This first volume of the Fibershed Producer Newsletter is designed to be a space to re-acquaint and connect, as well as refresh ourselves on the who and what of our projects and collective efforts.
We look forward to hearing from you about what kinds of information sharing, column ideas, poems, art, doodles, updates on your family and business, and notes from the field that you’d like to offer for the next publication. Newsletters will come out twice yearly to start, and our next edition will be sent in February of 2019.
Ongoing Public Notices: Do you have an internship, a residency, an ongoing course or service that you offer? We will include a Producer Classified Section in our next newsletter.
Classified ads, as well as your thoughts and visions, should be emailed to office@fibershed.com. Feel free to submit both your ideas and your classified ads between now and December 15th.
Welcome New Producers
Midway through our calendar year, we want to welcome and highlight producers who have joined our Northern California Producer community, up to July of 2018. As always, you can find information about local fiber, dyes, and skills within our community, alongside direct links to contact or support their enterprises, in our Producer Directory: fibershed.com/producer-directory/
• 5 Creek Farm – Offering free range eggs, lamb, walnuts, and wool from Romney sheep, Colleen Maloney also hosts the annual Sonoma County Fiber Trails Spinner’s Day on the Farm.
• Alpacas on the Rocks – Nancy Shelton raises alpacas in Weed, CA and specializes in needlefelting.
• Bio Hue – Inspired by the alchemy of pigment production, artist Judi Pettite crafts botanical inks and watercolors as mindfully and sustainably as possible, sourcing from materials grown and foraged locally as much as possible. Judi also teaches classes throughout the region, including at West County Fiber Arts in Sebastopol and A Verb for Keeping Warm in Oakland.
• Cast Away Yarn Shop – Justine and Cleo Malone offer a welcoming space for knitters of all ages in Santa Rosa, and are launching a knitting pattern app called Placemarker. They recently cohosted the Sonoma County Yarn Hop and previously participated in the Fibershed Knitalong Roundtable.
• Erin & Mark Liiv – Raising a small flock of Navajo-Churro sheep outside the quaint town of Bodega, Mark and Erin are devoted to restoration ecology. They guard their sheep with a llama and fences, and they tend a small garden and 4-year-old human named Freiya.
• Freestone Ranch – Guided by the principle that “we eat our ideas, building respect for all of life in each footstep and each choice we make in a day,” Freestone Ranch raises cattle and produces leather, along with indigo and other natural dye plants in Sonoma County.
• HexenWald Ranch – For Babette Turk and family, HexenWald Ranch in the hills of Aptos, is their “lifelong dream made reality,” producing organic food and incorporating diverse livestock, including Icelandic, Karakul, Leicester, Merino, and Navajo Churro sheep, as well as Pygora goats.
• Huntergatherer Artifacts – A basketmaker and natural dyer, Hunter Wallof is also a grower of willow rods in West Marin. He is a mindful gardener, practicing minimal disturbance in order to promote a healthy carbon cycle.
• Keyaiira – Santa Rosa-based maker Keyaira Terry weaves with fiber, leather, yarn, and found objects in nature. She teaches tapestry weaving at many locations around the Bay Area, including Fiber Circle Studio in Cotati, CA.
• Lorran Bronnar – Based in Monterey County, Lorran Bronnar raises Suffolk sheep in an integrated farmscape that includes chickens, vegetables, and oak forest.
• Milk & Honey 1860 – Passionate about preserving and educating about rare and heritage English long wool sheep, including Leicester Longwool, Teeswater, Wensleydale breeds, Elizabeth Larson and family offering roving, yarn, goat milk soap, and creative goods raised in Butte County.
• Occidental Arts & Ecology Center – With an 80-acre research educational center in Sonoma County with a Certified Organic nursery growing flax, indigo, natural dye plants, nettle, dye plant starts, OAEC is a center for permaculture teaching and education.
Clockwise from top left: Keyaira Terry; Owl Oak Acres; Babette Turk of HexenWald Ranch; Gotland sheep at Pont Farm; heritage wool products by Milk & Honey 1860 (photo by Paige Green); Lora Kinkade of Ovis Aries Shearing & Fiber; Uptown Alpacas; Cynthia Kuhlman of Sierra Rose Alpacas (center image). Photos courtesy of producers, except as noted.
• Ovis Aries Shearing & Fiber – Lora Kinkade is a triple-certified shearer through the UC Extension shearing school in Hopland, and offers professional, humane, fiber-oriented shearing, along with raw fleece purchases and sales, and dye plant seeds and starts grown in Sebastopol.
• Owl Oak Acres – Now offering Merino fleeces to hand spinners and commercial buyers alike, Owl Oak Acres began in 2015 when Dawn Graham and family decided to return to their roots, leave the suburbs behind, and focus on organic, ethical livestock production.
• Pont Family Farm – Bringing a Swedish breed of sheep to Petaluma, Joan Pont raises the dual-coated Gotland breed which is noted for long, soft, and lustrous fiber in light grey color with natural variation.
