Introduction

Look around your local farmers’ market and the first thing you’ll notice is how many women are running the booths. Many are
also the farmers who tended the goods they’re selling, whether it’s vegetables, flowers, eggs, or goat cheese. Visit any of your
local farms that focus on organic growing methods and sustainability and it is likely that a solid majority of workers and
interns on those farms are young women. But not just the smaller and sustainable farms are being run by women. Women are
inheriting large farms in record numbers, and running large cattle and commodity operations. Women are noticeably
visible as farm veterinarians, agricultural extension agents, and even as managers on the floors of meat processing plants. The
face of farming, at least at the local level, has become decidedly female.

Why, after all the years of women (and men) moving off farms and into cities, is there a
sudden return to the rural and agricultural work? Women worked for years to get off the farm
and away from the constant labor of farm living. Before electricity and in the not-too-distant
past, women were expected to help grow the food, make and wash the clothes, cook, clean,
and do all the chores of child-rearing, all without the right to vote or the right to inherit the
land.
War, a distinctly male pursuit, gave women more opportunities, first in the garden, but
then, more important, off the farm. Women in the United States and Europe used their skills
during WWI and WWII to raise food for the home front by developing Victory Gardens. Soon,
however, there was need for more workers in other areas, so women learned skilled trades,
formerly open only to men, and began working in factories, building planes and bombs while
the men were away at war. Women continued advancing the industrial revolution that
brought liberation in the form of dishwashers, washing machines, prepackaged foods, and
other time-saving innovations. Technological advances also provide automated ways of
completing farm chores. Farms that used such machinery required fewer actual farmers.
Suddenly, women had more time in their days and could consider leaving the toil of the farm
to pursue education and regular jobs. Women had left the farm for personal freedom and have
made great strides since then in the business and academic worlds.
Far more women are in the workforce than ever before, but also growing numbers of
women are leaving business to pursue agriculture. In the recent farm census, the percentage
of woman-operated farms held steady at about 13½ percent. The overall number of farms
continues to drop, which has been an ongoing problem. But these numbers overlook a major
trend of women incorporating into their lives farming and the growing of their own food. And
many of the farm businesses that women are engaged in—flowers, herbal products, artisan
cheeses, plant starts, and farm crafts—may not be reflected in a farm census. There’s also a
large group of community gardeners, urban farmers, and nonprofit farms that do not report
to the census as farms, although they are certainly farming food to feed people. A recent
article in the New York Times tracked down these farmers in the city and reported that these
organizations, both the management and labor, are dominated by women. 1 Many women in
these agricultural and entrepreneurial pursuits think of themselves as “growers” or artisans
in the local food community. Many are raising children as their primary pursuit, meanwhile
growing produce on the side to feed their family and create a second income. They don’t call
themselves farmers, but they are certainly reshaping what farming is and how it affects local
communities.
This book does not attempt to restrict the term woman farmer to only those women
running and earning 100 percent of their living on a traditional farm. Women farmers are
now as diverse a group as the country as a whole. They are becoming more diverse in a racial
sense—the share of black, Asian, and Native American women farmers (who responded to the
 census), grew by more than 13 percent from 2007 to 2012—but also in their pursuits. From
the high school and college students spending their summer breaks interning on local farms,
to mothers growing food for their families and selling the excess at the farmers’ market, to
single women herbalists growing their own ingredients, to volunteers growing food for the
poor, to older women who’ve inherited land from their husband and are now keeping cattle to
protect their agricultural heritage, to artisan cheese makers that keep their own goats and
sheep for the milk, the range of pursuits, ages, and experiences is as varied as women
themselves.
The term artisan has been applied to many of the new, organic, and small producers of
food that serve local communities and restaurants. And farming could be thought of as an art.
Sure, there are artists who are making their living as painters and musicians. But most artists
pursue their craft as a hobby or as a side income and most certainly as a lifestyle. You don’t
have to make a living at painting, sculpting, or playing music to be considered an artist. In the
same sense, making a living should not be a requirement for being considered a farmer. And
it’s women who are leading the way as artisans of agriculture.
If your income doesn’t depend on it completely, farming can offer a great deal of freedom.
It offers freedom from office work hours, freedom from commuting, freedom to work at home,
freedom to spend time with your children, freedom from industrialized food, and all the
freedoms of entrepreneurship. And on a deeper level, farming satisfies a woman’s desire to
nurture and to grow. It offers a way to become more fully a part of one’s community, the
opposite of being sequestered away in an office for eight hours a day. Farming also offers
women empowerment. For too long, women have given up control over the food they feed
their children to multinational food conglomerates and chemical companies. Farming
empowers women to take back responsibility for their own health and that of their families.
Women approach farming differently than men do, both emotionally and physically. This
book is written from a woman’s point of view and deals with issues that are unique to women.
In these pages, you’ll find stories of women who have pursued farming—women who’ve
interned or worked on a farm, started their own farm, or inherited a working farm to sustain.
But you’ll also find practical information about finding and starting and running your own farm
business, finding an internship, leasing land, or passing along your farm to your descendants,
among other things. There’s also practical how-to information about the basic skills that are
most valuable to running a farm or country homestead.

