Roots Deep & Wide

Michigan's crops are the second-most diverse of any state. We tried to replicate that point of pride that in this episode. We went to two seemingly disparate places to talk about the critical relationship farms have with pollinators.

First, we took the train to small-town Dowagiac in southwest Michigan to talk to Merry Clark about the history and benefits of organic and regenerative farming. Then, we drove over to Detroit's Brightmoor neighborhood to meet Brittney Rooney of Beaverland Farms to get a personal perspective of it all.

What unites both Merry and Brittney is organic farming. Merry's mother founded the movement behind it here in the state and Brittney is living it out 50 years later. Both also serve on the board of the Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance.

So join us as we learn about the economic, health and, of course, environmental benefits of embracing a more natural, holistic way of growing food.

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Learn more about the Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance here.

Read about the woman behind Michigan's organic farming movement by purchasing Merry's book, Dandelion Roots Run Deep, here.

Learn more about Beaverland Farms by visiting its website here or by reading its feature in Planet Detroit.

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Common Groundwater is hosted by the Michigan Environmental Council and Beau Brockett Jr.

Our music is "The Four Seasons" by Antonio Vivaldi, arranged by Derek Zhang and performed by Jackson resident Taj Wallace.

Transcript

Roots Deep & Wide

[00:00:00] 

Beau Brockett: Hey folks, you are tuning into Common Groundwater, a podcast by the Michigan Environmental Council where we talk about the environment in Michigan. We go across the state to talk about the environmental stories in those places, issues around the environment, and then sometimes solutions to environmental problems. I'm joined today with Merry Clark of the Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance for the second part of our pollinator miniseries here on the podcast.

Merry, welcome. 

Merry Clark: Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.

Beau Brockett: Yeah, not a problem. So for folks tuning in, our first episode is really focused on pollinators and the ways that they interact with, neighborhoods, gardens, parks, things of that nature, our yards even. 

Obviously by the name of your organization, you're here today to talk [00:01:00] about the ways in which pollinators interact with farming, particularly organic farming.

 And I'm very honored to have a board member of MOFFA here on me, with me today. So, thank you. 

Merry Clark: Thank you. 

Beau Brockett: Final little housekeeping note. You and I are here in Dowagiac, Michigan, and I have to give you extra thanks too for being so fluid and choosing a different location. So for folks tuning in on the video version, we had initially planned to maybe go in a more farm like setting, but just because of the heat, the humidity, the rain we literally just had, we had to pivot. So hello from the Dowagiac District Library instead. 

Well, great. So maybe we just kick things off very simply. Could you talk a little bit about your organization? What is the Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance? How did it start? 

Merry Clark: Well, it started back in the late seventies with a man named Maynard Kaufman, who is no longer with us, but he was one of the founders of this organization and my [00:02:00] mother was a managing editor because they started a [organic farming] newsletter and this was a brand new thing in Michigan because no one understood what organic was. There was no certification at that time, and so they realized they need to have an organization, and Maine started out with their Maine organic Garden and Farm Alliance, I guess MOFFA, and then California came along, and in Vermont, and then it came, and then Michigan.

So. And it's just, [MOFFA's] all about, it's really focused on both the alliance between farmers and the people who want organic food-- organic farmers. We're really more focused right now on organic farmers themselves, 'cause they need a lot of support and we're trying to get more people into the fold. More farmers, future farmers, people to transition into organic. [00:03:00] 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. Yes. And I mean, just in my few years at the Environmental Council, an organization that works a little bit with farmers but isn't a farming organization itself, even then I've heard many stories about farmers just saying like, 'Hey man, I could really use some peer-to-peer support, like some guidance, learn best practices that way' to learn what's going on. And as well as from groups like yours, those that can kind of help bring everyone together and provide resources. 

You mentioned this a little bit, but you have very personal ties to Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance. Your mom was a founding member of this Michigan organization. Could you talk a little bit about her role in this Alliance as well as just in the organic farming movement as a whole? 

