Greenhorns Radio

Marc Millitzer is the owner and farmer of Tree of Life Gardens in Cuba City, Wisconsin. Marc grew up in the city moving around a lot with his family until the age of ten when his family settled in eastern Iowa. Marc grew up helping on other farms. His farming experience came mostly from his extended family and neighbors. After a small career in glassblowing Marc pursued healthy living in the country and discovered organic gardening was a passion. He then traveled to Belize receiving education from a permaculture design course at Mayan Mountain Research farm. After a few years of practice in small scale gardening Marc took a course in market gardening at U.W. Madison. This spawned his current farm Tree of Life Gardens. With the help of his retired parents and his Partner Jessica Paarmann, Marc farms over ten acres of vegetables a year. He also grows many different kinds of mushrooms. He has marketed his produce in diverse ways including CSA, large wholesale accounts, local groceries, restaurants, and farmers markets. Currently Marc specializes in salad greens and mushrooms. He plans to expand his farm in the next few years and wants to explore small grain, bean, and cover crop seed production.

On this week's episode of Greenhorns Radio, Severine speaks with Dave Oien, a third generation farmer who continues to work his family’s land in Montana. Dave transitioned the land to organics back in the 80’s and started an organic seed and edible legumes business in 1987, along with three business partners. Dave, as well as Timeless Seeds and its other Montana-based legume growers, recently became publicly visible after being the focus of Liz Carlisle’s recent book, The Lentil Underground.

Today’s guests on Greenhorns Radio, Jason Angell and Jocelyn Apicello,came to farming later in life, transitioning from white collar jobs in NYC. They learned most of theirmethods on a small farm in Patagonia, Argentina and moved back to family land to start Longhaul Farm in 2011. Theyare a micro-farm (with one acre in vegetables, three in livestock, and a CSA of fifty families) — a model that theybelieve is accessible to thosewho want to grow their own food and live more sustainably. They believe the current food movement is incredibly hopeful; the start of a rising ecological consciousness that can be a springboard for a movement to promote progress across many sectors of our society – and this is what theEcological Citizens Project is all about.

This week onGreenhorns Radio, our guests are Effie Rawlings and Todd Darling.Todd and Effie were both involved in the Gill Tract protest, and the film that came out of this conflict, “Occupy The Farm.” They are excited to talk about the Gill Tract, food justice and organization tactics, as well how they captured this work on film.

OCCUPY THE FARM tells the story of 200 urban farmers who walk onto a publicly-owned research farm and plant two acres of crops in order to save the land from becoming a real-estate development. This direct action set up a vibrant tent village on land destined to become condos, while their crops blocked the development plans of a cash-starved public institution, the University of California, Berkeley. Their confrontational, yet hopeful tactic raises important questions: What are the most effective ways to bring healthy food to hungry, urban neighborhoods? And, who should control research and education at the world’s most important public university: private interests or the public good?

Sage Dilts owns and operates Barn Owl Bakery alongside her husband, Nathan Hodges. After earning a B.A. in Community Planning and Development, Sage spent time in politics and the non-profit sector working on food and nutrition issues. Then, looking for a more direct way to manifest her ideals about functional food systems, she began her baking in the Headland Center for the Arts in the Marin Headlands, working with Eduardo Morel of Morel’s Bread. The focus on small scale wood fired naturally leavened whole grain bread was the inspiration for her own baking when she moved to Lopez Island in the summer of 2011. After baking out of a small apartment in a 100 year old barn she moved to a wood fired oven at Captain Kenny’s house. Then, in the summer of 2012, Nathan built the bakery and wood fired oven and Barn Owl Bakery was born.

Nathan Hodges is the baker and all-around business helper for Barn Owl Bakery. After earning a B.S. in Environmental Science and a M.L.A. in Landscape Architecture, Nathan got charmed into managing the oven, chopping all the fire wood and baking the bread when Sage was pregnant with Eden and hasn’t looked back ever since. Nathan heads the grain trials and works with farmers on Lopez to grow more and more of the bakery’s grain. He is also a land artist and environmental consultant, look for his work at nathanrhodges.tumblr.com and nathanhodges.net.

