News: Local farming, sustainable future

Strawberries on Katie Hover’s farm are in big demand.

Hover and her husband, Paul Lacrampe, have sold just about every berry they’ve grown during the past four years on their four-acre farm on Mitchell Bay Road.

But Hover, a WSU Master Gardener, is not one to rest on her laurels. She has more ideas in store. Berry profits alone aren’t enough to pay the bills and farming today means searching for new ways to keep the operation viable and their way of life intact.

“It sounds kind of lame, but farming is really hard work,” Hover said.

For their fifth year at Lacrover Farm, a certified organic operation, the couple intend to provide 25 families with weekly boxes of produce via a subscription service, and hope to include a team of local farmers and a variety of locally-grown products in the enterprise.

The boxes would be available at the farm beginning in June, or an added fee may make weekly deliveries feasible, Hover said.

“There’s so many opportunities for local farmers to work with the community in food production, the schools are a good example,” she said. “What we’d like is for people who participate to have an active role in local agriculture.”

Playing an active role in local farming and food production is also the focus of a Feb. 28 seminar on Lopez Island.

Sponsored by Navigating Our Future, the seminar features a tour of S&S Farm, a discussion of agricultural issues with a panel of local experts, followed by an open community discussion and a potluck. The farm tour begins at 11:15 a.m. and the panel discussion begins at 1:30 p.m. in the multi-purpose room at Lopez Elementary School.

Henning Sehmsdorf of S&S Farm hopes cooperative enterprises and community-supported agriculture, or CSAs, like the subscription service envisioned at Lacrover Farm, can help a new generation of farmers expand their income and put down roots.

The islands’ farms, of which there are about 72, grow enough produce and raise enough livestock to provide a hefty amount of the local population’s demand for food, Sehmsdorf said.

The popularity of subscription services and the interest in small farm products are on the rise. One “CSA” Web site boasts 59 Washington farms that participate in community supported programs, many of which are located in neighboring Island, Skagit and Whatcom counties. But there are local success stories too.

Boyd and Lovel Pratt of San Juan Island supplied 30 families with weekly produce when their subscription service at Mulno Cove Farm hit its peak during a dozen years of operation.

The couple became too busy with “real” jobs last year to continue the service, Lovel Pratt said. They’ve talked about resurrecting the service after their schedules calm down.

“There’s something very fulfilling in providing people with food,” Pratt said. “I think a lot of people when they came to pick up their bag of produce also enjoyed visiting the farm. It put people in touch with where their food comes from.”

Food Production Forum Panel

— John Goekler, writer and change-management consultant; and Anna Anderson, writer, food advocate and author of "Women & Sustainable Agriculture and Global Food Systems: The Case for Decoupling."

— Tom Schultz of WSU Extension Office: Issues facing agriculture in the San Juans

— Dr. Bob Wilson of Lopez Clinic, author of The Islands' Weekly "Health Matters" column: Healthy diet and local food

— Elizabeth Simpson, teacher, farmer, currently writing "The Homestead Cookbook": Food security in the kitchen

— Henning Sehmsdorf, owner of S&S Farm and adjunct WSU professor: Economics of food self-sufficiency.

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