Joy Beghtel and her husband Greg wanted more for their family so they bought a strawberry farm that they've transitioned to a larger asparagus operation. Enjoy the story and deep-dive into all things asparagus!
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (00:00):
Joy Beghtel joins me today to discuss hand snapping an acre and a quarter of asparagus spears with her family on their farm, Fields of Joy, in Anderson, Indiana. Enjoy this conversation as we dive deep into all things farming with this perennial crop and their transition away from strawberries.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (00:22):
Welcome to More Than A Mile, a local food podcast from Market Wagon, focused on connecting you to local food through farmer stories from across America. I'm Nick Carter, your host, a farmer and CEO and co-founder of Market Wagon. We are your online farmers market with a mission to enable food producers to thrive in their local and regional markets. Food is so much more than just nutrients and calories. It's actually the fabric that holds us together. And I look forward to crafting a generational quilt of farmer stories and experiences, the victories and challenges of individuals, families, and teams doing their part to help democratize food in America. Thanks for joining me for this episode of More Than A Mile, and thank you for buying local food. It's one critical step in making an investment in food for future generations.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:11):
My guest today is Joy Beghtel from Anderson, Indiana. Not very far from Indy, just a few miles up the road from where we farm and where the Market Wagon headquarters is at. Joy, thanks for being with us today.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:22):
Yeah. Thanks for having us, Nick.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:24):
So you grow one edible crop--and one only that I know of, right?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:31):
Yes. . Well, one only that we sell on Market Wagon. Yeah. We do grow other things, but primarily just for our farm stand the rest of the year.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:38):
So you've got a farm stand where you grow some other produce for, but what do you sell on Market Wagon?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:43):
We sell a lot of asparagus.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:46):
How much, how many acres? Is it measured in acres or row feed? How much asparagus do you have over there.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:51):
It is measured in acres. We actually grow that much. So I always laugh and say, isn't it every little girl's dream to grow up and own an asparagus farm. We right now have about an acre and a quarter of asparagus.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:06):
Wow.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:07):
Yeah, that's a lot.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:09):
Okay. That's a lot of asparagus and this is--for our listeners who don't know--this is a permaculture, right? So it's perennial.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:18):
Correct. It has a 15 to 25 year lifespan on it.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:22):
Oh, wow. That long. Okay.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:23):
Yeah. It just depends on the variety and I think kind of the weather and that sort of things, but we should get at least 15 years, we're hoping for somewhere around 20 on the plants that we put in.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:35):
And so when did you start this farm?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:37):
Yeah, so we actually bought the farm in 2013. When we purchased it, it was a U-Pick strawberry farm. We kind of just stumbled onto it--kind of a long story. I grew up on a, what would probably be considered a small hobby farm. Probably not far from where you grew up, Nick. I grew up in Northern Grant County, so...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:58):
Yeah, I actually showed dairy calves in Grant County.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:02):
Okay. I thought you said on one of your podcasts, that you were a Howard County boy and I was like...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:05):
I'm a Howard County boy, but there was no other dairy farms in all of Howard County so I got special permission to drive to the next county over and show my Four-H dairy calves. Yep.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:15):
Very fun. Very fun. Yeah. So I grew up in Northern Grant County. We had probably what would be considered a hobby farm. You know, we did like a third of an acre of garden and had goats and chickens and rabbits and all of that kind of stuff. And so I didn't think much about it. I really had just an idyllic childhood looking back on it. It was all of that good stuff that you get living out in the country. And then I grew up and went to college, got a couple degrees in social work and Greg and I got married and started living the good life...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:46):
Two degrees.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:46):
Two degrees in social work.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:47):
Because if you're gonna get one degree in social work, you may as well get multiple. Right?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:51):
I mean, you might as well. And then end up growing asparagus. Right? I mean, why not?
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:54):
So it's a great application of that.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:56):
Yeah, perfect. My parents were thrilled. No, my parents actually are thrilled. I should say that they love what we are doing and how we're living our lives. So yeah, so Greg and I were just really happy living in Fishers, had a couple of girls and adopted our son from Ethiopia. And then as you do, when you have kids, I think probably Nick, you realize you get that itch to give your kids what you had growing up. And...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (04:19):
That is exactly why we started our farm. I mean like, verbatim. I can't, I know that you can grow up to be a functioning adult without growing up as a farm kid, but I don't know how to make it happen because it hasn't happened to me. So...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (04:34):
I don't know either. And I kind of, I told Greg I was getting panicked because I thought they don't, they don't have animals. Like cats and dogs to me aren't animals. I'm like goats, chickens. We have alpacas. We have, you know, I was just getting real nervous that the kids were not having the experience that I had growing up. So we started looking for a small farm and spent a couple years with a realtor, trying to nail something down when somebody at church casually mentioned like, 'Hey, I picked strawberries up at this strawberry farm in Anderson. And the guy said, he's putting his farm up for sale.' So I literally that day got in my van, loaded my kids up and drove up here. And I remember calling Greg from the field and just saying, I think I have found our spot.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (05:19):
Pack your bags, hubby, we're moving.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (05:21):
Yeah. We threw our house on the market. It was sold in two weeks. We closed on this place and we told ourselves, I remember my dad saying, 'you know, strawberries are not an easy crop to grow.' We grew them as kids. Right. You know, everybody grows a patch of strawberries, but this was...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (05:36):
So you promptly ripped them out of the ground and went to asparagus.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (05:40):
No, I let myself suffer for three solid years.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (05:43):
Three solid years.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (05:44):
Oh yeah. Well we promised ourselves, you know, it was a business that we were purchasing. Not only was it a house that was as large as our house in Fishers, but we got five acres with it and it had a functioning business. So we didn't wanna just toss that out. You know, we're like I remember saying, we'll give this three years and see what happens. And I think what we didn't realize is when you grow large scale, I mean, three acres of strawberries is large scale. When you do that in central Indiana, where there's a lot of water, a lot of late frost, it's a real risky product and it's extremely weather sensitive. And it requires a fairly significant amount of chemicals that we didn't realize we were getting into. And so after three seasons where every season we had a four and a half to five inch rain--in a day--during that season.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (06:37):
I remember literally the third year walking into the house and saying to Greg, 'I don't care what you do, but I'm not growing strawberries anymore.' Like I'm done with this crop. And we had a real serious conversation after that season and really had to pivot and say what works for our family? What is not going to cause us a lot of stress and anxiety weather-wise what will still produce a good income and not consume our whole summer. And I remember laying in bed talking about this one night and Greg said, 'I think we go for asparagus.'