“It’s physically demanding work, andthere’s a lot of variables that we deal with bake to bake…that makes it hard to scale up to a point of kind of an anonymous wholesale product.” [10:55] – Sage Dilts

On today’s episode of Greenhorns Radio, Megan Talley is coming to us from Spring Creek Farm in Alaska. Spring Creek Farm is a project of Alaska Pacific University, “which cultivates sustainable produce for a local market, and trains new growers.” Megan is excited to chat about what it means to farm in Alaska, and the food and agricultural context unique to the state. Megan also comes from a creative arts background, and has much to say on the role of farming and art in the community.

“Alaska needs farmers. Alaska is calling you if you’re feeling the pull.” – Megan Talley

This week’s featured farmer on_ Greenhorns Radio _ isRiannedeBeer.WhenRiannedeBeerwas asked to come work as a ships cook for -what was supposed to be only- a month on sailing cargo vessel Tres Hombres ‘because they really needed one at the time’, little did she know she was going to sail the world for the following two years. This dynamic and organic way of evolving is distinctive for the expanding fleet of Fair Transport. The three bro’s, Andreas, Arjen and Jorne, started the whole project with such power full vision and energy, it is hard not to get swept and sailed away by the ‘Tres Hombres’. Even though the hundred feet long wooden Schoonerbrik Tres Hombres has more soul and sailing spirit then any other ship out there, it is also a vessel to carry the message of Fair Transport: Emission Free Cargo Sailing. During the transatlantic crossing of 2014/2015Riannewas cooking three deserving meals for the fifteen hungry sailors in any kind of weather condition. With only a humble gas stove, no electricity or running water and a limited budget, it was a challenging task to endure. Not only at sea but also at port where provisions had to be purchased. Sailing to remote area’s madeRiannerealize that at some places you can’t always get what you want, but more suprisingly at other places where you least expected it, you could. The huge pressure the consumers demand were painfully visible in the strain put upon the local eco system of the visited islands.RiannedeBeeris currently continuing to raise awareness of the importance and effects of consuming behavior in her hometown of Rotterdam. Graduated a BSc in Art Therapy in Leiden and a BSc in Cultural Studies at the University of Amsterdam,Riannemakes use of art and cultural platforms to spread the message of Fair Transport.

Tune in for this week’s episode of Greenhorns Radio with guest Evan Marks. With his formal education and background in permaculture and agroecology, and, having worked extensively in domestic and international domains, Evan knows that people have the ability to directly impact the environment through individual change. As the founder and Executive Director of The Ecology Center in San Juan Capistrano, Evan and his team focus on activating change through individual and collaborative effort to improve our cultural and ecological environments. As a leader of regional hub, focused on building ecological environments within our household, schools, and workplaces, Evan has the tools to transform just about any space, small and large. His work often focuses on the intersection between individuals, communities and their basic needs; food, water, waste, energy, and shelter, designing solutions to our current environmental and cultural challenges.

_ Greenhorns Radio _‘s featured guest this week is John Chester. While elbow deep in a cow assisting a difficult birth, you’d never guess that John spent the first 20 years of his career making documentary films. As the directorof such critically-acclaimed films as Lost in Woonsocket (OWN) & Rock Prophecies(PBS), as well as the star and show runner of Random 1 (A&E) has built manyteams in his career, which certainly helps to develop the amazing group of people atApricot Lane Farms. John and his wife Molly run the elaborate and integrated operation. John focuses on the 213 acres of orchard floor (grass) and the Integrated Holistic Livestock Program. He also builttheir unique and active WWOOF program. Molly focuses on the fruit selection flavor and the culinary program that turns the fruit into product lines.

Today’s featured guest is Ryan Power.

Ryan Power farms where he grew up in Sebastopol, CA. He attended the apprenticeship in ecological horticulture at the Center For Agroecology and Sustainable Food Systems in Santa Cruz, CA. He spent time on a small farm in New Mexico learning to use draft horses, which he then used for the first four years farming in Sebastopol. Now, as co-owner of New Family Farm, he manages 15 acres of diverse, organic vegetable production, and a side project growing quinoa.