roots, and leaves) removes water,
carbon, and nutrients (Nelson, 2002, McAloon 2000,
Sheehan, 2003).
These practices lead to lower crop production
and ultimately deserts. Growing plants for fuel will
accelerate the already unacceptable levels of topsoil
erosion, soil carbon and nutrient depletion, soil
compaction, water retention, water depletion, water
pollution, air pollution, eutrophication, destruction of
fsheries, siltation of dams and waterways, salination, loss
of biodiversity, and damage to human health (Tegtmeier
2004).

Why are soil scientists absent from the biofuels
debate?

I asked 35 soil scientists why topsoil wasnt part of the
biofuels debate. These are just a few of the responses
from the ten who replied to my off-the-record poll (no
one wanted me to quote them, mostly due to fear of
losing their jobs):
* I have no idea why soil scientists arent questioning
corn and cellulosic ethanol plans. Quite frankly, Im
not sure that our society has had any sort of reasonable
debate about this with all the facts laid out. When you
see that even if all of the corn was converted to ethanol
and that would not provide more than 20% of our current
liquid fuel use, it certainly makes me wonder, even before
considering the conversion effciency, soil loss, water
contamination, food price problems, etc.
* Biomass production is not sustainable. Only business
men and women in the refnery business believe it is.
* Should we be using our best crop land to grow
gasohol and contribute further to global warming? What
will our children grow their food on?
This is not a new debate. Heres what scientists had to
say decades ago:

Removing crop residueswould rob organic matter
that is vital to the maintenance of soil fertility and
tilth, leading to disastrous soil erosion levels. Not
considered is the importance of plant residues as a
primary source of energy for soil microbial activity. The
most prudent course, clearly, is to continue to recycle
most crop residues back into the soil, where they are vital
in keeping organic matter levels high enough to make
the soil more open to air and water, more resistant to soil
erosion, and more productive (Sampson 1981).

Massive alcohol production from our farms is
an immoral use of our soils since it rapidly promotes
their wasting away. We must save these soils for an
oil-less future (Jackson 1980).

Gasohol was made so poorly in the 80s that the name
was changed to ethanol.

What the USDA knew about continuous corn in 1911:

When the rich, black, prairie corn lands of the Central
West were frst broken up, it was believed that these were
inexhaustible lands So crop after crop of corn was
planted on the same felds. There came a time, however,
after 15 or 20 years, when the crop did not respond to
cultivation; the yields fell off and the lands that once
produced 60-70 bushels per acre annually dropped to 25
to 30 bushels.

With the passing years, the soil became more
compact, droughts were more injurious, and the
soil baked harder and was more diffcult to handle.
Continuous corn culture has no place in progressive
farming...it is a shortsighted policy and is suicidal on
lands that have been long under cultivation (Smith
1911).
Peak Soil: Why Cellulosic
and other Biofuels are Not
Sustainable and a Threat to
Americas National Security
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 11
Special Supplement on
Organic Minor Fruit
by Jack Kittredge
If you have never taken a workshop by Lee Reich
at the NOFA Summer Conference, you have
missed something. Reich, author of such books as
Uncommon Fruits for Every Garden (reviewed in
this issue), Growing Fruits in Your Backyard, A
Northeast Gardeners Year, the Pruning Book and
Weedless Gardening is nothing if not enthusiastic
about the many uncommon fruits which can be
grown in the northeast. He is an expert on topics
horticultural, is a meticulous gardener, has a deep
curiosity about the way nature works, and does not
speak about something unless he knows it cold.
Thus I was excited to visit his garden in New
Paltz, NewYork, on a beautiful October morning.
On his property he grows almost every minor or
uncommon fruit one can raise in this latitude, and a
number which one cant!
Lee was in graduate school for theoretical chemistry
in the early 1970s when he decided to drop out and
live in Vermont for a year. That convinced him his
real interest was in some form of agriculture. So he
went back to school, this time at Wisconsin, where
he had done his undergraduate work. He ended up
with a masters degree in soils, which ft well with
his chemistry background. Realizing that there were
a lot of aspects to soils, however, and that he really
liked horticulture, he got a horticulture masters as
well.
Then Reich worked with the soils conservations
service for a couple of years in southern Delaware.
He found he hated that, so went back to school at
the University of Maryland and got a doctorate
with a specialty in fruits. He did his research at
the government station in Beltsville and loved it,
He wanted to stay, but once you get your degree
there you have to move on. So he took a job with
Cornell in their Hudson Valley research station.
When that ended he started writing for newspapers
and magazines, then got an agent who helped him
get his frst book published. After the frst book, the
others came easily.
Lee says he likes supporting himself by writing,
giving talks, and being at home in the garden
instead of working away from the house. Of course
now everything I do in the garden is sort of work
related, he sighs. Its gotten to be more than a
garden but less than a farm.
Reichs soil, a combination of silt loam, clay loam
and coarse sand, is river bottom soil to which he has
added an inch of compost every year for the last 20
years.
The soil is as good as anybody could ever want,
he smiles. No rocks, no stones even. When I built
garden walls I had to buy rocks!
Lee gets leaves for compost from local people.
He puts up signs to get volunteers, and now has
a mailing list of people who he solicits for their
leaves. They call him up when they have a bag or
two and he picks them up. He has several compost
bins, each of which he covers with rubber roofng
Lee Reich, Guru of Uncommon Fruit
when it is full. He says that material is great for
keeping heat in.
Over the years Reich has had the opportunity to buy
parcels on either side of his house lot, giving him
2 or 3 acres of growing land. He is slowly planting
this out with the many varieties of fruits which
interest him. Hell put in a row of trees or bushes
of different varieties of one fruit, and compare
their growth, favor, color, and form. He gets local
locust for posts, and uses soaker hose everywhere,
everyday. The soil is so well drained that he never
worries about too much water building up.
He currently uses organic methods throughout
his garden. Respecting fruits, he reasons that the
uncommon fruits are not highly developed, so still
have natural resistances bred into them and dont
need chemicals. The major fruits, like apples and
blueberries, he blesses with a lot of work many
sprayings of Surround on the former, and carefully
netting the latter to protect them from birds.
Blueberries are my best crop, says Lee. theyre
a challenge to grow, but I love them. Blueberries
have never failed me, even with wet springs or
cold springs. I like all varieties. We get an amazing
amount -- we ate them every day from June to
September and froze 50 quarts. We net the whole
area, using a plastic net over the whole planting, and
a metal chicken wire for the frst couple of feet off
the ground. We have to protect them from the birds
and from squirrels. I have sparrow traps over the
gates.
Another fruit which Reich grows that likes the same
acid soil as blueberries is lingonberries. He has a
planting of them, along with lowbush blueberries,
in a small area bordering his house. Lingonberries
are the hardiest fruit I grow, he says. They grow
wild in Scandanavia, where thousands of tons are
harvested for use in sauces, jams, juice and wine.
Theyre related to cranberries, but they taste much
better. I want to make this a solid groundcover
of them. They are bright red against bright green
leaves, which turn purple with the onset of cold
weather. Like blueberries, they like acid soil which
is high in organic matter and well drained. Peat
works well. But they require low fertility. The root
hairs are really fne and can burn easily if the soil is
too rich.
A few feet away are Lees American persimmons.
One tree of the variety Mohler, which is early
ripening, has a branch of cold-hardy Szukis grafted
onto it. (I tasted a ripe Mohler and thought it was
great!) The Szukis dont drop and instead hang on
the tree, drying slowly. He also has a tree of the
Yates variety with, of course, a graft from another
variety. Persimmons generally require a second tree
of a different variety for proper pollination.
Although persimmons are reputed to have an
astringent taste, given the excellent favor of the one
I tried, I asked Reich why it is not more popular.
He is also somewhat mystifed. Millions of people
have enjoyed persimmons, he smiles. But they
are all in Asia. The Oriental persimmon was the
most widely grown fruit tree in the Far East until the
twentieth century, when apples became popular. I
really think the American public doesnt know what
ripe fruit should taste like any more. Commercial
orchards cant sell really ripe fruit. It would
disintegrate. You have to pick it yourself. Youd
have to pick these persimmons into something like
an egg carton. They cant take any rough handling
at all.
This tree takes no spraying, no pruning, looks
pretty year round, he continues. The deer dont
even like to nibble on it. Its just a great tree! If you
pick it early, however, it wont ripen off the tree.
Asian persimmons will do that. Some are even frm
when they are ripe. But American persimmons turn
photo by Jack Kittredge
Lee shows pawpaws growing on one of his trees.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 12
to mush when theyre ripe. That makes it a hard
fruit to make commercial.
Lee is interested in test marketing persimmons and
seeing what they would sell for. He has a friend who
is a farmer who sells at the Green Market in New
York City. Reich has permission to have a section of
his booth.
Im interested in seeing if I could sell these the
same day I pick them, he says. The Asian variety
wont grow this far north -- it is limited and can
maybe reach into Pennsylvania. But American
varieties are much hardier.
Another minor fruit for which Lee thinks there is a
bright future is the pawpaw. Its a native fruit which
grows wild from Pennsylvania down to Georgia,
and out to Nebraska. Native Americans ate these
regularly and the Lewis and Clark Expedition
survived a long time on pawpaws.
Reich has a row of the trees and is experimenting
with different varieties. Right now he prefers one
called a Zimmerman. Pawpaws are hard until they
are ripe, and which point they feel like a ripe banana
and the fruit develops a delightful custardy favor.
One does not eat the skin or the large seeds, but
scoops out the raw fruit with a spoon or scrapes it
out with the teeth.

The trees get 8 feet tall, Reich says, and
theyre beautiful. The leaves are very tropical. The
plant produces bountiful fruit related to custard
apples. The main problem with pawpaws, as with
persimmons, is transplanting. They dont get
established easily. The trees are really expensive
they cost about $25 each. But pawpaws make such
big seeds, its hard not to plant them as seedlings.
Then I get scion wood from friends and graft it on.
I might have two or three varieties of pawpaws on
a tree. Each fower has a multiple ovary. So you can
get nine fruits, potentially, from one fower.
The major issue preventing commercial
development of the pawpaw, as with the persimmon,
is perishability. Lee is experimenting with picking
them when they barely begin to soften and storing
them in individual compartments in special boxes
that he built.
There is a considerable interest in the fruit from
buyers already. A chef at the Blue Hills estate
contacted Lee about securing some, and he was also
approached by a group that had customers willing
to pay $100 for 5 pounds of pawpaws, delivered to
their door. Reich, who hates shipping fruit, turned
them down.
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photo courtesy Lee Reich
Ripe Szukis persimmons cluster on a branch in late summer.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 13
Lees wife, Deb Goldman, is also a fan of pawpaws.
She serves the fruit in little custard cups after
pureeing it and adding cream. She says it also
freezes very well, keeping a good texture.
Kiwifruit is native to China, where it grows wild in
profusion (130,000 tons of fruit were picked from
wild vines in 1983). Early in the 20
th
century the
fruit was introduced to New Zealand. By the 1930s
superior varieties were selected, export began in the
1950s, and by the 1980s over half a million tons a
year were shipped from New Zealand.
Although the large-fruited varieties found in
supermarkets will not grow in the northeast, a
cousin to them called hardy kiwi does quite well.
Lee grows a number of the plants, some on a trellis
over his patio -- which also supports grapes -- and
many on a special set of overhead lines to which he
trains the vines.
The main problem of hardy kiwi, he relates, is
establishing them. Once theyre established they
do well. Often it takes 7 years or so for them to
produce, but I had one that started bearing at three
years. Hardy kiwi do take serious pruning, however.
They have fruiting arms which need to be attended
to. Like grapes, kiwis provide fruit growing off one
year wood, so they get pruned similar to cordon
grapes, with 8 to 12 inches between the vines. They
also are rampant vines and need to be pruned in the
summer. I have several hanging on a trellis of nylon
monoflament instead of wire. It stretches rather
than deforms, and doesnt get hit by lightening.
Hardy kiwi is adapted to being a marketable crop.
The fruits can be picked a little under ripe and will
ripen in storage. They are also easy to preserve and
will stay in the refrigerator for months.
Besides kiwi vines, Lee also has grape vines
supported on various trellises around the property.
He likes a number of the varieties developed by
Elbert Swenson, a dairy farmer from the upper
Midwest who bred a lot of large, productive, and
delicious grape cultivars like Swensons Red and
Edelweiss.
Reich grows medlars, a fruit quite popular in the
middle ages. (In fact, Charlemagne included it in a
list of mandatory plants for the royal estates.) The
fruit grows on a small tree and tastes somewhat like
applesauce laced with cinnamon. You pick it late in
the season, after early frosts, while hard, then blet
it for two or so weeks (allow it to soften indoors)
so that the sugars increase and the acids and tannins
decrease. Currently Lee has only one tree, because
another three which he had for 25 years died. But
the remaining one bears well.
The summer ripening fruits of the Ribes genus
(gooseberries, currants) are also favorites of Reich.
He feels currants are the most beautiful of fruits
and has espaliered some in his greenhouse. Their
popularity in this continent has been reduced,
however, because of their ability to carry white pine
blister rust, a disease of white pines to which the
ribes themselves are largely resistant.
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Red and white currants grow in delicate strings.
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Nanking Cherries are cold hardy and grow on bushes which give beautiful fowers in spring.
photo courtesy of Lee Reich
The pappaw contains large black seeds and a delicious pulp similar in
consistency and taste to banana custard
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Cornelian cherries were grown in ancient
Greece and in medieval monestaries
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 14
More for its decorative value than any practical
beneft, Reich has a castor bean plant in his garden.
Every part of the plant, he says, is super poisonous
-- except the bean. You remember those London
terrorists who were making a poison known as
Ricin? Well, thats from the castor bean plant. Its
Latin name is ricinus.
As one might expect, Lee is also interested in
growing nuts. He has chestnut hybrids which are
super hardy, blight resistant, taste good, and produce
large nuts. He did a lot of research and came up with
8 varieties that he planted. He has been happy with
them all. They bear very quickly -- he planted them
in 2000 and they are all producing now. The nuts
grow in a large burr which eventually opens and
drops the nuts onto the ground.
Weve been harvesting them to get ahead of the
squirrels as soon as they drop, he sighs. They
cant get them while they are in the burrs. A lot of
times there will be three nuts in a burr. This is the
colossal variety. It is appropriately named as the
nut is huge. All these are hybrids of Chinese and
American chestnut, and possibly some European
varieties as well, which are resistant to blight. The
American chestnut is more upright, the Chinese is
more spreading. On American chestnuts, the blight
makes a lesion on the trunk and kills the tree. But it
doesnt affect the roots, so the tree keeps regrowing.
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photo by Jack Kittredge
Reich has good success with Hardy Kiwi. Here he shows a cluster of fruits.
photo by Jack Kittredge
Reich holds a basket of ripe chestnuts
from his trees.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 15
On a garden scale you could possibly spray it and
contain the blight. I have also heard that you can
make a poultice from the soil around the tree and
put it on the lesions to help fght the blight.
Other nuts Reich grows are pine nuts, flberts, and
walnuts. His pine nuts come from a Korean pine,
although they could come from an Italian pine, or
the Southwest pine which makes pion nuts. The
nut appears at the end of each section of scale in the
cone.
American flberts nuts are really small and dont
taste that good, but Lee also has European flberts.
These are resistant (and in some cases immune) to
flbert blight. The nuts ripen in August. I didnt get
any nuts this year, sighs Lee. The squirrels got
them all. I had 6 traps set and used my BB gun, but
to no avail.
Reich says he has black walnuts all over the place.
We eat a lot of them! Theyre delicious. They are
hard to crack, however. They come down as green
husks, but then the shell within is super hard.
Besides the large number of uncommon plants
Reich grows, he has also worked with what are
more traditional fruits. He used to have plums,
but has given up on them, probably because of the
presence of curculio in the woods that border his
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photo by Jack Kittredge
Chestnut burrs each hold several nuts, protecting them until they are ready to drop.
photo by Jack Kittredge
Medlar, an apple relative, was popular in the
Medieval period. It was on Charlemagnes
catalog of mandatory plants for royal estates.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 16
land. He has had success grafting beach plums to
plum rootstock, and gets fruit from those because
they are more resistant to curculio.
Lee loves pears, and recommends a variety called
Magnus which he says is so good you wont ever
want to eat another pear. It bears a little lighter than
others, and you need another variety to pollinate it,
but it is disease resistant. He plants pear seeds to get
root stock, which he then can graft Magnus buds
photo by Jack Kittredge
This castor bean plant is an annual with striking leaves
and bright red fowers. All parts of the plant
except the bean are poisonous, however.
photo by Jack Kittredge
This European Filbert produces a crop of nuts in August,
but the squirrels always seem to get there frst!
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 17
onto.
But, he warns, youre supposed to pick European
pears like Magnus before they are ripe. You want
to get them off when they get easy to pick, then let
them sit for a few days. The very early varieties
you can even pick and refrigerate for a few weeks.
They ripen from the inside. If you let them ripen
on the plant they become mush. Read those British
gardening books. They have a lot to say about
getting a pear when it is just ripe. Its an art!
Reich also grows Asian pears, which are very
productive for him. He thinks their taste is not as
good, however. Theyre a little watery, he says.
photo by Jack Kittredge
Lee holds a ripe persimmon for a close-up picture.
photo by Jack Kittredge
Figs form on one of the trees in Lees greenhouse.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 18
I prefer regular pears to Asian ones. Asian pears,
in contrast to European ones, should not be picked
before they are ripe. I pick each one and make sure
it comes right off.
As with his plums, Lee has had problems getting
apples to provide good fruit. He suspects the
problem is curculio and has used Surround
religiously, but without success.
When Surround

came out, he says, I got a

sprayer and hooked it up and it was unbelievable
how many times I would spray my apples. But Ive
had really bad results. Id get fruit set, but then at
some point they would drop off. I thought maybe it
was squirrels, but I trapped them without result, so
I dont think it was that. Im so close to the woods
that I think I get a lot of curculio damage. Im
really diligent but I see it the next day after I spray.
This year Im giving it one more try. If it doesnt
work this time Im going to give up and go back to
spraying Imidan twice a year!
Last May, as an experiment, he enclosed some
young Gala apples just after fruit set in Ziploc bags.
Those grew to full size without damage, further
pointing to curculio as the source of his problem.
As with most of his fruit, Reich sets his own grafts.
He grows seedling rootstock from seed, which
makes a strong root. Then he grafts on a 9 to 12 inch
dwarfng section from a shoot of dwarf apple. Then
he grafts a scion with the fruit buds he wants at the
top. Double grafted trees like these are expensive to
buy, he says, but they make the best trees.
Another uncommon fruit Lee likes is the black
mulberry. Some mulberries were native to America,
but most were introduced early in the colonial
period for a domestic silk industry.
There are three species of mulberry, he explains,
black, white, and red. But the name has nothing
to do with the fruit color. The white mulberry is
the most cold hardy, and the most likely to be
grown in the northeast. One popular variety fruits
all summer and sports a glistening black colored