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (07:17):
How did he--had he ever grown asparagus before?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (07:19):
So the farm when we bought it, in addition to the three acres of strawberries, had just kind of a lot of little stuff. Like there was about 300 feet of established asparagus. There was 40 fruit trees.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (07:30):
So you were also growing asparagus in addition to the nightmare of the strawberries.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (07:35):
Right. 300 feet. It wasn't a huge amount. I mean, I grew up with this asparagus patch as a kid. I remember it was the worst place to get chiggers in the whole world. You know, it, it was what it was. And so he said, 'I really think it's a perennial crop. It requires no chemicals. And asparagus is such a smart crop--when it is cold, it stays underground. When it is hot and sunny, it comes up. So you kind of--you're at the mercy of the crop and the weather, but it does not ruin your crop in the way that strawberries are so weather sensitive.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (08:15):
And are there natural predators to the--the strawberry issue is that the bugs that live in Indiana really love our strawberries.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (08:24):
Yeah. That and the fungus. Yeah.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (08:25):
Uhhuh. Yeah. What, what do you have, what do you have that threatens the asparagus?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (08:30):
There's an asparagus beetle that sometimes we fight. But to be honest, we really haven't had a lot of issues. I've kind of attributed that to we don't have a ton of bug pressure on our farm. And I think part of that is we're in the middle of conventional fields. So whether I want to be organic or not. I don't have that luxury because I butt up to conventional farm fields.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (08:53):
So they're using chemicals that are actually--you're not spraying them on your field, but they're keeping the beetles away.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (08:59):
Right, right, right. And we're on the Indiana Drift Watch Program and we have a good relationship with the farmers close to us. We had a struggle with the farmer that was right next to us, but he sold that field and the other farmers are very conscientious. They've come, they've looked at what we're growing. They call us before they spray. So we've had a good experience.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (09:21):
Good. Now I have a similar experience. We grow a lot of sweet corn but we are nowhere near conventional ag. We're in the middle of Indianapolis. So there's not a cornfield for miles and miles around. So there's this moth that lays a larvae. If you've ever peeled sweet corn and you've got that one worm in there, it's actually a larva of a moth. And we thought that that was gonna be a big challenge. I've never seen a single one of them on our farm in four years because there's no other habitat for that moth anywhere around. Well the beetles that you're dealing with, can you deal with those with D.E.? Can we say that word? How do we say that word? Diet-tenacious...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (10:04):
Diatomaceous earth. Yeah. We used it a lot for our chickens and all kinds of stuff. You know what though? The issue that we've really run into, which has been great is the asparagus beetle does not tend to cause a problem when we're harvesting. They tend to come out after we've already let it fern out. So at the end, when we're done picking.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (10:24):
They're damaging next year's crop.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (10:26):
They're damaging next year's crop. But to be honest, there is so much asparagus out there that they're not really doing too much damage. So...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (10:36):
It's a welcomed population control.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (10:38):
Yeah. We've just been really grateful. We've not had to spray for anything. We fertilize once a year and that is it on the field. That's the only treatment that we do. Yeah. Other than, you know, mowing it off at the end of the season and a little top tilling at the beginning of the season.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (10:53):
So I was going to ask you because--and you brought it up. I know you mentioned that you are chemical free, so you don't use any chemicals. So what kind of--but you've said fertilizers--so what kind of feeding does asparagus need? Is it a heavy nitrogen feeder? Like tomatoes?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (11:07):
It's a real heavy nitrogen feeder. Yeah. it's not straight urea but it's like a 35 or 30 dash zero dash five something. So it's a real heavy nitrogen.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (11:17):
Heavy nitrogen. Got it. Do you have chickens?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (11:20):
We have chickens. Yep. We have chickens. We don't have enough chickens that we could fertilize this whole field. We have alpacas and we use every ounce of their fertilizer.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (11:29):
Is alpaca manure high in nitrogen too?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (11:31):
It's fabulous. It's not high in nitrogen. It's actually kind of like similar to a rabbit manure. So you can put it straight on. No aging. I put it on all my flower beds, rhubarb, all that kind of stuff.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (11:42):
We have goats--goats and horses and we put their manure straight on in the fall after everything's out. And then just under and let it know it's aging out in the field. But we have we have 400 laying hens. And so we get a decent amount of nitrogen. I gotta tell you.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:02):
Maybe you should bring your nitrogen up here for my field.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (12:05):
Oh, I'm using--I'm hoarding it. Sorry. No sharing of the nitrogen.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:09):
We're that way with our goat and alpaca poop. We sometimes get requests for alpaca fertilizer and I'm like, 'Nope.' I use it on everything. Yes.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (12:18):
So it's a heavy nitrogen feeder. What is, I should know this, but I don't. What technically is asparagus? Is it a broad leaf? Is it a grass? What is it? You want me to edit this one out so that we both sound smarter?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:33):
No, edit this one out. No. So asparagus is a crown. I don't know if you've ever seen what it looks like to plant it.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (12:38):
Oh, of course. Yeah. Yeah.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:39):
For sure. So when we decided to put in--in 2016 we put in 5,000 crowns. The next year we put in 5,000 additional crowns. So in addition to the 300 feet plus a little more, we had added to, we added 10,000 crowns of asparagus. And we're really lucky. I don't know if most folks would know that Michigan is a really good supplier of asparagus. That's where a lot of our asparagus comes from. When you get more kind of local asparagus. So there are a couple of different asparagus farms that sell crowns. So we were able to drive up to Southwest Michigan and right in front of us, they dug up the crowns. We brought 'em home, put 'em in fresh.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:21):
Oh, so you got to go get them. You dug them up yourself.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:24):
Yeah. They dug them right there for us, packaged them up and we brought them right home and got them directly in the ground.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:29):
