Richmond region's small-scale farmers head to market

Philip and Debra Stoneman moved back to the family farm in Goochland County six years ago from Northern Virginia after he retired as an Army colonel and from working at a nonprofit.

Debra asked if they could plant a little garden in the front yard. It didn't stay small for long.

The couple now grow food for about 125 families from May to October as part of Community Supported Agriculture, an increasingly popular way to buy seasonal and fresh food directly from local farmers.

They sell extra food at farmers markets in the Richmond area.

The season for farmers markets is about to kick into high gear, with most open from May through October with a few off-season markets open the rest of the year.

"We're here until the first snow falls," said Debra Stoneman, who was selling spinach, asparagus and fresh eggs at the Byrd House Market in Richmond last week.

"As soon as we take something out of the ground, we put something in," she said. Brussels sprouts poked through snow this past winter. Broilers and laying hens keep the Stonemans busy year-round.

"I have the best office in the world," said Debra Stoneman, who was in accounting and finance in her previous career. "It's green. You hear the birds sing. There are no sirens, no freeway traffic."

Her workspace is a 2-acre vegetable garden at The Byrd Farm in Columbia.

Outsized gardens like the Stonemans' can become extensive endeavors, and their production has added to the proliferation of farmers markets in the past couple of years.

The number of farmers markets in Virginia has doubled in the past six years to about 170, according to the Virginia Department of Agriculture and Consumer Services.

About five have cropped up in and around Richmond in the past couple of years.

"They have mushroomed, mainly due to the whole buy-local movement that started after Sept. 11," said Elaine Lidholm, spokeswoman for VDACS.

"People became concerned about their food securities. They were worried that terrorists could hit the food supply. . . . Some people turned their backyards into edible landscapes."

The push to buy local emphasizes the advantages of freshness and better nutrients, she said. Locally grown food saves energy by not trucking in, say, lettuce from across the country.

"I don't see it slowing down anytime soon," Lidholm said.

Agriculture is the largest industry in Virginia, with an economic impact of $55 billion annually and 357,000 direct and indirect jobs, according to VDACS.

Most people in the industry are commercial farmers who grow standard crops, including corn, soybeans, livestock and poultry. Organic farming makes up about 2 percent of the industry in Virginia -- and backyard farming only 0.5 percent. "But backyard farming is a very fast-growing segment," Lidholm said.

The Stonemans are converting from certified naturally grown to organic growers, meaning they must keep detailed records of planting, cultivation, fertilization, harvest and storage.

"Organic has a consumer level of awareness," Debra Stoneman said. She and her husband also run a kitchen certified by the Food and Drug Administration to make jams and jellies and blends of goat cheese.

"Luckily my husband has income from retirement," she said. "It would be tough to raise a family and pay for medical and health insurance on farm income. If you are going to farm, you need an outside source of income."

Mike Taylor of King William County is making a go of it.

"I was in construction and it went dead," said Taylor, explaining his decision a year and a half ago to turn his 13 acres into Empress Farms.

"It's enough to make a living, not a fabulous living. But at least we have food and money to pay the mortgage."

Taylor and his wife, Diane, raise chickens, rabbits and turkeys. They make apple products, such as Dutch apple jam and cranberry apple relish. They sell their goods at the Byrd House Market and South of the James Market at Forest Hill Park.

Carol Claspell turned growing flowers into a part-time livelihood after running a commercial skylight company in Northern Virginia.

"I ran the business for 22 years and I couldn't do it anymore," she said. "It was too stressful. After closing my business, I wanted something softer to do."

She grows mostly hydrangeas, peonies, lilacs, winterberries and pussy willows but also tulips and daffodils on her farm, Perennial Pleasures in Warsaw.

"It's hard work, but I am in control and I like that," Claspell said. Her husband works at a nonfarm job, managing government contracts.

She uses her farm income to buy groceries and support her rescue operation for aging cats.

Organic gardener and educator Patricia Stansbury has more than an acre in production on her 3-acre property in Bon Air, yielding vegetables to sell at markets with enough land for others to garden there as well.

"I have friends who come over because they want to get their hands dirty," she said.

They get to dig in the earth. She gets help with weeding, hoeing, splitting logs or building fences at Epic Gardens. "I couldn't possibly hire someone to do these chores," she said.

"It's the old barn-raising mentality, with neighbors helping neighbors. That's what we have at this garden."

Stansbury, a widow, started small and kept opening up more garden space and adding an orchard. "I love what I am doing. I haven't had a daytime [office] job in four years."

She worked at a software development business and at a natural-foods store before giving it up to live off the land.

She gives speeches and teaches about nutrition. She does a half-hour radio show on the food system on WRIR (97.3 FM) every other Wednesday at noon. She is working on a grant-funded project through Virginia State University to teach farmers about growing edamame, green soybeans.

"It's a joy to see things grow," Stansbury said. "It's important to produce something that is useful, to hold something in your hand that brings people joy. What is more beautiful or nutritious than a basket of fresh vegetables?"

Contact Carol Hazard at (804) 775-8023 or chazard@timesdispatch.com.