Featured

Cynnie Keller Davis and the farming legacy at Bellair

September 30, 2022October 24, 2022gotofarms 3 Comments

*Cynnie Keller Davis and her farm manager form a strong team in the Charlottesville area*

Nestled between vineyards, with the Trump winery as a neighbor and the Blue Ridge as the backdrop, Bellair farm sprawls across 900 acres. It has been a farm of some kind for 200 years. Today, with the vision of Cynnie Keller Davis, Bellair is flourishing as the most popular Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) farm in the Charlottesville area.

I was intrigued when I met Cynnie at my Hollins College reunion this summer. At Hollins, (which is now Hollins University) we didn’t have any agriculture classes to guide farming careers. Cynnie had majored in art history and spent her junior year in Paris. How did she end up farming?

To find out I drove up to see her from Halifax, around curving two-lane roads, up to southern Albermarle County where the straggly fields smooth out like green velvet.

Cynnie, casual and relaxed in her khaki slacks and moss-green sweater, reflects on the long porch overlooking the property that is thoughtfully planted and producing bumper crops this summer.

A swatch of meadow flowers to the left, a dogwood tree in the middle of her kitchen’s panoramic windows, and somewhere down the hill lie vegetable gardens, in the thick of a rich harvest full of ripening tomatoes, herbs, onions, and more. And further down the farm road are 30 cows, 30 hogs, and 1000 laying hens.

Back in 2006, she faced a major dilemma when her husband Mike Davis died of lung cancer. Still dealing with grief, she had to decide whether to continue farming.

With a Master’s degree in social work from Virginia Commonwealth University, she was building a practice as a clinical social worker in Charlottesville. Mike had taken on the role of managing the farm. The bottom lands were leased to commodities farmers who grew soybeans and corn.

“We had suffered through everything farmers went through. It seemed really impossible. There had always been the question: should we throw in the towel?’” she recalls.

Concerns about chemicals and industrial agriculture
But the seeds for an organic farm that was a vital part of the community had already been planted in Cynnie’s mind.

As a child growing up in rural Louisiana, she had been alarmed at the devastation caused by DDT after reading Rachel Carson’s Silent Spring in high school. She recognized at that time that DDT was commonly used in agriculture, including on her family’s farm. Later The Omnivore’s Dilemma, published in 2006, added to Cynnies’s concerns about the pitfalls of agribusiness and the potential dangers of fertilizer and chemicals in food.

“With the growing interest in eating local food following Pollan’s book I thought there might be an opportunity to orient the farm business to the local community,” Cynnie says.

On a visit to her daughter in Washington, DC, at a Saturday farmer’s market in 2009, she was impressed by the produce of New Morning Farm from Pennsylvania. “I talked with the owner. I couldn’t believe organic vegetables could be so beautiful.” She convinced the owner to come to Charlottesville and evaluate the possibilities of growing organic produce on her property.

“He thought it was doable. Mainly it gave me the courage to try.”

The Pennsylvania farmer also gave what she considers the most valuable advice for starting the new venture: hire the best farm manager you can find, one who can grow food as well as market it. Today Michelle McKenzie, a devotee of good food and nature-friendly farming practices, holds that key job. Michelle, a graduate of William and Mary College, has no degree or formal training in farming. “I consider myself a lifelong learner. I pick up information from conferences, farm visits, podcasts.” She learned the ropes over two years working under Jamie Barrett, the previous manager.

Enthusiasm for fresh local food feeds popularity of farm to table

The farm-to-table movement has fed the enthusiasm for fresh local food. “I see it in the farms that have popped up around here. And I see it in the huge enthusiasm in our customers,” Cynnie notes.

Together Cynnie and Michele practice regenerative farming techniques that are environmentally friendly and innovative. Without deep preconceptions about farming, they are free to come up with creative ideas and projects that appeal to their discerning customers. Cynnie acts as CEO on the business side while Michelle works in the field and manages labor and marketing as well as the crops.

Touring the barn and farm

We meet Michele down at the barn where farm workers are packing bags of homegrown garlic and mushrooms for the CSA members. The barn is a beautiful two story open-air building built in the 1930s. They’ve got standard mixed greens and turnips along with bok choy and choy sum. Bellair offers its own organic, grass-fed filet mignon and beef brisket, while selling the luscious cheeses from Caramont farms and blue corn grits and other non_GMO grains from Deep
Roots Milling, among others.

The CSA has attracted some 400 locavores ready to embrace –and eat—Belair’s delectable produce. Members pay $38.50 for a full share, for the basics, each week but often add on specialties which are available through Belair’s markets. “The CSA is the main part of what we do and makes up 60 percent of our income,” says Cynnie. The remainder comes from sales at markets and events. Members can pick up their shares at seven markets in the area or at the farm on Fridays and Saturdays. Or they can get delivery in certain areas. Periodically, on selected days, anyone can pay $20 for whatever they can pick on the farm.

As word has spread, demand increases for other products so that customers can do almost all their food shopping through Bellair. “They will pick up a share of vegetables, and someone will say, oh, do you sell eggs? Then they will ask it they sell chickens? turkeys. . .” says Michelle.

