Mud City Press

Home | Spaceship Earth | Book Reviews | Buy a Book | Bean and Grain Index | Short Stories | Contact | Mud Blog

THE SOUTHERN WILLAMETTE VALLEY BEAN AND GRAIN PROJECT

Stalford Seed Farms Tour, July 30, 2011

By Dan Armstrong

For the third straight year, Stalford Seed Farms, located just south of Tangent, Oregon on McLagan Road, hosted a farm tour. The farm is owned and operated by Harry Stalford and Willow Coberly. Willow has been a leading advocate for and participant in the Southern Willamette Valley Bean and Grain Project since its inception. Six years ago she was the first grass seed farmer to step forward and experiment with growing transitional dry-land beans and hard red wheat. Once entirely a grass seed operation, this 6000-acre farm is now using nearly a third of its farmland for food production, including more than a thousand acres of conventionally grown soft winter wheat and 288 acres of certified organic crops. One hundred acres of that is organic hard red wheat.

whole wheat flour
Hard Red Wheat Flour and Soft White Wheat Pastry Flour from Greenwillow Grains

Guests began to show at Stalford Seed Farms about two o'clock on the warm, brilliantly sunny Saturday afternoon. Along with cool beverages, there was a spread of breads, salads, and cookies made from products grown on the farm. The guests gathered on the lawn beneath a cluster of trees, snacked on the treats, and were given a description of the farm's activities by Willow Coberly's mother Gian Mercurio. Harry MacCormack and Dan Armstrong followed with a few brief comments on the Southern Willamette Valley Bean and Grain Project.

Guests beneath the trees Gian speaking to guests

Gian took a group of about 75 on a walking tour of the area east of the farm buildings where most of the certified organic crops are grown. Gian spoke of the farm's use of integrated pest management and compost tea (they have their own brewer), then detailed what was being grown as the group moved through the fields. The crops included emmer, oats, flax, hard red wheat, Dutch bullet beans, cranberry beans, black beans, buckwheat, garbanzo beans, and several experimental plots of other bean varieties. Gian noted that Stalford Seed Farms was part of the Farm to School Program in Linn County and told how Willow had made whole wheat pancakes from their flour one day and took them into the local public school to serve to the children–and lo and behold, to the students' surprise whole wheat pancakes were just as good if not better than non-whole wheat!

Gian also pointed out something new to the farm. Beside the farms buildings was a community garden. This garden was both for the farm workers to eat out of and to explore potential new crops.

In addition to the tour, the event provided publicity for the recently formed Willamette Seed and Grain, LCC. WS&G is a farmer owned and operated milling and seed cleaning company initiated by Willow Coberly and dedicated to"growing in the valley…for the valley." Stalford Seed Farms partners in this LLC with Greenwillow Grains in Brownsville, Sunbow Farm, Clint Richardson and Clint Lindsey, Horseshow Lake Farm, Lonesome Whistle Farm, and Open Oak Farm. The company is 100% local and processes, markets, and distributes grains, beans, and edible seeds throughout the valley.

Wheat at Stalford Seed Farm

WS&G currently sells whole wheat bread flour from certified organic hard red wheat, transitional to organic hard red wheat berries and soft white wheat berries, whole wheat pastry flour from certified organic soft white wheat, rolled oats, oat flour and Scottish oats from certified organic oats, and flax seed. WS&G also provides custom seed cleaning, grain milling, and oat rolling, as well as packaging and marketing services for growers of all sizes. Some of these products were for sale at the tour.

Again WS&G represents an important milling and seed cleaning infrastructure addition to our local food system. Stalford Seed Farms is where it started.

____________

Go to Open Oak Farm Tour.

Special thanks is extended to The Willamette Farm and Food Coalition and The Ten Rivers Food Web, Hummingbird Wholesale, and the Evergreen Hill Fund of Oregon Community Foundation for for their continued support of the Southern Willamette Valley Bean and Grain Project.

Prairie Fire

Home | Spaceship Earth | Book Reviews | Buy a Book | Bean and Grain Index | Short Stories | Contact | Mud Blog