Jennifer and her family came to this land in 2016. It was not a farm. No irrigation, no real care, just one sad-looking Chinese elm, a couple of unkempt old llamas, and a bunch of thistle and mustard everywhere.
Her work has been to re-eliven the soil so it can restore and recreate an abundant ecosystem over time.
For Jennifer, this involved following regenerative principles. I tried to show some of this in a few pictures - let me know if you don't see the invite thru Google Photos
She added water (irrigation, rainwater capture, and creating shallow channels we filled with the wood chips to rehydrate the earth and "slow it, sink it, spread it"
So much mulching or covering the ground with seed or living plants almost always going up to avoid disturbing the complex soil structure and/or disturbing the deep weed bank.
She sowed seasons of diverse cover crop and forage crop, native grass seed and animal-specific grass seed mindfully weaving in forage paddocks and clearing invasives / toxic plants. They put in native hedgerow plants to encourage and support native birds and pollinators, windbreak, etc. They planted diverse perennial shrubs and trees to bring fruits, berries, nuts, for food and photosynthesis to feed the soil life year-round.
She put up owl boxes, bat boxes, bird boxes and holistically manage rotations of ducks, geese, chickens, rabbits, sheep, goats, pigs, and even quail all to increase the diverse inputs and outputs.
She created fertility systems and have had successes and failures that have taught us much and led us to always be improving to continue the growth trajectory and enhance it further to share both the wild and the cultivated.
In harmony with nature was always my goal and so can I farm in a way that is riding the wave of
what nature is already providing and not so much like at odds with her. It's therapeutic to be
among these plants growing and feeding us and this circle is very purposeful to me and that
I want people to really feel held by nature's abundance. I want them to feel provided for.
I want it to be so like visceral that you're like watching the pollination, watching the
plants grow, seeing the abundance and feeling embraced by it here. Pretty much from like the
moment we set foot here I was all about how much food can I grow and what can I put in the ground
because there was no food really growing here before. There was a couple walnut trees, maybe
one old apple tree. Even if I don't sell an ounce of this to the community, this farm is sinking
carbon. This farm is providing a haven for wildlife, right? There's so many ways in which this
farm still gives even if I don't have a soul out here, right? It's doing something. I'm not spraying
it with pesticides. This farm is built with hands of people that wanted to be connected to the soil,
wanted to get in touch with their food and that that energy lives here, right? Both in the annual
crops but more importantly in the perennial crops, the crops that just come year after year. Like I
look at my olive trees and I remember the person that came and helped me do that as a
volunteer on the farm, a farm student. I feel so fortunate to be doing this work at this time.
There's only one thing more important than this work to me and that is raising and educating our
children. Thoughtful, mindful, caring young children for the future and creating a future
by creating regenerative spaces. We are doing the best most important work in the world.
