Here are some photos and notes from the agri-tour presented by Simby Agri Tours this past weekend. Enjoy!
http://www.flickr.com/photos/21602484@N07/sets/72157623861624719/show/
Urban Micro Farm Tour
May 1, 2010
What We Do – We are a USDA registered farm raising small-scale livestock and produce for our own needs – sometimes referred to as subsistence farming – but also for sale through local farmers’ markets, wholesaling, and direct marketing. The FSA (Farm Service Agency) of the USDA as well as other agriculture groups see small and urban farms as key to making food supplies more regional again.
We currently raise several varieties of kale, chard, lettuce, spinach, onions, garlic, herbs, brassicas (broccoli, brussels sprouts, cabbages, etc.), some squash, tomatoes, wine grapes, peas, beans. We also raise Lion Head Dwarf rabbits (for sale as pets and for their manure), Mini-Nubian goats (for milk and manure), and several breeds of chickens and ducks (for eggs and manure).
How We Do It - We use intensive bio-dynamic, no-till, and Square Foot Gardening methods. All of our composted manure goes back into our gardens here and at two other sites.
Why – Urban farming initiatives are an effort to reintegrate basic food growing systems on a scale that almost anyone can use. By demonstrating the possibilities and experimenting with new techniques, smaller animals, plants, and systems we continue to learn and help others to “try on the shoes.” We say, “if the shoe fits, wear it.” No one has to replicate everything we are doing but you might find one piece of it that makes sense for you and try it on for size. We are also interested in seeing how much capacity we have in a small space so every year we try to do a little more. We also try to use the space we have as effectively as we can and to grow things here that are most suitable to the soil conditions, and the amount of light.
Estimates of how much uncooked food it takes to feed an average person range from 2 to 4.5 pounds per day. That adds up to between 730 lbs and 1,642 lbs per year. Much of that food does not come from local sources (within 100 miles). We believe that a great deal of that food can be grown or raised locally thereby saving money, giving us more control over what we eat, and reducing waste. Not only that but it is fun and challenging!
We also feel that it is important to challenge existing laws that reflect an anti-agriculture mentality. We have helped to change the ordinances in Ypsilanti and Ann Arbor over the last few years and share our experience with people from all over the country. We are currently in court – on appeal – over the enforcement of an animal control ordinance and interpretation of the Michigan Right to Farm Act.
Where – Downtown Ypsilanti, Michigan, all over the country and the world. One of the restaurants that was nominated for the James Beard Award this year is a bar and grill in Birmingham, Alabama that serves fresh produce exclusively from an urban farm there.
Who – Family members, neighbors, and friends are involved. One adult daughter and three of her friends just moved in across the street so that they could be more directly involved with the farm. One of them manages the green house for example. Another neighbor manages the rabbits. Another comes over to work in exchange for vegetables.
When Did We Start – We moved to Ypsilanti 23 years ago bringing our bee hives with us from Ann Arbor where we had been living for 12 years. Ever since we moved here we have been re-claiming the soil and augmenting it with organic matter from our compost. We started raising farm animals here 3 years ago.
Some Online Resources:
http://www.squarefootgardening.com/, http://www.biodynamics.com/, http://www.rodaleinstitute.org/new_farm, http://www.cityfarmer.org/, http://ooooby.ning.com/, http://www.microecofarming.com/, http://urbanhomestead.org/, http://www.growinghope.net/, http://www.madonnahouse.org/restoration/2008/07/apostolic_farming_in_a_city.html, http://www.urbanchickens.net/
About Us - Updated
TO SEE THE MOST RECENT POSTS SCROLL DOWN
This link will take you to a news report from 2009 on our three year effort to legalize chicken keeping in the city of Ypsilanti.
http://ypsiciti.com/section/News/Urban+chickens+in+Ypsilanti-article-966.html
A LITTLE HISTORY - The Thomason family has been farming in the same part of Richland Parish Louisiana for almost two-hundred years, but our 1/10th acre urban eco-micro farm is located in historic downtown Ypsilanti, Michigan. It is easily reached from I-94 or US-23. We are just a few miles east of Ann Arbor and thirty miles west of Detroit. We raise Mini-Nubian-Nigerian-Dwarf goats , Hubbard ISA Brown French hens, and Lionhead Dwarf rabbits.