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photo by Jack Kittredge
This is a device that Lee patented that detects motion in the garden and turns on
a light and a low volume radio. It primarily is used to scare deer.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 19
berry. I have a tree of the black mulberry species,
which only grows in Mediterranean climates this
one is from Persia. But I keep it in the greenhouse
in the summer because it can take high heat. The
fruit is one of the best tasting fruits in the world. Its
unbelievable, like a dead ripe white peach!
Reich has several other fruits which dont normally
grow here as well. By the houses front door are a
number of plants in pots which he moves into the
house every winter. I grow kumquats, lime trees,
pineapple guava, and avocadoes this way. My dream
is to get one avocado a week. But this tree hasnt
borne fruit yet!
In the greenhouse he has 3 different varieties of
fgs, which fruit at the end of the summer. He heats
the building with propane to 35 degrees, just above
freezing. The fgs can take it down to about 15, he
explains, but we heat it for the winter vegetables
and the water system.
Growing so many delicious fruits next to a large
forested area has been attractive to deer, so Lee has
had to be creative in fguring ways to keep them
away. He developed a deer deterrent by hooking up
a solar powered battery charger to a motion sensor, a
light and a radio. When the device is on and motion
is detected in the garden, a light turns on and the
radio comes on, turned to a low volume. The deer is
startled and retreats.
It works about 90% of the time, he says. I
actually got a patent on the concept and tried for
about 8 years to get someone to make it. That fnally
happened and two weeks ago it went on the market.
Its called Deer Chaser. It sells for $70. They made
5000 and they are already sold out. I wish it had the
same range as my original, though. Mine picks up
motion as far away as 75 feet. This one only works
to 25 or 30 feet. I guess thats not bad if you have a
place where the deer walk by. It can stop them from
walking by there. Also, this one is battery powered,
not solar powered. They said it uses so little
electricity that batteries are no problem.
Asked about his future plans, Lee seems happy
growing the many varieties of fruit that appeal to
him and trying to promote interest in them among
others. He sells excess stock from his garden
one day a year, is an active member of the North
American Fruit Exchange, and has many friends
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with whom he passes around scions of the most
productive and favorful plants. He doesnt do
experimental breeding himself, but is in touch
with a lot of the leaders in that feld. It would not
be surprising if someday there is a pawpaw or
persimmon bearing his name!
photo by Jack Kittrredge
Lees home is surrounded by edible landscaping.
He has lingonberries and lowbush blueberries in front of his house.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 20
by Erica Myers-Russo
When I frst agreed to write an article for TNF on
growing ground cherries, I thought, Thats going
to be one short article. As far as unusual backyard
fruit go, theres not much to growing the humble but
unusual ground cherrywhich, combined with their
sweet favor and paper-wrapped appearance, make
them a perfect item for a childrens garden.
The Basics:
The ground cherry is known by a number of
common names, including cape gooseberry, husk
cherry, poha, strawberry tomato, and (occasionally)
pineapple tomatillo. They are members of the
physalis genus, which includes the more common
tomatillo (physalis ixocarpa, which shares many
cultural requirements) and decorative paper lantern
plants. Scientifcally, there are two main species
which may be called ground cherry: physalis
pruinosa and physalis peruviana. In addition,
there are two other even less-well-known species,
physalis pubescens (downy ground cherry) and
physalis subglabrata (purple ground cherry).
All are sprawling plants ranging in size from 18
inches to three feet. All produce small (-1) fruit
encased in a papery husk which drop to the ground
when ripe. This was a relief to my husband, who
had assumed ground cherry was a euphemism for
rabbit poopand was therefore concerned by our
childrens fondness for eating them.
Growing:
If you love to grow things you cant fnd
commercially, the ground cherry is for you. Several
Ground Cherries:
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Conditioned water used for irrigation penetrates the soil and
the plant cells better than unconditioned water. It significantly
reduces water spotting on leaves and fruit. In greenhouse tests
cuttings rooted more quickly and produced healthier plants.
Crops such as cantaloupes and tomatoes have been shown to
produce more and larger fruit.
Works with city or well water.
Other applications: Farms, Greenhouses,
Dairies & Irrigation Systems.
The SoPhTec water conditioning system makes
hard water act like soft water.
Ground cherries in their husks.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 21
seeds catalogs (see resources below) offer seeds,
typically one or two varieties. I have never seen
physalis pubescens or subglabrata offered as seeds,
and Ive never seen any ground cherries sold as
seedlings. Suzanne Ashworth writes in Seed to
Seed that members of the Seed Savers Exchange
typically offer 24 varieties for exchange. (The SSE
is a great resource and worth joining if you have
any interest in saving seeds, even if you dont need
twenty different varieties of ground cherry.) I have
grown both SSEs Aunt Mollys Ground Cherry and
Fedcos Husk Cherry and found them to be virtually
indistinguishable.
Culture the ground cherry like tomatillos, which is
to say like tomatoes. Start indoors, preferably over
bottom heat, and set out at the same time you would
set out your tomatoes. The seedlings will be quite
a bit smaller than same-age tomatillo seedlings, and
they beneft from thick mulch or other weed control.
They are largely pest-free. Flea beetles like the
foliage, but the plants soon outgrew the damage.
Even my two worst tomatillo pests (Mexican bean
beetles and Colorado potato beetles) largely ignored
the ground cherriesalthough they might be
attracted to the latter if they didnt have a stand of
tomatillo plants to eat.
Beyond that, provide adequate water (they are
not drought tolerant, although they are also not
particularly thirsty), soil fertility, and warmth,
and the ground cherry pretty much grows itself.
Most varieties ripen in about 70-75 days, and they
will continue bearing until fall, tolerating very
light frost. Several sources report some diffculty
ripening much fruit in the far north, but I had no
diffculties in my Connecticut garden.
There are only two real tricks to ground cherries,
both related to the plants habit. They are, as I
mentioned, sprawly. One seed-catalog listing
describes the pineapple tomatillo as reaching three
feet. Ive never seen a ground cherry grow more
than ten inches high, but if you stood it upright it
just might make three feet. So you can either let
them sprawl or cage them. Either way, they also
drop fruit when ripe, so the handiest way of growing
them is on some sort of mulchcardboard, thick
straw, planters paperthat keeps the fruit clean.
Fruit that has lain on the ground for too long will get
eaten by any number of marauding pests, so its a
good idea to check frequently.
Fruit starts out green in a green leathery husk, and
both fruit and husk will mature to golden-brown.
The husk will eventually become transparent,
though the fruit is safe to eat anytime after it falls
from the plant with a light nudge. The Fedco
catalog reports that the green fruit acts as an emetic,
but I know my daughters occasionally ate some that
were not-quite-ripe and no vomiting ensued. Which
is not to say that it is safe to eat the green fruit,
merely that its unclear how much of it you would
have to eat or how unripe it must be to make you
sick.
Eating:
Rumor has it that you can treat the ground cherry
like any other soft-feshed fruit, and that it makes
particularly good pies and preserves. The list of
possible uses includes freezing, drying, canning,
smoothies, fruit salads, and salsas. I have no frst
hand knowledge of this, however, because my
children have always snatched the fruit as soon
as it ripens. It is very good eaten fresh, with a
complex, fruity, favor. My children think it tastes
like a combination of pineapples and strawberries; a
friend described it as tasting like what cotton candy
should taste like.
Ripe fruit will store in the husk at room temperature
for up to several weeks.
Sources:
1. Fedco (www.fedcoseeds.com):
4008HC Husk Cherry, 77 days; ~700 seeds
$0.90
2. Seed Savers Exchange (www.seedsavers.
org): 912(OG) Aunt Mollys Ground
Cherry, 70 days; 50 seeds $2.75
3. Pinetree Seeds (www.superseeds.com):
W591 Pineapple Tomatillo, 75 days; 40
seeds $0.95
4. Johnnys (www.johnnyseeds.com): 773
Goldie (OG), 75 days; 75 seeds $3.30
5. Territorial Seed Company (www.
territorialseed.com): TM935 (OG)
Pineapple, 75 days; 150 seeds $3.05. Also
TM901 Aunt Mollys (OG), 65-70 days;
150 seeds $2.65
A ground cherry (also called a husk tomato)
with its husk popped.
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Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 22
by Jack Kittredge
Holyoke, Massachusetts is a city of 40,000 people
just north of West Springfeld, on the Connecticut
River. Once farmland of course, it was frst settled
in 1745. But it was the rapids in the river that caught
the eye of New England capitalists eager to further
the industrial revolution in America. They designed
and created Holyoke as the frst planned industrial
city in the country. A dam was built in 1848 to trap
the water power, but proved inadequate to contain
the river and was swept away on its frst day of
operation. Undaunted, the company built another
the next year, along with a system of canals to divert
and distribute the water as a power source to various
mills, primarily for processing paper and wool. As it
fowed through tunnels below buildings it powered
big wheels that conveyed the power via belts to
machines.
The city, with its square grid of streets so unusual
in New England, was incorporated in 1850. At one
point 25 paper mills were in operation in Holyoke,
and big infuxes of immigrants came to work in the
factories frst French Canadian, then Irish, then
Puerto Rican. By 1920 the population was 60,000.
In the mid 1960s and 1970s, when industries
started moving south, Holyoke went downhill
economically. Now there are just a couple of paper
factories in operation, and some light industrial
machine shops. The canals are still functioning
today, however, and some of the buildings are still
in production using steam power. There is even a
little bit of a movement to get hydropower back into
the energy mix.
Although it was excellent farmland a century and a
half ago, Holyoke now seems a strange place for an
innovative agricultural experiment. Nevertheless,
it is the site of the frst garden designed on David
Jacke and Eric Toensmeiers book: Edible Forest
Gardens. Eric and Jonathan Bates are buying a
Forest Fruit Gardening in Holyoke
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The Role of Raised Beds in the
FarmOrganism: Hands-on workshop
covering principles and practical details
of biodynamic eld & garden vegetable
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The Role of the Horse in the Farm Organism: The basic
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photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
Jonathan Bates stands before his seasonal banana plant at his home in Holyoke.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 23
house in Holyoke with a modestly sized backyard
and have decided that, just as the city was a product
of conscious design, so will be their garden.
The idea is to model a garden on the ecology
of a forest, Bates explains. Instead of a garden
in a forest, this is a garden like a forest. A forest
mulches itself. There are a lot of complex social
and ecological connections between plants and
animals in a forest. In the book they wrote about the
agriculture/nature continuum. Organic gardening
and farming starts on the agriculture end and moves
toward nature. Forest gardening starts on the nature
end and moves toward agriculture.
Forest gardening is an ancient way of growing
food in the tropics, he continues. It uses multiple
stories, both food and forest production. Indigenous
cultures around the world have been doing it in the
tropics for thousands of years. But it really hasnt
been thought about or developed for temperate
climates. It can produce food, fodder, forage,
pharmaceuticals and fun!
Many of the tenets of forest gardening are based
in permaculture creating a sustainable landscape,
organic methods, seeing how pests and diseases
can be dealt with by design. An important principle
behind their thinking is that plants have multiple
functions. Almost everything is useful a fertilizer,
a mulcher, edible, an insectory, or nitrogen-fxing.
Its complex, Bates admits, But the hope with
forest gardening is that you can design a garden that
doesnt need maintenance. If you are fertilizing and
mulching and maintaining moisture and a complex
ecosystem with the plants you grow, you dont
have to do much else. There are over 175 species of
plants in this garden! You cant see them all right
now, of course, in the early spring. Many will be
fruiting, a good portion of them are herbaceous
understory plants. Every year we keep adding more,
spreading them around, developing it, trying to fll
more niches.
So far the pair has six speaking engagements on
and off site this year, to explain what they are
attempting. They hope to spread their model, even
though it is still an experiment. Jonathan says they
feel their work with mulching is pretty confrmed
already. They use leaves gathered from people
nearby, get sawdust (applying it on the surface and
not mixing it in so as not to bind up nitrogen), and
use woodchips for the pathways.
The backyard runs roughly east to west. Two tall
trees are on the neighbors land to the north, so
Jonathan and Eric decided to focus the more shade-
tolerant plantings on that side, and the more sun-
loving ones to the south of the path which divides
the yard. A greenhouse sits in the middle of the yard,
facing south.
We did a site assessment of the land before we
planted anything, Jonathan says. We looked
at soil conditions, existing plants, water forms,
sun, shade, microclimates. One of our goals was
to get year-round fruit. That may seem strange
in Massachusetts, but were actually zone 6 in
Holyoke, because the river is just down the hill. The
way it is looking right now we will get fruit from
May to December -- from Alpine strawberries to
American persmimmons.
One of the pleasant surprises Bates and Toensmeier
had from their backyard gardening efforts was
how interested the neighbors were. One family has
kids who love to come over and help out, and pick
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In early April the Bates/Toensmeier backyard doesnt look like the
Garden of Eden it is in the summer!
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 24
strawberries. Another neighbor, who just moved
in, said one of the reasons they liked the house
they bought was that it looked out onto such an
interesting garden.
One less pleasant discovery was how bad the soil
was. It had been an orchard long ago, and soil tests
showed lead, most likely from lead-based pesticides.
The pair has used a number of ways to keep the
lead at bay: increasing the pH where the lead is to
bind it into the soil, and by putting 6 to 12 inches of
compost over it to build new soil so the lead wont
come out in the plants they are growing.
They lay drip irrigation around everything they
plant, but hardly need it. The mulch is so heavy,
Jonathan says, that they only use the irrigation 4 to 8
times a year, for a couple of hours at a time. If they
see some wilt starting theyll turn it on. Then, when
it rains, it recharges the mulch system.
To demonstrate his point about getting fruit from
May to December, Jonathans forest fruit garden
tour follows the seasons. The Alpine strawberries
are perennials and some are already leafng out in
early April, he says. Theyll have fruit by late
May or early June. Another early bearing fruit is
honeyberry. It comes from Russia and China and is
fairly new here. Its a little bluer than a blueberry
with the favor of a less watery blueberry. Its in the
honeysuckle family. Normally it gets to 8 feet tall,
but we also have a dwarfng one. You need two for
pollenation. It doesnt require an acid soil, and can
take a little shade.
Some of the next fruits to ripen, he continues, are
Juneberries or Saskatoons. This one is Regent, from
Oikos (oikostreecrops.com). Its a shrub. It will
be 5 to 6 feet wide and tall. It suckers a little but
shouldnt go beyond 4 to 5 feet. This was chosen for
bigger and tastier fruit.
Next to ripen, in the gardens acid section, are half-
high blueberries which should get to all of two feet
tall. Eric and Jonathan put sawdust around them to
bring down the pH. They also put in lingonberries
last year a low-growing small red berry with a
mild favor.
The pair have Nanking Cherry plants, and around
them have put in a groundcover of strawberries,
Honoye, and Intensity. Intensity is a cross between
a woodland strawberry and a conventional one,
with the behavior of woodland shade tolerant
strawberries -- rapid growth and leaders that go out
far, and a medium to small berry. The Honoye is
clumping and slower growing, but produces a big
berry. They hope the Intensity will cover the whole
bed this year, its so very aggressive.
In another bed they have jostaberry, which is a
shrub, and goumi, which is in the same family as
the Autumn Olive and is both a nitrogen fxer and a
shrubby plant that is happy in full shade. The goumi
is prolifc, with fruits that are approximately inch
long and have a sweet/tart favor. It produces fruit in
June of the second year. The seeds are big and take
maybe a third of the volume, but Jonathan says they
have a hand pitter to take them out.
They also have two Chinese dwarfng hazelnuts.
The long catkins formed in the middle of the branch
are the male fowers, and the female ones form
further out on the ends of the branches. Two are
necessary for pollination purposes, and Eric and
Jonathan planted them together to form a hedge to
serve as a windbreak.
In midsummer we get this fush of fruit, says
Bates. Raspberries two different varieties
golden and red. The golden are my favorite fruit!
These are beach plums. Theyre not supposed to get
to more than 6 or 8 feet. Over here are peaches. This
one is a genetic dwarf its sold as a patio peach.
Someone developed it by stunting the roots. Here
are gooseberries, and here we have jostaberry which
is a thornless cross of gooseberry and currant. I
think theyre okay tasting, but Eric really likes them.
My favorites are the green gooseberries. We have
two Invicta green/gold, which are big and delicious,
and a Glendale which gives red berries. This here is
a dwarfng mulberry. Its a Geraldi Dwarf. We got it
photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
Goumi is a legume and produces a prolifc crop of tart fruits.
photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
Hazelnuts are produced in these long husks.
photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
These pawpaws are from Nuestras Raices, an urban growing program in Holyoke
with which Jonathan and Eric are affliated. They have a grove of
9 or 10-year old pawpaws in a beautiful full-sun courtyard which was
abundant in fruit last year. Some were as big as Mangoes.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 25
from Edible Landscaping out of Virginia, which is at
Eat-It.com. These are all medium season fruit.
For late in the summer they have two bush cherries,
Jan and Joy. They havent been in long enough for
Eric and Jonathan to know how good the favor is,
but are supposed to be a sweet/tart blend similar
to a pie cherry. Theyre trying to develop another
space with clove currants, also known as Crandall
