After a three year effort by local food and farming advocates, on July 21, 2009, the Ypsilanti City Council, in a unanimous 5 - 0 vote, approved the keeping of hens in urban backyards. For more details visit http://ypsiciti.com/section/News/-article-1013.html
About Us - Updated
Poultry in Motion - Why are There Chickens in the City?
Wednesday, July 22, 2009
Wednesday, June 17, 2009
Mini-Nubian Breeding bucks for sale
We currently have three (3) - 2 month old bucklings for sale. These Mini-Nubians come from a good line of milkers out of our breeder and their grand-sire is well known. Contact Peter at 734-482-2438 or peterthomason@comcast.net for prices and more information.
Friday, May 15, 2009
Free Registration to Indiedibles
Right now you can register for free with Indiedibles at http://www.indiedibles.com/ and watch cool videos about urban farming. In the "How To" section there are sessions on cold frames and greenhouse plant starting by us. In the "Stimulus Package" there is an introduction to our family and a discussion about what we are trying to do with cooperative urban agriculture. There will be more pieces done throughout the year, I hope you enjoy them and tell your friends!
Saturday, May 2, 2009
May 2009 - The Vision Expands
I am terribly behind posting new photos and information. Between the normal stuff of daily life with a large family, Becky's and my other jobs, trying to expand our growing capacity, transplanting 10,000 vegetable starts, preparing for goats to be born, and trying to figure out how to make room for 60 rabbits, I just have not gotten to it...BUT I WILL KEEP TRYING!!
This year, our daughter Aubrey has taken on the role of farm manager. She brings a lot of passion to the job as well as a wealth of wisdom and experience that are unusual for a 24- year old. She has traveled the world, spent a summer internship at Spannochia http://www.spannocchia.org/ , been involved in the renaissance of artisinal cheese making in the U.S. , and worked for Zingerman's http://www.zingermans.com/ for 7 years. She will be running our downtown farm market stand selling our produce and cheeses that she makes under the Zingerman's brand name. We are very excited to have her on board! She joins Rebecca, me, and Jil as the other part-time staff and has already helped plant more stuff tan we have ever had in the ground before by this date.
Also, we are very excited to publish this link to indiedibles http://www.indiedibles.com/ a venture headed up by our friend Michael Peters to promote and to support urban micro farming. For only $5 a month, you can get access to cool videos that provide practical advice on a whole host of topics. Their first visit here was in February and they will be documenting our work throughout the year. One of the things that will be explained in the shows is our vision of urban micro eco-farming as a cooperative community enterprise for utilizing fallow land, increasing our growing capacity, and restoring fertility to our local soil. Follow the link and subscribe!
This year, our daughter Aubrey has taken on the role of farm manager. She brings a lot of passion to the job as well as a wealth of wisdom and experience that are unusual for a 24- year old. She has traveled the world, spent a summer internship at Spannochia http://www.spannocchia.org/ , been involved in the renaissance of artisinal cheese making in the U.S. , and worked for Zingerman's http://www.zingermans.com/ for 7 years. She will be running our downtown farm market stand selling our produce and cheeses that she makes under the Zingerman's brand name. We are very excited to have her on board! She joins Rebecca, me, and Jil as the other part-time staff and has already helped plant more stuff tan we have ever had in the ground before by this date.
Also, we are very excited to publish this link to indiedibles http://www.indiedibles.com/ a venture headed up by our friend Michael Peters to promote and to support urban micro farming. For only $5 a month, you can get access to cool videos that provide practical advice on a whole host of topics. Their first visit here was in February and they will be documenting our work throughout the year. One of the things that will be explained in the shows is our vision of urban micro eco-farming as a cooperative community enterprise for utilizing fallow land, increasing our growing capacity, and restoring fertility to our local soil. Follow the link and subscribe!
Sunday, April 19, 2009
Grass-fed West Michigan Beef & Downtown Farmers Market
Be sure to check out the excellent grass-fed West Michigan beef we will start supplying to our beloved Ypsilanti Food Co-op beginning this week. The animals are lovingly raised near Hesperia (North of Muskegon) by our dear friends Bill and Patrice Bobier on their two-hundred acre farm.
One of the reasons grass-fed beef is more expensive is that the animals are not fattened in crowded, unhealthy feed lots with GMO corn. Grass-fed animals are healthier but they are leaner and smaller with a hanging weight per side of around 250 pounds as opposed to their much heavier conventionally-raised counterparts. Grass and forage is the main stay of their diet, as it is naturally for cattle. We think the meat has a better taste and consistency from this more humane and healthier way of raising them. Though it does cost more we think it is worth it - both for them and for us - so we eat less of it and use it more like a protein condiment! Try it, we think you will like it too. There will be ground beef, steaks, roasts, stew meat and even soup bones if you need them. The supply is limited so get it while it lasts.
We are also looking forward to the opening of the Downtown Ypsilanti Farmers Market in May. We will again have a stand there and be selling our fresh vegetables and Zingerman's locally made cheeses. By early May we will have our own locally grown greens for sale. See you there!
