Ten Years of Cultivating Success
By Nella Letizia
In mid-June, 14 students and their instructors sat at a rustic kitchen table covered by a green-and-white-checkered cloth and adorned with handpicked field flowers in glass milk bottles. The table occupied pride of place in the Quillisascut farmstead—three-quarters of the length of the kitchen where the students had prepared the noontime meal of chickpea miso soup and three kinds of bread. In the three days of the hearth breads class at Quillisascut, students turned out 140 pounds of dough for everything from brioche to cornbread to naan, using ingredients only grown on or near the grounds outside the stuccoed kitchen walls.
“With all of our groups, I think the part that is the most out- standing to me is our meals, when everybody is sitting down and they’re enjoying the food,” said Lora Lea Misterly, co-owner with husband Rick of Quillisascut Farm. “Usually, they’ve had a hand in creating what we’re eating, and so they feel a sense of ownership with it. The conversations that people have and the relationships that they build speak to me of the power of food, dining well, and all these things that most of us take for granted.”
Rick and Lora Lea Misterly on their farm near Rice, WA.
Quillisascut Farm outside of Rice, Washington, has taught nearly 900 students about every part of the food cycle from farm to table since 2002, as well as fostering the close connection that comes from working on the land. People from New York, Florida, Texas, Colorado, and California have come to this little northeastern corner of the state to learn how to eat locally and seasonally.
Before the Misterlys taught their first class, Lora Lea was herself a student of a Washington State University program called Cultivating Success. Now in its 10th year, Cultivating Success has educated close to 3,500 individuals from Washington and Idaho inter- ested in learning about the economic, environmental, and social aspects of sustainable farming.
Cultivating Success courses are offered in 25 counties throughout Washington and 12 counties across Idaho. Activities and curricula are guided by three founding organizations: WSU, University of Idaho, and the non-profit Rural Roots. Core curricula center on sustainable small farming and ranching; agricultural entrepreneurship and business planning; science, society, and sustainable food systems; and field analysis of sustainable food systems.
A survey of past Cultivating Success students indicates that more than 37 percent are currently farming. For the agricultural entrepreneurship and business planning students, that percentage is as high as 78 percent.
Roots of Food
Lora Lea took the agricultural entrepreneurship course that the Cultivating Success program offered in 2002. By then, the Misterlys had been making farmstead goat cheese through their business, Quillisascut Cheese Company, for 15 years. This year, 29 goats produce the milk for three varieties of cheese sold in several Pacific Northwest stores.
The Misterlys wanted to start a farm school for food industry folks they’d met while selling their cheese. So Lora Lea took the Cultivating Success class to learn how to write a farm business plan. She also learned about determining who and where their market would be, whether a farm school was needed in their area, and more.
“It really gave me the skills to evaluate our goals, to become more focused, to make a path to get to where we wanted to go, and to assess what we had and what our needs were both financially and physically to bring people here and train them about the roots of where their food comes from.”
Extension specialists who understood agriculture and the region looked at their plan, offered guidance, and directed them to good resources, Lora Lea said. In addition, professional guest speakers discussed business law, insurance, record-keeping, and other facets of creating the business.
“I think that’s another piece that’s unique about Cultivating Success,” she added. “They bring in those people in your community who are your support network for being successful in farming.”
In turn, Lora Lea went through Cultivating Success’s instructor training program, and she has now taught for five years. To pass on the same principles, knowledge, and beliefs to others is exciting, she said.
“For us, it’s a lifestyle choice as well as a financial choice, to live in the country and to have a farm-based business. I think it’s a good life, and I really want more people to move to the country,” she added. “I think it could really bring us back to a more humane and agrarian lifestyle, which the United States was founded on. There are a lot of strong American values that are based on agriculture.”
To learn more about Quillisascut Farm, visit http://quillisascut.com. For more information about WSU’s Cultivating Success program, visit http://www.cultivatingsuccess.org.
2011 Contents
Cover Story
Features
CAHNRS Kernels
Discoveries
Spotlights
Feeding Interest in Sustainable Farming
There’s never been a greater need for interest in sustainable farming, according to Marcy Ostrom, Small Farms Program director at the WSU Center for Sustaining Agriculture and Natural Resources in Wenatchee. Over the past several decades, more small and mid-sized farms are disappearing—farms that could have generated household income in Washington and Idaho.
Like other small businesses, small farms are valuable community assets, generating revenue and employment opportunities. These farms also serve critical environmental, aesthetic, cultural, and social functions that benefit everyone. Finally, a diverse array of productive, independently owned farms operating across the state helps insure a healthy, dependable, and accessible local food supply and preserves farmland for future needs.
“The vision of the Cultivating Success program is to increase producer and consumer understanding, value, and support of sustainable local farming systems in Washington and Idaho through educational and experiential opportunities,” Ostrom said. “Partners in this program strive to create strong communities with infrastructures that provide the resources and skills needed to produce local and sustainable food and agricultural products for the residents of the Pacific and Inland Northwest.”
Participants in Cultivating Success courses have steadily increased over the past decade as course locations expanded (see map). Recently, the program added online options to reach still more students.