So we've never gone into asparagus. I, and before buying our farm, we did we attempted a failed attempt at a small asparagus patch. The crowns just never took. And I may, maybe I didn't fertilize him. Right. Interesting.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:42):
Yeah. You've got a trench really far down. It's about 14 inches that you trench way down into the ground. And then it's a pretty laborious process to plant 5,000 grounds. I'm pretty sure we should have hired that out.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:54):
But you only have to do it once every 20 years.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:56):
That's right. Right.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:57):
Once every 20 years,
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:59):
Trust me, I will not be doing it in another 20 years. Somebody else will be doing the labor on that.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (14:04):
You will not be doing it in 20 more years. So you you've decided that you've got a cap to how long you want to be an asparagus farmer.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (14:13):
Well, I think yeah, In 20 years Greg and I will be pushing retirement age for sure. I think that's, what's so great about this farm--us buying it--was, although I would love to have inherited, you know, an old family property that I could have kept the legacy going. The really great thing about this property is we've been able to make it what we want to and transition it to what works well for our family. So I think in another 15 years you know, our kids will all be grown--if one of them wants to come back and put in the next round of asparagus or grow flowers. Great. If they don't and they wanna put in something else or, you know, if they wanna go and do something else, that's great too. I don't want to put any requirements on what they choose.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (14:57):
Until they get that anxiety that, oh my gosh, I'm not raising my kids with animals.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (15:02):
Well, you know, teenagers, I've got three teenagers right now. And of course they're all like, oh, we're moving to the city. We're gonna eat processed food all day long. You know, they're at that stage of life. And I think, yeah, maybe, and that'll be fine. And if not, we'd love to have them back and love to see them raising our grandkids out here.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (15:19):
Yeah. Well Anderson's not that far.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (15:23):
No, no. Anderson's a great community. You know, we've really had a good experience here. A lot of people kinda looked at us strange when we left Hamilton County and said really Madison County, but it has been a really great fit for our family. The community's been really welcoming and we love it up here.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (15:39):
Talk to me a little bit more about the family. So your family's involved in the farm. Are your kids--they are out there cutting asparagus and bundling it and bringing it to Market Wagon?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (15:50):
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Our kids don't have much of an option. It's all hands on deck during asparagus season. They know that kind of late April to the beginning of June that's just what our family does. We kind of sign off from friends and family, say we'll see you in about four weeks. And we hit it hard as a family, so the kids harvest and then two of my kids harvest with Greg and then my middle daughter and I kind of trim it up and bundle it, weigh it all out and get it ready in the kitchen.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (16:19):
Wow. That's so great.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (16:19):
Yeah. And it'll be interesting. We don't know how much the crop will yield every year. That's the other thing that's unique about asparagus because it comes up from the ground, kind of like little fingers cropping out of the ground. We know what an acre of asparagus should produce when it is fully mature, but we're just now hitting that full maturity with our crop because it takes about three years for an asparagus patch to really produce fully. So, you know, last year we picked, well over 2000 pounds, we think this year we'll pick over 3000 and then we should level off somewhere in the next couple of years, somewhere between four and 6,000 pounds off of that acre.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (17:01):
Wow. Wow. Where, where all does it go? Do you sell that much on Market Wagon or do you sell most of it at your own farm stand?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (17:11):
Yeah, we've got several different outlets. So of course the farm stand is always the first place that it's out because we can put it out here in our front yard, on our big cart and, and it is a little temperamental when it's cold and, and cloudy, the crop doesn't come up. We have to wait for a hot sunny day to get it going. Once that gets rolling and we're a little later in the season, we'll be at the Pendleton Farmers Market. We have a couple of different little grocery stores that we sell to. And then we're excited to hopefully do both Tuesday and Thursday on Market Wagon this year.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (17:44):
Yeah, yeah. You should.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (17:46):
We're thrilled.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (17:47):
Yeah. That's great. So, all right. We've kind of talked about it. We can, people can find you at Pendleton Farmers Market, on Market Wagon.com. You have a farm stand, right? So people can drive out to your place. How else can customers learn about you online or otherwise?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (18:05):
Yeah, so we have our Facebook page and our Instagram, Fields of Joy produce. And then we should have asparagus this year at R&R Market in Pendleton and downtown Anderson at Collective Roots and then Wildwood Market downtown Indy. We sold with them for a long time. So we're excited to be in all those locations. Yeah.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (18:26):
Awesome. Now I don't know, Ross may cut this off, but I just wanna have fun learning a little bit more about asparagus and what you could do. So, and maybe this, will be the fun addendum to the end of the podcast. You said top tilling. So you have to go out and, and break the surface for the asparagus
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (18:42):
To come through. Yeah. Just helps to, to allow the asparagus to come up through the ground a little bit easier.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (18:47):
Do you use a disc or a rototiller for that?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (18:49):
A rototiller. Yep. We just go slightly over the top of all of those rows. Our struggle sometimes is weed control and weed pressure.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (18:56):
That's my next question, right? Yeah. You can't because this stuff, it spreads underground. Right. So you cannot use a weed block of any kind.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (19:03):
Correct.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (19:04):
So what's the weed pressure like, does it eventually win? Like does it...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (19:09):
