THE FARM
Our Story
John, Kim and Kim’s sister, Darlene, run the farm. They’ve had the farm for more than 45 years and have divided up the chores into different concentrations. Kim cares for the greenhouses, John maintains the fields and Darlene runs logistics in the farm market. The farm in Leicester, MA, where the market is, covers about 12 acres; there are 80 acres they own and farm in Spencer on the Seven Mile River, just off Route 31. Then they lease another 40 acres in Paxton on a 10-year lease. They plant on rotation about 100 acres of that land in one season.
Darlene, John and Kim
“Farming is a true labor of love. If you don’t love farming, I don’t think you’ll last long, as it really is a lifestyle... John doesn’t hold still for more than a few minutes, and farming suits people that don’t hold still because it’s so much work. It also changes with the seasons, so if you get tired of one thing, that’s okay because you’re going to be doing something else the next day. It’s one of the joys of farming!”
Our Land
Breezy Gardens specializes in sweet corn, and John is a master at harvesting corn at the right maturity in the high sweetness level.
The Miczeks grow everything from a to z — asparagus to zucchini — over the course of the growing season. Produce for salads, wonderful varieties of tomatoes and beans. Beautiful bunches of herbs. Great summer squashes and fruit, including strawberries, blueberries and raspberries.
Kim’s grandparents had a dairy farm in Spencer and Kim worked on that farm for many years. Her parents encouraged her to get an education, so she worked for a while as a microbiologist. John’s parents encouraged him to get higher education as well, so he did. But eventually they both wanted to go back into farming, so they started with a really large vegetable garden and corn field. Slowly the farm built up, so Kim quit working the lab and began selling fruit and vegetables on a picnic table in front of the house. They built up the farm more and more and added greenhouses over time, and people really responded to it.
John could eventually quit his work as an electrical engineer, and then when they were both working the farm things took off in leaps and bounds. They rented land in Spencer and farmed that until it was offered to them in a private sale, so they bought it. It was a neighboring farm to Kim’s family farm, owned by a good friend of her grandfather. “They were very generous in parting with their land… we bought it and it keeps going from there.”
Integrated Crop Management
When Kim and John started farming in the late 1970s and early 80s, the concept of organic was starting to roll out, and with a background in engineering and environmental science they were looking at what kind of farming they wanted to do. The University of MA and University of CT were coming out with this idea of integrated crop management and it’s a method of growing that uses as many organic methods as you can, but you combine it with new ways of approaching farming. [biodegradable ground cover made from corn / moths and pheromones/ indeterminant and determinant tomatoes]
