Just before you picked up this issue of Growing for Market, you likely were at your desk or computer planning out the growing season: What you will plant and where, and what supplies you’ll need to prepare for the growing season. Maybe you just charged a bunch of purchases to your credit card or scheduled payments from your bank.

Scrolling back through all of the photos tagged #toolsforgrowingformarket on Instagram I found a post of some long gauntlet gloves hanging in a packing shed that was posted by Kat Johnson when she was manager of @fieldsedgefarm back in 2020 (I also wrote up Kat’s pocket magnet knife holder in this column a few years ago). 

As I spent most of the day yesterday washing mud off of veggies in an open shed, taking extra care not to get water into my gloves, this was yet another reminder to me that I need to order a couple pairs of these gloves for me and my crew.

Last year on our farm, Moonshot Farm in East Windsor, New Jersey, we experienced a devastating year for a relatively common cut flower disease, botrytis (aka gray mold). The disease first appeared on ranunculus and freesia in our winter greenhouses, and later a different strain took hold of our lily crop. All told, we lost over $15,000 in product due to botrytis in 2023 and learned a lot of tough lessons along the way.

It’s January 2022. We’ve just returned from our annual winter vacation. No one has set foot on Ferme des Quatre-Temps farm for three consecutive weeks. The first thing we see when we arrive at the site is the row of ten caterpillar tunnels.

I’m expecting to see empty tunnels with their polyethylene neatly rolled up on top of the hoops. What I see instead: three tunnels collapsed under the weight of snow and the action of high winds during a winter storm. Several of the other tunnels have accumulated water in their plastic and are threatening to give way.

Many similar tools have been patented through the US Patent and Trademark Office.  Below are two examples of US-designed small farm transplanters, from patents filed in 1916 and 1937, respectively. They provide proof that human-scale tools—machines designed for real people to use—have existed in this country for decades, though in the shadows of gigantic-scale agriculture. Following these two is an example of a more recent Japanese invention of a transplanting machine.

This last season I have been learning the transplant tool, finding its advantages and limitations. For this article I interviewed several other farmers as well as folks at Paperpot Co. and Small Farm Works. I hope it will help distill some of the lessons I learned from my own first year and what I learned from my fellow farmers. Hopefully this information can help folks decide whether to give this system a try or perhaps work around some challenges.

In 2017, my wife, Rachel, and I moved our rural vegetable farm into the city, primarily to be closer to schools, extended family, and activities for our two young kids. The move also allowed the farm, then 11 years old, a fresh start.

We micro-sized, from 1 acre to 1/3 of an acre in production. Instead of seven buildings, we built one — a barn-house. Instead of four greenhouses, we put up two. We now sell almost all of our food within 1½ miles of the farm.

For newer farmers, it’s helpful to think of the crop planning process through the lens of sales and marketing (how much of a crop can you sell) rather than flower yields (how many bunches can you grow). While both methods have their merits, I recommend the former for one main reason: It’s easier to grow flowers than it is to sell them. More specifically, it’s easier to grow them than it is to continuously market and sell them at profitable price points on a dedicated schedule over the long term. Anyone can sell a few orders of flowers, just like anyone can do most anything once or twice. But sustaining the process over the long term is what we’re after.

Last summer I took a two-week summer vacation in June with my partner to Germany. It was right in the gap between peak planting and peak harvest time on my farm, but CSA harvests and distributions were still in full swing. I hadn’t done that in a while, but it’s also something that I’ve very intentionally set my farm up to be able to accommodate – for any member of the crew – and it’s a great tool for avoiding burnout for all of the folks on the farm.

Farmworkers play a critical role in the day-to-day operation and overall sustainability of diversified vegetable farms. But what are these individuals looking for in a work experience? Do they simply want a season spent outdoors and a few good stories, or are they hoping to pursue a long-term professional career in this field? More and more often, it’s the latter — and that’s great news for farm employers who hope to stabilize their workforce, streamline their operations, and improve quality of life for everyone on the farm.