American black currants. The plant is native to
western states and is very ornamental, looking like
forsythia. But in the fall it has large, black sweet/
tart fruits. The pair got it from One Green World
nursery (OneGreenWorld.com). It will get to 6 or 8
feet tall, and will form a hedge. Two are needed for
pollination.
For the late fruits, the men have American
persimmon, pawpaw, apple, Asian pear, grape, and
Autumn Olive plantings. The apple is Queen Cox on
M27 dwarfng root stock. Jonathan says it shouldnt
get more than 6 feet tall, but they will need to stake
it because the roots arent strong enough to hold it
erect. The Asian pear has three varieties grafted onto
it, which are ready over a fairly wide time span: mid
August, early to mid September, and October.
I think one of the reasons it is doing so well,
Jonathan says, is that I planted it literally over an
old white pine stump. Ive read that old stumps are
an amazing water storage system. In the ecosystem
one reason old stumps and logs are so important
is they have this ability to hold water in the large
underground root mass. If you think about the
function of stumps in the forest, they are nurseries
for new growth.
Our grapes are Lakemont, Reliance, and Glenora,
he continues. This is our third year for grapes.
Were trying to train them along the fence. Theyre
quite vigorous -- when Eric pruned these he took
the cuttings, dipped them in root hormone growing
solution, and potted them. Now he has about 50
seedlings he can transplant.
This is a weedly seedling Autumn Olive that just
showed up in our garden. A bird must have dropped
the seed. Its listed as an invasive species, and was
brought in originally to stabilize soil along the
interstate system, when they were building that. It
started spreading from there. The favor is highly
variable, but I ate the fruit and it was good. It is
edible in the fall, but is only good after a couple of
hard frosts. The fruit is cherry like, but both sweet
and tart. It has lycopene, an antioxidant which is
in tomatoes. Its also nitrogen fxing, and we dont
have many nitrogen-fxing shrubs which fruit and
can survive in shade and on poor soil. In their
natural habitat they come in after a disturbance
like a storm or fre and reestablish the system. Im
trying to keep it close to the fence so it grows back
from the path towards the fence. Everything here
is shade tolerant, including the Jostaberries and
Gooseberries.
An interesting and fun later fruit that Jonathan is
particularly excited about is pawpaw.
This is a grafted one, he says, pointing. It fruited
last year for us -- they tend to fruit earlier if they are
grafted. Theyre very good to eat! They dont store
well -- they go bad within a week. They dont ship
well either, because they have a soft skin. But you
are seeing them more and more in catalogs now.
Pawpaws can do very well in almost full shade.
Their native habitat is as an understory tree, along
riparian zones, and they have an insecticidal quality
that scientists are investigating. Theyre looking
at using the sap for a natural insecticide. Pawpaws
arent native to Massachusetts. They were, but the
glaciers pushed them out. Now theyre native to
Connecticut.
Pawpaw fruit buds are bigger and the leaf buds
smaller, he continues. This one is full of buds.
But we want it to grow more so were going to pick
the fowers off and use them to pollinate this other
photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
Juneberries turn blue when ripe and look and taste like blueberries growing on a tree!
photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
Alpine strawberries are early to fruit and
make an excellent ground cover.
photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
Jostaberries are a cross between gooseberries and currants.
They look and taste closer to gooseberries, but have no thorns.
photo courtesy Jonathan Bates
Cornelian cherries are not true cherries,
but have been eaten as fruits in the eastern
Mediterranean since ancient times.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 26
pawpaw -- a seven year old tree which just started
fruiting last year. There are 15 or 20 varieties in the
market right now, white-feshed and yellow-feshed.
Ive never eaten enough to know the difference in
taste between the varieties.
Ending the season is an Early Golden variety
of American persimmon tree, which is a self-
pollinating, partly seedless and partly dwarfng fruit
with good favor, Jonathan reports, and hardy to this
climate!
This garden of fruit is not without its problems,
however. Jonathan is concerned about a cane borer
problem with the golden raspberries which results in
destroyed tips. There is also a peach borer that gets
in and eats out the pith of the peach buds and also
likes Nanking Cherry plants. Jonathan is worried
that they might be going to have diffculty with
stone fruit generally because of this. The men also
have plum curculio on their apples and peaches.
They have sprayed with kayolin clay, but this year
plan to put fne mesh bags around developing fruits
right after petal fall to prevent the insect from laying
eggs in the young fruits.
Even the mulberry is not exempt. This was going
to fruit last year, its second year, recalls Jonathan,
but it was almost eaten to the nub by a groundhog.
Here in the middle of Holyoke! I have a feeling that
what attracted it to the garden was these mulberry
leaves, which are high in protein in the spring.
There is also a small tropical area where they guys
have two clumps of hardy banana trees that come
back every year.
They dont produce bananas, admits Jonathan,
but they get very big. If you are able to protect the
shoots above ground from the cold for a winter, you
could get bananas. They need a second growing
season to be able to fruit.
We also have annual beds mixed in for vegetables
and grains, he continues. We rotate produce
around through the beds. Im trialing a mimic of
the three sisters, using quinoa as the corn mimic, a
bushing squash as the pumpkin or squash mimic,
and some kind of unusual bean. Ive worked with
hull-less seeded varieties of squash where the seed
doesnt have a shell and you can eat it without
baking or cooking. With the bean, Im focusing on
ones that have all edible parts fower, leaf, shoot,
root and bean. Quinoa has edible shoots, leaves and
seeds. The idea is to produce more on a small piece
of land, just like the Three Sisters system does.
Given their interest in self-mulching and low-
maintenance gardens, Eric and Jonathan have put
a lot of creative energy into fnding appropriate
mulching ground cover plants.
We have lots of perennial ground covers that I
could talk about for an hour, beams Jonathan. The
idea over time is to use less and less mulch and
more ground covers that produce a self-renewing
fertility. Were looking at legumes which fx
nitrogen in the soil, and also dynamic accumulators.
They accumulate certain minerals that other plants
might not have access to, using devices like deeper
tap roots. They might accumulate phosphorus and
potassium in the leaves, then when they die in the
winter they are mulching with those high nutrient
leaves. That becomes a natural fertilizer plant.
Sorrel is one which is both edible and a dynamic
accumulator, he continues. It is also a low,
herbaceous clumper so it makes a good ground
cover. This variety is called profusion sorrel.
Its sterile. Its green all year round, continues
producing leaves, but never fowers. Typical sorrel
fowers and dies back. But this is the ffth or sixth
year for this one, and it has stayed right here, never
fowered, and never produced seed. The roots divide
slowly and it can spread that way. If we tilled it the
little rootlets would go everywhere and spread it.
Another one of our ground covers is called
astragalus. Its a nitrogen-fxing legume. The main
clump doesnt move, but the sprawling branches
and leaves fall to the ground every year and add
minerals to the soil. We have other ground covers
that we grow: white and red clovers, green gold
which is a native fower -- violets which are edible,
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a sterile variety of clumping comfrey which is a
dynamic accumulator. It stays where you put it, and
doesnt move around the garden by seed. Comfrey
is one of the best mulching plants you can get. We
can cut it back 3 to 6 times a year to the ground and
take those leaves to mulch with. Richters (www.
Richters.com) has these sterile varieties. This is
called Russian Comfrey. They have profusion sorrel,
too.
We got the astragalus from seed somewhere. Its
sort of experimental. We love perennial chives.
They come back every year and we eat the shoots.
We also have sea kale, which is a perennial native to
the coasts of Britain. It is low growing, you can eat
the leaves and the fower buds, and it has beautiful
spring clumps of fowers that give off a honey smell.
Insects love it.
This is one of our favorites, he concludes. It is
Scotch lovage. Its an edible, perennial, clumping
herbaceous plant. Its also an insectory because
its in the umbelliferae family. It has beautiful red
and green foliage and is native to the coasts of
Connecticut. Its shorter and more ornamental than
regular lovage, and has a milder celery favor.
The men also have a small greenhouse they use
both for greens production in the winter and tropical
production of tomatoes in the summer. One green
they like is miners lettuce. Its native to the Bay
area and western states, but you can get it from
Johnnies Selected Seeds. Planted in the fall it
produces a late crop, then winters under remay and
comes back prolifcally in the early spring.
One interesting project the guys are working on this
year is to create a shade room in the garden.
There is a lack of privacy here, explains Jonathan.
You can count 100 windows from this spot. The
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room should be close to what we want by the
end of the summer! Well put a bamboo hedge
in an L-shape in the corner, as an edible screen.
Another wall will be a hardy relative to ginseng.
Its a dieback perennial and you can eat the shoots
like asparagus. Here well put a tree for a canopy
ceiling, and on the end the pear will soon be big
enough and give us fruit. The passageway in will be
narrow, but once inside it will open up to a private
ferny, mossy paradise!
Besides the plant sources mentioned above,
Jonathan recommends Steve Breyer at Tripple
Brook Farm (tripplebrookfarm.com) in
Southampton who he says has one of the most
amazing nurseries in the country. He has 15-
year old pawpaw trees, persimmons, Korean nut
pines, a hardy citrus tree that survives outside, and
thousands of species of other things including
bamboo and chestnuts. For berries he suggests
Nourse Farms (NourseFarms.com) in South
Deerfeld, Massachusetts, for fruits Miller Nursery
(MillerNurseries.com) in Canandaigua, NY is
a good one. St. Lawrence Nurseries (www.sln.
potsdam.ny.us) in Potsdam, NY is another good one.
NOFA Videos
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graphic images of livestock slaughter and butchering.)
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Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 28
by Peter J. Rothenberg
Growing these exotic fruit is pretty easy and very
rewarding. Theyre beautiful, unusual, free of pests
and disease, marketable and delicious. I grow them
on a small farm in southern Connecticut where
Ive been since 1975. We were certifed organic
until the Feds turned it into a marketing label for
Agribusiness; now were Farmers Pledge.
Pawpaw
Someone showed up at a CT NOFA Winter
Conference years ago with a bunch of what looked
like watermelon seeds on steroids. He gave them
to anyone who wanted to try growing pawpaw. So
I took some home and potted them up and waited,
and waited..and waited. After two or three months
I decided my pawpaw career was over before it had
begun. As I was throwing out the pots, I decided
to look below the surface (as thats what Im paid
to do in my night job as a psychologist). Lo and
behold the seeds had germinated put down tap
roots, begun to shoot up stems, although none had
yet broken the surface. Moral: be patient if youre
growing pawpaw from seed.
Were speaking of Asimina triloba, a Native
American fruit -- in fact, the largest North American
fruit. Its the only tropical fruit to have survived the
ice age in the northern hemisphere. It used to be
abundant from the mid Atlantic to the Midwest, but
its not so easy to fnd these days.
Plant seeds from ripe fruit or stratify them over the
winter and plant them in the spring. They wont
germinate until July or August. I recommend
growing them inside the frst year as they grow quite
slowly the frst two years, then they take off. Deep
pots are best to accommodate their tap root. Then
Pawpaw and Hardy Kiwi
at Northfordy
photo courtesy Peter Rothenberg
Pawpaws look somewhat tropical, like a cross between an avocado and a banana.
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Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 29
plant out your year old plants into rich, well drained
soil with a neutral pH. Light shade is recommended
as they are found growing under large trees in the
wild. I planted mine in full sun and never had a
problem. They grow into small trees, maybe 30 ft
high with a 12 in. diameter, and can live and bear
fruit for quite a long time.
These guys put out numerous sucker shoots, so they
eventually form a hedge. Unfortunately these dont
transplant easily because they dont appreciate being
disturbed. With care you might be able to move a
few, thereby not having to wait so long to get fruit.
I put in six yearlings a few feet apart in 1996. Now
I have about a 20 ft. hedge, about 15-20 ft. high. I
think I got my frst fruit in 2000.
Plant at least two for cross-pollination. If you get
plants from a nursery or catalogue, the wait will
be more like three years. You get these beautiful
early fowers frst green, then changing to purple,
red and yellow. These are followed by long, oval,
avocado-like, tropical-looking leaves. But dont be
fooled this is a very hardy plant! The fruits ripen
slowly from August to November, but its totally
worth the wait. Greenish yellow turns to light
brown when ripe. You can pick them then or at the
half-ripe stage and let them fnish in a cool place.
You peel them kind of like a mango. They have a
bunch of large seeds in two parallel rows down the
center of the smooth, oblong (up to 6 in.) fruit. The
fesh is cream yellow, custard soft, and has a very
distinctive taste. The closest I can come is citrus/
mango-infused banana. And theyre very nutritious
full of anti-oxidants and more protein than other
fruit.
Shelf life is about a week at room temperature, three
weeks in the fridge. I hear pawpaw ice cream is
terrifc.
Interesting/gross fact: pawpaw is pollinated
by carrion fies. The fowers emit a weak scent
attracting relatively few pollinators, thus limiting
production. Are you ready for this? The solution is
to hang rotting meat in or near the trees at bloom
time to attract blowfies and thereby increase
pollination. Im saving up chicken necks as I write.
My Newfoundland, Mr. Big, thinks its a splendid
idea.
The only problem Ive had was the year that the
pawpaw blossoms came out before the last frost
no fruit that yearouch!
Ive had no pest or disease problems with my
pawpaw. Im told that the bark, twigs and leaves
contain a natural insecticide. All in all its a real
winner low maintenance, delicious and nutritious.
When we have more than we can eat, we sell them
for $1 each at the farmers market. They sell out in
minutes.
Hardy Kiwi
Actinidia Arguda is a very hardy, rapidly growing
vine that requires serious support. In the forests of
Siberia, Korea, and northern China, it can grow 100
ft. high. Id like to see the mechanical harvester for
that one! On my arbor it grows about 10-15 ft. a
year. As you can see I built a sturdy 16 x 8 x 8 arbor
with 4x4 vertical posts, 2x6 horizontal supports,
and 2x4 top slats. I added benches on both sides,
and as soon as the vines leaf out in May it makes a
wonderful shady nook. It only took one male and
two females to fll that arbor!
Hardy kiwi can withstand -25F. However, it requires
a long growing season, 150 frost-free days. The
leaves are dark green, 2-5 in. long and quite pretty.
Flowers appear May to June. Theyre small, white
and fragrant. Male and female fowers appear on
separate plants, so you need both to produce a
crop. Self-fruiting females now exist but I have no
experience with them.
The fruit are green, fuzzless and about the size of a
large grape. Its a miniature kiwi without the fuzz.
No need to peel you simply pop the whole thing
in your mouth and enjoy. Better yet, you hand a ripe
one to a farmers market customer, tell her to just try
it, and then sit back and watch the show. It never
fails youre going to get reactions ranging from
Oh my God, thats amazing! to R rated moans
photo courtesy Peter Rothenberg
Pawpaws can be prolifc if well pollinated. Rothenberg helps that along
by attracting carrion fies to the job.
photo courtesy Peter Rothenberg
Peters hardy kiwi arbor took only three plants a male and two females
to entirely cover it.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 30
NOFA Videos
0601 Climate Change, Ag & Energy Vern Grubinger
0602 My Weedless Garden Lee Reich
0603 Keynote Talk Sr. Miriam MacGillis
0604 Farm Pond Aquaculture Craig Hollingsworth
0605 Drip Irrigation for Gardens Lee Reich
0605 Growing Fall Brassicas Nancy Hanson
0607 National Animal Identifcation Debate
0608 Cover Cropping David Fisher
0609 Organic Veggie Farm Systems Ryan Voiland
0610 Vegetable & Flower Diseases Bess Dicklow
$15 each
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and gyrations with children asking their daddies if
something is wrong with their mommies. The fruits
are very sweet, sweeter than regular kiwi, and they
contain many times the amount of vitamin C as
citrus.
Buy a male and a few females from a nursery or
catalogue. Plant them in good, well-drained, slightly
acid soil in full sun to part shade. The books tell
you they need lots of water, high nitrogen, and
pruning. Mine are mulched with a generous amount
of compost yearly, rarely watered, never given other
fertilizer, not carefully pruned, and they seem to
thrive. Once or twice in 25 years they dropped all
of their baby fruit early in the season. Perhaps that
was due to inadequate irrigation or a pollination
problem.
Regarding pruning, if you have the time its
probably worth the effort. But those vines grow like
crazy and I fnd it impossible to keep up with them.
Like everbearing raspberries, the fruit grow on last
years canes. I just give them an old fashioned
haircut every year making sure not to cut out too
many one year old canes so Ill have plenty of
fruit. If I had them under control (about as easy as
keeping the lava from fowing out of a volcano),
and I had the time, Id prune properly and probably
increase production signifcantly.
Ive found Hardy Kiwi to be free of pests and
diseases. Theres an insect that comes into the arbor
every summer in droves. Its small, it jumps, and it
never holds still long enough for me to get a good
look at it. It also doesnt seem to bother the plants at
all??
photo courtesy Peter Rothenberg
Hardy kiwi ready for the eating.
photo courtesy Peter Rothenberg
Hardy kiwi are prolifc, delicious, high in vitamin C, and easy to sell!
Pick your fruit as they soften in the fall and eat or
market them quickly. Or you can cut them at the
mature-ripe stage while theyre still frm and let
them ripen off the vine. I mix ripe and frm ones
in pint containers and tell customers to eat them as
they soften. Believe me; youll sell out every time
if you let them taste one. One year I made Kiwi jam
pretty good albeit kind of runny even though I
used good pectin.
Hardy Kiwi and Pawpaw are real winners. Theyre
low maintenance, fun, and a real taste treat.
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Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 31
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Without pruning several times a year, hardy kiwi can get ahead of you.
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Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 32
by Lee Reich

