High Mill Park Farm and Mud Run Farm

Spring 2008

       

   

        Alex Dragovich works his 30-acre organic farm in Navarre with horses instead of a tractor.   He says that working with horses offers a slower, constant pace, the opportunity to hear things like bird song or wild animals, and a relationship that is impossible with a tractor.  “Horses need breaks, just like people, so we take breaks together,” Alex explains.  “There’s no soul in a machine.”

         High Mill Park, Janee Houston’s 14-acre organic farm, used to be a swim park owned by her parents.  She grew up on the land that she now farms and remembers planting the raspberry patch when she was in grade school, helping her father put in the orchard, and gardening with her grandmother on the large plot she had next to Janee’s parents’ land. 

         Alex and Janee share a passion for growing things, a commitment to taking care of the land, and a desire, as Janee put it, “to get people reacquainted with where their food comes from.”  Both farmers offer a community supported agriculture program (CSA). 

         A CSA offers the food-buying public (us!) a way to create a relationship with a farm and receive a weekly basket of the farm’s produce.  By making a financial commitment to the farm, usually in the form of a payment at the beginning of the growing season, people become “members” (or “shareholders” or “subscribers”) of the CSA.  Each member then receives a weekly share of the farm’s bounty: vegetables, fruits, herbs, and sometimes flowers, eggs, chicken, pork, milk, or other farm products.  In some cases, members pick up their shares at the farm on a designated day; in others, the produce may be delivered or picked up at a pre-arranged location like a farmers’ market.

        The CSA concept originated over 30 years ago in Japan, when a group of women concerned about the increase in food imports and the corresponding decrease in family farms initiated a direct growing and purchasing relationship between their group and local farms.  The arrangement was called “teikei” in Japanese, which translates as “putting the farmers’ face on food.”  The benefit of a CSA for farmers is a stable market for their products and a fair return on them.   The benefit for us is the joy of eating truly fresh food and knowing the people who produced it.

         The bounty from the Alex and Janee’s farms is enough to make your mouth water.  Both grow a wide variety of produce from salad greens, peas, and asparagus in the spring, to summer sweet corn, grapes, peppers, cantaloupes, tomatoes, and green beans, to autumn pumpkins and winter squash.  Both raise chickens and offer eggs and roasting chickens.  Janee grows fresh herbs and harvests raspberries from the raspberry bushes she planted as a girl.  Alex sells rhubarb from his rhubarb patch and makes maple syrup from the maple trees on his farm.  And it’s all organic.

         Both Janee and Alex want to educate people and involve the community in what they do.  They are happy to talk about what they grow and how they do it.  They welcome visitors to their farms, including children.  I visited both and came away talking non-stop about everything I saw.  Janee holds special events at High Mill Park, including a spring seed swap and zucchini bake-off in the late summer.  Alex summed it all up well: “A CSA is about community, and the theme is eating better food.”

         Details, Details: The season of both of these CSA’s is from early June to  October.  Both are still accepting members, although time is running short—if you’re interested in signing up, contact them soon.

         Alex’s farm is Mud Run Farm at 14126 Millersburg Road in Navarre, 6 miles southwest of Massillon (it took me less than 30 minutes to get there from North Canton).  His phone number is 330-268-2600.  His shares are $400 for 16 weeks, and members pick up their produce at the farm.  You can find details about Alex’s farm and CSA through the Local Harvest web site at http://www.localharvest.org/farms/M11431.

         Janee’s Farm is High Mill Park at 5404 High Mill Avenue in Massillon.  Her phone number is 330-309-0482.  Her shares are $10 per week per person for a 16-week season, and produce is delivered to members or may be picked up at the farm.  You can find details about Janee’s farm and CSA at her web site, http://www.highmillpark.com,  or through the Local Harvest web site at http://www.localharvest.org/farms/M19028. 

You can locate other CSA’s near you by doing a search at Local Harvest: http://www.localharvest.org.