• Rhoby’s Ranch – Rhoby Cook’s Romeldale sheep graze the landscape and provide fiber for her spinning, knitting, design services and education, in the Hoopa Valley.
• Sierra Rose Alpacas – Cynthia and Howard Kuhlman in Grass Valley, CA aim to serve “as the bridge for future generations to experience the wonders, enrichment and mutual respect that animals and humans give to each other” as well as produce and showcase the excellence of domestic Alpaca fiber.
• Sophie’s Icelandic Sheep – Sophie Sheppard and family raise Icelandic sheep in Modoc county, offering custom grazing and modeling integrated crop and livestock systems, Sophie is also a felter, knitter, and spinner.
• Sunny Oak Farm – Raising Merino and Shetland x Icelandic sheep in the Sierra Foothills, Mike Wolterbeek stewards the oak groves, manzanita, and open pastures on the family’s 18 acre ranch.
• Timefelt – Mendocino-based felt artist Timothy Easterbrook works across multiple felting methods to create artwork and teach courses.
• Uptown Alpacas – Anne and Keith Schroder care take of a 3-acre parcel in Sebastopol with an exuberant alpaca herd prancing through the field.
• Valhalla Yarns – Showcasing the soft and cashmere-like feel of Alpaca combined with the resilience of sheep’s wool, Signe Ostby proudly creates yarns and roving exclusively from their San Mateo-based herd of Alpaca and Cormo wool, using small American mills.
• Valley Oak Wool Mill – Marcail McWilliams is reviving the opportunities for local fiber to be carded, spun, and made into valueadded products within our region. Don’t miss her video feature from PBS.
• Womack Family Farm – In the foothills of the Sierra Nevada, David and Haley Womack raise a beautiful flock of sheep including Dorpers, Merinos, and Romney sheep for wool and lamb meat, alongside a diverse operation including beekeeping, pigs, chickens, ducks, and miniature horses too.
Passing of Time
We remember Dana Foss, a beloved member of the fiber community, after her passing in January of this year. A Fibershed member since 2012, Dana raised a multitude of fiber animals, including the rare and unique guanaco, and was an avid fiber artist. She participated in the Wool & Fine Fiber Symposium, and was a founding member of Lambtown, a fiber festival held in Dixon, CA, where she lived. She will be missed.
Clockwise from top left: Judi Pettite of BioHue; Colleen Maloney of 5 Creek Farm; Valhalla Yarns alpacas; Marcail McWilliams at Valley Oak Wool Mill (photo by Paige Green); inside Cast Away Yarn Shop; Rhoby Cook of Rhoby’s Ranch; inside the nursery at Occidental Arts & Ecology Center; the textures of TimeFelt by Timothy Easterbrook (center image). Photos courtesy of producers except as noted.
Producer Voices
Chico Flax Builds Hedgerows and Carbon on New Site, With HSP Support
BY SANDY FISHER AND DURL VAN ALSTYNE
In January of this year we took over a 3.75-acre plot in southwest Chico that had been an unproductive almond orchard, complete with a wonderful barn. What was once a carbon sequestered environment from the orchard had been cleared and was now an open field surrounded by other nonproductive acres of star thistle, tumbleweed and non-native grasses— the perfect setting to bring back some well-needed health. At that same time, Fibershed sent out a notice about the Healthy Soils Program Incentive Grants through CDFA. We saw an opportunity to use the grant funding to create a hedgerow for animal and insect habitat and to rotate our flax with a cover crop; we jumped onboard.
In May of this year we were awarded $10,600 to be used over a three-year period. We will start our implementation this fall. Year One of the grant will incorporate the planting of the hedgerow and one half of the 3.75 acres in a cover crop. Our hedgerow will use a variety of native California plant varieties within an 8-foot-wide span covering 1600 linear feet around the property, including Red Bud, Blue Elderberry, Coffeeberry, California Buckwheat, and Salvia Bees’ Bliss, just to name a few. We selected plants for the hedgerow to produce blossoms all year round and to use for natural dyes.
Year One also will see the implementation of a cover crop rotation. We will start our first winter season with one half of the acreage in flax, the other in cover crop. When not in flax production we will have a summer cover crop. In Years Two and Three we will expand our flax production, reducing cover crop acreage during our winter flax season, while maintaining the summer cover crop. The winter cover crop will include a variety of mixed seeds such as Bell Bean, Biomaster Bean, Purple Vetch, Hairy Vetch, Common Vetch and Cayuse. Our summer cover crop mix will include buckwheat and cowpea.
In order to plant the 900+ plants in our hedgerow, we will invite several organizations from our community and beyond to assist us with planting. Chico Flax will be sponsoring four work weekends from September to October of this year. We will have these weekends posted on the Fibershed events calendar along with our website, chicoflax.com, if any of our fellow Fibershed members would like to help with this project.