Merry Clark: Well, they started our farm of 1500 acres with cattle. It was actually Michigan's first organic farm. And a lot of people don't know this, but I thought, all right, I'm going to tell people. And that's what this book, Dandelion Roots Run Deep. She [00:04:00] started this a long time ago and she was determined to finish it, but then she got Alzheimer's and so I finished it, and that has been my driving force, I suppose for the last three to five years is getting this finished and getting it out into the world because they did something that was extremely not exactly popular, and a lot of people thought they were crazy back in the eighties. It was 1980, late seventies.

But then she, they reached out, they found other people in the area who were actually also very passionate about doing agriculture the way that the nature intended, basically. And, so she and my father together, they really spearheaded (that's the word I was looking for) this movement and really got everything going in Michigan along with the other people that I mentioned, Maynard Kaufman and [00:05:00] uh, and started MOFFA. Some people say "mof-uh," some people say "mo-fuh." Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance.

People don't know. People are like, what is this? I don't know. But we just did some farm tours actually yesterday, and some people knew about the tour, but they didn't know about the organization behind the tours. Yeah. So that's another thing that, you know, people need to become a little more aware of this organization. 

Beau Brockett: Mm-hmm. So your mom was involved in both actual organic farming but then kind of creating that infrastructure around it to allow it to flourish here in the state.

Merry Clark: She was an activist with a capital "A." I mean, she was a constant environmental-- I mean, anything. She became sort of a, a lightning rod for any sort of environmental groundwater, pollution, contaminant, any issue, it somehow landed on her desk and she had relationships with the local papers and local media, and so they went with it and they did a lot of articles about the farm [00:06:00] and then articles about all the contamination, the issues that she was made aware of or found out herself.

A lot of-- some things she actually investigated on her own. So she was, kind of the intrepid investigator.

Beau Brockett: Yeah, no kidding. 

Well, and you know, we had talked over email. I had spent about , you know, a little time here in southwest Michigan as a reporter myself in the next door neighbor, Niles. I could tell just how, I mean, one thing I loved about the Michiana area as they call it, is just how much agriculture there is and, and how diverse that agriculture is as well.

And as I was doing research for our meeting today, I was surprised to see how many organic farms are just in the area alone. Like, I think I saw two or three just in the Cassopolis area, and that's just one small portion. Anyways, it's all just to say that even just this little section of Michigan is proof that organic farming really has taken off in ways.

Merry Clark: It's better. It's more than it was. Than it used to be, especially since the [federal] certification. We haven't really [00:07:00] talked about when they finally did start, you know, at the federal level, 'cause my mom was on the National Organic Standards Board when it first got started, and that was also a key place for her to be because that standardized the standards across the country, where it's not like, "Oh, it's organic in Texas, but it's not organic in Maine. The same standards don't apply." So that was really important. And that's a lot of reason why more people got on board because they [thought], "Okay, there's a standard or there's certification. And there's a label. Oh, an actual USDA organic label that I can use." And people do look for that label a lot.

Beau Brockett: I see it and I see it all the time at grocery stores now. Yeah. Yeah, you have your own organic sections of produce and whatnot. 

Well, maybe we could talk about that a bit more. We've talked about organic farming very generally, but what is it? What kind of separates organic farming from a more traditional farm or a more industrial farm? 

Merry Clark: Well, it. It [00:08:00] honors the natural system. Instead of fighting against what nature is doing. You study. "Okay, this is what's happening. I'm not going to fight it. I'm going to work with it."

And so there's a lot more cultivating, not tillage. A lot of people are like anti-plowing. Tillage is plowing because it can release carbon. And so there's this whole other movement now called regenerative [farming]. Yeah. And while that's all well and good, organic is regenerative. Good organic is regenerative because we're talking about the soil. It's not just about not using pesticides and chemicals. It's about increasing soil fertility. 

Beau Brockett: And that's what regenerative means, correct? 

Merry Clark: And that's what regenerative is all about.

And a lot of farmers are realizing their soil is dead because they have been using all of this stuff for all this time, and now the fertility is so low that they have to use the fertilizers [00:09:00] and the stuff and the stuff because they completely disrupted the life in the soil and it won't grow without, you know, help, chemical help. 

