What is Rainshadow doing about the drought?
A lot of people have checked in about the drought. Thank you by the way. Farming is always a gamble and we are always at the whim of mother nature. Its just part of the deal. A farmer has to have a very high risk tolerance. Most people would look at the odds and the numbers and run the other way.
This spring is really putting the pressure on. Our snowpack was at an all time low (4% of normal) and our Three Sisters Irrigation District does not have any water storage in our system. There are no reservoirs, which means we rely entirely on snow melting over the course of the season. The unseasonably hot weather we’ve been having is melting what little snow there is a lot faster than normal.
I have been in an unrelenting state of concern as each day plays out. I love to farm. I mean really love it. I love the team I do it with. I love feeding my community. I am proud of the uniquely diverse farm we have created and I am proud that we have built so much organic matter in our soils, that we typically only use about 30% of the water allotted to our property. This is because organic matter has a tremendous water holding capacity (Each 1% of organic matter can hold 20,000 gallons of water per acre and we’ve increased our organic matter by 5% in the last 17 seasons).
Despite all of that, our work feels incredibly vulnerable right now. In addition to scrutinizing every crop, its timing and water consumption, we installed a weather station with moisture probes that will help us get to the absolute minimum water consumption on the farm. We also applied for a drought well permit, which are very difficult to get and we were recently granted permission to drill. By the time our irrigation district water shuts off for the season (looking like early July), we should be up and running to supplement with a brand new (very expensive) well.
I believe that if you can’t eat from where you live, you shouldn’t live there. So, here we go for the long haul, investing in resilience. You can bet we’ll be here doing what we love, growing a metric shit ton of food.
We need your support this summer.
Our Summer Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) membership starts the first week of June. Thats only two weeks away! Thank you all who have signed up for a summer journey of abundance. If you haven’t, now is the time! We’re making some big investments into our resilience and ability to feed our community for the long run. If that matters to you, now is the time to show it, by committing to cook and eat the food.
Food access has been a top priority for us this year. We know that a mid day Wednesday market is hard to make for lots of folks. So….
- We’ve added the NWX Saturday Market as a pick up location for the CSA. Maybe the weekend is easier for some folks?
- We’ve made Home Delivery an option and have secured funding for SNAP folks if home delivery makes eating fresh local food easier for you.
- We have partnered with Locavore as a drop site for pre-boxed shares. This way you can pick up Wednesday evening or anytime on Thursday.
- We’ve made the payment plan weekly instead of monthly so that farm food aligns better with cash flow.
- We have not raised our prices even though the whole world is getting more expensive including every single one of our inputs.
- We have a great relationship with the PNW CSA Coalition so that we can offer Double Up Food Bucks for SNAP recipients. They make using SNAP to get your CSA so easy!
