Black Bird Farm, MI

Coopersville, MI. In 2016 Tater Tats helped Blackbird Farms buy a seedbed roller, to streamline their transplant process. The farm, run by Greg Dunn is located in Coopersville, Michigan, not far from where we operate Tater Tats. Greg grows over one-hundred varieties of vegetables on sixteen acres for market and CSA. We first met Greg through our local farmers alliance West Michigan Growers Group and have enjoyed hearing his stories--laced with sarcasm--at our monthly potlucks. When he isn't farming, Greg offers garden teaching & consultation services. He also throws a mean bonfire.

Email Address: farmer.blackbirdfarms@gmail.com

Tell us about your project, what do you do?

Blackbird Farms is a small-scale, certified naturally grown market farm growing vegetables and cut flowers for our CSA and farmers' market stall.

How did you get into this business? What introduced you to and made you passionate about what you do?

I think I've always wanted to be a farmer, but never quite new how to act on that passion until I interned at Trillium Haven Farm in Jenison, Michigan. There I observed a model for how to grow good vegetables on a small scale, which sent me along the path that led my wife and I to start Blackbird Farms.

What are you most excited about right now? What are some of your future goals?

I'm most excited about our new greenhouse. This significant investment is going to allow us not only to grow our own transplants for the fields but also to experiment with greenhouse crops and season extension. As for future goals, I've been contemplating planting a small orchard, as well as thinking about how to incorporate livestock into the farm's system.

Any recent moments of optimism? Things you see changing for the better?

Yes, farming is hard work, and on any given day there are at least a half dozen things to be frustrated, discouraged, or angry about. But getting wound up about them only burns my (limited) energy that would be better applied to getting my work done. At the end of the day, the only way good change comes about is through the steady application of dedication, persistence, and patience. So we plant seeds, tend them with care, and wait to receive the harvest.

Favorite vegetable to eat, grow or wear?

Sausage.

(Very funny, Greg.)

Anything else you want us to know? Anything you want us to help you spread the word about?

The culture at large wants you to be a happy docile consumer, but if you want to preserve your dignity, you must resist! You must keep your freedom to do and to be. Don't settle for the cheap gimcrack products of the industrial system. Kick a hole through the dead eye of that television screen. Stop living inside your telephone. Take hold of your birthright as a human being and make something useful for yourself or for those you love, for godsake. Make a chair, or a story, or a good meal. You can have beauty and delight and health in your common life, if only you choose so. And you do have the choice.