Beau Brockett: Whereas organic farming is seeing, well, instead of putting all these chemicals or whatnot, onto these plants, into the ground and then ruining the soil, making it even tougher for produce to grow or whatnot, let's remove that problem from the situation and go back to the roots of how 

Merry Clark: Back to the roots.

Yes.

Beau Brockett: Back to the roots of how food was made. 

Merry Clark: Yeah. Because things live in the dirt. We don't know that it's, that's under our feet. Like we don't pay attention. But there's a lot of soil scientists and people out there who understand this and they aren't given the kind of voice I think that a lot of people need to hear.

You know, some people don't like dandelions and dandelions-- we're talking about pollinators-- bees love dandelions. And that's why I try not to [00:10:00] mow until the dandelions have gone to seed. And they're beautiful too. I don't know. That's why I put them all over the book. 

Beau Brockett: Very bold statement. I feel even just in the name, Dandelion Roots Run Deep, kind of embracing the idea of a more natural state of things.

Merry Clark: Well, the roots are also a generation thing. My mom and her parents and the background. Running deep that way too. 

Beau Brockett: Very true. So it seems like organic farming then really places a focus on keeping the soil healthy. And it does that by staying away from certain sorts of practices, like applying a ton of pesticides or insecticides, fertilizers, things like that. 

Merry Clark: Because the glyphosate, they are not good for bees. And I think the glyphosate is one of them that just is disruptive to the entire cycle. That happens with the bees every year.

Beau Brockett: It's a great setup for the second part of our podcast here, which I can totally get into now.

But, but I do have one last question first around organic farming, and I think you've already touched on [00:11:00] it a little bit, but just to say it outright: Why organic farming? Why do farmers choose to take up these maybe more sort of like restrictive practices, if you think about sort of the, use that other sorts of farming practices might have.

Like why make this? Why do this? What are the benefits? 

Merry Clark: Well, the benefits are you're gonna have better soil. And if you wanna look at it from an economic standpoint, pesticides are very expensive. Fertilizers, synthetic fertilizer, very expensive. I mean, you can make your own fertilizer, you know? There's composting and there's a whole thing with composting, and that's a whole other issue. But

from an economic standpoint, your net income will be higher because you're not putting so much out there. And it's faster, but ultimately over time, you're gonna pay the price because your soil is not gonna be what it could be if you hadn't done that to it. 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. That's right. Yeah. As you mentioned, the [00:12:00] soil.

Merry Clark: And that's why we're getting into the regenerative thing, because that's what's happened to the soil. It's not that great anymore, you know? 

Beau Brockett: I would love to hear more about the ways in which pollinators benefit organic farming and farming as a whole. Could you talk a little bit more about that? 

Merry Clark: Well, they help things grow. They pollinate the flowers and the crops and everything, basically. And a lot of the conventional farming is a monoculture, and they don't wanna have anything else growing in that field . You see corn. Corn, corn, corn, corn, corn, and it's all, basically, it's not really conducive at all to the pollinators.

So a lot of the farms, farmers have at least kept some of the trees. Bees live in trees, a lot of them do. They live inside the trees and they need flowers. Like you need some sort of, like you said, the plant infrastructure to [00:13:00] get these insects to be able to, so they can live, they can live, and that's how they live, and then that's how they continue the plant growth.

I'm not a biologist. But this is what I, this is what I know, and I learned a lot by osmosis just growing up. And it's just the diversity that my dad, my dad had a PhD. He was a PhD in biochemistry, so I kind of absorbed a lot of that too. And it was just all about diversity of plant life, animal life, insects.

You need all of it. 'cause it all works together.

Beau Brockett: .Again, you mentioned this a little bit, but there are also practices that organic farms are taking and can take to help promote pollinators in their own fields and next to their own fields to, in turn, help benefit the produce that they create. Could you talk a bit about those practices, what some of them look like?

Merry Clark: Well, we had an organic intensive, the Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance, they have at MSU this thing we call an organic intensive every [00:14:00] January. And we had a guest. She was interweaving the rows of whatever she was growing with, you know, flowers or different, just an incredible diversity where, "Okay, this row is this kind of flower and then I'm gonna put my parsnips or vegetable here, and then I'm gonna do another row of flowers." So it was basically this beautiful tapestry of growth so that all of them would work together and is synergistically to just have an incredible crop.

