cfsa farm tour perry winkle farm

Our last stop on the CFSA Farm Tour was Perry-winkle Farm in Chapel Hill, NC. Cathy Jones and Mike Perry farm roughly three and a half acres of intense vegetable and flower production. They also have chickens for eggs and meat as well as a new addition of pigs.

The weather was pretty crappy when we arrived at the farm. Shortly after parking and getting out of the car, a thunder storm rolled in and dropped hail on us for a half an hour. After the storm, Cathy took us on an in depth tour of the farm and gave us plenty of time to ask questions since there weren’t many folks left at that point.

One of Cathy’s cash crops for the spring season is green garlic. She gets a good price for it at market, and it helps her pay her labor bills. We listened as Cathy told us to make friends with the people who grind up trees and the folks who collect leaves for municipalities. Both are sources of free mulch that can quickly add organic matter to poor soils.

The farm boasts a passive solar greenhouse made of AAC block.

The greenhouse had plenty of seedlings and larger plants ready to go into the ground.

The best part of the tour was hanging out with the pigs. These Tamworths were digging and rooting machines. They inspired plenty of ideas for our near-future farming projects.

On the right side of the picture is the pigs’ previous work, now mounded into rough rows. If the pigs could form the rows, they would be even better. But unfortunately they still need help in cleaning up their mud-hole messes.

Tamworths are known for their digging abilities. They were ripping out roots right in front of us, and they had no intention of looking at us until they were disturbed.

Near the pigs was the chicken mansion, a large version of a chicken tractor.

I forget how many chickens were living in the mansion, but there were quite a few different breeds. I don’t know anything about the names of chicken types…

All of the creatures, veggies and flowers were located behind and eight foot tall electric fence. It was designed to keep deer and predators away from the crops and chickens. Noel is trying to figure out how to build one out of grass clippings and concentrated solar energy. Not really, but that would be awesome.

Thanks to Danielle for loaning me most of these photos.