(Photos by Paige Green)
Shepherd to Shepherd: Knowing our Wool
BY DAN MACON, FLYING MULE FARM AND UC COOPERATIVE EXTENSION
Isuspect that most of us who are involved with Fibershed take our wool (and other fiber) pretty seriously—regardless of the scale of our operations. If we’re fiber artists as well as shepherds (and I’m definitely not that talented), we’ve likely worn garments made from our wool (I am lucky enough to have several hats that others have knitted or crocheted for me). But if you’re like me, you may have never taken the time to have your wool scientifically analyzed.
This year during our shearing, we randomly selected wool from five ewes that were representative of our flock genetics and submitted samples to the Montana Wool Lab at Montana State University in Bozeman. The lab uses an OFDA 2000 portable wool testing machine to determine fiber diameter and variability, comfort factor, and staple length. The machine can also measure variation in fiber diameter along the staple. Comfort factor and fiber diameter variation were especially interesting to me. Comfort factor is the percentage of fibers in the sample that are 30 microns in diameter or less—in commercial clothing production, according to the lab, wool should have a comfort factor of 95% or more. Fibers greater than 30 microns are more likely to be scratchy or cause skin irritation. Since we raise coarse-wool sheep, our measured comfort factors where fairly low (ranging from 22% in a Blueface Leicester x Cheviot ewe to 64% in a Blueface Leicester x Rambouillet ewe). Having worn my hats, I’ve found our wool to be much more comfortable than the wool test would suggest!
As a shepherd, I was especially interested in looking at the variation in wool diameter. The OFDA 2000 measures individual wool fibers every five millimeters along the fiber. The test results are presented in the form of a graph, with the fiber tip diameter on the left side of the graph and the fiber base (closest to the skin) on the right. Environmental, production and nutritional factors can cause variation in diameter—things like gestation, transition from irrigated pasture to dry forage, disease or infection can result in finer (and potentially weaker) fiber. A relatively flat line on the graph indicates more uniform wool growth throughout the year. Here’s an example of the data we received on two of our ewes (2006 is a BFL x Cheviot maiden ewe; 1399 is the BFL x Rambo ewe):
As an out-of-state (that is, non-Montana) producer, the testing cost us a total of $5 per sample—which seems very reasonable to me. I now have much more knowledge about the attributes of our wool, which will help me in marketing our wool clip. More importantly, from my perspective, we can begin to identify critical points during our production year when we should pay more attention to the factors that influence fiber diameter. Knowledge, even for wool producers, is powerful!
Fibershed’s Wool Book
Qualitative and quantitative details about our region’s wool and fine fibers have been collated in the traveling Wool Book. This living library of protein fibers features details on micron count, annual quantity, color, and price points. The Oakland based Re-Fashion event during Fashion Revolution Week was a space were the general public and the design community were exposed to this resource. (Photo by Paige Green)
Milling Updates
Valley Oak Wool Mill
Begun in November of 2017, Valley Oak Wool & Fiber Mill has completed its first year in business, owned and operated by Marcail McWilliams (photo above), in Woodland, CA. VOWFM has both its own line of wool batting available, as well as offering custom milling services to the fiber community. Recent projects include spinning yarns for Twirl and Windrush Farm. Of particular note is a pioneering wool-hemp blend (think linsey-woolsey, but with hemp) for Twirl.
Valley Oak can process raw fiber into clouds, batting, sliver, roving, and single- or double-ply yarn. Minimum lot size is 10 lbs raw, skirted fleece. Current turnaround times range from 4-8 months.
To get a quote, visit the Pricing & Services Available page on their website: valleyoakwoolmill.com/
Mendocino Wool & Fiber Inc.
Mendocino Wool & Fiber Inc. is now carding wool and creating carded wool blends. We can wash and card your fibers into roving or cloud. We prefer to accept fleece with low vegetable matter, strong staple and length between 3 and 7 inches. (There can be some exceptions, and feel free to contact us if you have questions.) Turn around time is one to two months at this point. In addition to carding, we also offer workshops and space for others to teach workshops. We have a 24-harness dobby loom and we can take special orders for weaving. We look forward to working with you.
Contact Sarah Gilbert (photo above) for orders: figsrag@gmail.com
(Photos by Paige Green)
The Northern California Fibershed Cooperative
How can our community support a thriving regional economy? Fibershed has long focused on identifying regional needs and assets, prototyping solutions, and building relationships that value the true cost of fiber production and regeneration of our working lands. As a 501c3 nonprofit organization, Fibershed works to improve the health and strength of the regional fiber system, providing education, resources, and direct connectivity for all those involved in local fibers, local dyes, and local labor. Though our programmatic work aligns with economic development to serve the producer community, the limitations of administrative structures and tax restrictions make it difficult to directly and wholly support market-based activities. In 2017, Fibershed welcomed support from a USDA VAPG grant to explore marketplace structures for the producer community to share resources and market development activities.
