December 2, 2008 by Sara Zoe.

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December 1, 2008 by Sara Zoe.

This forward thinking group of farmers is working hard to bring us closer to a sustainable regional food system. And how amazing and exciting this will be when we can buy local grain!

[and it’s combine, not columbine, but we’ll forgive the newspaper because it is covering this good agricultural news]

East meets Midwest: Men plan a Seacoast wheat crop

Dick Wollmar has long been interested in sustainability, slow food and organic produce. The former North Hampton selectman lives on Walnut Avenue property that’s been farmland since 1729.

Jeffrey Schick is a financial planner who lives in a suburban neighborhood in Hampton. He wants to be a farmer.

Together, Wollmar and Schick purchased an old columbine for harvesting grains and had it trucked from Iowa to the University of New Hampshire’s Kingman Farm in Madbury. The columbine is 11 feet tall, 14 feet long and 8 feet wide, said Schick. They drove it, on a Sunday morning, at six and half miles per hour, to Wollmar’s farm. It took them more than three hours.

It’s currently being stored in a hangar at the Hampton Airfield awaiting Wollmar and Schick’s next big adventure: growing wheat on the Seacoast. On conservation land.

They want to grow, as locally as they can, a crop usually associated with the larger expanses of the Midwest.

The men have put the word out they want to grow wheat and other crops on land set aside as conservation easements. They’ve gotten a good response, said Schick.

 read the full article from the Portsmouth Herald >

Dick Wollmar will be at Saturday’s Winter Farmers’ Market in Exeter, come out and say hello and provide some words of encouragement! Details about the Farmers’ Market >

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December 1, 2008 by Sara Zoe.

This is extra early for these tasty and sustainable little local shrimp.

Imported shrimp, which make up the vast majority of what is available in our grocery stores, are one of the most abysmal fisheries in the world. If you make one switch this year for the sake of the world’s environment, I’d put not eating imported shrimp on the top of that list.

But our Northern shrimp, also known as Gulf of Maine shrimp, are the opposite story - sustainable and smart and local. And tasty. And affordable, even now.

Read more about these delicious shrimp in the Portsmouth Herald >

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December 1, 2008 by Sara Zoe.

From Andy of Andy’s Greens comes a link to a great article about a farm donating an amazing amount of produce each year for Maine’s Plant a Row for the Hungry Program. 

WELLS — Bill Spiller thrusts his calloused, mud-caked hands into the cold, damp dirt and pulls out the last of his carrot crop.

They are gnarled and knobby orange things, unlike the uniform versions found in most supermarkets. Their feathery green tops spike the chilly November air with the crisp scent of summer.

In a few minutes, Spiller and his farmhand, John Derosier, fill four big buckets with carrots that will be delivered to the food pantry at York County Shelter Programs in Alfred.

Spiller, 67, says he has never experienced the kind of need that drives a man or a woman to walk through the doors of a food pantry and ask for help. “I’ve been privileged,” says Spiller, wearing a dusty jean coat and a blue stocking cap. “Maybe never made much money, but never been hungry.”

This year, Spiller Farm donated 10,000 of the 85,000 pounds of produce grown statewide for the Plant a Row for the Hungry program of the University of Maine Cooperative Extension.

Spiller and his wife, Anna, his partner in running the farm, contributed more produce to Plant a Row than any other grower in the state, a position they’ve held every year since the program started in 2001. Their donation this year was worth about $20,000, but the Spillers say they don’t claim the Plant a Row contributions on their income tax returns.

……

The Spillers credit everyone else for making their generosity possible, especially the volunteers who pick the fruits and vegetables week after week throughout the growing season.

“I really have to give credit to the volunteers because I wouldn’t have time to do it otherwise,” says Bill Spiller, a former town selectman and School Committee member. “They come twice a week, Tuesday and Thursday, whether it’s raining or not, and pick whatever surplus we have.”

Read the full article, with photos and audio interviews, here >

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