Rosemary in Winter

Chris and Kim Blanchard of Rock Spring Farm and their amazing organic carrots. (Photo courtesy Bob Blanchard)

Rock Spring Farm is a family-owned farm located just south of Spring Grove, Minnesota, where farmers Chris and Kim Blanchard strive to produce healthy, delicious food that people can build a meal - and a relationship - around. In summer, Wedge customers are probably familiar with Rock Springs' organic carrots, chard, sugar loaf squash and, in winter, their organic herbs.

So about your winter herbs. How many of them are actually local?

The organic spearmint, rosemary, and the parsley in the herb mixes are local. The rest we buy from Jacob's Farm in California [which has been the long-time winter herb seller here at the Wedge]. The important thing to realize is that not all of [Jacob's Farms' herbs] are from California. They're coming from out of state organic farms in Mexico, Arizona, and Israel. The economics of production in the United States is such that it's typically cheaper to buy organic herbs abroad and freight them in than it is to grow them.

So if it's the same herbs as Jacob's Farms, why should Wedge shoppers buy Rock Springs' packaged organic herbs in winter?

Well, the main reason is that it provides support for local agriculture. For farmers in the Upper Midwest, you have a very short intense season, from May 1 to October 31. Now, most of the vegetable farmers I know are working 80+ hours a week during the summer because that's the only time to make money. Things go crazy for a few months, then the market's done, and everything drops off. But there's still work to be done, so you have to go through winter with what you earned in that short season, and you have to start NEXT year with that money, too, in the spring, when you'll have lots of start-up expenses.

But, on the other hand, if we get a little bit [of money from the herbs] every week throughout the winter, this allows us to pull back from the sheer scale and volume of [our workload] summer. It spreads out the cash flow and workload on our farm.

How did Rock Springs get started?

In 1990, I was attending Deep Springs College, where I worked 20 hours per week on the college farm. I was the Head Gardener, and I completely fell in love with it by the time I was done. Then I went to UW-Madison for a degree in Horticulture. Kim Blanchard and I met in Madison. She was the only woman in Horticulture who wanted to farm, so I married her (everyone else was going in for turf grass management or "gene jockeying"). From 1993-97, we worked for Harmony Valley Farm. We also managed the gardens at the Seed Savers Exchange in Decorah, Iowa. After that we worked some conventional jobs, hated it, and got back to farming. I consulted for Cascadian Farms out in Washington, and also managed a 5-acre organic vegetable farm in Maine.

Eventually, we had enough to start farming in the Upper Midwest. We looked at 40 different farms, and, in 1999, started Rock Springs, one mile south of the Minnesota Iowa state line, though we have a Minnesota Mailing address Spring Grove, MN). It's in the Driftless region, superb top soil, 5 acres of bottomland, 20 acres not so great ridge land but we're working on that. Pasture, woods, a trout stream in the middle of the farm. I don't fish but the kids do. We just planted 10 acres of hardwood forest (cherry, red oak, walnut, and green ash) in 2004. We'll have our first harvest of lumber in 60 years, so maybe our youngest daughters will see that happen.

What's next for Rock Springs?

We're kind of plateauing. We've grown rapidly and very successfully. Herbs continue to grow as part of our business, so we're thinking of more greenhouse space for local herbs. We'll continue to spread out our season as much as we can [as they've done with the Rock Springs herb program].

Kim and I are on the board of MOSES (Midwest Organic Sustainable Education Services), which organizes the Upper Midwest Organic Conference. I've been organizing presentations since 2000. That's a major investment of time since it's the largest organic conference in North America. Kim and I usually teach 3-5 classes at other organic farming conferences. I've also been part of the financial planning for the Land Stewardship project's Farm Beginnings Program. Kim is currently the President of the Rochester (MN) Farmers' Market.

What was the moment that you realized you wanted to farm organically?

Well, I grew up in an eco-aware and responsible house, so I was intellectually weaned on Edward Abbey, Wendell Berry and Jimmy Buffet. My default setting was organic. It was who I was.

But I think I know the moment you're talking about. I had a job at a potato research farm in Rhinelander, WI in 1992. I remember opening up the pesticide locker and saw a bag of DDT [which was banned by the US government back in 1972]. I remember staring at it and thinking, "What do you DO with it? Where do you put DDT that didn't get used?" That's kind of when it all came together. I started thinking, "I don't WANT to do this. I don't want to put a respirator when I go out to treat my crops."

--Barth Anderson