In consultation with lawyer Jenny Kassan, the Northern California Fibershed Cooperative was formed as an agricultural cooperative. The Coop shares the values and vision of Fibershed yet its legal structure allows it to engage and support regional producers and economic activity in a unique and complementary way. Fibershed will continue to serve the community and broader movement for regional, regenerative fiber systems as a nonprofit organization, and is excited by the possibilities that the Coop offers to producer members and consumers alike.
The Northern California Fibershed Cooperative is a California Agriculture Producers Cooperative formed in 2018. Its mission is to provide stability and lasting prosperity for independent producers who own and operate farms and ranches; and for those who create goods from locally grown materials within our Northern California Fibershed through cooperative marketing, value added production, and education. The Coop will promote the use and production of regionally grown materials, and support our community to enhance and restore our soil, water, and the health of the biosphere.
UPCOMING WEBINAR
All producers are invited to learn more in a digital gathering (webinar) on August 27th at 10:00 AM Pacific. Jenny Kassan and Erin Axelrod will provide information and short presentations to share “What is an Agricultural Coop and How Can it Benefit My Business?” Invitations to register for this webinar will be sent to all producers by email, or you may sign up directly by emailing your RVSP to Jess at office@fibershed. com; a recording of the webinar will be shared via email with all Fibershed producer members.
Samples of inks and paints made from plants and minerals by Judy Pettite of BioHue.
The founding directors of the Coop are producer members of Fibershed: Robin Lynde, Carol Frechette, and Lani Estill. The inaugural board and officers are Stephany Wilkes, President; Rebecca Burgess, Vice President; Lani Estill, Treasurer; Robin Lynde, Recording Secretary; and Carol Frechette, Membership Secretary. In the future, Coop members will vote for board members after the founding group serves out their initial terms.
The Coop, with support from attorney Jenny Kassan, carefully considered what it would take to achieve its goals. They have raised capital and accepted funding from the LIFT Economy Force For Good Fund to develop a robust Marketplace website, and to support Coop operations that bring producer goods to market.
THE FIBERSHED MARKETPLACE RETURNS
Thanks to the formation of the new Northern California Fibershed Cooperative, the online Fibershed Marketplace is back, in beta form, and is now accepting merchants. Read on to learn how to list your goods for sale:
Step One: Ensure your goods follow the Fibershed Certified Product Guidelines: bit.ly/2MGgE4L
Step Two: Join the Northern California Fibershed Cooperative, a forprofit agriculture cooperative which built and operates the Fibershed Marketplace. The Marketplace test site can be seen here: fibershed.testblock.co
There are different levels of Coop membership, depending on whether you are a Producer, Processor, Distributor, Artisan, or existing Fibershed Producer member. If you live outside of the Northern California geography, but your goods meet the Fibershed Certified Product Guidelines, you can join the Coop as a Community Supporter. Join here: bit.ly/2KM8uGe
After you join, you will receive information on how to create a Fibershed Marketplace account, log in, and list your items for sale.
Step Three: Prepare your products for the Marketplace. Watch a series of instructional videos from photographer Paige Green on how to take beautiful photos on a white background in your home or studio, using simple, inexpensive materials. Watch the videos here: bit.ly/2nrFFpA
Step Four: Sell! Learn more about how the Marketplace operates in terms of commission, payment, shipping and more: bit.ly/2PllPsV
These are examples of products sold on the prior Fibershed Marketplace site, including work by (clockwise from upper right): Robin Lynde, Amy Keefer, Matt Katsaros, Bonnie Chase and Carol Frechette. (Photos by Paige Green)
Farther Afield
Each producer program newsletter will include a little inspiration from a far-away land whose community members are engaged in a life that has many qualities similar to those working in our Northern California Fibershed.
Regional Manufacturing Is Not Dead: Notes from the SENE Fibershed
BY AMY DUFAULT
The mission of the Southeastern New England Fibershed, a project of Southeastern Massachusetts Agricultural Partnership (SEMAP), is to build a regional fiber system in Southeastern New England centered around local fibers, local dyes, and local labor. From farmer to processor, from financing to cut and sew, we are connecting the dots of the supply chain to bring production back to reinvigorate a oncethriving New England textile industry. We base our geographic radius on the historical textile processing centers of New Bedford, MA, and Providence, RI, both of which have extensive remaining infrastructure.
As our SENE Fibershed intern Emma Werowinski says in her recent blog post Is New England Textile Manufacturing Dead?, “We know the facts of the decline in U.S. textile production over the past 50 years. Competition from foreign imports, combined with less institutional support, manufacturing equipment sold overseas, financial crashes, and production shifting from traditionally New England based manufacturing to the Carolinas where labor was cheaper. What we don’t always know is how and why existing mills have survived and what they need to do to keep surviving.”
This is only part of the challenge we have taken on and are trying to solve.
