Field of dreams | The number of women in farming is on the rise nationwide. We spend a weekend in Turner with their Maine counterparts.

Colette Thompson didn't plan to be a farmer. She grew up in Westbrook, graduating from high school in the class of 1985 and going on to get advanced degrees in nutrition and health administration. Later, she and her husband, Lee, settled in Harrison, a small town in western Cumberland County. But, says Thompson, "We wanted more land so we could have a bigger garden. Prices were really high in southern and western Maine. So we started looking farther around the state in Uncle Henry's."

As their search widened, the couple was surprised to find themselves looking at property in Patten, north of Millinocket. "A year later," Thompson says with a laugh, "we were buying a home in New Sweden."

Not only did Thompson find herself in northern Aroostook County, but her plot of land for a garden had become a 65-acre former potato farm. With that change has come an entirely new plan: "Our goal is to earn enough income from the farm to be able to support our lifestyle," she says as she sits in a rocking chair on the front porch of Nezinscot Farm in Turner. "We want to do this through diversified methods ˆ— maple syrup, honey, fruit trees, eggs. I don't think [focusing on] any one thing will work; we need to have a variety."

Thompson drew much of her approach to farming from Gloria Varney, who co-owns Nezinscot Farm with her husband, Gregg. The couple manages a herd of more than 100 dairy cows, raises nine species of animals for their meat, eggs and fiber, operates a popular farm store, cheese room and café and recently began providing catering services for central Maine business meetings. Both Gloria and Gregg grew up on farms ˆ— she in Livermore, he on Nezinscot Farm ˆ— and they worry about the fact that few young people see farming as a viable career choice. Gloria Varney's own family is a case in point: "I am one of 75 grandchildren on my dad's side, from four generations of farming," she says. "I am the only one farming."

The decline of the small family farm over the last few decades has been well documented; the 2002 Census of Agriculture, which was released this summer by the U.S. Department of Agriculture, found that there were nearly 90,000 fewer farms in the United States in 2002 than there were five years earlier. During that same period, though, the number of women running farms increased more than 13%, to 237,819 nationwide. In Maine, the increase was even more dramatic: The number of women running farms in the state increased 35% from 1997 to 2002; the majority of them work on relatively small farms of 10 to 49 acres.

While the numbers are encouraging to Varney, she'd like to see even more women running small, diversified, organic farms. (Twenty-two percent of organic farms nationwide are run by women, according to the Organic Farming Research Foundation.) So Varney and her friend Vivianne Holmes, who runs the Maine chapter of the Women's Agricultural Network and works for the University of Maine's Cooperative Extension, recently organized their second annual experiential on-farm weekend for women. The goal is to teach women, as the promotional materials put it, about "the rhythms of farm life," but also to provide some practical skills in areas including pasture management, cheesemaking, weaving and canning.

Though the list of workshops sounds like a primer in the back-to-the-land lifestyle of the 1970s ˆ— and some of the participants aspire to exactly that off-the-grid life ˆ— each of the topics represents an essential part of Nezinscot Farm's business. "When you look at farms and what needs to happen to survive, it's diversity," says Varney. "They're here to experience that diversity ˆ— you can't just do an organic vegetable garden and survive in the agriculture sector."

So, on the third weekend in August, more than 30 women from across northern New England took part in what amounted to Nezinscot Farm 101. Days began at 6 a.m. with farm chores ˆ— feeding chickens, milking goats, picking vegetables, making bread ˆ— then proceeded through the hands-on workshops led by Varney and other women, all shot through with a healthy dose of Varney's personal story and a decided bias toward both organic and sustainable farming methods. (The former refers to farming practices that eschew pesticides and antibiotics, while the latter is a more philosophical approach involving an effort to produce as many of the goods your family needs as you can, while also practicing efficient farming methods.)

Thompson, who bought her New Sweden farm in September 2003, returned this year as an alumna of the first class and the leader of an hour-long discussion of nutrition and wood stove cooking. Her 2004 weekend at Nezinscot Farm was an important step, she says, in the development of her strategy for running a small, diversified family farm. "Last year, I felt overwhelmed with the farm and all the things we had discussed [doing]," she says. "But when you see everything Gloria does, it helped me to see all the possibilities and try not to think about the stress involved in it."