 So there was one thing I learned. And then, um, and just maintaining the diversity, the diversity around, interwoven like that. I mean, there's just, there's a lot that can be done that you don't see in the conventional world. 

You know, I wanted to [00:15:00] add about the cover crops. Sunflowers and any type of flower. A lot of those are really good for pollinators as well. Yeah. And so there are multiple. Benefits to doing the cover crops, which I talked about before. 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. Could you just reiterate very quickly what a cover crop is for folks ?

Merry Clark: Crop is to cover the soil, because soil does not want to be uncovered. It's completely unnatural for just a bare patch of dirt. I mean, if you are not treating it, it will be weeds and it wants to be weeds. And the weeds are there for a purpose. And you'll have a diversity of weeds. We call them weeds, but it's plants that feed pollinators. 

Beau Brockett: So rather than leaving a crop bare after you're done harvesting whatever was first on it--

Merry Clark: your field.

Beau Brockett: Yes. Right. You then plant another cover crop, as they say, on top.

Merry Clark: And some of the conventional farmers will just plant another crop altogether. But it's kind of like a [00:16:00] resting period though. The cover crop adds the nutrients back in and it gives the soil a chance to come back, have a little break.

Beau Brockett: Definitely. So I think another benefit is kind of what organic farming doesn't do, which again, we've talked about, but it doesn't apply nasty pesticides onto seeds or onto the plants themselves or whatnot. Which is great because in our last episode we talked about the ways in which pesticides are bad for pollinators, right? Like very bad. They may have like a specific name, "pest," in the word "pesticides," but really, it can kind of have a full-scale effect on a lot of insect species and can trickle its way into groundwater. Things like that. 

Merry Clark: Absolutely. 

Beau Brockett: Well, so we talked about some of the ways in which pollinators benefit organic farming.

We talked about some of the practices involved. Anything else along these sorts of lines that you wanna mention? Any other sorts of connections to pollinators in farming that you want to call out before we move on to the last segment? 

Merry Clark: I talked about the [00:17:00] diversity. The, diversity is the key.

 I mean, my mom-- again, back to my mother-- she planted so many different types of things. I'm still discovering what she has planted and you know, she developed Alzheimer's 10 years ago and I'm still exploring what she did and it just keeps going and going.

Beau Brockett: If people want to learn more about these sorts of practices, whether it's pro pollinator stuff, whether it's organic farming or a mix of both. What are some of the resources that they can turn toward? What are some opportunities that they can turn toward? 

Merry Clark: Well, once again, I'd like to mention the Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance. So it's MOFFA, moffa.net. And they have a lot of really good information and a lot more people need to be aware of this organization. And there are also some other resources such as the Cornucopia Institute and they are kind of like [00:18:00] a watchdog, but they also have a lot going on, a lot of information.

It's kind of more consumer-based, but that's a good organization. Beyond Pesticides also. They're out of DC and they really talk a lot about pesticide policy.

 There's also the Leopold Center [for Sustainable Agriculture]. I don't know if anybody's familiar with Aldo Leopold outta Wisconsin. They have a lot of great information too. Aldo Leopold wrote a book called A Sand County Almanac in-- I don't have that book with me-- but, in the 1940s.

A lot like Wendell Berry. You can read books, Wendell Berry there. There's really a lot of great books, information, and this one's one's one of 'em.

Silent Spring is another one. And a lot of people have heard of this book, but they haven't actually read it. And it has just in-depth information on just [00:19:00] everything that pesticides can do. Yeah. And have done, have been doing. And unfortunately since this book was written, we have only increased our usage of pesticides. Yes, DDT was banned, but it can still be manufactured in other countries and used in other countries. 

So there's a lot of work to still be done and some people are still convinced that we can't feed the world without pesticides and that's just not true. 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. All the more thankful then you provided some resources. 

Merry Clark: Dig down to those roots. 