To date, Fibershed SENE’s activities have focused on assessing these regional needs and mapping information about the local fiber processing and manufacturing chain. Our activities to date have included the Southeastern Massachusetts and Rhode Island Fiber and Textile Roundtable, a pilot regional Wool Pool in collaboration with Bristol Agricultural High School and Bartlett Yarns, and expansion of Emma’s New England Mill Inventory (coming soon to our website!).
As part of SEMAP, we also see that local textile manufacturing on a small scale parallels the efforts made over the past two decades to rebuild local food systems. Fiber – in the form of both animalbased and plant-based products – has significant potential to spur economic growth at an appropriate scale and to support the farming community. To continue to support the production of regional fiber, we need to improve the existing infrastructure and increase the level
of communication and collaboration, not just between the food and fiber farming industries, but also with our community at large through creative outreach and consumer education.
We are already seeing so much positive growth and interest in our work today and are excited for the opportunity-filled future.
Learn more about the SENE Fibershed at senefibershed.org, read their latest blog posts at senefibershed.org/blog, and follow on Instagram @senewenglandfibershed
Norwegian Inspiration from Lofoten Wool
Ragnhild
Lie started Lofoten Wool in 2014 as an agritourism, farm yarn, and finished product business. ‘Rags’ is how her friends know her, and she began life as a fine artist and graphic designer—two skills that she employs consistently with Lofoten Wool. She moved to the farm in the Northern part of Norway to raise a traditional breed of sheep, the Villsau. She is a single mother who recently extended her business out of her home and built a second story onto her barn that now includes her farm shop, her dye studio, and her office. The office doubles as a dining room for guests who would like to sit down with Rags for a home-cooked root vegetable and leg of lamb lunch or dinner. People who enter her shop are greeted by a pot of fresh tea, with the option for coffee, while surrounded by drying skeins of naturally dyed yarn swinging on drying racks overhead.
Rags lives just a short distance from Norway’s most northern wool pool station—a place where she purchases her neighbors’ wool, grades it, and then bundles it to send it off to the Hillesvag mill south of her farm. With the yarn from the mill, Rags uses her art and design background to generate modern and clean lined patterns for blankets that she has woven at the local weaving mill; she also designs sweaters that are inspired by traditional Norwegian design but veer just enough outside the canon to be enticingly original. She works with home knitters throughout the region to put her old breed yarns into play as beautifully warm and lightweight sweaters. Within her farm shop you can also purchase cured lamb and sheepskins.
When we caught up with Rags just before publication of this newsletter she said the summer had gone very well and that her business is thriving. She works long days on the farm, caring for sheep, her son, and managing her flow of products and finances. Her business got off the ground with the help of friends, family and a local bank that provides low interest ‘cultural loans’ to those individuals who are keeping Norwegian farming and craft alive and well. If you happen to be in Norway, we recommend a trip to Lofoten Wool!
Leedon Webbing, above (photo by Emma Werowinski) and Bartlett Yarns, top right (photo by Charlotte Atkinson)
The farm store sits atop the winter quarter sheep barn, and is filled with natural colored and naturally dyed yarns, hand knit sweaters, wool blankets, cured meats, and hides.
The sweater pattern at right is inspired by stones and generated from old Norse breed wool, hand knit in the town of Leknes.
(Photos by Lena-Therese Lie)
The Lofoten Wool farm is on a fjord in Northern Norway where sheep graze on perennial grasses and heather.
Fibershed Producer Program Business Course Offering
The non-profit has been working with Olivia Tincani through our Textile Economy Program on a business curriculum that will take place primarily in the winter of 2019, with a first phase financial literacy course being held this September. Your participation is not only welcome, we also look forward to receiving your feedback about this first ever offering.
Financial Basics for Businesses in the Fiber & Natural Dye Economy
Date: Wednesday, September 19, 2018
Time: Noon (12pm) Pacific Daylight Time
Length: 90 minutes
Taught by: Olivia Tincani and Anjali Oberoi
Description: Our first session in a series of business and financial skill-building courses, this webinar is Part I of a two-part course. Part I will focus on getting comfortable with financial lingo, understanding the purpose of financial statements, and making time to use them in the course of business. Our goal is to teach comfort and confidence in financial language and concepts for sustainable, values-driven entrepreneurs whose businesses are not focused solely on the bottom line. We will also discuss choosing and using an accounting system with particular emphasis on QuickBooks Online. Participants should ideally have some familiarity with keeping and maintaining business financial records in some format, and are highly encouraged to set up an accounting software account prior to the session, although it is not a prerequisite for attending the class.
