140: Andy and Melissa Dunham of Grinnell Heritage Farm on Growing a Vegetable Farm in a Sea of Corn and Soybeans

Andy and Melissa Dunham own and operate Grinnell Heritage Farm in Grinnell, Iowa. From corn-and-bean ground and no infrastructure when they started in 2006, Grinnell Heritage Farm has grown to twenty acres of vegetables, marketed through a 250-member CSA, natural foods stores, multiple farmers market, and a new on-farm pizza night that they started this year. Andy and Melissa share how they worked with New Pioneer Food Co-op to develop their skills as market farmers and to learn how to better serve the wholesale marketplace. We also dig into their CSA model, employee management on Grinnell Heritage Farm, and how they’ve changed their CSA to respond to the needs of both customers and employees. We also learn how Andy and Melissa developed their farm infrastructure, created environmental enhancements to change the farm ecology and benefit the farm overall, organic weed control in asparagus, and how they’ve managed repeated pesticide drift incidents on their Central-Iowa farm. Perennial support for the Farmer to Farmer Podcast is generously provided by Vermont Compost Company and BCS America. Pictures, show links, and more at farmertofarmerpodcast.com/episodes/dunham.