Beau Brockett: So well, and I am glad you mentioned Rachel Carson's [book Silent Spring] because this kind of ties into some of the Environmental Council's own work on the pollinator space. My coworkers in the more policy-oriented field are really focused on, trying to ban like the most dangerous pesticides-- or maybe not banned, but make sure that they're deemphasized, I guess, in a euphemistic way-- from the market to [00:20:00] make them less ubiquitous across these sorts of-- corn, soybeans, et cetera. They just use them everywhere. And one of those is kind of being dubbed by some ally organizations of ours as kind of like the next DDT in terms of its just danger two-- 

Merry Clark: Glyphosate or,

Beau Brockett: Uh, neonics. 

Yes. Yeah. It's, it's a family, it's like a name for a family of pesticides just given how much, again, like the market really has made it seem as if this is like the only good choice farmers can make when really, as we've talked about all day today or all episode today, that there are many great choices that you can make that don't have to be such a, so destructive to so many different species of insects and travel so far into the soil, et cetera. 

 Well great. And I have to ask, too, are some of those resources you mentioned, are these for both farmers and for folks that want to like advocate for better farming practices?

Merry Clark: Yes. 

I think there's something out there for everyone if you're a [00:21:00] consumer or a farmer. And every 

farmer should read Silent Spring, just so you know, you know, what's in there. You know, I mean, she was a biologist. She knew what she was talking about, even though a lot of people tried to discredit her and everything that she was saying. But, yeah. 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. And then what do you know, it's like, as you mentioned, a super familiar book now many people know of it. Many not many people have read it. But people know it. 

Merry Clark: Yeah. It's pretty dense.

Beau Brockett: Yeah. Fair enough. Yes. Well, to folks listening, the audience, know that we'll have links to some of the resources and books that we've mentioned today in the podcast description.

So all you need to do is just scroll down a little ways and you'll find, MOFFA's website, as well as some of these other resources, too.

Well, in that case, Merry, thanks so much for joining us today. Really appreciate you and for the Michigan Organic Food & Farm Alliance for joining us. 

Merry Clark: And thanks for having this interview. Thank you so much.

Beau Brockett: Yeah, not a problem.

[00:22:00] 

Beau Brockett: Hey folks. Welcome back to Common Groundwater, a podcast by the Michigan Environmental Council, where we go across the state to talk about environmental issues. I'm in a new place with a new face on this podcast episode. Originally I was in Cassopolis with Merry Clark talking about organic and regenerative farming especially as they pertain to pollinators.

And I'm here today on a different day with Brittany Rooney, the owner and manager of Beaverland Farms over [00:23:00] in Detroit. 

Brittney Rooney: Yeah, welcome. So happy to have you here. 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. This is a beautiful space. 

Brittney Rooney: Yeah. We've, we love it here. 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. Yeah. I can tell.

So when I had Merry Clark on, for the first part of this podcast episode, we did a lot of grounding. We talked about kind the history of organic and regenerative farming in Michigan, and then we talked about how that sort of history kind of tied into pollinators and native plants, how organics kind of played a role in protecting those species and how they, in return, get a lot of look back , to the farm itself. You and I here are here today to kinda get a little bit more specific .

 Just to do some scene setting, could you share a little bit about Beaverland Farm, what it is, how you got into it? 

Brittney Rooney: Mm-hmm. So we're here in Detroit, northwest Detroit, the neighborhood of Brightmoor. Beaverland Farms is about four acres, so we've slowly kind of bought up land from the city as houses in this neighborhood have come down.

 Brightmoor was a neighborhood that was hit by blight pretty hard in the 90s and early 2000s. [00:24:00] But I feel that we've made the best of the situation and really turned a lot of these overgrown and blighted lots into a regenerative agroforestry farm.

Beau Brockett: Would you mind talking a little bit more about your farm itself?

 What sorts of things you're growing, how you do it? 

Brittney Rooney: Absolutely. So, we primarily are an annual vegetable farm, that is kind of the bread and butter of our farm, but we also do annual cut flowers and a lot of perennials. So we have an aging orchard of peaches and pears and apples. a lot of more like brambly berries, things like that. A lot of wild flowers. We have a developing asparagus patch, rhubarb, things like that.

We're able to spend a lot of energy on these other enterprises around the farm as well, that really help our farm become kind of environmentally and economically a little bit more stable.