"What real farming is"
And what Gloria Varney does is significant. Her day begins, she says, at 4:30 a.m., when she heads from her farmhouse on Route 117 between Turner Village and Turner Center into the attached farm store. From 4:30 to 6, she watches the sun come up as she bakes bread, scones, muffins and donuts for sale in the store; on a recent morning, 30 loaves were out of the oven by 8:30. Her five children, who range in age from three to 15, are typically up by 7; during the summer, the older kids are responsible for helping their father in the dairy barn's milking parlor, feeding chickens, taking care of calves and milking goats.

Varney's day goes on to include gardening, weaving, cheesemaking or canning. Much of what she creates is put out for sale in the farm store, which doubles as a small natural products store, a café and a yarn shop. But other products ˆ— canned vegetables, knit socks, dried herbs ˆ— are stored away for the family's use over the long Maine winter. At about 6:30 p.m., Varney, 39, makes dinner for her family, and by 8:30 she's in bed, where she reads for half an hour, then goes to sleep.

While the schedule sounds grueling, Varney delights in spending the day with her family close at hand. Her kids, the two dogs and a multitude of cats scamper in and out of the farm store; Mackenzie, age seven, perches on a bench next to a visitor, gnawing a homemade bagel and unselfconsciously chattering about the movie she's making with an improvised "camera" of what looks to be a plastic plant hanger and a roll of Scotch tape. "I wouldn't trade my life for anything," Varney says.

Over the course of the weekend, it becomes clear that Varney does not distinguish between her work and her life; they are one and the same. And when asked if it's possible to run a diversified farm business simply as a job, rather than as a lifestyle, Varney replies, "The clientele are here because of the lifestyle you have and the product you're producing. The lifestyle we lead is probably one of our biggest marketing tools."

Indeed, on a gray Sunday morning shoppers at the farm store are entranced by the spinning and felting workshops taking place on the front porch. They're shy about asking what the women are doing, but they stand in the dirt driveway and watch the steady motion of the spinning wheel for minutes at a time, then head into the store to peruse the inventory.

That's not to say that the farm presents a Disneyland-like picture of modern agriculture ˆ— something Varney says was a conscious choice. "We're not all painted up and pretty," she says. "People get a sense of what real farming is. We have tin missing off the roof of our barn ˆ— that's reality."

Time for a change
That reality ˆ— and the Varneys' lifestyle ˆ— is part of the attraction for Meagan Corriveau, a 22-year-old student at the University of Maine at Fort Kent. A Caribou native, Corriveau plans to start a small farm when she graduates with a degree in environmental studies next year. The choice sets her apart from her peers; even in heavily agricultural Aroostook County, she says, "There's no one around interested in the same things."

Corriveau's initial plan for her farm includes a herd of goats for cheese and milk, some angora rabbits for their fur, chickens for egg laying and herbs. Part of the challenge, she says, is getting customers in the county used to the idea that the experience of visiting the farm can be as important as the products it sells. "Down here, it's all over ˆ— natural food stores and farms like this," she says. "Up north, there's a farm here and there, and you just don't hear about them."

Among the women who attended the weekend at Nezinscot Farm, Corriveau was again unique, by virtue of her age. "When we did it last year, my vision was a bunch of 20- to 30-year-olds ˆ— the group that usually approaches me in terms of internships," says Varney. "But, amazingly, the average age ˆ— as you can see this weekend ˆ— is 50. They're women who have money saved up, they're tired of their jobs and they're ready to make a change."

Indeed, not many attendees plan to make farming their sole means of support. Wilton resident Sarah Sousa, who Varney describes as one of her best yarn customers, makes felted products, including a wool ball with a bell inside for cats, to sell at farmers' markets in western Maine, and is pondering buying goats or sheep in order to produce her own wool. Ellen Gibson recently moved back to the West Paris farm that's been in her family since the late 1700s, and is intent on preserving it for the next generation. Jennifer White and her partner bought a 22-acre farm in Yarmouth a few months ago and hope to revitalize it with some small animals and a garden.