This course is offered free of charge for all Fibershed Producer Program Members whose membership is current. If you have questions about your membership status, you can email Marie Hoff at: producerprogram@fibershed.com
To RSVP for the course please email: olivia@oliviatincaniandco.com
TOPICS TO BE COVERED IN PART I:
1. Financial Lingo
• Accrual vs Cash Accounting
• Char t of Accounts
2. Financial Statements
• Income Statement, Balance Sheet, Cash Flow Statement
• Finance Building Blocks
• Revenue: Understanding volume and sales channels
• Costs: Cost Of Goods Sold, Operating Expenses, Capital Expenses
• Understanding the difference between assets & liabilities
3. Using financial statements
• Prioritizing use and application
• Must do’s & can do’s of small business accounting
4. Accounting system use for business efficiency
• Introduction to QuickBooks Online
• Links to relevant tutorials
Instructors
Olivia Tincani (below left) is a food and agriculture consultant and educator. Her work focuses on farmer and rancher training, strategic and business planning, curriculum development, whole animal supply chains, communications and food systems development.
Anjali Oberoi (below right) founded Bernoulli Finance to address critical gaps at fast-growing ecologically-minded companies, helping them record, monitor, and use their financial data for better decision making and long term planning. In addition to advisory services, Anjali is a frequent instructor of all things Finance and has taught classes and workshops with numerous organizations across the country.
PART II (TO TAKE PLACE IN 2019):
Part II of this course will focus on using the skills and tools taught in Part I, and will require participants to be set up with an accounting software. Part II details will be announced later in the year and will take place in the early part of 2019, giving participants plenty of time to implement outcomes of Part I and set up accounting software.
Fibershed’s Annual Wool & Fine Fiber Symposium
Save the Date: November 10th, 2018
This year’s Wool Symposium will focus upon two fundamental soilto-skin themes that have touched all of our community members in some way, shape, or form. The first of these themes is Fire Ecology and its Connection to Fiber and Natural Dye Systems. We will deepen our understanding of human led land-management practices that have shaped the form and function of our region’s ecology from over ten thousand years ago to the present day. We will hear from speakers who actively practice, study, and organize land-based cultural projects in our region that are re-engaging time honored and emergent methods to enhance balance, complexity, and the overall health of the of the land from which our textile material culture derives.
The second theme of the Symposium focuses upon the preciousness of our natural fiber and dye materials; we will hear from designers who are translating their understanding of how to retain balance in an ecosystem and what that functionally means for how we make and use our garments. We will learn more about the ‘functional use’ stage of a garment and hear from those that are seeking new ways to support us in retaining higher quality garments and textiles for much longer periods of time than what we see manifest in the throw away models promulgated by faster forms of fashion.
Current Speakers (more are on their way): Dr. Kat Anderson – Author of Tending the Wild; Jared Childress – Prescribed Fire Specialist for Audubon Canyon Ranch and Prescriptive Grazer; Lenya QuinnDavidson – Director of the Northern California Prescribed Fire Council; Nick Tipon – Chairman of Sacred Sites Graton Rancheria; Paige Trotter – Sweet Grass Grazing; Brittany Cole Bush – Grazing School of the West; Christian Cain – prescriptive grazing; Melissa Tregilgas – Free Hand Farm; Dr. Amelie Gaudin – Gaudin Lab UC Davis; Timo Rissanen – Parsons School of Design; Sierra Reading – artist, designer, teacher; Geana Sieburger – designer, seamstress & educator; and many more, including community member updates.
If you have a community update (job opportunity, a new venture, a beneficial reminder about a program or offering) that you would like shared at the Symposium please email Rebecca Burgess at harvestingcolor@gmail.com
All Fibershed producers who are not already vending at the Symposium will receive the first opportunity to purchase tickets to this event two weeks prior to the general public. Look for emails with ticket details in early-September in your inbox. This event sells out every year!
(Photo by Paige Green)
Healthy Soils Program Funding Opportunity Update
California’s Healthy Soils Program (HSP) will issue new guidelines for Incentives and Demonstration Projects and a Request for Grant Applications this November, followed by an eight-week application period. With $8.5 million in this round allocated from the recently passed Parks and Water Bond, the program provides financial incentives for new adoption or expansion of agricultural practices that improve soil health, sequester carbon and reduce greenhouse gas emissions. CDFA has released a set of draft guidelines and budget worksheets, with an opening for public comment on these proposals until September 12. Fibershed is preparing a comment letter and would love to hear any feedback on the current program proposal from our members. In the first round of HSP funding, five Fibershed producers received HSP support to initiate new carbon farming practices. We would like to see many more members receive support in the future.