Beau Brockett: For sure. And I think we're in one of those ventures as we speak. 

Brittney Rooney: Yes. Here we are. Yes. 

Beau Brockett: This is a retail space of sorts, correct? 

Brittney Rooney: Yeah. [00:25:00] So we opened this farm stand two years ago. When we started the farm about 12 years ago, we primarily sold the restaurants in the city. We were mostly doing wholesale. And then when the pandemic hit, as like every other business in the world, we really had to pivot, and so we really decided to focus more on direct to customer. And so for us, that looked like a CSA [community-supported agriculture]. Then also kind of dreaming up this, retail space, and along with this retail space, it's been a really cool opportunity to invite people to the farm. And so not only are they here to purchase vegetables, but we also have events whether that's like art workshops or parties and DJ sets.

 Having people come onto the farm and really interact with what we're doing has been a really cool kind of development over the last couple years for us.

Beau Brockett: I love that. That's great. What are some of the practices Beaverland Farms really holds near and dear to itself as it's, you know, growing its food?

Brittney Rooney: Yeah. So I would say our number one priority is always our soil. Everything we do, we're thinking about our [00:26:00] soil 'cause that is the battery of our farm. Everything comes from the soil. But to have healthy soil, you have to have a healthy ecosystem. And so that means that we are prioritizing pollinator habitat and benefit insect habitat, even habitat for birds with trees that may not produce a fruit that is particularly good to us but you know, provides that habitat and that food source for those other insects, like chokecherries.

 We don't use chemicals of any kind just because we care about what we're eating and we don't wanna be eating those chemicals. But for us, the secondary and almost equal benefit of that is the health of the ecosystem. Because if we're, you know, spraying for a bad bug, it's gonna kill all the bugs in the area. And we know that over time, if you have predatory insects, they'll take care of your insect populations for you and you don't need those insecticides or things like that.

Beau Brockett: That's great. Could you [00:27:00] speak a little bit more about that sort of pollinator plant farm relationship? We spoke on this podcast a lot about, the ways pollinators benefit places like neighborhoods, how they benefit wilderness. I'd love to get that perspective from an agricultural sense.

How does that relationship work? 

Brittney Rooney: Yeah, absolutely. So one part of it is that we, um, because we're growing so many different types of things, we have this continuous bloom cycle. First thing in the spring, we have things that are blooming. That works towards our cut flower production, but it also is great for those early insects.

And then throughout the whole year, whether that's our tomatoes or whether that's wildflowers, there's always something blooming on the farm. And so, again, that's like great for the insects, but it's also great for our farm.

 Another part of that is with the habitat creation, even though it's maybe not something that's like normally marketable, there's always gonna be someone who's like, 'What is that weird orange berry and can I turn it into a medicinal balm?' Or something like that. And so, um. We found that these things that we've planted really just for the health [00:28:00] of the ecosystem, people actually are interested in it.

And so, over time, the more we've kind of focused on building up that pollinator habitat and things like that, it's actually just, like, served so many more purposes. 

Beau Brockett: Even in our last podcast episode with Dan Raichel of NRDC, the Natural Resources Defense Council, he spoke a lot about how, like, pulling back from pesticides can really help out a farm and the nature around it without harming one's bottom line as well, which is pretty thin, I would guess, among farmers, generally speaking, at this moment in time.

 Could you speak a little bit more about those sorts of economic benefits that you see just from your farm?

Brittney Rooney: Absolutely. So one part of that is just the cost savings. So not that we've never spent money to, you know, deal with insect issues, but if we purchase, you know, ladybugs or we purchase praying mantis instead of an insecticide, that cost is basically gonna be a wash but we don't have to do it year after year right? It's just like a one time [00:29:00] infusion of an insect we really want on the farm. And then because we're not spraying, because we're not, you know, doing anything to diminish their populations and we're providing habitat and we already know that there's plenty of food for them because the kale is covered in aphids or whatever it might be, they thrive.

And so it's just kind of this one-time cost rather than year after year after year, you know, each season having to spray a different chemical. I know how cost-prohibitive that becomes, and so it's great for us that that's not, that's not an issue. 

