My friend and I are looking for land where we can farm, grow, research, and sell perennial food crops. We want to start breeding open-source perennials for sustainable futures. My friend has a degree in resource management, and I have a degree in studio art with a focus on ecosystem-human interactions. We both are very passionate about food security. We want to do our part to help grow food crops that are bioregional specific so that we can build up a robust nursery stock to sell to others at a reasonable price. Beyond nursery stock, we want to farm using agroecological and biodynamic principles. We take a lot of inspiration for farm design from Mark Shepard’s farm in Wisconsin which uses principles of permaculture and biodynamic farming to grow food in a savannah-like system, which is what the Willamette Valley’s original state was. Here is the link to a tour of Shepard’s farm, and if you’d rather read about his farm you can find his website here. We are two passionate individuals with a lot of ideas, but only some experience, so we are also looking for someone to mentor us so we can learn more. Overall we are young, hard-working people who are ready to learn and grow.
We are not sure what infrastructure we will need but are open to finding creative solutions to any problem. Water rights would be one thing that is definitely desired.
Both my friend and I have experience gardening and testing soil-building techniques. My friend has worked with forest management groups and as a stream restoration technician. Other than that we are eager to learn.
Establish a nursery stock program with the intention of doing breeding research as well. In the first year, we want to assess the land and plan out alley-cropping systems for long-term perennial tree crops. With alley cropping, we can also grow annuals to supplement the farm income as the perennials grow. We are also interested in starting a food forest system that people can u-pick at to help show urban and suburban dwellers ways to grow some of their own food.
We want to build up a system that can sustain itself with minimal off-farm inputs. We want to be able to use this farm system as an example to show others so we can inspire others to think in new ways. We also want to host work exchange programs later on to help improve our systems and give people opportunities to learn about regenerative farming.
We both live in portland right now, so if it is commutable we do not need housing right away. Eventually, as the operation grows, we would like to live on the farm for active management.
We will accept anyone on the land who comes with good intentions and an open mind.
To contact a land seeker, you must first create a land listing and have it approved by our staff. Thank you.