Well, we hope not. We're hoping it doesn't eventually win. The good thing is that by the time we are done harvesting, that's really when you have your heavy weed pressure coming on. Right. So that kind of late May, we've already really harvested by the time heavy weed pressure comes on. And at that point, you let your whole field go to fern, that fern shades out those weeds, and they really don't get established. So other than thistle, we, you know, if we find thistle we go out and try to deal with that. Horse weeds, we had a horrible problem with horse weeds when we first--what we call horse weeds. Digging those things out, you know, making sure you're staying on top of seeds, all of that. But people ask us that all the time, do you weed your asparagus? I'm like, oh, there's no way I could weed this patch. And it's really okay. It doesn't bother me that there's weeds out there. Because we can pick around all of that. And then that fernage just kind of shades it out.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (20:09):
Yeah. So that's what I meant when I said, does it win? I meant does the asparagus eventually win? Cause I know that happens like corn. It will it'll canopy eventually. So you just need to keep ahead of the weeds until the canopy. But I hadn't thought about the fact that yeah, the weed pressure, you know, I always feel like I'm a big victorious vegetable farmer until like the first week of June. And that's when I'm like, oh man, , it's like a tortoise and hare race. And I'm the hare in the first month and a half of produce season and then the tortoise always catches up. All of those weeds become overwhelming. So what does harvest look like? How do you, how do you have to is it's not by hand, is it you're not cutting every spear?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (20:51):
Every snap. We are, we are actually hand snapping every spear. So we've found it's just the best way, you know, there's certainly methods. People can use a tractor and you can lay on your belly and kind of pick it that way. We just, I know--
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (21:06):
I just picture myself telling my daughter, no, it's gonna be fine. You just lay under the tractor like this. Yeah. Daddy won't I won't roll over your legs. It's gonna be fine.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (21:13):
No, it's totally fine. If you look on YouTube, I'm sure you could find a whole bunch of creative inventive ways. At this point we are still hand harvesting it. You know, when we get to that four, 5,000 pounds, we may decide to, to invest in something different. But for us right now with our kids, we've hired a young boy to come and help us harvest. It is what it is. And that's what we say makes our asparagus different. It's not machine harvested where, you know, they set a height on the asparagus and it all gets knocked. At the same point, we are running our hand from the bottom of that spear up. We're finding that tender spot. We're popping it off there. And then it, it gets brought in. We sort all of our asparagus into four different sizes so that your full pound of hand snapped asparagus--not only can you eat the entire stalk because the entire stalk is tender , but it's all sized appropriately so that you can cook it in the same way and have a good success.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:13):
Because that is something that happens with store bought asparagus--you can't eat the bottom of it.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:19):
No, it's usually...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:20):
Do they?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:20):
We basically tell people it's not the same product. If you buy something in the store. It might all be sized similarly, similarly, similarly, but lemme get that word out.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:30):
Diatamatious earth...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:33):
Diatamatious. Let's just call that DE. You're definitely going to cut the bottom third off to get to your tender spot where we've already hit that tender spot for you.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:43):
And is it a true cut and come back? Like you're gonna get another spear out of that same plant or it's just different spears are coming up.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:50):
Different spears. Yeah. So if you think about that asparagus, crown, that little crown that you plant with one little spear coming up, it will build every year. So off of that crown, you will have buds all of those buds then produce spears coming up off of the ground. And that's really where you get your different sizes. I think people sometimes think that the real thick ones are real Woody and you can't eat those. Those are just as tender. It's just an older bud off of that crown. So every year we should get more and more of the thin spears because new buds produce thin spears, but as they age, they get bigger. So yeah, so always we have lots and lots of different sizes coming up out of the ground.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (23:39):
One of the others--we talked about strawberries being a headache. One of the other headaches about strawberries is if you intend to grow anything else, you also have to be murdering strawberry plants every year because they want to, they want to invade and take over. Does asparagus do the same thing? Is it difficult to keep in place?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (23:55):
No, we've actually we designed all of our field so that the asparagus has plenty of room to spread. That's what we wanted to do. So our older patches are you know, a foot and a half wide. Well, they're probably more like three feet wide at this point. And then when you plant your new patch, when we planted all of those 10,000 crowns, they were of course in a one little single row. And every year when you go out that wide, that road just keeps getting wider and wider. So we've left plenty of room between all of those rows, not only to mow, to keep a good walking path down, but to allow that one little crown to just take off over the next 20 years and start widening out and develop lots of different buds coming off of it.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (24:42):
Very fascinating. Thank you for the asparagus farming tutorial that most of our listeners would've turned off about five minutes ago, but this was great.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (24:51):
I'm not sure I should be proud of myself that I know quite so much about asparagus .
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (24:56):
You know, if it takes two social [work] degrees in order to know this much about asparagus, I guess...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (25:00):
That's right. That's right. Well, I can do other things too. I can do other things too.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (25:06):
Oh. Joy, this has been great. I really appreciate you sharing your story and letting people know a little bit more about where their food comes from and how difficult and challenging it is to raise good, both strawberries and asparagus, and everything else because it just engenders, a greater appreciation for what you do and where our food comes from. So thanks for joining me.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (25:27):
Hey, thanks for having me, Nick.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (25:34):
Thanks for listening to this episode of More Than A Mile. Be sure to sign up for Market Wagon at MarketWagon.com or after downloading the Market Wagon app for iOS or Android. Follow us @MarketWagon on Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and Facebook for stories, recipes, special announcements, news, and just digital handshakes from our friendly farming community. If you enjoyed More Than A Mile, please rate the podcast and write a review on iTunes, CastBox, PodChaser, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. Thank you for continuing to support local food.
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By Nick CarterJoy Beghtel and her husband Greg wanted more for their family so they bought a strawberry farm that they've transitioned to a larger asparagus operation. Enjoy the story and deep-dive into all things asparagus!