On a tour of the farm, we see a pretty field, which looks silver from a distance. It’s a mix of buckwheat, sun hemp and sorghum that has grown as tall as corn. Michelle has bush-hogged an intricate maze, to be used for fall fest October 22-23, a two-day family affair on site. After the festival, rather than plow away the old corn stalks, the remaining stalks will be turned into fodder for the soil.

Healthy pigs, healthy land

While the fields are green and rich, the pigs in a well-planted pasture steal the spotlight. These dark brown pigs are the prettiest, neatest pigs I’ve ever seen. They are rooting around in a pasture full of ironweed, golden rod and fescue. They also feed on corn in troughs. And while they are not strictly organic due to the content of the feed, they are what they refer to as “pasture-raised.”

The knee-high two-tier fence is electrified and powered by the sun to keep the pigs in.

The pigs are moved every three weeks. “If they are kept here, it would be a mud pit,” explains Michelle.

The pigs carve out an under-story of shrubbery to attract quail, a species which has been vanishing from the area due to destruction of their habitat, mostly due to the rampant development around the Charlottesville area. “We are trying to diversify the types of animals and in the environment so that they diversify themselves,” says Michelle. “We are doing less so nature will do its thing.”

Through her newsletter, designed for members, Michelle promotes the crops, recipes and new projects in hopes that more people will adjust their tastes to what is in season.

Challenges

The challenges in organic farming go beyond the many challenges of standard farming which wipe out weeds with the help of pesticides and fertilizers. “You have to figure out ways to manage disease and weeds. But part of their strength is the diversity of the vegetable operation,” says Michelle. This wasn’t the best year for tomatoes due to the abundance of rain. But the other flourishing crops made up the difference.

There is also the challenge of year-round reliable labor. Bellair sets up decent work schedules and pays minimum wage and higher which sets it apart from many of the area farms. The mostly-all women workers work for the season and then return to school or their families. This year for the first time, they hired two Mexican workers.

As for other major challenges? “Honestly, it’s been a great joy and a constant preoccupation. . . . trying to wrap our minds around all the pasturelands. Now we’re thinking about managing for both wildlife and agriculture. I’m always thinking of ways to sell more at the CSA and trying to develop more events to bring people here,” says Cynnie.

As the farm strives to reach a break-even point, it has grown in Charlottesville as the source of great fresh produce. Cynnie approaches her success with guarded satisfaction. “At this point, I feel a deep love for the land and a deep sense of community. There is a lot of joy in harvest time and in the spring planting. And I feel joy in seeing my vision come into being and seeing it evolve.”

*Franklin (Delano Roosevelt) enjoying a mudpuddle at Bellview farm*

Turkeys, sheep, geese, lambs, alpaca: a peaceable kingdom

June 30, 2022July 1, 2022gotofarms Leave a comment

The newborn lamb, just two hours old, was already standing. I wasn’t sure if it was real; it was so soft white and cuddly as a baby’s stuffed animal. All around the spacious pen, exotic turkey, peacock, geese, ducks, and sheep mingle There was no crying– only a lot of baahing, quacking, and ringing wind chimes to herald the arrival of one more creature to this peaceable kingdom at Breezy Hill in Woodbine, Maryland.

Amid the chaos, Heather Lysantri, resplendent in a purple and orange tunic, strides out of her 2-story home across the lawn, to greet me. But first she goes right into the middle of the animal fest to check on the state of the newborn which still has its umbilical cord hanging

“It’s ok. It’s nursing,” she says as she settles down at a picnic table in front of the rebuilt silo, to talk about how this animal kingdom has blossomed. Five lambs have been born this spring, she says. And six more cria (baby alpaca) are on the way.

This is a way of life that goes beyond a hobby even though both Heather and her husband Alex Lysantri still maintain full time jobs to support the farm and their two children. “We still have to find the time to build it up,” says Heather. “We had originally set this up for horses. Then we discovered alpacas.”

Neither she nor her husband Alex has taken a vacation together for years. It has become a mission, far from the original career goal of her 20s when she envisioned a career as a professional pool player in New York City.

But farming was in her blood, ever since she herself grew up on a farm in Bluemont, Virginia. She and Alex, who was familiar with raising chickens and other domestic birds in Cyprus where he grew up, were intent on finding a farm to raise horses. They bought Breezy Hill in Woodbine, Maryland, through a short sale in 2009.

Heather lined up riding lessons for her young children and for herself. On the third lesson, two weeks before moving to the farm, Heather fell off a horse and broke her humerus, the upper arm bone. “It was a long and painful recovery,” Heather recalls. The injury took the idea of a horse-riding center off the table.

At first glance, alpaca would seem to be an odd, if not random, choice. Heather recalls years before they bought the property, she had talked to a man who promoted alpaca for the business potential of their wool and their pleasant disposition. She and Alex investigated and decided to invest in three alpacas for sale in nearby Frederick. It was a good deal– for three when they then cost much more on the market for just one. “Back then it was a pretty exotic market. You could get good money for breeding them and you could sell their fur for fiber products, “explains Heather.