Many people that Ive met over the years, upon
hearing that I have graduate degrees in agriculture,
have next asked, What kinds of plants do you
breed? And when I say Ive never done any
breeding, these people, admittedly not gardening or
farming types, wonder just what I do do. Well, much
of what I have been involved in over the past quarter
century has been researching and developing the
best way to grow plants, and seeking out overlooked
plants worthy of more widespread cultivation.

Perhaps because one of my graduate degrees is in
soil science, what I look at in terms of plant care
starts at ground level surely not a bad place to
start! My ongoing interest and focus has been in
composting, minimal or no soil tillage, and cover
crops. Ive been lucky enough to earn much of
my livelihood in writing about what I like to do,
and parlayed some of my soil work into a book,
Weedless Gardening ($8.95, Workman Publishing,
2001).
The crop that I most like to eat, that I fnd most
challenging to grow, and that I give most attention
to has been fruits, the subject of my other graduate
degree. Here in the northeast, though, do what you
will with the soil, if you grow apples or any one
of many other common fruits, spraying with some
sort of pesticide is going to be part of your regular
regimen. Im not fond of spraying anything, even
organic sprays, which led me to some cold-hardy,
uncommon fruits that have fewer or no signifcant
pest problems. Although uncommon generally, these
fruits are or have been enjoyed in some parts of
the world at some time. Because Im not much of
a cook with fruits and anyway prefer to pluck fruit
right off the plant and into my mouth, Ive stayed
away from what I call survival fruits (cranberries
and elderberries, for example) that are palatable
only after being doctored up in the kitchen.
Over the years, I came up with about two dozen
fruits that are well adapted for growing in the
northeast, all featured in my 2004 book Uncommon
Fruits for Every Garden (Timber Press, 2004) [and
reviewed in this issue of The Natural Farmer
ed.] Besides having unique and delectable favors
and needing little or no attention to pest control,
many of these fruits, in addition, need little or no
pruning and are borne on ornamental plants ideal
for edible landscaping.
People who have learned of my passion for fruits
often ask me what my favorite fruit is. Tough
question: I feel like Davy Crockett tasting pies in
the old Disney movie; as he bit into the slice of pie
cradled in his left hand, he declared it his favorite,
then the same as he bit into a slice from another pie
cradled in his right hand, and so on back and forth.

That said, shipova, one of the most uncommon of
uncommon fruits, would defnitely rank up there
among my favorites. Picture a small pear with a
sweet, ambrosial favor and a meaty texture, just the
thing for stuffng into your pocket before an autumn
hike, which is when the fruit conveniently ripens.
The origin of this intergeneric hybrid of European
pear and whitebeam (Sorbus aria) is hazy, but my
tree traces its roots back to a tree growing on the
grounds of the Paris Museum of Natural History as
far back as 1834.
Me, Soil, and Uncommon Fruits
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Shipova has a regal history as well as a taste like Ambrosia!
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Lee grows red currants with an espalier system. Once prohibited in northeastern states as
carriers of white pine blister rust disease, the federal ban on these fruits was lifted in 1966
and state bans are slowly coming off for the red and white varieties.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 33

No plant is perfect, and shipova has two
shortcomings. One is that its slow to come into
bearing; my tree lumbered along for eight years
before bearing its frst crop. And second, the tree
can grow large for a backyard fruit tree. On the plus
side, because the tree got so big before bearing its
frst crop, that frst crop was prodigious. Grafting
shipova on a dwarfng rootstock makes shipova
trees smaller and quicker to bear according to One
Green World nursery owner Jim Gilbert. Ill confrm
this as soon as the new tree I received from Jim last
year begins to bear. Things did not look bleak, by
the way, while I was waiting for my large shipova
tree to fnally bear because the trees naturally
perfect form and downy leaves made the plant a
pretty sight right from the get go.

Okay, another of my favorite uncommon fruits?
American persimmon. Better varieties of this native
of the eastern U.S. actually have been selected from
the wild population, the frst one a variety called
Early Golden and still available from a farm feld
in Illinois back in 1880. New England is north of
persimmons native range, but persimmon can still
grow and fruit there in sunny, warm locations. My
trees survived our cold winter, where temperatures
dipped below minus thirty degrees F., back in 1994.
The important thing with growing persimmons this
far north is to plant a named variety that is both
cold-hardy and that will ripen its fruit within the
rather short growing season. My number one choice
would be the variety Szukis, which has the added
advantage of not needing the cross-pollination that
wild persimmons need in order to bear fruit.

Szukis and other good persimmons have taste and
texture something like dried apricots that have been
plumped up in water then drizzled with honey and
given a dash of spice. I couldnt ask for a more
carefree tree: no pests and, beyond some pruning to
shape the tree in its youth, no pruning!
Pawpaw is another uncommon fruit that ranks up
there among my favorites. Heres another native
plant, this one with so many tropical aspirations
that it seems out of place where winter temperatures
often plummet. Pawpaw is the northernmost
member of the custard apple family, has large,
lush leaves like those of avocado, bears its fruits in
banana-like clusters, and has the taste and texture of
banana along with hints of mango, pineapple, and
avocado. Some people compare the fesh to vanilla
custard; I think its more like crme brule.

Like American persimmon, pawpaw is a carefree
plant and a number of varieties exist, most of
them just selected from seedlings. To be able to
better know pawpaw, Ive planted a row 175 feet
long of several varieties of this fruit. Currently,
there are some attempts to improve both pawpaw
and American persimmon through breeding.
Interestingly, I fnd more variation in fruits of a
given variety from tree to tree and within a tree
than between one variety and the next. Im also
interested in the commercial potential of this fruit
for small farms.

Paralleling my row of pawpaws is a test row
of a few varieties of another uncommon fruit,
hardy kiwifruit, a fruit that I believe also has very
good commercial potential. Its also a great fruit
for backyards because its pretty, does not need
spraying, and tastes great, much like its supermarket
cousin except smaller, with a smooth, edible skin,
and sweeter and more aromatic favor. Hardy
kiwifruits grow on vigorous vines that do require
more input than some of the uncommon fruits. The
vines need to be trellised and, a few times each year,
need pruning. Backyard vines, of course, could
be grown in a more slapdash manner if maximum
fruiting is not the goal. Hardy kiwifruits need
separate male, nonfruiting vines, to pollinate the
fruiting females, and their soil must be perfectly
drained.

I would be remiss not to mention my large
collection of currant and gooseberry plants. Here
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Goumi fruits have the advantage of not only producing tart and delicious fruit,
but also fxing nitrogen in your soil at the same time.
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Red and white Alpine strawberries are smaller than their conventional cousins, but oh so delicious!
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 34
are two fruits whose rising popularity in the U.S.
was cut short a hundred years ago when they were
implicated as contributing to the spread of white
pine blister rust disease. The resulting federal ban
that kept them out of gardens and woods caused
two generations of Americans to forget about
these fruits. Because cultivated red currants, white
currants, and gooseberries are actually not good
hosts for the disease and because the disease spores
can spread over a hundred miles under optimum
conditions, the ban was limited in its effectiveness.
It was lifted in 1966 and put under state mandate.
Initially, relatively humdrum varieties were re-
introduced into the nursery trade but in the last few
years specialty nurseries have been offering better
varieties.

As I said, Im not much of a cook when it comes to
fruits, so the only gooseberries I grow are so-called
dessert varieties, those that British writer Edward
Bunyard wrote are the fruit par excellence for
ambulant consumption. The very best varieties
are, unfortunately, susceptible to another disease,
powdery mildew, but just about as good as the best,
yet disease resistant, are such varieties as Poorman,
Glendale, Red Jacket, and Hinonmakis Yellow.
Red currants (and white currants, a variant of the
same fruit) are usually cooked into jelly, but some
varieties have excellent favor if picked after they
thoroughly ripen. My currant (sorry) favorite for
favor is the white currant variety Primus.

The one currant that defnitely is a carrier for that
white pine blister rust disease is European black
currant, a berry that has a strong, distinctive favor
for which I have great fondness. Rust resistant
varieties Consort, Crusader, and Contender -
- of this fruit were bred in Canada decades ago,
effectively extending the range of this plant. Lately,
Ive been testing some newer, Russian varieties
that taste far better than those original rust resistant
varieties. Most everyone enjoys black currants in
jams, juices, and the like, but many people who do
not enjoy black currants fresh do enjoy some of
these newer varieties in that way. My currant (sorry
again) favorites among those newer varieties are
Kirovchanka and Belaruskaja. I am removing many
of my Crusader plants and replacing them with these
delectable Russian varieties.

I could go on and on about some of the other
uncommon fruits about which Im excited: medlars,
tasting fresh like old-fashioned applesauce with
winey overtones; white alpine strawberries,
everbearing and pineapple-y; etc. Let me focus,
though, on two fnal fruits, goumi and Nanking
cherry.
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Pruning hardy kiwi in the late winter and again in the summer is a must! Here Lee prunes the vine to an arbor.
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Pawpaws tend to grow in clusters, like bananas.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 35

Back in 1937, in that years U.S. Department of
Agriculture Yearbook, renowned fruit researcher and
breeder Dr. George M. Darrow (whose name you
might recognize in variety names for strawberry,
blackberry, and blueberry) wrote an article entitled
Some unusual opportunities in plant breeding. In
that article, he cited some fruits that were not well
known but which deserved more attention. Some of
the fruits that Ive mentioned growing were included
in that article, as well as goumi and Nanking cherry.
I had the opportunity to visit Dr. Darrow at his home
back in 1980 (he died in 1984 at the ripe old age
of 94), and I consider him one of my pomological
inspirations. Perhaps because of my soil foundation
and subsequent writing career, I chose to focus on
cultivating these fruits and spreading the word about
them rather than breeding them. Nonetheless, I have
often thought that if I were ever to become a fruit
breeder, the frst two fruits to which I would direct
my efforts would be goumi and Nanking cherry.

Goumi and Nanking cherry, transplants from Asia,
are both shrubs and both tolerant of rather poor, dry
soils and extreme conditions. Goumi roots actually
are associated with a soil microorganism (an
actinomycete) that can turn atmospheric nitrogen
into nitrogen that the plant can use. Nanking cherry
hails from hills of Manchuria where winter lows
can drop to minus ffty degrees F. and then summer
temperatures can soar to over a hundred degrees F.
Besides strong constitutions, my reason for singling
these two fruits out for the imaginary beginning
of my career as a breeder is that run-of-the-mill
seedlings of both fruits start out quite good; with
just a little improvement in favor and fruit size,
both could be outstanding.

Goumi fruits are the size of small cherries and have
a bright red skin that is beautifully speckled with
silver. The feshy is juicy with a very refreshing,
sprightly favor, a bit too sprightly, for me at least,
who doesnt like very tart fruits. Still, the fruits
good favor, peeking through that tartness, always
keeps me picking and eating more of them. The
Japanese name for the fruit, daio-gumi, translates as
rhubarb silverberry. Just a little breeding might take
the edge off the favor and swell the fruit up a bit.

photo courtesy Lee Reich
These hardy kiwi fruits are ripening.
Nanking cherries are often planted as ornamentals
for their prolifc show of white blossoms in early
spring. The fowers are so dense as to almost
hide the stems. That fowery show is followed
by an equally profuse crop of fruits, a show in
themselves. The small cherries, true cherry species
in this case, are bright red, very juicy, and have
favor somewhere on the spectrum between that
sweet cherry and tart cherry. No named varieties of
Nanking cherry are available but Ive tasted a lot of
Nanking cherries and never found one that didnt
taste good. Again, though, with some breeding to
improve size and favor just a bit, youd have an
outstanding fruit.

When I was a graduate student in the soil science
department at the University of Wisconsin, my
advisor there tried to guide all his students into
administration rather than research. He contended
that the bottleneck in agriculture was not in the
science itself but in the application of existing
knowledge. I did not wholly appreciate the truth of
his words at the time -- my view shaded by my low
tolerance for meetings and other administrator-type
activities but over the years I have totally come
around to his way of thinking. No, I have not moved
into administration. After a brief stint in agricultural
research (not as a breeder, though) with the USDA
and Cornell University, I moved on to widening that
bottleneck, I hope, through my lectures, workshops,
and writing in newspapers, magazines, and books.
Along the way, I have been enjoying a lot of very
tasty and interesting fruits.
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Lee shows off a couple of his delicious pawpaws.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 36
From the Ground
To the Plate
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Visit our web sites at www.aza-direct.com or www.gowanco.com
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Summers uncommon fruit gooseberries, currants, mullberries and Juneberries create a rich tapestry of fruit for early gourmands.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 37
Open your mind
to a creative reception
that transgresses
the earthly boundaries
to which we are otherwise
so tightly bound. . .
Available in September 2007
34 pages $14.95
<www.northernstarcalendar.com>
<info@northernstarcalendar.com>
Northern Hemisphere Astro Calendar
PO Box 783, Kimberton PA 19442
(610)469-9686
Naked Eye Astronomy
Getting to Know the Night Sky
Biodynamic Planting Rhythms and Practices
Understanding and Living with the Celestial Cycles
Weather Forecasting Based on Moon & Planetary Observation
by
Brian Keats & Stefan Mager
down-to-earth advice for
gardening with cosmic rhythms
Now published and distributed by
Camphill Village Kimberton Hills
Available in September 2007
40 pages, 9" 12" $14.95
<www.stellanatura.com>
<info@stellanatura.com>
Stella Natura
PO Box 783, Kimberton PA 19442
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For each calendar sold, $4.00 goes to
support the work of Camphill Village
photo courtesy Lee Reich
These colorful gooseberries give a sense of the diversity in this family.
photo courtesy Lee Reich
Lee picks some of the profusion of Nanking
cherries produced on his edible hedge.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 38
Annie McCleary, Director, with George Lisi
Plant Spirit Communication
Nature Adventures ~ Herbs and Wild Edibles
Food as Medicine ~ Holistic Living Skills
Certication, Advanced and Winter Programs
802-453-6764 ~ anniemc@gmavt.net
Lincoln, Vermont ~ www.WisdomOfTheHerbsSchool.com
Wisdom of the Herbs School
by Alan Surprenant
For the past seventeen years apple growers from
throughout the northeast have gathered together
for 2 days of information sharing and camaraderie.
Through the efforts of the New England Small Farm
Institute in Belchertown, MA, Margaret Christie
and Alex Stone coordinated the initial meetings of
4 groups of growers who faced specifc challenges
in raising their crops organically or using integrated
pest management (IPM) methods. The crops
selected were apples, sweet corn, strawberries, and
greenhouse plants.

The apple growers have continued meeting since
that frst time on their own, usually coming together
inn early march. Stump Sprouts Ski Touring and
Conference Center in Hawley, MA has become
the geographic center for the apple growers who
come from Maine, New Hampshire, Vermont,
Massachusetts, New York and Pennsylvania. Each
year sees new attendees and the return of many
growers whove been attending since the beginning.

The meetings agenda is generated during
introductions of each grower along with a
description of their farm or orchard. All viewpoints
and methods of growing tree fruit are welcomed,
as each growers methods contain a valuable
piece of the (apple) pie. This year we discussed
soil health and how it relates to tree health,
seasonal spray programs as they correspond to
tree growth and fruit development, and orchard
foor management and tree fertilization. As always,
there were reports and discussions of growers
experiments and observations in their orchards from
the previous season.

The meeting room at Stump Sprouts looks east out
over the Berkshires of western Franklin County.
The meals prepared and cooked by co-owner Lloyd
Crawford are delicious and plentiful. The ski trails
await growers needing some outdoor movement and
the fre in the saunas stove stays hot for use during
meeting breaks.