We grow organic vegetables for our own use and sell our surplus through the Ypsilanti Downtown Farmers Market along with artisinal cheeses made by Aubrey Thomason
http://www.growinghope.net/projects/vendorprofiles.shtml
We plan to add mushrooms to our growing mix this year and will post more about that exciting development as it happens.
OTHER BLOGS - To read more about families coping with substance abuse click on this link http://hopeforourfamilies.blogspot.com
To read more of Peter's articles and essays on urban farming, Christian thought, home economics, coffins, and other topics click on this link http://notmyplans.blogspot.com
Stay tuned for more information and visit often!
This link will take you to a news report from 2009 on our three year effort to legalize chicken keeping in the city of Ypsilanti.
http://ypsiciti.com/section/News/Urban+chickens+in+Ypsilanti-article-966.html
A LITTLE HISTORY - The Thomason family has been farming in the same part of Richland Parish Louisiana for almost two-hundred years, but our 1/10th acre urban eco-micro farm is located in historic downtown Ypsilanti, Michigan. It is easily reached from I-94 or US-23. We are just a few miles east of Ann Arbor and thirty miles west of Detroit. We raise Mini-Nubian-Nigerian-Dwarf goats , Hubbard ISA Brown French hens, and Lionhead Dwarf rabbits.
We grow organic vegetables for our own use and sell our surplus through the Ypsilanti Downtown Farmers Market along with artisinal cheeses made by Aubrey Thomason
http://www.growinghope.net/projects/vendorprofiles.shtml
We plan to add mushrooms to our growing mix this year and will post more about that exciting development as it happens.
OTHER BLOGS - To read more about families coping with substance abuse click on this link http://hopeforourfamilies.blogspot.com
To read more of Peter's articles and essays on urban farming, Christian thought, home economics, coffins, and other topics click on this link http://notmyplans.blogspot.com
Stay tuned for more information and visit often!
Poultry in Motion - Why are There Chickens in the City?
August 2007 - When people ask me, and they frequently do, why we have chickens living in our Ypsilanti City yard, I usually answer, "for the eggs."
But the truth is, the main reason we have them is that it pleases my wife. And, if my wife is happy, most of the time, I am too.
What I’m referring to is the inestimable value of pleasure that philosopher-farmer Wendell Berry speaks of in, "Economy and Pleasure," an essay that should be required reading for anyone who refuses to accept the idea that a monetary bottom line is the only "real" bottom line.
There are many things about having chickens in the city that please us: gathering dew-laden forage for them early in the morning; neighbor children stopping by to feed them broccoli leaves or bugs from our garden; the cooing sounds they make when you stop for a few moments to watch them; the way they like to fly up and to sit on your shoulders when you go into the coop; the smile on our grandson Sam’s face when he sees the "chichens;" our grand-daughter Judah riding on the hood of a tractor in the Heritage Festival Parade pulling a mobile coop-float with all twelve hens inside; and of course, there are the eggs.
For several years we tried to sell our house, move to the country and start a farm but, the times and the market were against us and we finally accepted that, at least for the time being, we were going to have to stay where we were. Not that we had a problem with being here, we just felt a need to reconnect with our agrarian roots.
The thought that we were not going to be able to do that was depressing but we did our best to let go of it and to focus on growing as much of our food as we could on our one-tenth of an acre city lot.
Then one day it just got to her and she said, "I don’t ask for much. I don’t want jewelry or fancy cars, I just want to have some chickens."