But the first group of alpaca turned out to be “awful.” One was obese, one was old and the worst one suffered from an ill temper known as berserk syndrome. Berserk is one of the many idiosyncratic features of alpaca, usually known to be docile pets. It occurs in males that have been bottle-fed. “When they reach full maturity, they think everything with legs is a threat. They chase, they bite. He charged us all the time,” Heather pauses. “We traded them for five peacocks.”

A few of the ribbons won by Breezy Hill alpaca

As for the alpaca that year, the couple realized they needed to invest in better stock. They bought five alpacas” above pet quality.” The herd has now grown to 20 with many ribbons and medals for wool and quality of the animals.

We walk down to see the alpaca which live and forage free-range in the paddocks behind the house. They seem happy and goofy as they nuzzle and ogle us with their big brown eyes and flickering eyelashes. They have just been shorn of their fluffy, warm coats, a routine in May. They yielded huge bags of fur that Heather will blend into threads and yarns for weaving.

She points to Motion, who has won 13 championships, including the Grand Champion in the White class, a kind of best in group award. Today, shorn of fur, he looks skinny and awkward as a boy with his first crewcut.

“He’s got perfect conformation,” Heather points out. The distance of his legs is equal to the distance across his back, from his tail to neck. But more important, his wool is prime, “all in clumps, fine and soft.” She’s got a huge bag of Motion’s fleece to enter in this fall’s shows.

Alpacas crashed the gates in mating season

As native of the Andes, the alpaca cannot cope with the extreme heat and cold of Maryland when they are delivering offspring. Heather and Alex separate the boys from the girls except for the mating season so they can time the births in temperate weather of spring or fall. However, one day when the couple was driving home last year from an alpaca show, they noticed that the alpaca had broken through the fence.

“We had two gate crashers,” recalls Heather. “One alpaca was very horny. I saw more and more pairing. It resulted in five babies.” One mother and baby died in the summer due to the heat.

The alpaca are organic, feeding on grass and some special grain made for their nutritional needs.

How do they produce champions? “Mostly, it’s the genetics,” says Alex, a mix of strong males with smaller, less perfect females. “Nothing is guaranteed. They judge on conformation and density of the wool.”

Alpaca eat a healthy grain blend and forage on grass.

Alex is legendary in the neighborhood located in the Maryland Agricultural Reserve for his knack with birds and animals. He sells chickens, roosters and peacocks from pens behind the barn. His customers call him for advice, which can range from how to shield birds from predators to why a hen is not laying eggs.

Alpaca care has had its learning curve, but the Woodbine couple has mastered the fine points. They call the vet for emergencies but have found meds for horses and alpaca are interchangeable.

Overall, the alpaca offers many products for business: wool and offspring. But the most exciting potential lies in their manure, which Heather calls “black gold.”

Black Gold in the manure mine

“I attended a poo seminar, and I was blown away by this class. They could pay all their expenses of raising the alpaca by selling manure,” explains Heather. Alpaca manure, an all-natural, organic fertilizer, deters deer and insects in addition to boosting growth of all kinds of vegetables and flowers. At the seminar, the program leaders planted tomatoes in the manure to demonstrate its power to boost crops. “They had cables going up to the second floor” of the building to support the massive tomatoes,” says Heather.

Alex and Heather bought the gear and supplies to make bricks of the manure, which they expect to invest in once they retire. Every morning they rake the pasture and pile up the manure in the compost which they will spread over the fields.

They have discovered the power of alpaca manure for themselves. Last spring Alex carefully tilled the fields for grazing and lined them with alpaca manure. After a rain, the field filled with little yellow buttercups. Nothing but buttercups—toxic for the alpaca and most grazing animals. They uprooted the buttercups, reseeded and refertilized with the black gold for a healthy, organic grazing field.

From shearing to cape

The couple set up a studio and shop in the property’s converted barn and silo. They send some of the raw wool off to be sorted, fluffed and cleaned to Painted Sky Mill in Pennsylvania . The debris is removed from the fiber to ensure that the best is used for yarn, leaving the rest for roving or bond spinning. Heather keeps some of the fleece to process herself into threads and yarns. These go into a variety of fiber art

which is sold in the Little Boutique, where we end up. The shop displays socks, scarves and other warm products. Some are made by commercial shops, such as the stuffed alpaca toys, but all contain alpaca wool, known for its warmth and softness.

The most stunning operation occurs in Heather’ studio, located behind the shop. It houses a Felt LOOM Proseries machine that blends the refined alpaca fleece with other materials to make some beautiful, brightly colored designs. Heather may add some mohair or silk for texture, or to add structure.

“I love this machine!” Heather enthuses.

She places the fleece on top of a material decorated with peacock feather eyes. The loom, with over 900 needles, weaves the wool with the material into a warm, felt-like cover.

Heather displays the alpaca-blended textile

It seems a big jump from the plastic bags of fleece lined up outside the door to these works of art. But like the alpaca, it’s soft, warm and engaging.