This annual growers meeting is open to any grower
or apple enthusiast. Many growers raise other fruits
in addition to apples. There is talk about pears,
peaches, plums, nuts, and kiwis. Growers tell of
trips around the country and around the world
visiting other orchards and fruit growing regions.
Some growers have 10 fruit trees, some several
hundred, some over a thousand. Some growers own
nurseries and sell trees and rootstock.

Each year longtime growers learn new things and
new growers learn longtime methods of successful
fruit growing. For more information contact Alan
Surprenant at Brook Farm Orchard in Ashfeld, MA
01330 or alansurprenant@hotmail.com. Happy
pruning, for the blossoms will soon be bursting open
and fruit will begin growing once again.
Apple Growers Meet Annually,
Welcome Others
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 39
futurist, as she views it, is someone who thinks
beyond the immediacy of everyday life. Its a
person who is concerned about ones actions and
the collective actions of society what happens
if we continue in a certain way. Its the old law of
cause and effect. In line with this years theme of
sustainable living, we are deeply proud and honored
to have Hazel Henderson as a Keynote Speaker at
this years NOFA Conference.
Space will be limited at Hazels keynote, which will
be brought by satellite TV to the Franklin Patterson
Main Auditorium. It will be open to registrants only
and attendance will be on a frst come, frst served
basis as the hall only has seating for 300 people.
Registration Forms Now Available!
Receive a Registration form in the mail by
contacting Julie Rawson at julie@nofamass.org or
by calling her at (978) 355-2853. You can also go to
our website for a Registration Form and to register
online: www.nofamass.org.
Saturday Afternoon Fair Fun-Makers Sought
Do you wanna have fun? Do you know how to
make fun? Interesting question. Were still seeking
those who want to make it happen gymnasts, dog-
tricksters, jugglers, game-makers, and all others
with ideas or talents. The Music Stage is open to
those with a desire to play if you want a venue,
youve got it! Contact Tricia Cooper at triciacoop@
hotmail.com or phone her at (617) 558-3322.
( Summer Conference - continued from pg 1)
Exhibitors Theres Still Space Available
What a great way to expose your business to so
many wonderful people. With over 1,300 people in
one great location, its a fantastic way to expand and
grow your business. Feel free to get in touch with
Katie Campbell-Nelson at (413) 337-4327 or by
email: katiecampbellnelson@gmail.com
Financial Aid, Volunteering, Helping Hands
For those needing fnancial assistance in order to
attend the Conference or those giving hearts who
would like to volunteer, that information is available
on the Registration forms.
Meal Tickets NEW THIS YEAR!
Just a heads up everyone who wants meals tickets,
MUST buy them when they register in advance
of the Conference. New this year no meal tickets
can be purchased at the Conference, on site. So,
remember when you fll out your Registration Form
to include meal tickets!
Mini-Conference Friday Morning
For those interested, were hosting an interactive
Mini-Conference on Friday morning, August 10
th
,
from 8:00 am till 12:00 pm. The Mini-Conference
will be on Agricultural Justice and Domestic Fair
Trade in the Northeast. A relevant topic to the
themes of local economies and sustainability. Check
off that information on the Registration form if
youre interested in attending this mini-conference
offering.
Updates and more on the website!
Keep checking the website for continuous news and
updates on the NOFA Summer Conference. Go to
www.nofamass.org and click on Conferences, then
click on Summer.
A Special Thanks to The Peoples Pint
Thank you, Peoples Pint. In Spring, 2006, Alden
Booth of The Peoples Pint in Greenfeld, MA
proposed a new fund-raising idea in support of the
NOFA Summer Conference; locally made beer
crafted with organic ingredients. He then enlisted
his brew masters to create a crowd-pleasing, thirst-
quenching ale that could be served at The Peoples
Pint with 25 cents per pint going to NOFA. It
was also sold at other establishments. The NOFA
Summer Ale was served to patrons at the Gardner
Ale House in Gardner, Redbones in Somerville, and
the Ashmont Grill in Dorchester, with a portion of
the keg sales going into NOFAs coffers.
Additionally, tuckered-out dancers at both the
Friday night (contradance) and Saturday night
(Cajun) events at last years summer conference
were able to refresh themselves with the ale from
kegs that The Peoples Pint donated to the NOFA
Summer Conference. No doubt more than a few
conference goers enjoyed the fresh, tasty brew!
We are grateful to Alden and his cohorts at The
Pint for their generous support and hard work. We
look forward to future tastings!
We Look Forward To Seeing You At This Years
NOFA Summer Conference!
on behalf of the federal government and so are not
persons entitled to bring administrative appeals.
The decision goes to the nature of the relationship
certifers have with the government. A lot of
people thought that this was an unusual kind of
public/private partnership with each side bringing
something crucial to the relationship. This ruling
interprets the relationship as a classic administrative
program in which the government has the fnal say.
MICI and its attorneys with the Farmers Legal
Action Group (FLAG) are discussing their options
as we go to press. One option would be to appeal
the District Court decision to the 1
st
Circuit Court of
Appeals (the court which issued the Harvey decision
a year and a half ago). Another would be to address
the issue of outdoor access for poultry and the
independence of certifcation programs in a more
political fashion with the larger organic community.
Although organic standards for growing plants
have been widely agreed upon within the organic
industry, that is not the case for animal products.
Access to the out of doors and pasture is a relatively
expensive requirement, involving much more land
and management than large operations want to pay
for. It is the smaller farms that by and large provide
such access, and many in the industry feel that such
farms cannot supply the quantity of organic product
the market demands at a reasonable cost. The NOP
has been dragging its feet in implementing pasture
requirements for organic dairy operations, and large
poultry producers are providing, at best, porches
on their houses as a low-cost alternative to actual
access to the out doors.
( MICI Rulking - continued from pg 1)
by Larry Siegel
Nobody asked me, but this hue and cry, this
enthusiasm, for the elimination of invasive species
has left me bemused and bewildered. Forget for the
moment that it was the authorities (the experts)
who encouraged, urged, us to plant many of them in
the frst place (kudzu, multifora rose, autumn olive,
and on and on). Forget, also, that solid scientifc
data in regard to invasives is strikingly absent. The
suppression of invasive species at the nursery level
is yet another example of government intrusion into
private matters. I am now a law breaker. Among
other items I peddle at farmers market are perennial
plants, among those plants are ground covers,
among those ground covers are golden moneywort
(Lysimachia nummularia aurea) and variegated
bishopsweed (Aegopodium podagaria variegata).
The Plant Nazis have determined that life would
be far better in their absence and have outlawed
trade in these, and many other, species. Were not
talking Cannabis here folks (though perhaps we
ought to be), were talking ground covers. We plant
them to cover ground, to be aggressive growers in
troublesome spots. I have planted them and many
other ground covers, in areas previously covered by
Virginia creeper, grape vines, poison ivy, brambles,
and asters, a veritable jungle of junk. Ironically,
other, permissible ground covers (vinca, lily-of-the-
valley, lamium, and lamiastrum) far outperform the
two invasives, but the hoodlums who set policy are
not interested in the twenty-fve year experiences of
an actual grower.

Bear in mind that ten thousand years ago (a blip
in earth-time), New England sat below a mile or
so of ice. When the glaciers retreated, nothing was
growing. Everything invaded. The modus operandi
of the plant police seems to be if it established
itself a long time ago its native; if it arrived more
recently, it is an invasive.
The principal argument for suppressing invasives
is that they compromise bio-diversity. You want
compromised bio-diversity? How about lawns?
Green asphalt. I attended a talk by one of these
experts who bemoaned the intrusion of invasives
into her beloved lawn. Compromised bio-diversity?
We have entire states covered in corn and soy.
Somehow it is permissible for humans to alter the
environment, but not a plant.
The very term invasive suggests a battlefeld.
(I consider these plants opportunistic.) You
want invasive? How about western Europeans
overwhelming the Americas fve hundred years ago?
How about Iraq? Nah, were more concerned about
purple loosestrife.
Nothing of which Ive written is grounded in fact, of
course. Less contestable however, is the solution,
application of one chemical or another to relieve
us of the problem. Once again, thoughtful people
might want to consider the possibility that the
elimination of invasives is more troublesome than
their presence. You can be assured of at least one
thing: Monsanto and its ilk are champions of the
suppression of invasive plant species.
Larry Siegel grows opportunistic plants in
Royalston, Massachusetts.
On Invasives
Many Hands Organic Farm
Julie Rawson, Jack & Dan Kittredge
411 Sheldon Rd., Barre, MA 01005 (978) 355-2853
www.mhof.net, farm@mhof.net
Organic & Free-range
Poultry & Pork
CSA shares available
Organic Garlic Seed and Braids
Certifed Organic
by Baystate Organic Certifers
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 40
Uncommon Fruits for Every Garden
by Lee Reich
published by Timber Press, 2004
288 pages with illustrations, index and appendices
$24.95 hardback
review by Jack Kittredge
This little volume is an expanded sequel to the
authors Uncommon Fruits Worthy of Attention: A
Gardeners Guide published in 1991 and now out
of print. If you are a fan of Lee Reich (as I admit
I am) the republishing of the unavailable former
book in an expanded version is a welcome occasion!
For folks who like the idea of an edible landscape,
who dont like fussing a lot with highly developed
varieties and are willing to spend time picking small
berries and unusual fruits the way nature intended,
Lees advocacy of minor and uncommon fruits is a
noble endeavor.
The major reason that uncommon fruit is
uncommon is that we have not yet put the effort into
developing varieties for commercial exploitation.
With these plants the fruit yield is too small for
proftable harvest, or it comes over an extended
period requiring repeated pickings, or the seeds are
too large, or it cannot be shipped easily. But none of
these are arguments against growing these at home
and consuming them at your leisure. The tastes
of many are exquisite and well reward a casual
stroll, grandkid on shoulder, through such a picking
paradise.
In this volume Reich covers an enormous amount
of territory: Juneberries, Beach Plums, Alpine
and Musk Strawberries, Pawpaws, Raisin Trees,
Lingonberries, Kiwi (Hardy and not), Mulberries,
Persimmons, Gumi, autumn Olives and Russian
Olives, Gooseberries, Maypops, Che, Black,
Red and White Currants, Nanking and Cornelian
Cherries, Asian Pears, Jostaberries, Lowbush
Blueberries, Jujubes, Shipovas, and Medlars.
Each fruit is blessed with an introduction covering
botanical name, plant type, pollination requirements,
seasonality, a little history, biology, range, alternate
names, and odd yet interesting facts which Lee
always seems to have at his disposal. Then there is
a plant description, discussion of major varieties, a
section on cultivation, propagation, harvest and use,
and when appropriate a list of cultivars with a short
description of eachs fruit. That he can do this in less
than 250 pages and leave another 50 for appendices
on nomenclature, pollination, siting and planting,
pruning, propagation, and a wonderful list of mail-
order sources by type for all the fruits he covers,
plus an index, is a testament to his skill in getting
you the facts you need while entertaining you with a
meander through his garden of delicious delights.
I should also mention the drawings and over 50 full
color photos of the fowers, fruits, leaves and bark
of this cornucopia. If you dont want uncommon
fruits for the eating variety they offer, you may want
some for their beauty and ornamental grace.
Although Julie and I have already succumbed
to the temptation to plant juneberries, pawpaws,
hardy kiwi, mulberries, persimmons, gooseberries,
red currants, and Nanking cherries, reading Reich
has me determined to expand our holdings in the
world of minor fruit. With our normal fruit crops
(raspberries, strawberries, peaches, pears and
grapes) we have markets and uses all laid out. But
our gooseberry crop is minor enough that we often
ignore it (to the great delight of CSA kids who make
a beeline for the bushes and crouch there carefully
avoiding the thorns and happily bringing each berry
to their mouths one at a time.) The same with the
mulberries. If its a good year Ill spend hours over a
couple of weeks climbing around on a ladder to get
3 pounds of the exquisitely tasty berries to make a
gallon of wine. If its not, Ill leave them to the birds
(who seem to prefer mulberries to any other fruit we
grow.)
If you are a production grower, this may not be
the book for you (although Lee is not at all blind
to the possibilities of these plants being bred
for commercial qualities and ultimate proftable
production.) But if you like to surround yourself
with tasty and colorful shrubs, bushes and trees, and
enjoy a bit of nature that is only half-way along the
path from wild to domesticated, give it a read. Ill
bet you cant resist trying at least one next year!
Small Fruits in the Home Garden
edited by Robert E. Gough and E. Barclay Poling
published by Food Products Press, 1997
272 pages with illustrations and index
$24.95 softcover
review by Jack Kittredge
This is a new issue of a publication frst put out
in 1996. It has separate chapters on Blackberries,
Blueberries, Currants/Gooseberries/Jostaberries,
Grapes, Raspberries, and Strawberries. The authors
are primarily university and extension employees,
and thus the writing is recognizable as scientifc
and careful. The strengths of this book are that it
includes some excellent tables and diagrams to give
you a basic idea of soil structure, soil chemistry,
plant nutrition, plant structure, pruning techniques,
and trellising and support methods. There are also
excellent lists and descriptions of varieties for the
plants covered.
I was frustrated by several aspects of this book,
however. For one, the information is ten years old
and a lot of new varieties have been developed
which are not mentioned at all. Some of the
excellent varieties of erect and highly productive
thornless blackberries which have come on the
market recently, for instance, are not given any
ink. For another, the treatment of organic methods
is tiringly reminiscent of the dominant extension
service view in the mid-1990s. After a short
discussion of fertilizers, for esample, one of the
editors dismisses the topic with the statement:
there is no apparent advantage to using the more
expensive organic fertilizers. Lastly, although the
diagrams are excellent, the book contains a number
of seriously blurred black and white photos of
diseased plants. It appears that they just inserted
bad photocopies of some illustrations from the
1996 version. It is hard to imagine these slipping by
professional editors!
In sum, if you are looking for a primer of basic
information on these grapes and berries, this can
give you what you need. But if you want something
more up-to-date and written from an organic
management perspective with a touch of humor or
passion (not to mention clear and colorful pictures),
the same price can get you Lee Reich (above).
Currants, Gooseberries, and Jostaberries: A
Guide for Growers, Marketers and Researchers
in North America
by Danny L. Barney and Kim E. Hummer
published by Food Products Press, 2005
266 pages with illustrations and index
$34.95 softcover
review by Jack Kittredge
This is a book full of interesting information on
the Ribes species. Did you know, for instance, that
in 1989 US currant production amounted to 100
metric tons, compared to Europes 453,000 metric
tons? Or that black currants contain large amounts
of antioxidants and vitamin C and that in 1920 there
were 7400 acres of Ribes grown in commercial
production in this country?
Beginning with a history of the species, then
covering their genetics, growth and fruit
composition, propagation, site selection and
design, cultivars, planting and management, pests
and diseases, harvesting and storing, and ending
with breeding, this book tells you as much as you
could possibly want to know about these fruits.
Many tables and diagrams, as well as illustrations,
augment the information and make it easy to fnd.
Particularly useful are comparisons of the various
cultivars for mildew resistance, vigor, pH, total
soluble solids (sugar), weight, bloom and ripening
dates, and ease of picking for 41 gooseberries, 23
black currants, 30 red currants, and 5 white currants.
The book appears to be designed for people who
want to go into commercial production of these
fruits (there is one chapter on Designing a Currant,
Gooseberry, or Jostaberry Farm) so I imagine its
audience, at least in the northeast, is small. But for
the home grower who would like to know more
about this interesting group of fruiting plants than
one can get in the standard chapter on them (if you
are lucky!) in the usual book on fruit growing, this
dedicated volume is a real boon. I plan to carefully
review the variety comparisons before I order my
next set of Ribes.
Introduction to Fruit Crops
by Mark Rieger
published Haworth Food and Agricultural Products
Press, 2006
462 pages with drawings, black and white and color
illustrations, appendices, glossary and index
$59.95 softcover, 119.95 hardcover
review by Jack Kittredge
Rieger is an academic and begins this volume
with a fascinating chapter on fruits their botany,
taxonomy, origins and history, folklore and
medicinal and non-food uses, production methods,
their parts, methods of culture, harvest, handling,
and nutrition. He uses a specifc defnition of fruit
-- a perennial edible crop where the economic
product is the true botanical fruit, or is derived
therefrom -- which leaves out annuals such as
melons, non-edible fruits such as kapok, and
includes a few strangers like nuts, coffee, and cacao.
Book Reviews
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 41
You get used to this, however, because he does such
a good job of making fruits interesting. Besides, all
the ones we care about apples, peaches, berries,
grapes, etc. are included.
A chapter each is devoted to 29 of the most popular
fruits and nuts: Almonds, Apples, Apricots, Bananas
and Plantains, Blackberries and Raspberries,
Blueberries, Cacao, Cashews, Cherries, Citrus,
Coconut, Coffee, Cranberries, Dates, Grapes,
Hazelnuts, Macadamia Nuts, Mangos, Oil Palms,
Olives, Papayas, Peaches, Pears, Pecans, Pineapples,
Pistachios, Plums, Strawberries, and Walnuts. For
each of these he covers all the aspects he dealt with
in the intro chapter, but dealing specifcally with that
fruit this time.
You might be surprised, as was I, at the rank of
these in terms of weight of world production per
year. Was the winner the mighty apple? No, that
came in ffth. Ubiquitous coffee only ranks 16
th
. The
winner? The African oil palm, with over 150 million
metric tons produced annually, beats out by more
than two times the measley 70 million metric tons of
bananas we consume each year.
If you are interested in fruits, as am I, you could
easily while away hours reading about the strange
fowering structures of dates, the comparable
strengths and weaknesses of various grape
rootstocks, the process of making chocolate from
cacao beans, which fruit has the largest seed
(coconut), and the fascinating variety of ways
endocarps, mesocarps and exocarps can variously
swell with sweetness or toughen into rinds and
shells to make a panoply of fruits.
Although I cant fnd much to complain about in this
book, I did spend a while looking to fnd a defnition
of lenticel whose color, it says on page 334, when
it changes from white to brown, is a good way of
indicating when to pick pears in the absence of a
pressure tester. (If you have one of those, however,
frmness in the range of 10 to 15 pounds is the
proper reading.) In vain I looked in the glossary,
index, and at many of the numerous diagrams of
fruit parts strewn through the book to fnd out what
a lenticel is. If you know, drop me a line at jack@
mhof.net.
Genetic Roulette: The Documented Health
Risks of Genetically Engineered Foods
by Jeffrey M. Smith
published Yes! Books, 2007, www.GeneticRoulteet.
com
336 pages with appendices and index
$27.95 hardcover
review by Jack Kittredge
Smith is the author of the best-selling Seeds of
Deception, another book exposing the dangers of
GMOs. This one focuses on documented health
risks to humans, and is pretty convincing. It starts,
as one must, with the most thorough GMO feeding
study every conducted Britains Rowett Institutes
GM potato study of 1996 involving a team of
scientists led by Arpad Pusztai. As anyone who
has read much about GE food knows, the study
was set up by the British government based on
the assumption that GE foods are in fact harmless.
They would review the products carefully to assure
the public and then commercialize them. But this
carefully controlled study found that rats fed the
GMO potatoes developed potentially pre-cancerous
lesions on their stomach and intestinal linings,
showed inhibited development of their brains,
livers, and testicles, exhibited partial atrophy of the
liver, enlarged pancreases and intestines, and had
immune system damage. Pusztai was invited onto
British television to speak about his results, did
so, and within a few days was fred (allegedly at
the urging of Tony Blair) silenced with threats of a
lawsuit, and the research was terminated. What is
most disturbing about the study is that it not only
compared rats eating GM potatoes and controls,
it also looked at rats eating the protein the GM
potatoes produced but mixed with normal, not GM
potatoes. Surprisingly, the protein without the GM
potatoes produced no damage. So it was not the
trait for which the potatoes were engineered that
produced damage, but the very process of modifying
the potato itself. Thus the study raised questions
about the safety of all GM products on the market.
Smith details the many other studies and reports
which raised questions about the suitability and
safety of GM products: rats and the FlavSavr
tomato, rats and MON 863 Bt corn, mice and Bt
potatoes, agricultural workers and Bt cotton, sheep
and Bt cotton, humans and Bt corn pollen, US pigs
and cattle and Bt corn, German cows and Bt corn.
mice and Roundup Ready soy, rabbits and Roundup
Ready soy, rats and Roundup Ready soy, human
allergies and Roundup Ready soy, rats and Roundup
Ready canola, chickens and Liberty Link corn, mice
and GM peas, animal choice and GM feed, human
deaths and a GM supplement.
Surprisingly, these indications of danger involving
GM products have not been taken seriously by
regulators. In some cases they were ignored, in
some cases denied, and in some cases specifcally
suppressed by regulators overruling concerned
scientists.
The rest of the book is devoted to explaining more
thoroughly the ways GM techniques work and
how they can introduce disruptive and potentially
harmful processes in growing organisms, how
regulatory bodies are totally inadequate to protect
the public health, how industry studies (the only
ones done) are not competent to identify most
hazards presented by GM foods, and what is wrong
with the arguments used to justify GM crops.
Anyone concerned about this technology, especially
farmers and those on the front line having to fght
it, would gain a lot from reading Genetic Roulette.
Its hard to imagine any proponents able to stand up
to the evidence accumulated here and still maintain
GM food is harmless. This is a useful book!
The New American Farmer: Profles of
Agricultural Innovation; 2
nd
edition
Edited by Valerie Berton
Published by Sustainable Agriculture Network,
2005, www.sare.org
$16.95+ $5.95 shipping and handling. Softcover
195pp.
review by Tamara Scully
The diversity of small, family farming comes alive
as The New American Farmer explores farms across
the United States, profling each with a depth of
understanding that farmers and non-farmers alike
will appreciate. From problems to solutions, through
trial and error, these farmers found ways to address
issues and to make farming a proftable, sustainable
and family-friendly career.
This updated and extended version of the original
edition, circa 2000, includes 14 additional farmer
profles, as well as full profles- including updates-
on all previously covered farmers. With at least one
farm from every state, the profles represent a cross-
section of American agriculture today. Profling
farms of all shapes and sizes, from commodity
growers to organic CSAs, The New American
Farmer celebrates the family farm, whether it is
several thousand acres in the corn belt, or several
acres outside of a major Northeastern city.
Every farmer tells his story following the same
basic outline: farm, location, acreage, crops and
a description of the basic problem situation being
faced. Background information on the farm and the
local agricultural scene add relevance. The Focal
Point highlights the main change in operations
implemented on the farm in order to address the
basic problem.
Economics and proftability are discussed,
comparing the costs incurred in the change to the
end results. Did the benefts, if any, outweigh any
initial cost? Did yield suffer, and if so, for how
long? Has the health of the land been affected by
the change? How about the lifestyle of the farmer?
Did the transition into a new approach take years
or just a season? What would be most important for
other farmers to know before attempting a similar
solution? Want to contact the farmer directly to ask
questions? Full contact information for each farm is
included.
Thoroughly engaging, these farm/farmer profles
generate a realistic example of common farming
issues, tools for change and real-life results. A
valuable learning tool, these profles cover such
practices as cover cropping, IPM, crop rotation,
crop diversity, no or low till, farmer cooperatives,
on-farm educational endeavors, direct-marketing
techniques and season extension. From small
to large, coast to coast and cattle to crop,
innovative ways of addressing problems have been
implemented by these farmers, many times with
expert advice from agricultural professionals. The
results, dissected in this book, have been positive.
Whether going organic or stopping erosion through
contour stripping, grazing livestock in the orchard
or planting cover crops, or simply questioning
the conventional wisdom of mono-cropping,
the farmers profled all were concerned with the
viability of their farming operations. By identifying
issues and implementing changes to address the
problems, the profles show the why and how of
making procedural changes on-farm. Interestingly,
although not all of the farmers were specifcally
concerned with going all natural, or even reducing
chemical use, the vast majority found that their
dependence on chemicals decreased as a direct
result of the changes they implemented.
Each profle also includes a section on
community. This feature focuses on the
relationship between the farmer and the consumer,
resident, visitor and municipality. Participation
in the community outside of the confnes of the
farm is shown to be one of the key ingredients
for a successful, economically viable and fully
sustainable farm business. Demonstrating that
farming is most successful when it positively
impacts the local community, the New American
Farmer encourages all farmers to get off of the plow
and into the fray of community life.
Whether looking to address existing on-farm
problems or simply wishing to learn about the trials
and tribulations facing family farmers all across
the country, this book is packed with enlightening
stories, useful information and a good representation
of the cross-section of todays small farm
agriculture. The inspiration to question conventional
wisdom, embrace solutions which address the
underlying problems and ultimately be successful
in farming is all packed into this book. The New
American Farmer, 2
nd
edition, is a must-read for
anyone involved in small farming today.
Natural Sheep Care
by Pat Coleby
published by Acres U.S.A, Austin Texas
$25.00, Paperback, 215 pages
Black and white photography, drawings
review by Christine Atkins
Natural Sheep Care author Pat Coleby of Maldon,
Victoria, Australia has more than 30 years
experience in animal husbandry and is also the
author of Natural Farming, Natural Cattle Care,
Natural Horse care, and Natural Goat Care. In this
book she shares with you her amazing amount of
knowledge pertaining to the sheep industry and the
link between land management and the natural care
of sheep.