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (00:00):
Joy Beghtel joins me today to discuss hand snapping an acre and a quarter of asparagus spears with her family on their farm, Fields of Joy, in Anderson, Indiana. Enjoy this conversation as we dive deep into all things farming with this perennial crop and their transition away from strawberries.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (00:22):
Welcome to More Than A Mile, a local food podcast from Market Wagon, focused on connecting you to local food through farmer stories from across America. I'm Nick Carter, your host, a farmer and CEO and co-founder of Market Wagon. We are your online farmers market with a mission to enable food producers to thrive in their local and regional markets. Food is so much more than just nutrients and calories. It's actually the fabric that holds us together. And I look forward to crafting a generational quilt of farmer stories and experiences, the victories and challenges of individuals, families, and teams doing their part to help democratize food in America. Thanks for joining me for this episode of More Than A Mile, and thank you for buying local food. It's one critical step in making an investment in food for future generations.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:11):
My guest today is Joy Beghtel from Anderson, Indiana. Not very far from Indy, just a few miles up the road from where we farm and where the Market Wagon headquarters is at. Joy, thanks for being with us today.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:22):
Yeah. Thanks for having us, Nick.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:24):
So you grow one edible crop--and one only that I know of, right?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:31):
Yes. . Well, one only that we sell on Market Wagon. Yeah. We do grow other things, but primarily just for our farm stand the rest of the year.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:38):
So you've got a farm stand where you grow some other produce for, but what do you sell on Market Wagon?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:43):
We sell a lot of asparagus.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (01:46):
How much, how many acres? Is it measured in acres or row feed? How much asparagus do you have over there.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (01:51):
It is measured in acres. We actually grow that much. So I always laugh and say, isn't it every little girl's dream to grow up and own an asparagus farm. We right now have about an acre and a quarter of asparagus.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:06):
Wow.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:07):
Yeah, that's a lot.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:09):
Okay. That's a lot of asparagus and this is--for our listeners who don't know--this is a permaculture, right? So it's perennial.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:18):
Correct. It has a 15 to 25 year lifespan on it.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:22):
Oh, wow. That long. Okay.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:23):
Yeah. It just depends on the variety and I think kind of the weather and that sort of things, but we should get at least 15 years, we're hoping for somewhere around 20 on the plants that we put in.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:35):
And so when did you start this farm?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (02:37):
Yeah, so we actually bought the farm in 2013. When we purchased it, it was a U-Pick strawberry farm. We kind of just stumbled onto it--kind of a long story. I grew up on a, what would probably be considered a small hobby farm. Probably not far from where you grew up, Nick. I grew up in Northern Grant County, so...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (02:58):
Yeah, I actually showed dairy calves in Grant County.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:02):
Okay. I thought you said on one of your podcasts, that you were a Howard County boy and I was like...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:05):
I'm a Howard County boy, but there was no other dairy farms in all of Howard County so I got special permission to drive to the next county over and show my Four-H dairy calves. Yep.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:15):
Very fun. Very fun. Yeah. So I grew up in Northern Grant County. We had probably what would be considered a hobby farm. You know, we did like a third of an acre of garden and had goats and chickens and rabbits and all of that kind of stuff. And so I didn't think much about it. I really had just an idyllic childhood looking back on it. It was all of that good stuff that you get living out in the country. And then I grew up and went to college, got a couple degrees in social work and Greg and I got married and started living the good life...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:46):
Two degrees.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:46):
Two degrees in social work.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:47):
Because if you're gonna get one degree in social work, you may as well get multiple. Right?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:51):
I mean, you might as well. And then end up growing asparagus. Right? I mean, why not?
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (03:54):
So it's a great application of that.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (03:56):
Yeah, perfect. My parents were thrilled. No, my parents actually are thrilled. I should say that they love what we are doing and how we're living our lives. So yeah, so Greg and I were just really happy living in Fishers, had a couple of girls and adopted our son from Ethiopia. And then as you do, when you have kids, I think probably Nick, you realize you get that itch to give your kids what you had growing up. And...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (04:19):
That is exactly why we started our farm. I mean like, verbatim. I can't, I know that you can grow up to be a functioning adult without growing up as a farm kid, but I don't know how to make it happen because it hasn't happened to me. So...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (04:34):
I don't know either. And I kind of, I told Greg I was getting panicked because I thought they don't, they don't have animals. Like cats and dogs to me aren't animals. I'm like goats, chickens. We have alpacas. We have, you know, I was just getting real nervous that the kids were not having the experience that I had growing up. So we started looking for a small farm and spent a couple years with a realtor, trying to nail something down when somebody at church casually mentioned like, 'Hey, I picked strawberries up at this strawberry farm in Anderson. And the guy said, he's putting his farm up for sale.' So I literally that day got in my van, loaded my kids up and drove up here. And I remember calling Greg from the field and just saying, I think I have found our spot.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (05:19):
Pack your bags, hubby, we're moving.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (05:21):
Yeah. We threw our house on the market. It was sold in two weeks. We closed on this place and we told ourselves, I remember my dad saying, 'you know, strawberries are not an easy crop to grow.' We grew them as kids. Right. You know, everybody grows a patch of strawberries, but this was...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (05:36):
So you promptly ripped them out of the ground and went to asparagus.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (05:40):
No, I let myself suffer for three solid years.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (05:43):
Three solid years.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (05:44):
Oh yeah. Well we promised ourselves, you know, it was a business that we were purchasing. Not only was it a house that was as large as our house in Fishers, but we got five acres with it and it had a functioning business. So we didn't wanna just toss that out. You know, we're like I remember saying, we'll give this three years and see what happens. And I think what we didn't realize is when you grow large scale, I mean, three acres of strawberries is large scale. When you do that in central Indiana, where there's a lot of water, a lot of late frost, it's a real risky product and it's extremely weather sensitive. And it requires a fairly significant amount of chemicals that we didn't realize we were getting into. And so after three seasons where every season we had a four and a half to five inch rain--in a day--during that season.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (06:37):
I remember literally the third year walking into the house and saying to Greg, 'I don't care what you do, but I'm not growing strawberries anymore.' Like I'm done with this crop. And we had a real serious conversation after that season and really had to pivot and say what works for our family? What is not going to cause us a lot of stress and anxiety weather-wise what will still produce a good income and not consume our whole summer. And I remember laying in bed talking about this one night and Greg said, 'I think we go for asparagus.'