But there were also women like Laura Webb, a telephone operator from Parsonsfield who aspires to the ideal of homesteading, in which, as she puts it, "You're trying to make everything for yourself, and then make a living off it."

Shelley Johnson, who runs a small business with her husband, lives off the grid on 60 acres in Appleton and describes herself as "planning a five-year exit strategy" from the business in order to focus on farming. "My dream job," she says, "is as a gardener for a restaurant."

Yankee frugality is a key factor in this lifestyle; Webb, for example, began raising pigs when she could no longer countenance eating meat she didn't raise herself. When confronted with the question of how to use the rest of the pig, she hit upon the idea of using the lard to make soap. These days, she exclusively uses her own soap; she gives the excess as gifts or sells it at farmers markets. However, she says, the economics don't often work out ˆ— she earns just $6 an hour for plain soap, which she says is hardly worth the time.

Demand for organic dairy products
However, one area that does hold economic opportunity is the production of organic dairy products. According to Varney, in 1994 Nezinscot Farm became the first certified organic dairy farm in Maine. Just a few years later, she says, "markets started opening up" for organic milk, due to demand from consumers. Since then, the market for organic dairy products has boomed; in July, the Bangor Daily News reported that demand for organic milk exceeds supply in the state ˆ— even though Maine has a higher percentage of organic dairy farmers than any other state in the country.

Since 1997, Nezinscot Farm has sold its milk to Organic Valley, a LaFarge, Wisc.-based co-op that distributes organic milk across the country. Sue McGovern, a Massachusetts resident who participated in the Nezinscot Farm weekend through her job handling marketing and public relations for Organic Valley, says the mad-cow disease incident of two years ago caused a spike in consumer awareness of food safety. "Meanwhile, more conventional supermarkets have natural [food] aisles," she says. "So it's more convenient for you to go to your store and get organic vegetables and Diet Coke and your horrible margarine and your kids' Cocoa Puffs."

For farmers, organic milk demands a premium over the federally regulated pricing on non-organic, or conventional, milk. Varney says that fact alone means that organic milk literally has saved many family farms.

Still, running an organic farm is no panacea for the troubles of small family farms: The conversion from conventional to organic dairy farming can take up to three years, in order to ensure that pasture land is free of contaminants. According to McGovern, Organic Valley and Londonderry, N.H.-based Stonyfield Farm have partnered to provide funding to farmers in the Northeast who are transitioning from conventional dairy farming to organic. "It takes so long to become an organic farmer and is such an investment that that's where the energy is," she says.

The economic challenge doesn't end when a farm is certified; Varney says that while conventional grain costs $180 a ton, organic grain runs $450 a ton, in part because the market for organic grain for human consumption has been increasing along with the nation's organic dairy herd. Nezinscot Farm has dealt with the cost in part by relying on Organic Valley, which is working to connect grain growers with cattle farmers; by eliminating the middleman, the dairy farmers gain a significant cost savings. "We need more organic grain growers," says Varney, "but it's also forced us to see what we can do to become more efficient."

Indeed, anyone who thinks farming doesn't require business skills ought to spend an hour touring Nezinscot Farm. For example, Varney practices intensive grazing, in which large pastures are divided into smaller areas, and animals rotate through them in small groups. The benefit is that sheep, for example, gravitate toward different plants and grasses than do ducks and geese, so the same pasture can be used by different species without stressing the vegetation. "To keep costs down, I utilize as much natural forage as I can," Varney says. "It takes me a little longer to get them up to weight, but when I look at the cost of organic grainˆ…"

Despite the continual challenges, Varney is adamant about the value of small family farms to communities and to consumers. However, she worries that consumers value tasteless convenience foods over flavorful, locally grown meats and vegetables that might take a bit more time to prepare. "The media does an excellent job of portraying the easiest food system, the most convenient," she says. "But I'm asking you to care about where your food comes from."