In the frst part of the book are the basics: origins
and uses of sheep, history, and breeds of sheep. All
these chapters are flled with anecdotes and real-
life useful information. Its when you get into the
second half of this book that Pat Coleby gets deep
into her favorite subject, the connection of vitamins
and minerals in the sheep and their connection to
the land they live on. Directions on making and
maintaining a stock lick are included in chapter 4,
and then referred to several times throughout the
rest of the book as the starting place for natural
sheep care. Many defciencies are corrected at
the stock lick with a varying use of vitamins and
minerals. As the author explains in chapter 8, if the
minerals are in total balance, vitamin defciencies
should not occur. In other words, behind every
vitamin shortfall is the lack of a mineral. Each
mineral is identifed and explained in detail, as are
the vitamins.

In the later chapters many health problems are
addressed and natural solutions are suggested, with
many useful land management tips and tools to
improve the soil. Also included are identifcations
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 42
of most of the North American noxious plants and
natural ways to eradicate them.

This book is for all breeders of sheep, whatever their
kind, small fock or large. In the words of Graham
Holton, sheep classer extraordinaire in Australia:
Its all in the feeding.
Building Without Borders: Sustainable
Construction for the Global Village
edited by Joseph F. Kennedy
New Society Publishers, 2004 www.newsociety.
com
$25.95, paperback, 253 pages, b/w photos
reviewed by Nick Leone
The last 15 years have witnessed a proliferation
in books on natural building. You can now fnd
books explaining how to build everything from a
clay plastered strawbale house for cold climates
to a wood-fred backyard cob hot tub. Some are
written for engineeroids like myself, some give the
perspective of the struggling owner builder. But
what they all have in common is a desire to spread
the word about natural building and its advantages
both for the homeowner and the environment.
Building Without Borders takes that mission one
step further. Assuming the reader already has a
working knowledge of natural building methods
and techniques, this book focuses on using that
knowledge to help solve the housing shortage in
underprivileged communities around the world
even in some parts of developed (some might
argue over-developed) nations such as the US.
The idea is not to build houses for poor people.
It is to empower communities to build shelter for
themselves using local materials and methods
appropriate to their cultures and climates.
The book is divided into 7 chapters each with a
different author and each discussing some aspect
of bringing sustainable building to under-housed
communities. These range from the broad-based
philosophical viewpoint provided by Susan Klinker
in the opening chapter Shelter and Sustainable
Development to Joseph Kennedys expository
summary of the options available to natural builders
in his Critical Overview of Sustainable Building
Techniques. Case studies of world-wide projects
aimed at spreading natural building techniques are
included in each chapter, and smattered throughout
are inspiring profles of architects and others
(including a group of Native American school girls)
who have worked to fnd ecological and effective
solutions to the shortage of appropriate housing.
Periodic tech boxes outline relevant technical
concepts such as the usage of straw-clay blocks,
small dimension lumber, and bamboo.
The focus throughout is on transferring natural
building technology to local communities so that
the work doesnt end when the builders go home.
There is much discussion about the need to use
methods and designs that ft with the local climate
and resources, but of at least equal importance is
the need to make sure the end product fts the needs
and aspirations of the families and communities
who will be using it. For instance, building styles
associated with poverty will be slow to catch on
- if at all, and uncomfortable buildings wont
be repeated. Local involvement throughout the
process is essential and the authors make this point
compellingly.
Building Without Borders is well written and well
informed. The frst-person experience provided
by people like Kelly Lerner in her chapter Down
to Earth Technology Transfer is particularly
informative. She is very clear about what has
and hasnt worked over the course of her project
in China (around 600 straw bale houses and
counting), and it isnt hard to imagine that
knowledge translating to other parts of the world.
With so many different authors covering similar
concepts, there is bound to be some repetition. In
this context, though, it effectively highlights the
key components to successful projects. (There
is a reason early local involvement comes up so
frequently)
Because the focal point of this book is spreading
appropriate building technology to under-privileged
communities, it wouldnt be of much help to
someone considering building a natural structure
for their own use. It would, however, be highly
instructive to anyone considering starting or taking
part in relief projects of a variety of natures, not just
natural building. The messages of communication
and end-user involvement could also have some
value for professional natural builders looking
to move natural building closer towards the
mainstream. In short, if you are considering
designing and building a natural structure for your
own use, Building Without Borders isnt going
to help you much. But if you already have some
natural building experience and are interested
in sharing it with others particularly those
experiencing a housing shortage its defnitely
worth the read.
Cultivating a New Crop of Farmers: Is On-
farm Mentoring Right for You and Your
Farm
by Kathryn Hayes
New England Small Farm Institute; 2006 www.
smallfarm.org,
70pp., paperback
review by Tamara Scully
This little gem of a workbook serves as a starting
point to help farmers who may be wondering if
hosting on-farm trainees is a wise decision for their
operation. Packed with quizzes, insightful tips and
easily overlooked issues, this workbook offers
guidance on what- and what not- to expect as a
mentor.
Divided into four sections, the book focuses on
a systematic explanation of determining whether
mentoring can work given the personality of the
farmer, the needs of the farm and the desired
outcome. Each section contains numerous
worksheets which guide the reader in self-analysis,
farm analysis and future planning.
Simple and direct, the book forces the reader to
focus on the business plan of on-farm mentoring
rather than the idealistic vision of passing on
wisdom, getting free labor or expanding the
business through mentorships.
By examining where your farm is - start-up,
establishing or well-established, what knowledge
you possess, whether your equipment, housing,
routine and family are ready for on-farm trainees
and the potential negative effects of trainees, any
farmer considering on-farm mentoring should have
a relatively accurate picture of the issues that arise
in these situations, Hayes writes.
The frst three sections should leave the reader
with a better understanding of on-farm mentoring,
the factors that need to be considered and the
personality traits that are needed to serve as a
host mentor. For those still enthusiastic about
the possibility of hosting on-farm trainees, the
fourth section contains an occupational profle of
successful mentors, resources for fnding trainees
for your farm, and the problems others have faced
when hosting trainees.
Readers who may have decided that on-farm
mentoring isnt quite the right ft neednt despair.
Other opportunities to share your wisdom and assist
beginning farmers are also outlined.
By asking insightful questions, anticipating potential
trouble spots and focusing on fnancial implications,
this workbook guides readers through the practical
considerations of on-farm mentorship. While simple
in format, the book is packed with real-life issues,
examples and even legal implications which can be
faced by those hosting on-farm trainees.
Whether or not on-farm mentoring is the right
choice for your farm should be clear after
completing the worksheets and questionnaires.
Hayes demonstrates why growing a new crop of
farmers should take as much planning as growing
any other crop. For those seriously considering on-
farm mentoring, this workbook is a must-read.
Grass: the Forgiveness of Nature
Charles Walters
Acres U.S.A. www.acresusa.org
Softcover, 295 pp., $25.00 U.S.
reviewed by Erica Myers-Russo
Lets start out by saying that 300 pages on grass is
exactly what it sounds like: dense reading. Charles
Walters, founder and executive editor of Acres
U.S.A., decided to collate several decades worth
of reading, interviews, and experience about grass
(which he defnes as the grand diversity of plants
that make up the natural cover of the Great Plains)
into a single volume. The book is organized into
three main sections (The Seekers, The Graziers,
and The Futurists) and in each section he organizes
information from experts--like Malcolm Beck,
Henry Turney, biodynamicist Hugh Courtney-into
individual chapters.
He writes colorfully: a nitrogen-nitrogen bond is
the elements powerfully narcissistic love affair
with itself, plants on synthetic fertilizers are
junkies crying for another fx. Throughout, he
takes an unabashedly anti-agrichemical and pro-
sustainability stance, summed up thusly:
In the face of all the propaganda to
sell chemicals as cheap, safe, and
effective, people have to do their
own thinking before they realize
that to achieve self-suffciency they
must improve soil biology.
If you have even the slightest interest in pasture
management, odds are youll fnd something
valuable hereand that you will fnd it taken to
a depth seldom published elsewhere. Theres an
entire chapter, for instance, dedicated to dung
beetles. Others cover pastured poultry, Holistic
Resource Management ranching, and the role of
forbs in forage. One of the most interesting topics
to me (being a gardener rather than a livestock
farmer) is the increasing research showing that
optimal levels of organic matter in soil can
counteract global warming and desertifcationtwo
of the most pressing environmental crises today.
Grass: the Forgiveness of Nature is an insightful,
informative book. That said, I do offer a few
caveats: As I mentioned, this book is information-
dense-and this density demands a little more
organizational framework than Walters provides.
Perhaps because of his decades-long storehouse of
information, the author tends to jump from topic
to topic within a chapter--sometimes even within
a sentence. Given that each chapter highlights
a different aspect (and, typically, a different
personality), it would help if the chapter titles were
more descriptive. Also, Walterss wordy, simile-
packed writing style tends to obfuscate (e.g., Urine
and manure gifted the soil by tight herds, most of
it stomped into the soil, the carbon dioxide fush is
more than ample for rapid regrowth.)
So read Grass: the Forgiveness of Nature when
you are alert and able to make notes in the margins
for future reference. Because if you are a grazier,
pasture manager, or just curious, youll want to refer
back often to the books considerable information.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 43
David Stern, Rose Valley Farm
When your farm incorporates a double-wall
plastic hoop house, tight plastic is good plastic.
Bad plastic is foppy-fapping and means one
of two things: your house has had a catastrophic
malfunction (this aint no small tear) or your fan is
on the fritz. As soon as you walk into your hoop
house youll know: any fan noise? When its quiet
it means it must be either the electricity, or the fan.
If the light switch works, you know youve got the
infation fan blues.
Its not a big machine--the size of a baseball--but
its a valiant co-worker loyally spinning away as
we tend to our work. It runs on 115 volt electric,
2800-3200 rpm (revolutions per minute), and is
technically known as a shaded single-pole motor
attached to a squirrel cage fan used to pressurize
the air space between two layers of plastic. Not
a lot of power at 1/25 HP and many have a nice
safety feature: thermally protected auto-reset,
which means the fan will shut itself off when it gets
too hot and will restart after you unplug the motor,
then plug it back in. These fans/blowers come in
two sizes: 60 and 148 cfm (cubic feet per minute),
which is the amount of air the fan will move. A
21x100 house with a 9 air space would have 2400
cubic feet of air in the infation space (a 21 house
takes 32 plastic, so 32 x 100 x .75). A 60 cfm
would fll this in approximately 40 minutes (2400 /
60) and easily keep it infated. These blowers arent
expensive to purchase: 60cfm for $45-$65 and the
148 cfm for $60-$80, and are fairly economical to
run. To operate a 60 cfm/1.9 amp fan on 115 volts
for a year would cost $172.27 if your utility charged
$.09 per kilowatt hour: volts x amp = watts (115
x 1.9 = 218.5), watt to kilowatt (218.5 / 1000 =
.2185), hours per year (24 x 365 = 8760),
kilowatt hours per year (8760 x .2185 = 1914.06),
kilowatt hours at cost (1914.06 x .09 = 172.265).
Lets go back to your foppy-fapping plastic and
the fan that isnt working. What to do? First of
all, listen closely: can you hear a hum-m-m-m?
Unplug the fan or disconnect from power (switch
off lock out). Is the motor hot? Cold? Keep
an old slotted screwdriver in the hoop house and
remove the cover plate and screen from the fan body
and then, using the screwdriver, spin the fan cage.
Does it spin freely or is there resistance? Can you
feel a drag or is it hard to turn it at all? Now check
your electrical outlet using any appliance or test
light. If the outlet works, its your fan that doesnt.
When I wrote that these motors arent expensive,
I should have said that they are cheap, as 75% are
made in China for $10-$12, but perform the task
they are built to do: move air. Like us, they wear
with use and each year of full use service means
15,768,000 revolutions (365x24x60x3000). A
motor that was serious about this task would be
sealed (keeping out dirt and moisture), have a
hardened steel shaft (not soft-rolled steel), sealed
bearings (not wear washers with socket cups), a
capacitor (to give it a little boost when needed),
as well as safety features, and would cost four
times as much. But lets face it, the hoop house
is a low-cost structure and can claim the worst
conditions for any motor: dust, heat, moisture, oils
and vibrations. Dust or dirt is the real villain as
an abrasive, trapping moisture and lubricants, and
flling the insulation grooves in the rotor. Moisture
destroys insulation and mixes with the dust coating
the windings. Oils and spray lubricants can destroy
insulation and corrode connections. Vibration
(caused by being out of balance) greatly increases
wear, so its a good idea to keep all bolts, nuts and
clips tight. Eventually, the little motor gets tired,
dirty and weak and once it stops running (for any
reasonpower outage, time for cleaning, etc.)
without a capacitor, the 1/25 hp cant restart itself.
The hum-m-m-m you heard is that effort. Too
many revolutions, too much dirt, moisture and oil
and your motor will fail, or fail to restart.
When it wont start with a little help from a spin of
the screwdriver, its good to have a spare infation
fan unit on hand. Unplug the disabled fan, remove
the four mounting nuts and bolts, replace it with
the new unit, and youll be infating the plastic
in 15 minutes while you put the old fan on your
workbench. When you get some time, theres one
thing you can try: 90% of the time, dirt and dust
have packed the bearings on which the rotor and
motor shaft turn. The oil ports on the motor housing
lead to the bearing cups. If the fan doesnt spin
freely, I put a long hypodermic needle down the port
and use high pressure compressed air to blow out
or clean the bearings. For me, and the neighbors
motors I work on, this is successful 50% of the
time. Maintenance is always better than repair. It
is not economical to take this inexpensive motor to
a repair shop where an hours wage will buy a new
motor.
Replacement motors can be purchased for $40-$55
and usually only take a few minutes to install. First,
remove the hold-down ring and screen from the
unit, apply a break free rust solvent using a Q-tip
(not an aerosol) to the fan/motor shaft at the stop
collar and to the set screw on the side of the collar.
Using a long 3/32 allen wrench, loosen or remove
the set screw that youll access through the fan body
and between the fan blades. The fan cage can be
removed by drawing it away from the motor shaft
and out of the fan body. The stop collar and cage
fan are one piece. This will expose four 11/32 nuts
that hold the fan body to the motor. Remove and
save nuts and lockwashers, remove the fan housing
from motor. Remove and inspect the synthetic
rubber anti-vibration gasket. Install new motor,
reversing this procedure. Id recommend a never-
seize product when installing the cage fan on the
motor shaft. Be sure that the 3/32 set screw is
lined up with the fat on the end of the motor shaft.
The old motor should be given a proper burial.
There are a few small things that can be done to
keep your infation fan running that are inexpensive
and simple. Dust from the foor and soil fats can be
fltered out by putting panty hose or furnace flters
above the screen to keep dirt from getting between
the plastic layers, and below the fan to keep it out
of the motor. Oil: you have to lubricate the motor,
but use the right oil. The best on the market today
are the new (and expensive) synthetic lubricants for
motors, or the old 10:1 oil for electric motors. Old
ag journals recommend 10-20 wt. non-detergent
oil. Lubricants like WD-40 are too light for the
job. Your bar buddies might recommend automatic
transmission fuid or the (in)famous Marvel Mystery
Oil-- the choice is yours. Equally important: dont
use more than a drop or two on a regular basis,
and no aerosols. Lubrication should be part of a
regular maintenance schedule: every three or four
months, like most things on the farm, to keep it
running well. Unplug the fan motor and then, using
40-50 psi compressed air, blow out all parts of the
fan and motor from all directions, then lubricate.
If you can mount the fan with the oil ports up
as indicated on the I.D. plate, you wont have to
dismantle the fan to lubricate. Theres not much
we can do about moisture but hope the heat in the
house will evaporate it rapidly. Keep all the bolts