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (07:17):
How did he--had he ever grown asparagus before?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (07:19):
So the farm when we bought it, in addition to the three acres of strawberries, had just kind of a lot of little stuff. Like there was about 300 feet of established asparagus. There was 40 fruit trees.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (07:30):
So you were also growing asparagus in addition to the nightmare of the strawberries.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (07:35):
Right. 300 feet. It wasn't a huge amount. I mean, I grew up with this asparagus patch as a kid. I remember it was the worst place to get chiggers in the whole world. You know, it, it was what it was. And so he said, 'I really think it's a perennial crop. It requires no chemicals. And asparagus is such a smart crop--when it is cold, it stays underground. When it is hot and sunny, it comes up. So you kind of--you're at the mercy of the crop and the weather, but it does not ruin your crop in the way that strawberries are so weather sensitive.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (08:15):
And are there natural predators to the--the strawberry issue is that the bugs that live in Indiana really love our strawberries.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (08:24):
Yeah. That and the fungus. Yeah.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (08:25):
Uhhuh. Yeah. What, what do you have, what do you have that threatens the asparagus?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (08:30):
There's an asparagus beetle that sometimes we fight. But to be honest, we really haven't had a lot of issues. I've kind of attributed that to we don't have a ton of bug pressure on our farm. And I think part of that is we're in the middle of conventional fields. So whether I want to be organic or not. I don't have that luxury because I butt up to conventional farm fields.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (08:53):
So they're using chemicals that are actually--you're not spraying them on your field, but they're keeping the beetles away.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (08:59):
Right, right, right. And we're on the Indiana Drift Watch Program and we have a good relationship with the farmers close to us. We had a struggle with the farmer that was right next to us, but he sold that field and the other farmers are very conscientious. They've come, they've looked at what we're growing. They call us before they spray. So we've had a good experience.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (09:21):
Good. Now I have a similar experience. We grow a lot of sweet corn but we are nowhere near conventional ag. We're in the middle of Indianapolis. So there's not a cornfield for miles and miles around. So there's this moth that lays a larvae. If you've ever peeled sweet corn and you've got that one worm in there, it's actually a larva of a moth. And we thought that that was gonna be a big challenge. I've never seen a single one of them on our farm in four years because there's no other habitat for that moth anywhere around. Well the beetles that you're dealing with, can you deal with those with D.E.? Can we say that word? How do we say that word? Diet-tenacious...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (10:04):
Diatomaceous earth. Yeah. We used it a lot for our chickens and all kinds of stuff. You know what though? The issue that we've really run into, which has been great is the asparagus beetle does not tend to cause a problem when we're harvesting. They tend to come out after we've already let it fern out. So at the end, when we're done picking.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (10:24):
They're damaging next year's crop.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (10:26):
They're damaging next year's crop. But to be honest, there is so much asparagus out there that they're not really doing too much damage. So...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (10:36):
It's a welcomed population control.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (10:38):
Yeah. We've just been really grateful. We've not had to spray for anything. We fertilize once a year and that is it on the field. That's the only treatment that we do. Yeah. Other than, you know, mowing it off at the end of the season and a little top tilling at the beginning of the season.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (10:53):
So I was going to ask you because--and you brought it up. I know you mentioned that you are chemical free, so you don't use any chemicals. So what kind of--but you've said fertilizers--so what kind of feeding does asparagus need? Is it a heavy nitrogen feeder? Like tomatoes?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (11:07):
It's a real heavy nitrogen feeder. Yeah. it's not straight urea but it's like a 35 or 30 dash zero dash five something. So it's a real heavy nitrogen.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (11:17):
Heavy nitrogen. Got it. Do you have chickens?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (11:20):
We have chickens. Yep. We have chickens. We don't have enough chickens that we could fertilize this whole field. We have alpacas and we use every ounce of their fertilizer.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (11:29):
Is alpaca manure high in nitrogen too?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (11:31):
It's fabulous. It's not high in nitrogen. It's actually kind of like similar to a rabbit manure. So you can put it straight on. No aging. I put it on all my flower beds, rhubarb, all that kind of stuff.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (11:42):
We have goats--goats and horses and we put their manure straight on in the fall after everything's out. And then just under and let it know it's aging out in the field. But we have we have 400 laying hens. And so we get a decent amount of nitrogen. I gotta tell you.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:02):
Maybe you should bring your nitrogen up here for my field.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (12:05):
Oh, I'm using--I'm hoarding it. Sorry. No sharing of the nitrogen.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:09):
We're that way with our goat and alpaca poop. We sometimes get requests for alpaca fertilizer and I'm like, 'Nope.' I use it on everything. Yes.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (12:18):
So it's a heavy nitrogen feeder. What is, I should know this, but I don't. What technically is asparagus? Is it a broad leaf? Is it a grass? What is it? You want me to edit this one out so that we both sound smarter?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:33):
No, edit this one out. No. So asparagus is a crown. I don't know if you've ever seen what it looks like to plant it.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (12:38):
Oh, of course. Yeah. Yeah.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (12:39):
For sure. So when we decided to put in--in 2016 we put in 5,000 crowns. The next year we put in 5,000 additional crowns. So in addition to the 300 feet plus a little more, we had added to, we added 10,000 crowns of asparagus. And we're really lucky. I don't know if most folks would know that Michigan is a really good supplier of asparagus. That's where a lot of our asparagus comes from. When you get more kind of local asparagus. So there are a couple of different asparagus farms that sell crowns. So we were able to drive up to Southwest Michigan and right in front of us, they dug up the crowns. We brought 'em home, put 'em in fresh.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:21):
Oh, so you got to go get them. You dug them up yourself.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:24):