This year several new practices are proposed for inclusion in the program, including prescriptive grazing, range planting, forage and biomass planting, and on-farm produced compost that follows specific management protocols. We encourage you to look over the proposed guidelines here, where you can find a list of eligible practices and a worksheet showing proposed incentive funding: cdfa.ca.gov/oefi/ healthysoils/IncentivesProgram.html
Contact Heather Podoll at Fibershed with any questions or comments: hpodoll@gmail.com
Soil Carbon Stewardship and Enhancement: Citizen Science at Work
By August 2018, a total of 44 farms and ranches have taken soil samples as part of the Citizen Science Protocol, a program made possible through a collaboration that has been fostered between Fibershed and the Gaudin Lab at UC Davis. This unique opportunity allows producer members to have soil samples taken at no cost to them and provides analysis of their results from the Gaudin Lab’s Junior Soils Research Specialist, Kelsey Brewer. The soil sample results and Gaudin Lab analyses provide producers a quantitative soil organic carbon metric for each field, pasture, or rangeland system that they’ve tested, and these carbon figures provide producers an understanding of how much carbon they are currently stewarding within their soils—we call this ‘carbon baseline’. During follow-up calls with the lab, producers are able to discuss and think through how management effects soil carbon levels, and what kinds of management will enhance those levels. Based on the current number of test sites, results show that participating producers are currently managing a quantity of soil carbon that equates to over 652, 816 gallons of oil.
The Gaudin lab has also been able to describe to producers how the carbon in their soils compares to unmanaged soils (non-working landscapes) with the same texture and in the same region. This has provided producers with information that has helped them to understand how their management is potentially enhancing soil carbon levels beyond what unmanaged systems are naturally sequestering—or, it can also show how management is leading to losses in soil carbon.
Why is soil carbon the focal point you may ask? Soil scientists have come to understand what many farmers and ranchers have known for some time, which is that soil carbon is an indicator of overall soil health that leads to improved ecosystem function. Increasing one’s soil organic carbon has shown to purify water, denature pollutants, provide microbial habitat, decrease erosion, increase water infiltration, reduce the risk of fire, reduce flooding, improve stream flow, increase plant available water, improve soil structure and tilth, store plant nutrients, increase yields, increase biodiversity, and very importantly—increasing soil organic carbon helps us to achieve our climate goals.
Having your soil carbon levels tested is a first step in entering into Fibershed’s Climate Beneficial Transitional Program. This is a program that includes committing to three steps: 1) Having your soil carbon samples taken, 2) Having a follow-up consultation with the Gaudin Lab, 3) Committing to, and implementing one new management shift that is known to increase soil organic carbon. After these steps are taken, Fibershed issues tags and logos that support you in communicating your efforts to build healthy soil and soil carbon with the people and community members that purchase your goods. For more details on the Climate Beneficial Transitional program you can email: producerprogram@fibershed.com
What the Gaudin lab has to say about Fibershed Producer managed landscapes:
“ There is great potential to increase soil organic carbon, water holding capacity, and productivity in Fibershed producer landscapes, and it has been great to have conversations with the producer community to brainstorm and share ways in which we can do this!”
“Getting these results was so helpful! Thank you for making this possible for us all!”
– Amy Skezas, Meridian Farm, Petaluma
“We have always loved our land and wildlife so we decided that building healthy soil could be part of our legacy.”
– Colleen Simon, Fiber Confections, Vacaville
To schedule your site visit for Citizen Science soil sampling, please email Marie Hoff at producerprogram@fibershed.com
Food, Fiber, and Farms of the Future:
Thursday, October 18th, 1:00 – 7:00 pm
Resilient systems rely on integrating ecological, social, and financial outcomes, and harmonizing the carbon cycle: join the Fibershed community and The Savory Institute for a daylong event to dig in to regenerative agriculture. Gathering at Stemple Creek Ranch in Marin County presents a hands-on opportunity to experience the results and processes of carbon farming, along with short presentations about economic systems such as Climate Beneficial Wool and Land to Market, by leadership from Fibershed and The Jefferson Center (our local Savory Hub), and an understanding of tools for the future of farming, with a keynote by Christine Su of PastureMap Grazing Management and Livestock Software. A locally-sourced dinner catered by The Fig Rig and a social hour at the barn offer community-building conversation in celebration of California’s regenerative agriculture community.
Tickets begin at $50 and are available online at bit.ly/ FoodFiberFutureEvent; a 50% discount on all tickets is available for Fibershed Producer members by entering the code FibershedProducer2018 at checkout.
A Snapshot on Fire, Policy & Climate in California:
• In 2018 the Governor issued a mandate ordering prescriptive burning and thinning to take place ahead of next year’s fire season
• $100 million budget for fire prevention has been requested by the Governor as of the summer of 2018
• California spent $1.8 billion in fighting fires in 2017
• 22.8 million metric tons of carbon dioxide and green house gasses (known as CO2e), were emitted in 2015 from California’s wildfires (the number of acres burned have steadily increased in subsequent years).
• 431 million metric tons is the emissions target as legislated in the 2006 Assembly Bill 32 that required that green house gas emissions be cut to pre-1990’s levels by the year 2020.
• The state’s economy generated 429 million metric tons of green house gases in 2016—based on these numbers the state met and exceeded its climate action goals four years early.
• California’s Air Resources Board (the agency that keeps the scorecard for our state’s emissions and who documented that we met and exceeded our emission’s goal) does not factor in the emissions of California’s wildfires.