tight to keep it balanced. Restrictor plates over the
fan intake should look like a donut, not the sliced-
off coffee can lid that I use. I think that I can claim
that regulating the air pressure/ fan speed is a good
idea, as back-pressure makes the fan work harder.
If it takes only 40 minutes to fll the space, what
is happening when you continue to push air into a
closed space? Most of us inadvertently build gaps
into our hoop house construction. Others I know
open a seam in the far end of the house from the
fan to expel moisture and release pressure. There is
also the rheostat (a switch) that regulates the fow of
electricity. You might know it as a dimmer switch
to a light or speed control for a ceiling fan; it costs
about $18-$25. Once the air space is full, reduce to
the lowest speed possible on those hot calm days,
and speed it up for the cloudy windy days. You will
also save money by reducing the use of electricity.
Keep it spinninghappy spring!
David farms in Rose, New York and has been trying
to repair electrical motors for 30+ years. April 2006
photo courtesy David Stern
A simple squirrel cage fan
The Infation
Fan Blues
photo courtesy David Stern
A squirrel cage fan vented to infate the space between inner and outer poly in hoophouse.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 44
Mini-conference at the NOFA Summer Conference,
August 10, 2007: 8 am noon. Elizabeth Henderson
and Richard Mandelbaum, conveners.
Both the Organic and Fair Trade movements are
commercial successes and are bringing positive
change in the food system. Even on an industrial
scale, organic agriculture provides demonstrable
environmental benefts, preserving soil health and
reducing amounts of toxic runoff from farms into
surface and ground water. Fair Trade has increased
prices paid to producers in the global south, created
more accountability and transparency in the food
chain, and worked to build awareness of complex
trade inequities among northern consumers.
Challenges dog the heels of the very success of
these efforts. As organic agriculture becomes more
mainstream, it is increasingly characterized by the
injustices of conventional agriculture: decreasing
income and unfair contracts for family-scale
farmers, and exploitative working conditions for
farmworkers. Fair Trade is likewise struggling
with questions regarding the lack of standards for
farm labor, the level of pricing to farmers and the
entrance of large traders who attract shoppers with
the fair trade label, although that only represents a
small percentage of their products.
Neither program addresses the full spectrum of
a healthy and viable food system. The National
Organic Program in the U.S.doesnt address the
who in agriculture; the farmers and workers
whose labor feeds all of us although historically,
progress towards social justice has been one of the
basic principles of organic agriculture. Fair Trade
fails to address environmental concerns. And,
neither system addresses the problem of relying on
an unsustainable global distribution chain fueled by
a dwindling supply of cheap oil.
Momentum is growing in the United States to
apply the lessons learned from Fair Trade and
Organic into a comprehensive plan for a truly
sustainable domestic supply of food that offers
environmental benefts, just treatment for workers,
and economic returns for family-scale farmers
and rural communities. Now is a time of great
strategic importance to this work, as multiple social
justice claims are poised to enter the marketplace.
Some of these efforts lack adequate stakeholder
representation and transparency in their process
and some claims lack verifable standards to back
them up. Labeling projects wishing to adopt
diluted versions of social and economic standards
commonly cite feasibility as the reason, and yet
no concrete examples exist of what is or is not
feasible in the marketplace.
At the Domestic Fair Trade in the Northeast
mini-conference, we would like to bring together
people from around the NE who are interested in
the concept of Domestic Fair Trade to exchange
ideas, share experiences and see whether we
want to move forward together in some way. We
will talk about how domestic fair trade relates to
organic agriculture, the role of NOFA, and whether
additional labeling or guarantees might be helpful
for NE farms and consumers.
Background: Since 1999, the Agricultural Justice
Project (AJP), a coalition led by RAFI-USA,
Peacework Farm, CATA - El Comit de Apoyo a
los Trabajadores Agricolas, and Quality Certifcation
Services, (QCS), has been working to develop
standards for fair trade between family-scale
farmers and buyers, and just working conditions
for workers, interns and children on farms. A
basic premise of this work has been the equal
participation of farmers, farmworkers, buyers
and consumers. During the 2007 season, AJP in
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Jay & Janet Bailey Family
www.fairwindsfarm.org
511 Upr Dummerston Rd.
Brattleboro, VT 05301
802-254-9067
Back Issues!
Current issues ($3) :
71 Globalization &Agriculture
70 Organic Potatoes
Collectors Copies ($5) :
68 Who Owns Organic?
67 Organic Fine Dining
66 Renewable Energy on Farm
65 Organic Cucurbits
64 Youth &Agriculture
63 Organic Meat
60 Access to Land
59 The NOPAfter 1 Year
58 Irrigation
57 On-Farm Dairying
56 Farm Equipment
55 Beginning Farmers
54 Organic Berries
53 On-Farm Research
51 Farming & Families
48 Home Gardening
47 Can Organic Feed the World?
46 Transition to Organic
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Domestic Fair Trade in the Northeast
An Exploration of Possibilities
cooperation with the Local Fair Trade Network
(LFTN) in the Upper Midwest, is piloting a Local
Fair Trade label in several food co-ops. In May,
QCS will be certifying these co-ops and four of the
organic farms that supply them as meeting the AJP
standards for social justice. A small check-off from
each sale will help fund further work.
In 2005, the AJP and other like-minded
organizations (Organic Valley (CROPP Co-
operative), FarmerDirect Co-operative of
Saskatchewan, Canada, and the worker co-operative
and Fair Trade Organization Equal Exchange)
began formal dialogue about the need for fair
trade in domestic agriculture. Based on a sense of
common ground, these co-ops and AJP issued an
invitation to a broader list of organizations. After a
year of intensive discussions, they agreed to launch
a Domestic Fair Trade Association (DFTA) a
movement rooted in the principles of international
Fair Trade, but adapted to the concerns of domestic
and regional production. In June 2007 DFTA began
circulating its application forms and NOFA will
have the opportunity to apply. This year as well,
several other domestic fair trade initiatives and
labeling projects have appeared on the national
scene.
If you would like to participate in the Domestic
Fair Trade in the Northeast mini-conference,
please send a brief (1 2 pages) write-up of your
involvement in fair trade efforts so far to Elizabeth
Henderson. Deadline July 15. Each participant
will receive a packet of these write-ups to help get
our conversation started.
For more information:
Elizabeth Henderson
Peacework Farm
2218 Welcher Road, Newark, NY 14513
315-331-9029
ehendrsn@redsuspenders.com
Agenda
Go around who is here and why
Introduction to Domestic Fair Trade
History of what has happened so far:
The Agricultural Justice Project
The Local Fair Trade Network Upper Midwest
The Domestic Fair Trade Association its set of
principles for DFT, what joining the DFTA would
mean for NE organizations
Other initiatives
Updates from participants on related activities they
are engaged in
Discussion: do we see a need for domestic fair trade
in our region? If so, what form should it take?
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 45
Taste! Organic Connecticut, the states largest
celebration of organic food and farming, takes place
from 10 to 4 on Sunday, September 9, 2007 at
Topmost Herb Farm in Coventry, CT. The low $5
admission includes parking, workshops on organic
food, gardening, farming and land care, live music,
A New, Comprehensive Resource for Landscapers,
Municipalities and Citizens
The Connecticut Northeast Organic Farming
Association (CT NOFA) has announced the
release of their new book: Organic Lawn and
Turf Handbook: Beautiful Grass Naturally. The
handbook is a 108-page comprehensive and
practical reference manual detailing methods and
materials for growing and maintaining beautiful,
healthy, organic turfgrass. Written and edited
by scientists and experts in the feld of organic
lawn and turf care, this manual covers what
landscapers, landscape designers, municipal staff
and homeowners need to know to grow natural and
organic lawns. Book topics include: Why Organic?
Site Analysis; Soil Health, Fertility and Testing; Soil
Amendments; Cultural Practices; Weeds; Insects;
Diseases; Obtaining Materials and Equipment;
Running a Business; and Client Relations.
We get thousands of requests each year for
information on how to grow a great lawn without
chemicals, said Bill Duesing, executive director of
CT NOFA. This is the frst handbook of its kind,
written specifcally for landscapers, municipalities
and citizens who want to make the change to
organic.
The handbook, written and published with
assistance from the Quinnipiac River Fund of The
Community Foundation for Greater New Haven,
serves as the new manual for the one-day NOFA
Organic Lawn and Turf Course, which is held
annually in August. The course is organized by
the NOFA Organic Land Care Committee, a joint
program of the Connecticut and Massachusetts
chapters of the Northeast Organic Farming
Association.
Nell Newman, founder of Newmans Own
Organics, praised the NOFA Organic Lawn and Turf
Handbook: The NOFA Organic Lawn and Turf
Handbook is an interesting and thorough manual
on the practices of sustainable lawn care for anyone
concerned with health and the environment.
Paul Tukey, founder of People, Places and Plants,
said the handbook is a tremendous tool and resource
for anyone interested in getting involved with
organic lawns, Yet another fne example of all the
great work NOFA is doing. At my talks all across
America, I hold up NOFA as a nationwide leader
and organic resource.
The NOFA Organic Land Care Program also offers
its fagship annual NOFA Accreditation Course
in Organic Land Care, a fve-day-long intensive
course that educates professionals in organic land
care from design to maintenance. The curriculum
is based on NOFAs Standards for Organic Land
Care: Practices for Design and Maintenance of
Ecological Landscapes. These Standards are the frst
of their kind in the country. Students who pass the
accreditation exam at the end of the fve-day course
are eligible to become NOFA Accredited Organic
Land Care Professionals. These professionals
are annually accredited, supported and promoted
through the program via newsletters, update courses,
advertising and website listings.
The NOFA Organic Lawn and Turf Handbook is
available for $25 plus $3 shipping and handling
at the NOFA Organic Land Care website -- www.
organiclandcare.net. The handbook can also
be ordered by calling CT NOFA at (203) 888-
5146 or by sending to: CT NOFA, PO Box 164,
Stevenson, CT 06491. Copies for review may also
be obtained with proof of article publication. Please
call CT NOFA at (203) 888-5146 or visit www.
organiclandcare.net for more information or copies
for review.
NOFA Organic
Lawn and Turf
Handbook is
Published
Taste! Organic Connecticut
childrens activities and samples of organic produce.
Purchase organic produce at the farmers market,
delicious food at the Willimantic Food Coops tent
and local sustainable crafts from the vendors. For
more information visit www.ctnofa.org.
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 46
Connecticut
CT NOFA Offce: P O Box 164, Stevenson, CT
06491, phone (203) 888-5146, FAX (203) 888-
9280, Email: ctnofa@ctnofa.org, website: www.
ctnofa.org
President: James Roby , P.O Box 191, 1667
Orchard Road, Berlin, CT 06037, 860-828-
5548, 860-881-8031 (C), jroby7088@sbcglobal.
net
Vice President: Dr, Kimberly A. Stoner, 498
Oak Ave. #27, Cheshire, CT 06410-3021, (203)
271-1732 (home), 203-974-8480 (w), Email:
kastoner@juno.com (h), kimberly.stoner@
po.state.ct.us (w)
Treasurer: Ron Capozzi, 69R Meetinghouse
Hill Rd., Durham, CT 06422-2808, (860) 349-
1417, ronsraspberries@hotmail.com
Secretary: Chris Killheffer, 112 Bishop Street,
New Haven, CT 06511-7307, 203-787-0072,
Christopher.killheffer@yale.edu
Farmers Pledge Program: Contact the offce.
Conference Coordinator: Jennifer Brown , PO
Box 730, Rhinebeck, NY 12572, 413-553-3634,
jennifer@ctnofa.org
Executive Director: Bill Duesing, Box 164,
Stevenson, CT 06491, 203-888-5146, 203 888-
9280 (fax), bduesing@cs.com
Organic Land Care Accreditation Manager
and Webmaster: Janet Cunningham, PO Box
978, Southbury, CT 06478, 203-525-0376 (c),
janet@ctnofa.org
Massachusetts
President: Frank Albani Jr., 17 Vinal Avenue,
Plymouth, MA 02360, (508) 224-3088, email:
plymouthrockmusic@msn.com
Vice President: Sharon Gensler, 87 Bullard
Pasture Rd. Wendell, MA 01379, (978) 544-
6347, email: wildbrowse@yahoo.com
Secretary: Mary Blake, P.O. Box 52, Charlton
Depot, MA 01509, (508) 248-5496, Email:
blakem_2001@msn.com
Treasurer and Executive Director: Julie
Rawson, 411 Sheldon Rd., Barre, MA 01005
(978) 355-2853, Fax: (978) 355-4046, Email:
Julie@nofamass.org
Administrative Coordinator: Kathleen Geary,
411 Sheldon Rd, Barre, MA 01005 (Mondays
& Thursdays, 8:00 am - 5:00 pm), email: info@
nofamass.org
Webmaster: David Pontius: 68 Elm Street,
Shelburne Falls, MA 01370 (413) 625-0118;
Email: webmaster@nofa.org
Baystate Organic Certifers Administrator:
Don Franczyk, 683 River St., Winchendon,
MA 01475, (978) 297- 4171, Email:
baystateorganic@earthlink.net, website: www.
baystateorganic.org
Extension Educator: Ed Stockman, 131 Summit
St. Plainfeld, MA 01070, (413) 634- 5024,
stockman@bcn.net
Newsletter Editor: Jonathan von Ranson, 6
Lockes Village Rd., Wendell, MA 01379, (978)
544-3758, Email: Commonfarm@crocker.com
Website: www.nofamass.org Email: nofa@
nofamass.org
New Hampshire
President: Essie Hull, 115 Baptist Rd.,
Canterbury, NH 03224, (603) 783-4782,
seedhead@essenceofthings.com
Vice President: Joan OConnor, PO Box
387, Henniker, NH 03242, (603) 428-3530,
joconnornh@yahoo.com
Treasurer: Paul Mercier, Jr., 39 Cambridge
Drive, Canterbury, NH 03224, (603) 783-0036,
pjm@mercier-group.com
Program & Membership Coordinator: Elizabeth
Obelenus, NOFA/NH Offce, 4 Park St., Suite
208, Concord, NH 03301, (603) 224-5022,
info@nofanh.org
Newsletter Editor: Karen Booker, 44 Prospect
St., Contoocook, NH 03229, (603) 746-3656,
pottedplant@juno.com
Organic Certifcation: Vickie Smith, NHDA
Bureau of Markets, Caller Box 2042, Concord,
NH 03301 (603) 271-3685, vsmith@agr.state.
nh.us
Website: www.nofanh.org,
New Jersey
President: Donna Drewes, 26 Samuel Dr.,
Flemington, NJ 08822, 908-782-2443,
drewes@tcnj.edu
Vice President: Stephanie Harris, 163
Hopewell-Wertsville Rd., Hopewell, NJ 08525,
(609) 466-0194, r.harris58@verizon.net
Treasurer: William D. Bridgers, c/o Zon
Partners, 5 Vaughn Dr., Suite 104, Princeton,
NJ 08540, (609) 452-1653, billbridgers@
zoncapital.com
Secretary: Emily Brown Rosen, 25
Independence Way, Titusville, NJ 08560, 609-
737-8630
Newsletter Editor & Outreach Coordinator:
Mikey Azzara, PO Box 886, Pennington, NJ
08534-0886, (609) 737-6848, fax: (609) 737-
2366, Email: mazzara@nofanj.org
Certifcation Administrator: Erich V. Bremer,
c/o NJ Dept. of Agriculture, PO Box 330,
Trenton, NJ 08625, (609) 984-2225 erich.
bremer@ag.state.nj.us
Offce Assistant: Cynthia Beloff, PO Box 886
Pennington, NJ 08534-0886, (609) 737-6848,
Fax (609) 737-2366 General Request Emails:
nofanj@nofanj.org Email: cbeloff@nofanj.org
website: www.nofanj.org
New York
President: Scott Chaskey, Quail Hill Farm, PO
Box 1268, Amagansett, NY 11930-1268, H
(631) 725-9228 W (631) 267-8942, schaskey@
peconiclandtrust.org
Vice President: Vince Cirasole, Sunshine Farm,
745 Great Neck Rd, Copiague, NY 11726,
(631) 789-8232, vince@sunshinefarm.biz
Treasurer: Joseph Gersitz, 90 Hotchkiss Cir,
Penfeld, NY 14526-1402 (585) 381-8659,
josephg2@aol.com
Secretary: Maria Grimaldi, Panther Rock Farm,
148 Hardenburgh Rd, Livingston Manor, NY
12758, (845) 482-4164, pantherrock@direcway.
com
Interim Executive Director: Greg Swartz, 245
Westwood Dr, Hurleyville, NY 12747-5527,
(845) 796-8994, fax: (845) 434-7306, director@
nofany.org
Offce Manager: Mayra Richter, PO Box 880,
Cobleskill, NY 12043-0880, (607) 652-NOFA,
fax: (607) 652-2290, offce@nofany.org
NOFA-NY Certifed Organic, LLC,
Certifcation Director: Carol King, 840 Front St,
Binghamton, NY 13905, (607) 724-9851, fax:
(607) 724-9853, certifedorganic@nofany.org
Organic Seed Partnership (OSP) Project
Coordinator: Elizabeth Dyck, Crimson Farm,
1124 County Rd 38, Bainbridge, NY 13733-
3360, (607) 895-6913, organicseed@nofany.org
Projects Coordinator & ODT Project Co-Project
Manager: Kate Mendenhall, 14 Menlo Pl,
Rochester, NY 14620-2718, (585) 271-1979,
projects@nofany.org
Organic Dairy Transitions Project Co-Project
Manager: Bethany Russell, PO Box 874,
Mexico, NY 13114-0874, (315) 806-1180,
bethany.organicdairy@nofany.org
Organic Dairy Transitions Project Dairy
Technician: Robert Perry, Maple Slope Farm,
5557 NYS 41, Homer, NY 13077, (607) 749-
3884, robert.organicdairy@nofany.org
Newsletter Editor: Aissa ONeil, Betty Acres
Organic Farm, 21529 State Highway 28, Delhi,
NY 13753, (607) 746-9581, newsletter@
nofany.org
website: www.nofany.org
Rhode Island
President: Fritz Vohr, In the Woods Farm, 51
Edwards Lane, Charlestown, RI 02813 (401)
364-0050, fritzvohr@verizon.net
Vice-President: Kristin Howard 1245 Reynolds
Road, Chepachet, RI 02814 (401)-647-4570
kmariahoward@yahoo.com
Secretary: Dan Lawton 247 Evans Road
Chepachet, RI 02814 (401)-949-1596
dlawton33@hotmail.com
Treasurer: Abbie Barber, Shannock
Organic Farm, 1411 Shannock Rd.,
Charlestown, RI 02813-3726 (401) 364-7140
shannockorganicfarm@hotmail.com
Bookkeeper/Membership Coordinator:
Peggy Conti, Brookside Apartments, Apt.
978-449-9919
Groton Dental
Wellness Spa
health-focused dentistry
www.grotondentalwellness.com
G. Robert Evans, DMD
Jean Nordin-Evans, DDS
Gilbert D. Carney, DMD, DC
Mill Run Plaza
495 Main Street
Groton, MA 01450
holistic/biological dentistry and orthodontics
safe mercury filling removal
digital x-rays
root canal information
dental material biocompatibility testing
detox program
whole health education
TMJ pain & physical therapy
invisible braces
Our goal is to provide the highest level of patient
care promoting wellness through oral health.
Gail Giustozzi, Realtor