Farming became my passion, a labor of love, and the most meaningful work I know to exist. Not only does
it take perseverance, but an innate intimacy with the land, plants, weather, and nature itself. Early to rise,
often before the sun, a woman farmer cultivates devotion to the work of producing food—good, honest
work. As I weed beds, I often feel that I am also weeding my heart and my soul. As I rhythmically plant
seeds, the meditation of growing nourishment through organic vegetables enlivens my being. My sincere
desire to know that my children and my community are eating organic, local vegetables that I have taken
part in growing, gives me a sense of satisfaction.

—Elizabeth Blecha
the author’s sister and a farmer in Willits, California
Within these pages, you’ll find:

Step-by-step instructions on chopping wood, operating a chainsaw, basic small-engine

maintenance, fence building and repair, and other traditionally male pursuits that
every woman farmer should learn, most with step-by-step photos of women
demonstrating these skills

Instructions and ideas for growing such plants as flowers and vegetables

Guidance on taking care of animals, both big and small

Advice on keeping your body, mind, and soul healthy for the demanding work that
farming requires

My own path fits nicely into the modern journey most women take into farming. My husband,
Michael, and I bought our farm together 12 years ago. We cosigned our mortgage together.
We shared labor and quickly fell into the traditional roles of the male operating all the power
equipment and the woman gardening and taking care of house chores. We both maintained
off-farm jobs, he in publishing and me as a teacher.
When it became clear that I was ready for a break from teaching, we made the decision
to turn our place into a productive farm that could spin off a second income. My heart led
me to pursue growing cut flowers as a business. I attended flower conferences, read all the
books, talked to other local growers, and learned by trial and error. As the business has
grown over the last seven years, I’ve taken on the role of
principal farm operator.
Michael’s job now demands more of his time and he
travels often. This has forced me to learn all the chores that were previously his. I’ve done it
all, from burying dead chickens, to chopping wood, to rounding up loose donkeys in his
absence. Much, if not most, of the time, I’m a one-woman farm and farm business.
Sometimes living and working alone on the farm can be overwhelming. But it never fails
to be both rewarding and empowering. And by all measure, my situation as a self-sufficient
woman living on a farm is no longer a novel one. Thousands of women are operating farms,
many much larger than my own, and many others are living and raising children in the
country in a sustainable way. They all are helping to reassert women’s primary place in our
food system and our environment. This can only be a positive and healthy development.
I would have liked to have a book like this before jumping into agriculture, and even now, I
expect to look back on the interviews I conducted and some of the how-to techniques I’ve
written about. Sometimes reading about another woman’s experiences can be invaluable both
as support and as useful information.

I hope you’ll see this book as a primer and a jumping-off point for whatever might be your interest in
farming, whether it be as a backyard gardener, homesteader, intern, small farm operator, or market
farmer. I hope that you’ll gain inspiration and valuable practical skills so that you can help to continue to
transform farming into a more natural, sustainable, and compassionate pursuit that will continue to give
women freedom and comfort. Use it to begin weeding your own heart and soul and that of your
community.