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Nearly
10 years ago, while we were still in college,
we sat in our small, one-bedroom apartment and put
on paper what our "dream" farm would be.
We outlined every detail, listed every piece of equipment,
and prioritized our goals. After
graduation (with our degrees in forestry and horticulture),
we began our farm search in earnest. We placed an
ad in the agriculture bulletin, but came up empty.
We attended a state-sponsored farm program without
success. We met numerous times with a business consultant
regarding developing a business plan, but he couldn't
quite understand all the things we wanted to do on
our farm.
Little did we know that a chance meeting at a local
donut shop would help our dream come true. But that's
exactly where we met the gentleman who would eventually
sell us his family farmstead in Ashford, Connecticut!
It would be 18 months of developing a relationship
and sharing our plan before the farm became our own.
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Then another 18 months of work on the house before
we could turn our attention to the land and the outbuildings.
Which brings us to where we are now - on the verge
of diving in full time on our farm.
Along the way, we have become keenly interested in
saving and promoting heritage breeds of livestock
and heirloom varieties of plants. Our goal is to have
a traditional New England diversified family farm.
We also wish to be good stewards of the land by practicing
appropriate forestry and wildlife habitat management
activities.
Our gardens are currently full of heirloom vegetables,
fruits, and flowers (more than 30 different species/varieties!),
which we hope to sell roadside this summer and fall.
We are also in the process of developing our Forest
Stewardship Plan for the property, which we plan to
highlight at our Walking Weekends Farm Tour
on October 8 and 15. And we are in the final phase
of selecting and procuring heritage livestock for
the establishment of our breeding program. We believe
that saving genetic diversity from the past is the
key to the future of family farming.
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