About 9 Bean Rows LLC
In 2008 Nic and I began our second season CSA farming at Black Star Farms. In addition, we added the wood-fired pizza café to the farm market and added breads to our line up of on farm goodies.
Then, in the fall of 2008, because we’re just plain CRAZY and have SOOOO much time on our hands, we decided to launch our own farm – 9 Bean Rows. The mission: to create greater availability and diversity of fresh, local foods for our community 52 weeks of the year.
9 Bean Rows is an 11 acre farmstead in Northport, MI. While modest in size as some farms go, we purchased this parcel because it was jam packed with tons of wild and cultivated edibles. There are wild leeks, blackberries, red raspberries, wild apple trees, choke cherries, asparagus, rhubarb, table grapes, garlic, walnut trees, strong maples, and a forest full of edible wild mushrooms, not to mention an acre-sized spring-fed pond! We added a 144X34 ft. passive solar hoop house to the property this fall in order to extend our season as well as to grow some really far out plants well outside Zone 6.
Then came winter at Black Star Farms, a time when we gather ourselves from the season past and look ahead to improve the new. We were searching for ways to increase our production at the farm when Don Coe, managing partner of Black Star Farms as well as our beloved boss and long time supporter of agricultural entrepreneurship, asked us if we would like to make the businesses we had been developing at Black Star Farms our own. We saw this as more than a great opportunity, it was an unbelievable and unforeseen catalyst that would help us put our mission into action. By combining forces we could increase production to a level that would further meet the rising demand for local, sustainable food.
So here Nic and I are today, part Black Star Farms, part 9 Bean Rows, and 100% committed to making this season our best yet, by bringing you the best of both farms. We welcome each and every one of you to visit both farms as often as you please – you are the reason we are here!
Here’s to new beginnings!
Super Sincerely,
Jen and Nic Welty