Climate Beneficial Wool Guidelines
Through the time-honored process of photosynthesis, our landscapes and processes are cycling carbon all around us. In this way, as soil biogeochemist Dr. Christine Jones explains, “all farming is light farming,” and as land managers and material stewards we have the opportunity to engage with, and even harmonize, the carbon cycle. Fibershed’s Climate Beneficial™ verification signifies just that: these natural fiber products are raised on landscapes where carbon farming practices are being implemented. As of the time of writing, thirty-eight Northern California farms and ranches are participating in the Climate Beneficial program, with 7 Climate Beneficial Verified producers, 12 Climate Beneficial Transitional producers, and nineteen members working toward documenting their first carbon farming practice.
The Climate Beneficial label is designed to directly honor and acknowledge the work of producers: it signifies that a price premium is returning directly to the farmer or rancher to support carbon farming implementation. As the Climate Beneficial acreage and eligible fiber pool grows, so too does the need for clarity around labeling and promotion. To support the emergence and expansion of regenerative fiber systems through direct relationships between wearers, designers, producers, and land managers, and to maintain the integrity of the Climate Beneficial verification, Fibershed has formalized parameters for use of United States produced Climate Beneficial Wool for clothing brands, farm-to-yarn and felt businesses, mills, yarn developers, and all businesses who are purchasing Climate Beneficial Wool from a verified source.
The full text of the Climate Beneficial guidelines is available at: http://www.fibershed.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/08/cbwguidelines.pdf
Fibershed Staff
Rebecca Burgess is the Executive Director of Fibershed. Her work focuses on developing the vision and funding required for operational planning and execution. She oversees the implementation of the organization’s programs and projects, and executes and manages special projects for Fibershed specific to the development of strategic partnerships with sister organizations within the fields of agriculture and design.
If you have questions about the Wool Symposium, Climate Beneficial Fiber Systems, Hemp Research, Indigo feasibility, Carbon Farming or Fibershed’s national and international presentation and workshop schedule she can be reached at harvestingcolor@gmail.com.
Jess Daniels is the Director of Program Integration & Communications for Fibershed. In the spring of 2014, Jess attended a Fibershed presentation and became eager to support this community and outreach any way she could, beginning with some hands-on volunteering, social media posts, and a bit of time dedicated to membership administration. Drawing on her background in community organizing, environmental education, and nonprofit program support, Jess works to foster regional fiber systems in Northern California and beyond. She facilitates membership engagement and resource development for the Fibershed Affiliate Network, organizes project data and deliverables (such as the Wool & Fine Fiber Book, the National Mill Inventory, the Fibershed Knitalong, and a Salesforce database for streamlined program support), and coordinates Fibershed’s communications, press coverage, and digital media presence. If you have questions about Fibershed’s newsletter or social media content and strategy, research projects and database organization, or want to connect to our global Fibershed Affiliate peer communities, she can be reached at office@fibershed.com
Heather Podoll’s work for Fibershed covers advocacy and public funding support for our programs and producers, as well as managing the Fibershed Wool Book and a variety of outreach initiatives.
If you have questions about California’s Healthy Soils Program or other grant opportunities for producers; public policy collaboration work; the Wool Book or other outreach projects, contact Heather at hpodoll@gmail.com
Wild Oat Hollow Farmscaping
Above ground carbon capture & hedgerow development on a 2-acre site. Elderberries are both a good dye and wonderful medicine. Sarah Keiser is developing her Carbon Farm plan as part of Fibershed’s pilot Carbon Farm Cohort Project. Newsletter Vol. 2 will share Carbon Farm Cohort updates and how this project informs Fibershed’s work expanding access to carbon farm planning and implementation.
Fibershed is hiring a general Operations Manager and an experienced Director of Carbon Farm Implementation for our Producer Program. Please reach out if you know of someone who is has the skill and experience in these fields!
Marie Hoff is the Producer Program Coordinator for Fibershed. A producer member herself, Marie’s work covers member communications, office administration, programming for the Producer Meet-Up, and organizing for the Wool & Fine Fiber Symposium and fashion shows. She also coordinates soil sampling for the Citizen Science program, and is currently drafting a Resource Guide on Carbon Farm Planning for producers of all scales.
If you are interested in soil sampling, or have items for the online calendar (can include classes you teach, events you will vend at, or other items that support our local and regenerative fiber system) or have any other questions regarding Fibershed’s benefits for producer members, please contact her at producerprogram@fibershed.com
Erin Walkenshaw is fortunate to have worked with a number of non-profit and for-profit entities and farms whose common thread is their work towards the emergence of health in and across systems. Her work with Fibershed is focused on designing and implementing a pilot program to collaborate with land managers to develop and implement carbon farm plans and create a peer-to-peer support network of fellow carbon farmers. Contact Erin at ewalkens@ gmail.com
PO Box 221, San Geronimo, CA 94963 office@fibershed.com • www.fibershed.org