Yeah. They dug them right there for us, packaged them up and we brought them right home and got them directly in the ground.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:29):
So we've never gone into asparagus. I, and before buying our farm, we did we attempted a failed attempt at a small asparagus patch. The crowns just never took. And I may, maybe I didn't fertilize him. Right. Interesting.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:42):
Yeah. You've got a trench really far down. It's about 14 inches that you trench way down into the ground. And then it's a pretty laborious process to plant 5,000 grounds. I'm pretty sure we should have hired that out.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:54):
But you only have to do it once every 20 years.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:56):
That's right. Right.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (13:57):
Once every 20 years,
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (13:59):
Trust me, I will not be doing it in another 20 years. Somebody else will be doing the labor on that.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (14:04):
You will not be doing it in 20 more years. So you you've decided that you've got a cap to how long you want to be an asparagus farmer.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (14:13):
Well, I think yeah, In 20 years Greg and I will be pushing retirement age for sure. I think that's, what's so great about this farm--us buying it--was, although I would love to have inherited, you know, an old family property that I could have kept the legacy going. The really great thing about this property is we've been able to make it what we want to and transition it to what works well for our family. So I think in another 15 years you know, our kids will all be grown--if one of them wants to come back and put in the next round of asparagus or grow flowers. Great. If they don't and they wanna put in something else or, you know, if they wanna go and do something else, that's great too. I don't want to put any requirements on what they choose.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (14:57):
Until they get that anxiety that, oh my gosh, I'm not raising my kids with animals.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (15:02):
Well, you know, teenagers, I've got three teenagers right now. And of course they're all like, oh, we're moving to the city. We're gonna eat processed food all day long. You know, they're at that stage of life. And I think, yeah, maybe, and that'll be fine. And if not, we'd love to have them back and love to see them raising our grandkids out here.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (15:19):
Yeah. Well Anderson's not that far.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (15:23):
No, no. Anderson's a great community. You know, we've really had a good experience here. A lot of people kinda looked at us strange when we left Hamilton County and said really Madison County, but it has been a really great fit for our family. The community's been really welcoming and we love it up here.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (15:39):
Talk to me a little bit more about the family. So your family's involved in the farm. Are your kids--they are out there cutting asparagus and bundling it and bringing it to Market Wagon?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (15:50):
Yeah, yeah. Yeah. Our kids don't have much of an option. It's all hands on deck during asparagus season. They know that kind of late April to the beginning of June that's just what our family does. We kind of sign off from friends and family, say we'll see you in about four weeks. And we hit it hard as a family, so the kids harvest and then two of my kids harvest with Greg and then my middle daughter and I kind of trim it up and bundle it, weigh it all out and get it ready in the kitchen.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (16:19):
Wow. That's so great.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (16:19):
Yeah. And it'll be interesting. We don't know how much the crop will yield every year. That's the other thing that's unique about asparagus because it comes up from the ground, kind of like little fingers cropping out of the ground. We know what an acre of asparagus should produce when it is fully mature, but we're just now hitting that full maturity with our crop because it takes about three years for an asparagus patch to really produce fully. So, you know, last year we picked, well over 2000 pounds, we think this year we'll pick over 3000 and then we should level off somewhere in the next couple of years, somewhere between four and 6,000 pounds off of that acre.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (17:01):
Wow. Wow. Where, where all does it go? Do you sell that much on Market Wagon or do you sell most of it at your own farm stand?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (17:11):
Yeah, we've got several different outlets. So of course the farm stand is always the first place that it's out because we can put it out here in our front yard, on our big cart and, and it is a little temperamental when it's cold and, and cloudy, the crop doesn't come up. We have to wait for a hot sunny day to get it going. Once that gets rolling and we're a little later in the season, we'll be at the Pendleton Farmers Market. We have a couple of different little grocery stores that we sell to. And then we're excited to hopefully do both Tuesday and Thursday on Market Wagon this year.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (17:44):
Yeah, yeah. You should.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (17:46):
We're thrilled.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (17:47):
Yeah. That's great. So, all right. We've kind of talked about it. We can, people can find you at Pendleton Farmers Market, on Market Wagon.com. You have a farm stand, right? So people can drive out to your place. How else can customers learn about you online or otherwise?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (18:05):
Yeah, so we have our Facebook page and our Instagram, Fields of Joy produce. And then we should have asparagus this year at R&R Market in Pendleton and downtown Anderson at Collective Roots and then Wildwood Market downtown Indy. We sold with them for a long time. So we're excited to be in all those locations. Yeah.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (18:26):
Awesome. Now I don't know, Ross may cut this off, but I just wanna have fun learning a little bit more about asparagus and what you could do. So, and maybe this, will be the fun addendum to the end of the podcast. You said top tilling. So you have to go out and, and break the surface for the asparagus
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (18:42):
To come through. Yeah. Just helps to, to allow the asparagus to come up through the ground a little bit easier.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (18:47):
Do you use a disc or a rototiller for that?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (18:49):
A rototiller. Yep. We just go slightly over the top of all of those rows. Our struggle sometimes is weed control and weed pressure.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (18:56):
That's my next question, right? Yeah. You can't because this stuff, it spreads underground. Right. So you cannot use a weed block of any kind.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (19:03):
Correct.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (19:04):
So what's the weed pressure like, does it eventually win? Like does it...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (19:09):