My wife’s distress about this weighed on me for weeks until it finally occurred to me one day to check the city’s animal control ordinance. Though it did not specifically prohibit chickens - it allows keeping "common cage birds" and other pets – a call to the city attorney for clarification confirmed that, according to the city’s corporate and legal interpretation, they were not allowed.
This just made me more determined than ever so I decided to try to amend the ordinance by first getting the support of two city council members and then making a presentation to the public meeting of the whole council.
The members I approached had grown up in the city and remembered the days when chickens and goats were allowed to live in backyards. They supported my request for an amendment to the council but, when the mayor was dismissive of any real discussion on the subject, one of them backed down and helped "her honor" derail the prescribed process into a bureaucratic dead end.
I had not even been given the opportunity to present the details of the proposed amendment. It made me angry that a perfectly legitimate request by a tax-paying citizen could be summarily rejected on the basis of an elected official’s personal bias – she had made it known from the time I made my first presentation that she had no interest in allowing it to happen.
When I came home from the meeting the night of the vote, my wife asked how things had gone.
I answered, "we have chickens in the city!"
To which she, elated, replied, "You mean we can have chickens?"
"No," I answered tersely. "What I mean is that we already have them. They are roosting down in the city council chambers."
Later, I apologized to her for insulting the birds.
The Michigan Right to Farm Act of 1981 is little known among city dwellers because it doesn’t impact us much. That is, unless you happen to live on the outskirts of a town that has been developed through the acquisition of nearby farms.
Where farms are still operational and close enough to subdivisions to be smelled or heard, those agricultural activities are protected, and rightly so because we need them, as long as they follow GAAMPS – an acronym for Generally Accepted Agricultural Management Practices.
We need local farms, especially small family owned farms, for a whole variety of reasons which cannot just be described in economic terms.
Using the law to support having chickens in our backyard did not occur to me until I was being interviewed by Michigan Radio several months later and the interviewer suggested I look into the case of a suburban Michigan woman who had successfully used it in defense of her flock of goats. It is a surprisingly strong law, and, to my knowledge, all attempts to modify it have fallen flat.
Two recent Michigan Court of Appeals rulings - one involved a riding stable and the other a nursery - have upheld it to the extent that it trumps even local zoning requirements and ordinances.
The catch for backyard chicken keepers – or urban micro farmers like us - is that the law appears to be designed to protect those engaged in agricultural activities for commercial purposes.
We don’t have a problem with that because, as produce growers – we sell to a local food cooperative – we fit the IRS and the USDA description of farmers.
We file a Schedule F with our Federal 1040 and we also follow GAAMPS. I can imagine that the protections would be extended to subsistence farmers as well.
So, there it is. Why are there chickens in the city? It’s really all about the pursuit of happiness.
Peter Thomason is a part-time urban farmer and a carpenter. He has lived in the Ypsilanti area for 32 years with his wife Rebecca and nine of their ten children.
But the truth is, the main reason we have them is that it pleases my wife. And, if my wife is happy, most of the time, I am too.
What I’m referring to is the inestimable value of pleasure that philosopher-farmer Wendell Berry speaks of in, "Economy and Pleasure," an essay that should be required reading for anyone who refuses to accept the idea that a monetary bottom line is the only "real" bottom line.
There are many things about having chickens in the city that please us: gathering dew-laden forage for them early in the morning; neighbor children stopping by to feed them broccoli leaves or bugs from our garden; the cooing sounds they make when you stop for a few moments to watch them; the way they like to fly up and to sit on your shoulders when you go into the coop; the smile on our grandson Sam’s face when he sees the "chichens;" our grand-daughter Judah riding on the hood of a tractor in the Heritage Festival Parade pulling a mobile coop-float with all twelve hens inside; and of course, there are the eggs.
For several years we tried to sell our house, move to the country and start a farm but, the times and the market were against us and we finally accepted that, at least for the time being, we were going to have to stay where we were. Not that we had a problem with being here, we just felt a need to reconnect with our agrarian roots.
