Page 13 - the NOISE March 2014

USDA STATES AMERICANS CHOOSE A DIET THAT IS: 20% refined grain • 15% sweets 10% red meat • 10% beverages 10% frozen foods • 8% dairy 5% other meat • 5% fruit 4% non-leafy green vegetables 1.5% fats • 1.5% whole grain 0.5% leafy green vegetables
For over a decade now, while people sup- porting organic, local and sustainable, have been championing an ideal of farming in our region, Crooked Sky Farms of Phoe- nix has actually been doing what everyone says needs to be done. Few attempt farming. Less do it as successfully.
Beginning with nothing, against all odds, Crooked Sky Farms led by Frank Martin, has become the most successful small farm in Arizona, the driving force that has carried many other aspiring farmers and related businesses into the game.
The importance of Crooked Sky Farms is its ability to consistently grow a massive amount of over 60 varieties of organic veg- etables every year. Agriculture from the Phoenix area can sustain the state’s veg- etable needs year round until the higher elevation crops come into season.
Fifteen years ago, Mr. Martin embarked on his path from humble beginnings, living in a 12’ x 12’ shed with no electric and no water, on a couple of acres in the hood of south
Phoenix. All he had to his name was a bi- cycle, $60 and dream of growing affordable natural food for all people.
Mr. Martin’s parents were farm workers who emigrated from California and were on their way to Springerville, Ariz., when their truck broke down in Buckeye.
“As a family we all worked out in the field and it was very hard working cotton,” Mr. Martin recalls. “The crop dusters would fly over us and spray while we were not allowed to leave the fields.”
Mr. Martin lost his father to the effect of those chemicals, and he too suffers to this day from incessant small coughs as he talks.
The toxic legacy of industrial agriculture has inspired Mr. Martin to grow his crops completely natural with no chemicals of any sort. Even “certified organic” allows for cer- tain concentrations of manufactured prod- ucts not found in nature, to be applied to agriculture. Mr. Martin believes all chemical products — conventional or organic — must be avoided.
More people today believe in natural food and once in a while, a rare character attempts to become an organic farmer. Ac- cording to Mr. Martin, a problem many new farmers face is the need they might feel to keep a day job while trying to farm and they struggle for the time and energy needed for the commitment required by a farm.
“It all comes down to what you allow your- self to do,” said Mr. Martin. “You have to take that first step followed by the second step
and keep going ... it is just how really dedi- cated to it you want to be.”
Back when Mr. Martin was in the shed in on those initial few acres, he did not feel bad about his situation, and just kept working the land by hand and selling greens for 25¢ a pound to the neighborhood from a roadside stand, while approaching new groups who’d be interested in his fresh produce.
“There were some ladies at the Circle K down the road who would trade me a cup of coffee for a bunch of greens,” he said. “Ev- eryone has that comfort need, and as long as I had coffee, I felt fine. That was all I really needed to project me forward.”
Soon he found a produce distributor who paid him $3.75 a pound for basil and he was able to make a good weekly income grow- ing 200 pounds of basil each week. This took him only about 8 hours of work each week, which freed him up to grow even more.
“I always felt like I needed to keep pushing myself. That is when I leased a 20-acre farm in Glendale that came with a storefront,” he said.
Mr. Martin’s vegetable crop dream was soon taken to additional heights with the creation of Community Supported Agri- culture programs in Flagstaff, Tucson and Prescott, with the help of grassroots CSA organizers and inspired Arizona college stu- dents.
“Art Babbott and Gary Nabhan said they would help round-up some people interest- ed in a CSA,” Mr. Martin said. “After that, we gained few more members each year.”
By 2010, the CSA was so successful, it was not unusual for harvesters to go out in the morning and pull enough carrots to make
1000 bunches for the day. Such amounts of carrots and many other vegetables comprise 600-ft rows that need to be flood irrigated, maintained and weeded by hand. It may seem romantic on the surface, but doing this day-in and day-out becomes excruciating.
“There are not enough young people who really want to get involved aside from holding up a sign that says ‘NO GMO,”’ said Mr. Martin. “It is an empty thing to me be- cause to affect those things like Monsanto, you have to be involved in farming.”
The reason many farmers have gone to GMO products and using large machinery, according to Mr. Martin, is because farm la- bor is expensive and has been increasingly harder to find since the 1970s. Agricultural technologies like GMO, Roundup and me- chanical harvesters have aided many con- ventional farmers to compete in the econo-
mies-of-scale.
Yet this is the system consumers support
when going to most restaurants and grocery stores — one that depends on ignorance and complacency. Crooked Sky has made the conscious effort to give conscious Ari- zona consumers a local and natural option that gives us almost as much abundance as the grocery stores. At times, many things are available from Crooked Sky that will never be found in stores, like tatsoi, shingiku, purslane, quelites, purple mustards and arugula pods – that challenges consumers to try new things.
Support from the community through CSA is not what it used to be though, not so much because of the economy, said Mr. Mar- tin, but from competition with buyers clubs that import things many people want that cannot be grown in the Southwest, like avo- cados, year-round tomatoes, and pineapple.
“Most people don’t understand what is tru- ly local. Many people want fruit year-round and it just doesn’t grow that way,” said Mr. Martin. “You cannot have those things most of the year.”
Look at what the possibilities are for our region and see that Crooked Sky is able grow enough beets to feed thousands of people every week; including white, scarlet and pur- ple-top turnips; multi-colored carrots; all the radishes kids don’t eat; kale varieties for the health conscious; chard, broccoli, broccolini, rapini, cabbage, colored cauliflower, roma- nesco, sweet potatoes, colored potatoes, butternuts, yellow and red onions, native Ar- izona I’itoi onions, tatsoi, pac choy, lettuces, cilantro, sorrel, dill, fennel, purple artichokes, endive, citrus, melons, squash, corn, wheat, cucumbers, peppers, okra, tomatoes — to name a few — all piled high at CSA locations and markets across the state, into a crazy col- orful abbondanza.
For those who can see the value of this farm and the importance of what it does, perhaps you may be interested in getting involved: to learn about farming, become a farmer or help expand the strength of natu- ral food availability to people throughout the state. Crooked Sky Farms is always look- ing to good folk to join in the cause for af- fordable, natural steps towards sustainability. CrookedSkyFarms.com
| John Bianchini is a farmer in his own right, tending two wild and woolly chillens to his variety of home grown. wildcanyon@gmail.com
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