In baseball, they call it “small ball.” Be it by walks, bunts, steals, or singles, the idea is that a series of more measured, incremental steps is a more successful path to home base than swinging for the fences. Of course, who doesn’t love seeing a home run or a grand slam?

Like America’s pastime, farming success arises from a combination of making careful calculations and taking risks. Some farmers have inherited their operations from earlier generations and have more secured assets. But new or returning farmers know all too well that even starting small requires a hell of a lot of capital — and leverage.

Still, more and more of the little guys are coming to bat. Where the big boys have, over decades, come to overtake the field on economies of size and government support programs, their smaller counterparts are suiting up to fill in the gaps in the local food system. Time will tell if we’re seeing the construction of a winning rotation, or a short-lived collapse in a field of dreams.

Evermore Farm is a small, family owned and operated, grass-base farm dedicated to three goals:

  1. Share the Wealth- We don’t measure all our outputs in dollars. We want to grow safe, whole-some, nutrient dense food and make it available to our local community. We are a farm-to-table producer and we don’t market any products I won’t feed my grand-children. That is sharing the true wealth of this farm.
  2. Leave the land in better condition than we found it- We employ grazing and large yard areas for our cattle, hogs, and chickens to graze and live in. They spread their manure, we keep all our acreage in grass and hay crops, and we submit an Annual Nutrient Management Plan to the Maryland Department of Agriculture detailing what and when we have added nutrients to our soils. While we are not Certified Organic, we don’t spread commercial fertilizers on our fields.
  3. We want anyone who works here or is in a marketing partnership with us to feel valued, safe, and respected- It’s hard to compete monetarily with today’s labor market but we are committed to treating the folks that help make this farm “go” the way we would like to be treated. Golden Rule.

So, we’ll keep going with these small ball tactics- each animal, each season, each customer, each purchase- building a resilient local food system together. Play ball…