Building the Farm Plan at Merck Forest

By Hadley Stock, Farm Manager

A good Farm Plan is the foundation that any good farm is built on. It is a step-by-step tutorial that identifies the core principles of the farm, providing a “North Star” by which to navigate. It guides decision making and goal setting. If the Farm Plan is the foundation, the farmer and farm team are the framework – walls, floors and ceilings – which form the farm’s structure. And to complete the analogy, the community that supports the farm is the roof that ties all things together, and makes the whole a dwelling, enabling the enterprise to stand up to unpredictable challenges and storms.

A Farm Plan is clean, simple and clear. But then . . . there is the reality of farming, which is – to put it mildly – very rarely clean, clear or simple. There are no straight lines, nothing is cut and dry, and it is not very easy. Farming is working with nature, and nature does not care about a farmer’s plans, so the ability to adapt a Farm Plan to the will of nature is a critical skill. A good farmer can keep the “Where” and ‘Why” in sight while keeping the farm on track to meeting the Plan’s goals, even when circumstances introduce a new course.

Our Farm Plan is still a work in progress, and it is something which cannot be rushed. Our Northstar – the “Where” and “Why” – is already in place: we focus on farming in a way that promotes the health of our farm’s ecosystems, and engages and inspires our visitors.

The Team

What remains to be developed is the map for “How” to achieve our goals. As I work my way through my first field season at MFFC, I record everything that is happening on the farm, making an inventory of the steps it will take to advance our goals. There is not often a straight line leading from point A to point B; there are a lot of twists and turns, plenty of backtracking and (so far) one notebook full of reminders to do things a little differently next season. My notes and records will guide me in building better, more efficient and beneficial systems for next season. I learn from every element:

• What grasses the sheep like to graze on and what ones they don’t like;

• What direction the water runs off the hills in a rainstorm;

There’s not much that can’t be fixed, built, mowed, cut, milled or mended by our team of Mike, Dylan and Rick – they’re among the most talented guys I know, and I’m convinced that the improvements happening at MFFC would not happen without them.

And my wonderful children, Brantley, Amelia and Creighton, pitch in to keep the dream alive. They may very well decide to be anything but farmers someday, but for now they are farmers because they are the children of farmers. After school they come up to the farm to help me catch chickens or set fences or take on any other task that goes quicker with a few more sets of hands.

• How long does it take to prune the blueberry bushes; and most importantly

• What do our visitors have to say, what animals excite them, how do they interact with the land, buildings, animals and our infrastructure.

Along the way I have discovered that I can be more flexible, bend a little more to accept the “how it’s going to be’s” and the chaos that nature throws my way. My personal objective is to complete daily tasks with the long goals in mind, caring for this beautiful land, and doing all that I can do to give back to it, and

Being Flexible

I wasn’t planning on lambs in February but some of the ewes were, and nothing I could do would stop them from coming. So we improvised, making a safe and cozy space for them to come into the world. And as it turns out, early lambs can be a good thing during a somewhat quiet time on the farm: the early babies drew a lot of excited visitors out to the farm who might not have come otherwise.

maintain it so that the land will continue to give to the community that loves Merck Forest and Farmland Center so much. With the Farm Plan as our structure, a skilled team in place, and the support of the community to tie everything together, the job of a MFFC farmer is, in my opinion, the best job a person could ask for.

New Addition to the Livestock

We have introduced some new animals to the farm this season to help add nutrients to the soil and help grow grass without using synthetic fertilizers and inputs:

You may have already met Cow Cow. My family’s milk cow has been a great addition to our livestock, and I love seeing the reactions of our guests when they see her. She’ll be going back to our family farm in a few months when she is ready to have her calf, so be sure to come say hello to her before the summer ends.

Cow Cow grazes with the sheep, cleaning up the grasses that the sheep skip over. Cows are less picky eaters than sheep and make the pasture more evenly grazed while adding to the nutrient cycle. After Cow Cow moves with the sheep to a new pasture, our ginger broiler meat birds work the first pasture, scratching the ground, cleaning up further and adding their own nitrogen-rich fertilizer to the soil.