Let us live in harmony with the earth and the creatures,

all given to us by God, our Creator.
105 Old Long Ridge Road, Stamford, CT 06903
Cell/VM: (203) 561-5764 Fax: (203) 595-9815
Email: gailg3@optonline.net Website: iworkforyou.us
i work for you
NOFA Contact People
Th e Nat ur al Far me r S u mme r, 2 0 0 7 47
Calendar
Friday, June 8: Producer Workshop and
Veterinarian Roundtable on Quality Milk and
Udder Health on Organic Dairy Farms with Dr.
Linda Tikofsky, Waterbury, VT, for more info:
NOFA-VT, 802-434-4122; info@nofavt.org
Saturday, June 23: Organic Dairy Workshop on
Managing Health on Organic Livestock Farms
with Dr. Hubert Karreman, Hyde Park, Vermont,
for more info: NOFA-VT, 802-434-4122; info@
nofavt.org
Wednesday, July 11- Saturday, July 14: 2nd
National Conference on Facilitating Sustainable
Agriculture Education, Cornell University,
Ithaca, NY, for more info: www.hort.cornell.edu/
SustAgEd/
Thursday, August 2 Saturday, August 4: The
KNEADING Conference, Skowhegan, ME, for
more info: kneading@heartofmaine.org
Friday, August 10 Sunday, August 12: NOFA
Annual Summer Conference, Amherst, MA. For
more info: 978-355-2853 or www.nofamass.org
Saturday, October 6 and Sunday, October 7:
Garlic and Harvest Festival, Bethlehem, CT, for
more info: 203-266-7351 or www.garlicfestct.com
Wednesday, February 13 Friday, February
15, 2008: 5th Biennial Organic Seed Growers
Conference and Organic Seed Production Short
Course, Salem Convention Center, Salem, OR,
for more info: http://www.seedalliance.org/index.
php?page=2008OSGConference.
You may join NOFA by joining one of the seven
state chapters. Contact the person listed below for
your state. Dues, which help pay for the important
work of the organization, vary from chapter to
chapter. Unless noted, membership includes a
subscription to The Natural Farmer.
Give a NOFA Membership! Send dues for a friend
or relative to his or her state chapter and give a
membership in one of the most active grassroots
organizations in the state.
Connecticut: Individual $35, Family $50,
Business/Institution $100, Supporting $150,
Student/Senior $25, Working $20
Contact: CT NOFA, Box 164, Stevenson, CT 06491,
(203)-888-5146, or email: ctnofa@ctnofa.org or join
on the web at www.ctnofa.org
Massachusetts: Low-Income $20, Individual $30,
Family/Farm/Organization $40, Supporting $100
Contact: Kathleen Geary, 411 Sheldon Road,
Barre, MA 01005, (978) 355-2853, or email: info@
nofamass.org
New Hampshire: Individual: $30, Student: $23,
Family: $40, Sponsor: $100, Basic $20*
Contact: Elizabeth Obelenus, 4 Park St., Suite 208,
Concord, NH 03301, (603) 224-5022, info@nofanh.
org
NOFA
Membership
New Jersey: Individual $35, Family/
Organizational $50, Business/Organization $100,
Low Income: $15*
Contact: P O Box 886, Pennington, NJ 08534-0886,
(609) 737-6848 or join at www.nofanj.org
New York*: Student/Senior/Limited Income
$15, Individual $30, Family/Farm/Nonproft
Organization $40, Business/Patron $100. Add $10 to
above membership rates to include subscription to
The Natural Farmer.
Contact: Mayra Richter, NOFA-NY, P O Box 880,
Cobleskill, NY 12043, Voice (607) 652-6632, Fax:
(607) 652-2290, email: offce@nofany.org www.
nofany.org
Rhode Island: Student/Senior: $20, Individual:
$25, Family $35, Business $50
Contact: Membership, NOFA RI, 51 Edwards Lane,
Charlestown, RI 02813 (401) 364-7557, fritzvohr@
verizon.net
Vermont: Individual $30, Farm/Family $40,
Business $50, Sponsor $100, Sustainer $250, Basic
$15-25*
Contact: NOFA-VT, PO Box 697, Richmond, VT
05477, (802) 434-4122, info@nofavt.org
*does not include a subscription to The Natural
Farmer
#8, Charlestown, RI 02813, (401) 364-3426,
PeggyConti@peoplepc.com
NOFA/RI : 51 Edwards Lane, Charlestown, RI
02813, (401) 364-7557, nofari@nofari.org
website: www.nofari.org
Vermont
NOFA-VT Offce, P. O. Box 697, Bridge St.,
Richmond, VT 05477 (802) 434-4122, Fax:
(802) 434-4154, website: www.nofavt.org,
info@nofavt.org
Executive Director: Enid Wonnacott, elila@
sover.net
NOFA Financial Manager: Kirsten Novak
Bower, kbower@gmavt.net
Winter Conference Coordinator: Olga Boshart,
olga@madriver.com
VOF Administrator & Apprentice Program
Coordinator: Nicole Dehne, nicdehne@hotmail.
com
Bulk Order Coordinator & VOF Staff: Cheryl
Bruce, Cheryl2643@aol.com
VOF Staff: Erin Clark, ebclark23@hotmail.com
Dairy & Livestock TA Administrator, David
Rogers, drogers@uvm.edu
Dairy and Livestock Advisor: Willie Gibson,
wgibson@thelifeline.net
Offce Manager: Meg Klepack, info@nofavt.
org
Ag Education Coordinator: Abbie Nelson,
abbienelson@comcast.net
Offce Assistant and Share the Harvest
fundraiser: Becca Weiss, info@nofavt.org
NOFA Interstate Council
* indicates voting representative
* Bill Duesing, Staff, Box 135, Stevenson, CT,
06491, (203) 888-5146, fax, (203) 888- 9280,
bduesing@cs.com
Kimberly A. Stoner, 498 Oak Ave. #27,
Cheshire, CT 06410-3021, (203) 271-1732
(home), Email: kastoner@juno.com
* Mary Blake, Secretary, P O Box 52 Charlton
Depot, MA 01509 (508)-248-5496 email:
blakem_2001@msn.com
* Ron Maribett, 269 Elm St., Kingston, MA
02364, (781) 585-9670, ron_maribett@hotmail.
com
Elizabeth Obelenus, 22 Keyser Road, Meredith.
NH 03253, (603) 279-6146, nofanh@innevi.
com
* Jack Mastrianni, 277 Holden Hill Road,
Langdon, NH 03602, (603)835-6488,
jamastrianni@yahoo.com
* Steve Gilman, Ruckytucks Farm, 130
Ruckytucks Road, Stillwater, NY 12170 (518)
583-4613, sgilman@netheaven.com
* Vince Cirasole, Sunshine Farm, 745 Great
Neck Rd, Copiague, NY 11726, (631) 789-
8231, vince@sunshinefarm.biz
Elizabeth Henderson, 2218 Welcher Rd.,
Newark, NY 14513 (315) 331-9029 ehendrsn@
redsuspenders.com
* Fritz Vohr, In the Woods Farm, 51 Edwards
Lane, Charlestown,RI 02813 (401) 364-0050,
fritzvohr1@verizon.net
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I Ia a d dc cr ra a t te ed d I Ie er rJ Ja aI I u uo oa a u u
b b a at tu ur ra aI I J Jo od dy y c ca ar re e
| | www.uIeeyoouoau.co
30--

* Abbie Barber, Shannock Organic Farm,
1411 Shannock Rd., Charlestown, RI 02813-
3726 (401) 364-7140 shannockorganicfarm@
hotmail.com
* Enid Wonnacott, 478 Salvas Rd., Huntington,
VT 05462 (802) 434-4435 elila@sover.net
Kirsten Novak Bower, 65 Wortheim Ln.,
Richmond, VT 05477 (802) 434-5420,
kbower@juno.com
Kay Magilavy, Virtual Rep, 212 18th St., Union
City, NJ 07087, (201) 927-7116
Brian Schroeher, Webmaster, 21 Tamarack
Court, Newtown, PA 18940, (215) 825-2140,
cell (908) 268-7059, Email: webmaster@nofa.
org
Jack Kittredge and Julie Rawson, The Natural
Farmer, NOFA Summer Conference, 411
Sheldon Rd., Barre, MA 01005 (978) 355-2853,
Jack@mhof.net, Julie@mhof.net
Torrey Reade, Treasurer, Credit Card Support,
723 Hammersville-Canton Rd., Salem, NJ
08079, 856-935-3612, neptune@waterw.com
Interstate Certifcation Contacts
Nicole Dehne, nicdehne@hotmail.com,PO Box
698, Richmond, VT 05477, 802-434-4122, 802-
434-4154 (fax)
Carol King, 840 Front Street, Binghamton, NY
13905, (607) 724-9851, fax: (607)724-9853,
certifedorganic@nofany.org
Erich V. Bremer, c/o NJ Dept. of Agriculture,
PO Box 330, Trenton, NJ 08625, (609) 984-
2225 erich.bremer@ag.state.nj.us
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