FAIRVIEW — When you hear the name, Birdsong Community Farm, you just know it’s going to be something special.

Joshua and Beth Haynes and their son, Andrew, are eating healthy, wholesome, nutritious foods, grown and marketed on their farm in the Fairview community.

Not that it’s anything new to grow your own food, after all, people have been doing that for millennia.

What’s new and different about what they do is a combination of how they grow it, how they market it, and why they choose this method over other, more conventional ones.

The Haynes grow their fruits and vegetables with no poisonous insecticides and no commercial fertilizers. Instead they opt for gardening in a manner that promotes healthy, vigorous plants using methods that insure the health and safety of their family, and of all the customers who belong to their CSA, or Community Sustainable Agriculture.

“We’re selling more than fruits and vegetables, we’re selling people the security of knowing we do what we say we’re doing,” said Josh.

One look at Andrew, and it’s plain to see just one of the reasons the young couple decided to grow their food in this manner. At just over one year old, Andrew is the picture of health. Sitting in his highchair, he breakfasts on a fresh-from-the- farm egg, testing its texture with his new teeth, and enjoying every bite.

Although the Haynes have customers who are vegan and vegetarian, they also raise chickens, and partner with local beef cattle farmers who believe that the way they are growing their animals is the healthiest, most thoughtful way for the environment.

“We all share our knowledge and we are able to create jobs for other farmers,” said Josh.

“We raise free-range chickens, there are sunflowers nearby for them to forage on along with compost from our vegetables.

“We believe that everything used on food, be it pesticides, commercial fertilizers, what have you, may come back to our tables,” he said, “ and we opt not to use those methods in our gardens.”

Joshua and Beth, who met at Wheaton College, in Illinois, are committed to this way of growing produce.

Josh, a lifelong Cullman resident who attended Cullman High School before going away to college, received a degree in Economic Development.

Beth, who grew up in the suburbs of Plymouth, Michigan, received her degree in Art Education.

“We knew each other in college at Wheaton, but it was on a trip to Honduras when we were sophomores that we got to really know each other better,” said Beth.

“On that first trip, we helped to build a gravity fed water system in a rural village that had no running water.”

In 2004, Josh returned to Honduras with HNGR, Human Needs and Global Resources, doing a six-month internship in a developing third-world country, which was his first real experience with hands-on farming.

That trip may have unknowingly set them on the course which their lives have now taken.

After graduating from Wheaton, in 2005, the couple married and moved back here to Josh’s family farm.

Beth taught at Cullman Middle School, and Josh worked for a local contractor.

In 2007, the couple, neither of whom had even gardened very much, started thinking about a working farm. Not wanting to risk the dangers of using poison on their plants, they decided to grow them without using modern methods of pest control.

Before pesticides and commercial fertilizers were widely available, farmers and gardeners used some of the methods that the Haynes now employ to ensure the safety of their food.

“We’d thought about selling our produce,” said Josh. “Then we saw an article in The Cullman Times about the new Farmers Market, and we were inspired to try it.

“That first year we saw such interest that we went ahead and started the CSA and the results have been tremendous.

“We’ve learned to spot the eggs and larvae of specific insects, and as we work in the gardens, we pick those eggs, or even the hatched insects off by hand, we know the harmful ones from the beneficial ones, like ladybugs,” said Josh, showing an example he’d saved of a potato bug, and the leaf where it’s eggs were laid.

“There are other deterrents, such as hot pepper or garlic spray, and soapy water, all of these are safe practices.”

“This may be extra work, but it’s well worth it,” he said. “This ensures our customers that we are providing them with the safest, most nutritious food available.”

“We first learned from other farmers about Community Supported Agriculture, and believe strongly in the concept that there is a better way to grow food,” said Josh.

In the quiet, rolling hills and meadows of this countryside, the couple live on a farm where Josh grew up, owned by Josh’s parents, Dennis and Charlotte Haynes. Dennis Haynes is a veterinarian, who has served the community for more than 30 years.

The farm now encompasses 110 acres, and here Joshua and Beth grow a wide array of vegetables, including lettuce, green beans, summer squash, zucchini, peppers, okra, cucumbers and garlic. They have herbs like oregano, sage, rosemary, thyme and dill, and small fruits, such as Muscadines, blackberries, and blueberries.

“We had a great crop of organic strawberries this year,” said Beth.“Even though it was a wet season, and they are supposed to be a hard crop to grow organically in the South.”

Beth had never eaten many of the foods she now grows and sells. “I had never tasted okra, purple-hull peas, collards, turnip greens, or muscadines,” she laughed.

“In our first season, we didn’t know it would turn into this,” Beth said.

“But we love growing things,” she said. “I was just thinking the other day how amazing it is that the food we need in order to live actually grows on plants.”

“We are really excited about the heirloom berry tomatoes, which we hope to have soon, they are a tiny, super sweet and tangy tomato,” said Beth. “You can eat them by the handful, like a snack, sprinkle them on salads, or use them for sauces.

