Let's get rolling

Please see our new website at 

hullfarmsandgardens.com

A little bit about who I am.......

We had been married nearly a year when my husband proposed we move back to the farm.  I was scared.  I had heard the stories about the long hours and no vacation time.  But I knew I needed to be supportive of my husband, and so the adventure began. I didn’t expect to fall in love with farming, but that is exactly what happened.

We own and operate a 4^th generation small dairy farm on the Utah/Idaho border.  My day usually begins with feeding milk to all the baby calves, and hay and grain to all the young stock.  Then running home to feed my twin girls breakfast. From there my days work can take me anywhere from hauling hay to moving sprinkler pipe, to tending to a sick animal, to endless piles of paperwork. Slowly I kept dipping my foot into the farm a little deeper.  I never thought I would be able to say I pulled and delivered a baby calf by myself.  But there is definitely something to be said about assisting a new little calf into the world and then watching it grow and be healthy.

We have always had a roadside stand and sold sweet corn. We enjoy working with our customers and having a one on one relationship with them.  As our community grows we started noticing a dis-connect between the consumer and the farmer.  People were excited to learn we were producing the milk they drink and the food they eat_{, so we decided to grow our operation into what we hope will become a place} where the public can see where their food is being grown, and then purchase it.  We have two high tunnels housing 150 tomatoes each, and have planted close to an acre of different vegetables. 

Farming is definitely a challenge.  There are no days off.  The cows have to be milked twice a day 365 days a year.  Our girls have learned that we have to open presents from Santa AFTER morning chores are done.

This last summer we had an especially long day, it was 9pm, we hadn’t eaten dinner and my husband had to head back out to bale hay. We had been working apart all day.  I grabbed a few things from the pantry and all four of us piled into the tractor for some family time. I was grumbling, thinking about how hard it is to have no down time when my daughter said “ We are so lucky to be farmers, we have the best life.”

She is right, farming is rewarding.  Planting seeds watching them grow into food and being stewards over the land.  Raising animals, caring for them and in turn having them provide food for us.  The beauty of the crop fields, the time spent side by side working as a family. And knowing that we are carrying on a heritage that was started over a hundred years ago brings a pride that compares to nothing else. Especially when only 2% of the country’s population are farmers.