Monday, Aug. 23, 2010

The Old West goes organic at 11th Heartland Festival

Stevinson event 'sneaks in' education about benefits of non-conventional farming

STEVINSON -- The 11th annual Heartland Festival was held Saturday at the Double T Ranch in Stevinson.

A unique event, designed to entertain and educate, the festival focused on organic farming via information booths as well as hands-on displays and activities.

"It's a celebration of food and family and fun," said Tony T. Azevedo, who owns The Double T with his wife, Carol.

Festival-goers played and danced at the faux old-western town, which had been constructed just inside the Double T's front gates. Guests dined on organic food, enjoyed bluegrass music from the Down Yonder Group and visited various educational booths under the shadow of a real, but stationary, Santa Fe locomotive and a handful of rail cars.

"We're hoping they're going to enjoy themselves, and when they're not noticing we're gonna sneak a little education in on them," said Azevedo. "Nowadays you gotta be sneaky about educating people. If we made this all about education, nobody'd show up."

Azevedo is passionate about the organic farming movement and what it has meant to his business.

"If I was a dairyman in the conventional world, the only way I could increase my income is how? By doubling the size of my herd. By tripling the size of my herd," he said. "That is the only way I can increase and keep up with inflation. Well, before you know it, what have we done? We've created these factory farms that now contribute to bad air, bad water, and nobody wants to live next to them."

Even so, Azevedo was adamant about not blaming conventional farmers.

"Now, it's not the conventional farmer's fault," he said. "It's not organics against conventional. That was the only way that person could increase his income and keep the kids on the farm and keep the thing going.

"In organics, we get paid for what we do. There's a premium. It not only costs extra, but the small percentage of people that buy organics realize that farmers need to be paid for what they do. Our clientele is maybe 3 percent of the population and they're willing to pay that extra."

Part of Azevedo's "3 percent" attended the weekend festival and made their way around several exhibitor stations. There were many things for guests to learn about -- worms, knives and condors, to name a few.

Lara Laskay of Urban Worms was extolling the virtues of worm castings, which she said were the best fertilizer one could obtain.

"This is beautiful, black and rich," said Laskay as she ran her hand through a substance that looked like fine dark coffee grounds.

"You have to separate the worms from the castings which is a bit of a project," Laskay said. "But being the lazy gardener that I am, I use something called an upward-migration bin."

Laskay described how to make the tiered-rack system work to produce the fertilizer from things like kitchen waste and junk mail.

In another booth, Jess Auer and Tessa Christensen of the National Park Service were talking about the California Condor, explaining the challenges that the scavenging birds face. Auer also explained how the Pinnacles Condor Recovery Program appreciates getting stillborn calves from organic dairies. The hormone and antibiotic-free carcasses are a preferable nourishment source for the endangered condors.

The educational flavor continued as Michael Quesenberry of Quesenberry Custom Knives showed off his knifemaking skills. Quesenberry had examples of his work on display as well as a series of Damascus steel blades that were in various stages of being produced. Quesenberry was scheduled to do a knifemaking demonstration on Sunday.

From the booths to the organic dinner that was served, an estimated 300 attendees focused on closer-to-nature alternatives.

"I think there's a little bit better way to do it than the way we're doing it," said Azevedo. "The way we're doing it now is we produce, produce, produce, and then we don't get paid for it and then our farmers die. In organics we're getting paid for what we do."