“These tomatoes are incredibly sweeter than the cherry tomatoes,” she added. “We should have them at the Farmer’s Market as soon as they come in.”

“After hearing about the CSA from other farmers, and seeing how much interest there was in food grown in such a way, we started a pilot program that first year with only five customers,” Beth said. “Now we have over 30, plus there are people on a waiting list.”

“A CSA is basically a subscription,” she said. “They buy into it for $250, for a 20 week supply, which comes to them once per week.”

As she explained the concept of the CSA, she worked diligently, sorting through piles of aromatic, fresh basil leaves. Andrew, strapped to her back, played contentedly, and the day’s first customer arrived to pick up her box.

Karen Duffy, who makes the 45-minute drive from Blountsville every Thursday to buy the Haynes produce, has been a loyal customer for two years now.

“I love that they do the kind of organic gardening that I would love to do myself, but don’t have time,” she said,” They are so attentive to the things we need.”

“I prefer their beef because it contains no hormones, I keep a cooler in my car, and make the trip so that I can get food grown this way,” said Duffy. “I have gone to the farmer’s markets, but I don’t like questioning each one on the methods they use to grow their produce.”

“It’s important that our customers understand our methods,” said Josh.

“We work backward,” he laughed. “Instead of saying “I need this, to cook that,” we say,” I have these ingredients this week, what can I cook with them?”

It seems to work well. The Haynes’ even have one customer who drives all the way from Birmingham each week, taking back enough food for two other families.

The produce available each week is listed on their website, and customers have choices and preferences, made beforehand, so that the Haynes know what goes in each weekly box.

“This week they are getting potatoes, blueberries, cabbage, green onions, fresh basil, and one red, ripe tomato,” smiled Beth. “Along with the produce, we included a recipe for pesto, using the basil.”

“Sometimes they might want to change something, or buy a little extra of something else,” she said.

About this time, another customer pulled into the driveway, unloading a big cooler filled with clean half-gallon jars. The Haynes filled the jars with fresh milk, and he purchased fresh eggs.

The milk is labeled “For animal consumption only,” pointed out Josh.

“Some of the other farmers we co-op with raise grass-finished beef cattle,” said Josh, “They all believe in the same concept that we do, that food should be grown in as healthy a manner as possible.”

“That means our customers might see a blemish on our tomatoes from time to time, but they know this is because we don’t use fungicides, or other harmful products on our vegetables.” The use of drip irrigation cuts down on many fungi, and the Haynes’ also use BT, which is a natural insecticide, for pests such as tomato hornworms.

“We believe that God intended us to be good stewards of the land he provided us with, that he gave us the tools to do it properly, without using harmful sprays and other chemicals,” said Josh. “The fact is, that when people started demanding fast food, it changed the way we lived.”

“How we eat dictates how our land is used,” said Josh. “People wanted bigger vegetables, faster. More and more the beef industry catered to the fast food industry, using hormones to grow heavier cattle, and chickens, too.”

“As Christians, our lives are about the way we interact with the world, we believe in a God who loves these things, the land, and the food we grow on it.”

“Our motivation is that we want to do things that benefit our neighbors, our customers and our family.”

“That means that this might not be the easiest thing, but we believe that it’s the best thing.”

As he walked down the rows of eggplants and other vegetables, bees moved around him, going from plant to plant. “We have bee hives, too, and harvest the honey.”

From that honey, and the pecans from their trees, Beth makes natural granola, and energy bread, called Bucketabon, which she discovered on a wilderness trip to Wisconsin.

“This all comes back to the soil, everything depends on having good soil, it’s really the most important part of our business,” Josh explained, looking out over the fields full of summer’s bounty.

“We build it up, with compost, wood shavings, things like that. And we try not to till, so that no nitrogen is taken from the soil and released into the air,” he explained. “We also use crop rotation to enrich the soil.”

In addition to the weekly Thursday pick-ups, Josh also runs a delivery route on Tuesdays. “We fill these boxes and have them ready for busy people who lack the time or space to garden, but want to provide their families with fresh, wholesome and nutritious fruit and vegetables.”

“This fall we will grow winter squash, which I love to eat,” said Beth.

“In the winter, we will have plenty to do, we still sell milk, beef, and eggs, we do the maintenance that goes along with these things, and that’s also when we prepare the soil.”

“That’s when we attend conferences, such as the Alabama Sustainable Agriculture Network, and the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group,” said Beth. “We’ve learned a lot in those places.”

The Haynes have a farm party for their customers in November, taking them on tours of the farm, showing them where their food is coming from, and how it’s grown.

“We are working on a program to educate youth in these methods of farming and growing crops, “ said Josh. “We have an intern, Bret Wolfe, helping us right now, learning these practices and methods.”

“The more I learn about growing food this way, the more passionate I become,” said Josh.



To learn more about sustainable agriculture, the Haynes, and Birdsong Community Farm, visit their website at HYPERLINK "http://www.birdsongcommunityfarm.com" www.birdsongcommunityfarm.com