Casey O’Neill is a farmer and owner of Happy Day Farms in Laytonville, Calif. The opinions expressed in this column do not necessarily reflect the views of The Mendocino Voice. If you’d like to write your own column for The Mendocino Voice, send your idea to info@mendovoice.com.
The older I get the more I come to value friendship, companionship and relationships. I come to see that connection and fellowship are the driving forces in my life, that it’s as much about the sharing as it is the journey. Some of the best conversations happen during work, shared effort creating the space for openness and understanding. I love that farming presents such a varied palette of jobs yet also offers enough repetition and sameness to let the mind fly where it will. When the work feels like a meditation, I know I’m in the right headspace.
Few things affect life on the farm like the arrival of a new puppy, changing routines and expectations, bringing joy and delight. I’m seeing a shift in myself around how I interact with dogs, moving from a compartmentalized set of farm protection roles to a relationship based as much in companionship as work. As I reflect on this change within myself, I come to see that it’s part of a larger life shift, a move to value more than just the job at hand, a deeper focus on the tending of relationships.
It wasn’t until our last dog began an obvious decline that I came to understand how much her presence meant to me, and how much I missed her after she died. She taught me a lot about myself, about patience and love, lessons that will hold me in good stead in this next chapter. It feels good to have dog energy back on the farm. I’m delighted to have a new friend and also hopeful for a future of protection from wildlife incursions.
It feels like fall is coming early this year. Leaves are changing color, greenhouse tomatoes flushed hard and are now in between, outdoor tomatoes have just begun but the plants aren’t as vigorous as I’d like, and the cucumber bed is already replanted to salad mixes. I’m excited for the shortening days, the cool-weather crops and the eventual slowdown as winter returns.
My rule is that I don’t dream of slow, rainy days until August, because the threat of burnout is too real if I start earlier. This year is no exception, I’m tired and ready for the seasonal shift but now that we’re approaching September, I can see light at the end of the tunnel. Brassica beds are being planted for the last time this year, which means that the workload will begin to lessen in the months to come. I take these signs where I can get them, even as I sow more seeds and focus on the upcoming harvest push with an eye to planning and scheduling.
This has been the mildest summer I can remember, yet also one of the heaviest workloads I’ve ever experienced. Scaling up the vegetable business to move into wholesale sales has taken huge effort with lots of lessons along the way, but I’m delighted with the results. It feels good to pack bigger volumes of produce, and I’m happy with the quality and consistency of our efforts.
It took a number of weeks of harvesting for wholesale on Wednesdays before I could piece together a new picture of our workload. We used to harvest on Mondays and Thursdays for markets, but this summer we’ve been picking, processing and selling for the first four days of each week, with Friday the only day not earmarked for the end stages of production. This meant that seeding, bed prep and planting got crammed into the margins, edges, weekends and any spare moment, gobbling up downtime and deferring maintenance.
In this moment of reflection I see that my role has transitioned to more of choreographer, planning and managing to create smooth workflows that are doable for everyone. As we get better at the craft of rapid rotation, intensive vegetable production, I learn lessons about which crops serve well in this role, refining and honing our seeding schedules, bed prep methodologies and expectations for harvest and marketing. With so many moving pieces, there is a ton of data input that will be useful this winter as we clarify planning for next year.
Overall, our strategies are working. We’ve been able to increase both quantity and quality of our produce, becoming ever more consistent in our offerings as we time seeding and planting to have abundant harvests available each week. Salad mix is the cornerstone of the vegetable business; we never missed a week of production this summer, and though there was a slight downturn earlier this month we’re now ramping back up with the upcoming harvests.
The thing I love most about farming is honing the craft. The impetus to get better is a key driver, pushing me to evaluate every part of the process to make improvements. Seeing the results as our production expands and the quality increases provides positive reinforcement to keep going. As always, much love and great success to you on your journey!
Casey O’Neill owns and runs HappyDay Farms, a small vegetable and cannabis farm north of Laytonville. He is a long time cannabis policy advocate, and was born and raised in the Bell Springs area. The preceding has been an editorial column. The Mendocino Voice has not necessarily fact-checked or copyedited this work, and it should be interpreted as the words of the author, not necessarily reflecting the opinions of The Mendocino Voice.