Well, we hope not. We're hoping it doesn't eventually win. The good thing is that by the time we are done harvesting, that's really when you have your heavy weed pressure coming on. Right. So that kind of late May, we've already really harvested by the time heavy weed pressure comes on. And at that point, you let your whole field go to fern, that fern shades out those weeds, and they really don't get established. So other than thistle, we, you know, if we find thistle we go out and try to deal with that. Horse weeds, we had a horrible problem with horse weeds when we first--what we call horse weeds. Digging those things out, you know, making sure you're staying on top of seeds, all of that. But people ask us that all the time, do you weed your asparagus? I'm like, oh, there's no way I could weed this patch. And it's really okay. It doesn't bother me that there's weeds out there. Because we can pick around all of that. And then that fernage just kind of shades it out.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (20:09):
Yeah. So that's what I meant when I said, does it win? I meant does the asparagus eventually win? Cause I know that happens like corn. It will it'll canopy eventually. So you just need to keep ahead of the weeds until the canopy. But I hadn't thought about the fact that yeah, the weed pressure, you know, I always feel like I'm a big victorious vegetable farmer until like the first week of June. And that's when I'm like, oh man, , it's like a tortoise and hare race. And I'm the hare in the first month and a half of produce season and then the tortoise always catches up. All of those weeds become overwhelming. So what does harvest look like? How do you, how do you have to is it's not by hand, is it you're not cutting every spear?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (20:51):
Every snap. We are, we are actually hand snapping every spear. So we've found it's just the best way, you know, there's certainly methods. People can use a tractor and you can lay on your belly and kind of pick it that way. We just, I know--
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (21:06):
I just picture myself telling my daughter, no, it's gonna be fine. You just lay under the tractor like this. Yeah. Daddy won't I won't roll over your legs. It's gonna be fine.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (21:13):
No, it's totally fine. If you look on YouTube, I'm sure you could find a whole bunch of creative inventive ways. At this point we are still hand harvesting it. You know, when we get to that four, 5,000 pounds, we may decide to, to invest in something different. But for us right now with our kids, we've hired a young boy to come and help us harvest. It is what it is. And that's what we say makes our asparagus different. It's not machine harvested where, you know, they set a height on the asparagus and it all gets knocked. At the same point, we are running our hand from the bottom of that spear up. We're finding that tender spot. We're popping it off there. And then it, it gets brought in. We sort all of our asparagus into four different sizes so that your full pound of hand snapped asparagus--not only can you eat the entire stalk because the entire stalk is tender , but it's all sized appropriately so that you can cook it in the same way and have a good success.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:13):
Because that is something that happens with store bought asparagus--you can't eat the bottom of it.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:19):
No, it's usually...
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:20):
Do they?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:20):
We basically tell people it's not the same product. If you buy something in the store. It might all be sized similarly, similarly, similarly, but lemme get that word out.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:30):
Diatamatious earth...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:33):
Diatamatious. Let's just call that DE. You're definitely going to cut the bottom third off to get to your tender spot where we've already hit that tender spot for you.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (22:43):
And is it a true cut and come back? Like you're gonna get another spear out of that same plant or it's just different spears are coming up.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (22:50):
Different spears. Yeah. So if you think about that asparagus, crown, that little crown that you plant with one little spear coming up, it will build every year. So off of that crown, you will have buds all of those buds then produce spears coming up off of the ground. And that's really where you get your different sizes. I think people sometimes think that the real thick ones are real Woody and you can't eat those. Those are just as tender. It's just an older bud off of that crown. So every year we should get more and more of the thin spears because new buds produce thin spears, but as they age, they get bigger. So yeah, so always we have lots and lots of different sizes coming up out of the ground.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (23:39):
One of the others--we talked about strawberries being a headache. One of the other headaches about strawberries is if you intend to grow anything else, you also have to be murdering strawberry plants every year because they want to, they want to invade and take over. Does asparagus do the same thing? Is it difficult to keep in place?
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (23:55):
No, we've actually we designed all of our field so that the asparagus has plenty of room to spread. That's what we wanted to do. So our older patches are you know, a foot and a half wide. Well, they're probably more like three feet wide at this point. And then when you plant your new patch, when we planted all of those 10,000 crowns, they were of course in a one little single row. And every year when you go out that wide, that road just keeps getting wider and wider. So we've left plenty of room between all of those rows, not only to mow, to keep a good walking path down, but to allow that one little crown to just take off over the next 20 years and start widening out and develop lots of different buds coming off of it.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (24:42):
Very fascinating. Thank you for the asparagus farming tutorial that most of our listeners would've turned off about five minutes ago, but this was great.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (24:51):
I'm not sure I should be proud of myself that I know quite so much about asparagus .
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (24:56):
You know, if it takes two social [work] degrees in order to know this much about asparagus, I guess...
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (25:00):
That's right. That's right. Well, I can do other things too. I can do other things too.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (25:06):
Oh. Joy, this has been great. I really appreciate you sharing your story and letting people know a little bit more about where their food comes from and how difficult and challenging it is to raise good, both strawberries and asparagus, and everything else because it just engenders, a greater appreciation for what you do and where our food comes from. So thanks for joining me.
Joy Beghtel (Fields of Joy) (25:27):
Hey, thanks for having me, Nick.
Nick Carter - Host (Market Wagon) (25:34):
Thanks for listening to this episode of More Than A Mile. Be sure to sign up for Market Wagon at MarketWagon.com or after downloading the Market Wagon app for iOS or Android. Follow us @MarketWagon on Instagram, Twitter, Pinterest, and Facebook for stories, recipes, special announcements, news, and just digital handshakes from our friendly farming community. If you enjoyed More Than A Mile, please rate the podcast and write a review on iTunes, CastBox, PodChaser, or wherever you listen to your favorite podcast. Thank you for continuing to support local food.