One of the reasons grass-fed beef is more expensive is that the animals are not fattened in crowded, unhealthy feed lots with GMO corn. Grass-fed animals are healthier but they are leaner and smaller with a hanging weight per side of around 250 pounds as opposed to their much heavier conventionally-raised counterparts. Grass and forage is the main stay of their diet, as it is naturally for cattle. We think the meat has a better taste and consistency from this more humane and healthier way of raising them. Though it does cost more we think it is worth it - both for them and for us - so we eat less of it and use it more like a protein condiment! Try it, we think you will like it too. There will be ground beef, steaks, roasts, stew meat and even soup bones if you need them. The supply is limited so get it while it lasts.
We are also looking forward to the opening of the Downtown Ypsilanti Farmers Market in May. We will again have a stand there and be selling our fresh vegetables and Zingerman's locally made cheeses. By early May we will have our own locally grown greens for sale. See you there!
Wednesday, April 15, 2009
Collective Urban Micro Farming
Here's a link to a new article in the Detroit Metro Times about our urban micro farm and what we are doing new this year.
http://www.metrotimes.com/news/story.asp?id=13878
http://www.metrotimes.com/news/story.asp?id=13878
Sunday, April 5, 2009
Early April 2009
Wow, I just noticed that it has been nearly a month since my last post. We have been busy here and life has a way of getting in the way of blogging - so to speak. Rebecca has been off work since February on a medical leave so that has been a big concern. She has gotten some good care though and seems to be improving, plans to be back to work this month. She and Jil are making progress on the rabbit business, sales are up, especially through a local pet store, Pet City, owned by our friends Annette and Stuart Collins. We have some really cool Lionhead rabbits...
A big event this Spring was the coming of the greenhouse courtesy of Amanda Edmonds and Growing Hope. We got all of our March starts seeded with the help of a class of 1st and 2nd graders who have come to learn and to help for the last two weeks. Collectively they planted over 1200 seeds! We now have 50 or more flats and troughs going with 3000 - 4000 seeds started.
Other news is that we are the subject of a yearlong documentary / instructional film series being produced by Michael Peters of indiedibles http://indiedibles.com/ . One of the cool things they are doing is advocating for urban farming while providing "how to" segments on everything from building cold frames to how to plant really small seeds and a bunch of things in between. I will let you know when the first piece is complete and available for viewing, it will be very soon, we have already previewed the final rough draft.
What else? Our daughter Aubrey, a cheesemaker for Zingermans and a member of the board of directors of Growing Hope has agreed to take on the role of farm manager for the Thomason Family Farm. She is helping us to take the urban farming venture to the next level of growing enough fresh and storage crops for our 5 households. By utilizing unused urban yards (unused in the sense that they are just growing grass lawns) we expect to have about 1/4 of an acre or more under tillage this year. What we don't need for ourselves we will be selling through our co-op, the Ypsilanti Food Co-op, or the downtown farmers' market in the KeyBank parking lot. From our stand at the market we plan to be selling our veggies, Zingermans cheeses, and some other items so look for us there! It looks like it will be a fun season.
Let's see, we also thinned out our flock of hens, down from 37 to 24 this week. We decided that was a number we were comfortable with so we donated the extra pullets to Dawn Farm http://www.dawnfarm.org/index.html. Manager Rick Weirich graciously took them in to help their cause.
I will try to get some photos posted soon, way behind on that. Goat kids due in a few weeks, hope to get video of that for you and write more about our collective / cooperative approach to growing more food in an urban setting and restoring fertility to the soil.
More soon!
A big event this Spring was the coming of the greenhouse courtesy of Amanda Edmonds and Growing Hope. We got all of our March starts seeded with the help of a class of 1st and 2nd graders who have come to learn and to help for the last two weeks. Collectively they planted over 1200 seeds! We now have 50 or more flats and troughs going with 3000 - 4000 seeds started.
Other news is that we are the subject of a yearlong documentary / instructional film series being produced by Michael Peters of indiedibles http://indiedibles.com/ . One of the cool things they are doing is advocating for urban farming while providing "how to" segments on everything from building cold frames to how to plant really small seeds and a bunch of things in between. I will let you know when the first piece is complete and available for viewing, it will be very soon, we have already previewed the final rough draft.
What else? Our daughter Aubrey, a cheesemaker for Zingermans and a member of the board of directors of Growing Hope has agreed to take on the role of farm manager for the Thomason Family Farm. She is helping us to take the urban farming venture to the next level of growing enough fresh and storage crops for our 5 households. By utilizing unused urban yards (unused in the sense that they are just growing grass lawns) we expect to have about 1/4 of an acre or more under tillage this year. What we don't need for ourselves we will be selling through our co-op, the Ypsilanti Food Co-op, or the downtown farmers' market in the KeyBank parking lot. From our stand at the market we plan to be selling our veggies, Zingermans cheeses, and some other items so look for us there! It looks like it will be a fun season.
Let's see, we also thinned out our flock of hens, down from 37 to 24 this week. We decided that was a number we were comfortable with so we donated the extra pullets to Dawn Farm http://www.dawnfarm.org/index.html. Manager Rick Weirich graciously took them in to help their cause.
I will try to get some photos posted soon, way behind on that. Goat kids due in a few weeks, hope to get video of that for you and write more about our collective / cooperative approach to growing more food in an urban setting and restoring fertility to the soil.
More soon!
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