Jane Doe
After farming for five seasons in the sweet town of Washington, we had the opportunity to find a more permanent residence in Nobleboro. We now operate our little farm on a historic homestead here, where fields and wise old trees mingle with forgotten gardens and traces of the loved home that we are blessed with the privilege of using.
Our aim is to honor this place -stolen Abenaki land- by good stewardship with help from our farming allies: animals, plants, and soil bacteria. We want to pass on our gratitude by sharing the bounty of this land with our friends and neighbors.
"There is no doubt about it, the basic satisfaction in farming is manure, which always suggests that life can be cyclic and chemically perfect and aromatic and continuous."
-E.B. White
“A proper community, we should remember also, is a commonwealth: a place, a resource, an economy. It answers the needs, practical as well as social and spiritual, of its members - among them the need to need one another. The answer to the present alignment of political power with wealth is the restoration of the identity of community and economy."
-Wendell Berry
"I think it's worth it, for wonder's sake, to stick your hand in a compost pile in winter and be burned by a series of suns that last set the summer before."
-Kristin Kimball
why we farm
Work is essential to our being; it gives us purpose. And we love the work of farming. The complexity. The simplicity. The way it requires us to use our bodies and to think in systems.
Our work here and the things we produce are expressions of ourselves: our personal passions and collaborations.
We love food! And we believe food is medicine. We are excited to have a small part in making this whole living organism - from soil to society - more vibrant. Specifically, we want to do our part by caring for the soil here, encouraging diversity, and paying attention to nature's brilliant innovations.
In the names of nutrient-density, diversity, whole systems, and biological advantages, we choose to raise animals as a central part of our farming enterprise. We do this with reverence. We value the role each animal has in this complex system as well as our relationships with them. On our end of the exchange, we aim to provide those in our care with freedom (freedom from hunger and thirst, freedom from discomfort, freedom from pain, injury, and disease, freedom to express normal behavior, freedom from fear and distress), with special emphasis on freedom to express normal behavior. We do our best to create an environment where our animals can express their true uniqueness while being protected from the forces of predation and food scarcity.
In raising animals, we view it as our responsibility and privilege to continue honoring them after they are gone by utilizing their parts economically and for maximum nourishment - from the leaf lard and caul fat to organs and chicken feet.
We encourage you to embrace the odd bits, too! Visit us on Facebook to see upcoming events featuring nose-to-tail cookery and to share recipes.
Our goals are to come to know this piece of land and to form symbiotic relationships with our community, thereby creating mutual empowerment. We embrace the rich heritage of the place we live, and look forward to the lessons and challenges ahead.