The thought that we were not going to be able to do that was depressing but we did our best to let go of it and to focus on growing as much of our food as we could on our one-tenth of an acre city lot.
Then one day it just got to her and she said, "I don’t ask for much. I don’t want jewelry or fancy cars, I just want to have some chickens."
My wife’s distress about this weighed on me for weeks until it finally occurred to me one day to check the city’s animal control ordinance. Though it did not specifically prohibit chickens - it allows keeping "common cage birds" and other pets – a call to the city attorney for clarification confirmed that, according to the city’s corporate and legal interpretation, they were not allowed.
This just made me more determined than ever so I decided to try to amend the ordinance by first getting the support of two city council members and then making a presentation to the public meeting of the whole council.
The members I approached had grown up in the city and remembered the days when chickens and goats were allowed to live in backyards. They supported my request for an amendment to the council but, when the mayor was dismissive of any real discussion on the subject, one of them backed down and helped "her honor" derail the prescribed process into a bureaucratic dead end.
I had not even been given the opportunity to present the details of the proposed amendment. It made me angry that a perfectly legitimate request by a tax-paying citizen could be summarily rejected on the basis of an elected official’s personal bias – she had made it known from the time I made my first presentation that she had no interest in allowing it to happen.
When I came home from the meeting the night of the vote, my wife asked how things had gone.
I answered, "we have chickens in the city!"
To which she, elated, replied, "You mean we can have chickens?"
"No," I answered tersely. "What I mean is that we already have them. They are roosting down in the city council chambers."
Later, I apologized to her for insulting the birds.
The Michigan Right to Farm Act of 1981 is little known among city dwellers because it doesn’t impact us much. That is, unless you happen to live on the outskirts of a town that has been developed through the acquisition of nearby farms.
Where farms are still operational and close enough to subdivisions to be smelled or heard, those agricultural activities are protected, and rightly so because we need them, as long as they follow GAAMPS – an acronym for Generally Accepted Agricultural Management Practices.
We need local farms, especially small family owned farms, for a whole variety of reasons which cannot just be described in economic terms.
Using the law to support having chickens in our backyard did not occur to me until I was being interviewed by Michigan Radio several months later and the interviewer suggested I look into the case of a suburban Michigan woman who had successfully used it in defense of her flock of goats. It is a surprisingly strong law, and, to my knowledge, all attempts to modify it have fallen flat.
Two recent Michigan Court of Appeals rulings - one involved a riding stable and the other a nursery - have upheld it to the extent that it trumps even local zoning requirements and ordinances.
The catch for backyard chicken keepers – or urban micro farmers like us - is that the law appears to be designed to protect those engaged in agricultural activities for commercial purposes.
We don’t have a problem with that because, as produce growers – we sell to a local food cooperative – we fit the IRS and the USDA description of farmers.
We file a Schedule F with our Federal 1040 and we also follow GAAMPS. I can imagine that the protections would be extended to subsistence farmers as well.
So, there it is. Why are there chickens in the city? It’s really all about the pursuit of happiness.
Peter Thomason is a part-time urban farmer and a carpenter. He has lived in the Ypsilanti area for 32 years with his wife Rebecca and nine of their ten children.
Monday, May 3, 2010
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I beg you to please contact me regarding this issue. We are meeting with our city council in Zeeland MI about our chickens. We have a few in a coop in our backyard but they found out and have given us only 10 days to "get rid of them". We have them for the fresh eggs. We have the Right to Farm paperwork but don't completely understand it. We also have the GAAMP and are following it. Please help us put the Right to Farm in simple terms so we can argue our case at the City Council on MOnday night May 17th at 7:00. Thank you so much. nikkishipley@charter.net
ReplyDeleteI emailed you with my phone number so that we can talk about the particulars of your situation and see if there is a strategy that would be helpful for you.
ReplyDelete