And then like I mentioned, we do get those additional products from our pollinator strip.

And, and those choices we've made, whether that's, you know, extra wild flowers for our bouquets or that's, um, you know, a weird fruit that somebody's interested in trying or a cutting that they want for their garden. It's become a sellable product and so that's fantastic for us. 

Beau Brockett: Yeah. First I gotta say, I didn't realize you could buy bugs in bulk, but it totally makes sense. Absolutely. 

Brittney Rooney: You can, yeah. 

Beau Brockett: Just like you could buy seeds in bulk. Have the [00:30:00] bugs that help them out. And then, second, again, just really, I just wanna like emphasize how much I personally love, and I think folks listening, too, love the idea of, like, utilizing those strips that are meant to like, boost up those pollinator populations around the farm. 

Brittney Rooney: Yeah. Absolutely. And even more than just providing pollinator habitat. They're providing unlimited compost and the leaves that they give out, right?

 There's just so many benefits to having these strips around the farm full of insect habitat. It just a gift that keeps on giving.

Beau Brockett: Yeah. Yeah. I am thinking back to, again, to that episode with Dan where he really spoke about the solution to limiting these pesticides that are really causing a lot of harm, not only to pollinators, but to soil health, to water. And it really, it's just kind of pulling back in the potency.

Retailers, you know, might market very strong, potent pesticide. Really, that's not needed for many farms. When you pull back, you kind of allow other things to flourish a bit more. The soil's health, [00:31:00] the creatures around it. 

Brittney Rooney: And at the end of the day, you just have a better product to feed people with, which is ultimately our goal is to feed people. That's why we're a farm. And so at the end of the day, having the most nutrient-dense, chemical-free product is our goal. And so it just works great with the other goals that also align with environmental impact.

Beau Brockett: Definitely so. And maybe that sets us up pretty well for my last question for you, which is like, we're halfway through August. What's on the horizon for Beaverland Farms, whether in the near or far future?

Brittney Rooney: Yeah. Over the past decade we've really been expanding various enterprises going from just veggies to also doing perennials, to also doing cut flowers, expanding our actual footprint, all of. But, I'm really excited to kind of hone in on what we are doing now and just perfect it.

 And so it's not like the most exciting answer, but it feels really good knowing that we are exactly where I wanna be. I don't think there's a lot of like growth that I'm looking forward to in the next couple years, but [00:32:00] rather just a fine tuning and like, how do we do exactly what we're doing, but with a little less labor and a little less time? And how do we improve the systems that we've set up? Because I'm very proud of all of our ecosystem here, of all the systems we have.

Beau Brockett: I think that's a perfect answer. That's kind of like an ideal answer, right?

Brittney Rooney: Yeah.

Beau Brockett: That's where you want it to be. Yes. And then it's just a matter of sprucing it up.

Brittney Rooney: That's, that's my hope. Yeah. Yeah, 

Beau Brockett: I should mention to folks tuning in, too, that if you go to the podcast description, you'll be able to see a link to Beaverland Farms ' site. And then I also might include, there's like a really nice Planet Detroit article written up about you and about the farm itself.

Brittney Rooney: Yeah, please

Beau Brockett: So if they wanna learn more, that's where you can go head on. 

Brittney Rooney: Fantastic.

Beau Brockett: Well, great. 

Well, thank you so much, Brittany. Yeah. We really appreciate you, again, being here and taking time. As I said before the podcast, um, you kind of did this on a whim of sorts to really appreciate the quick turnaround especially. 

Brittney Rooney: No problem. Thanks for coming out.

Beau Brockett: For sure. A few other quick thanks are in order, too. Thank you to NRDC for being a production partner on this podcast. They're doing a lot of [00:33:00] great work in the policy space around pesticides, and my organization, the Environmental Council, is very happy to be working with them on that.

And then to thank you, too, to the listeners. Thank you for tuning into this episode and others. Really appreciate you. And stay tuned. While this may be the last episode of our pollinator podcast miniseries, we have another launching in late August that's all about solar siting.

So with that, thanks again and- 

Brittney Rooney: Absolutely. 

Beau Brockett: We'll see you soon. 

Brittney Rooney: Thanks.