Small Farm, Big Challenges

Davoren fights food insecurity, trains farmers Agriculture is big business, but a local farm is punching above its weight. Owned by Peter Davoren and Stacey Farley of Philipstown, Davoren Farm cultivates 6 acres on Route 9D that it leases from Boscobel House & Gardens. The couple also farms a tract owned by the Town of Philipstown on Route 403 in Garrison, where they host an annual sweet potato dig. Farley, her husband and their children launched the farm 13 years ago, but even with farm stands and restaurant sales, it wasn't viable. Early in the pandemic, Farley happened upon Fred's Food Pantry in Peekskill and was taken aback by the lineup that stretched around the block. "We decided we'd give away the food from that season, and now that's all we do," she said. "It changed our mission, and it's the best thing we ever did." Davoren's secondary mission is "to grow farmers," she said. Today, its principal farmers are Max Kristiansen, 34, and Lauren Thorpe, 40, who live in Cold Spring. After training at the Glynwood Center for Regional Food and Farming in Philipstown, they joined Davoren Farm in 2022. Kristiansen had experience in landscaping in Washington state, at summer camp in Pennsylvania, with a local surveyor and at Stonecrop Gardens. After studying environmental policy at the University of New Hampshire, Thorpe worked for Greenpeace, the Sierra Club, Tahoe National Forest and a Florida nonprofit focused on climate change. She also did a stint as a bartender. Asked what most surprised him about farming, Kristiansen said: "There's a lot of smells, both good and bad. Every year that I do it, I feel I'm getting better at it." He adds: "I've never heard of another farm like this one." Kale and collards are harvested in spring and sweet potatoes in the fall. In between, he says, "we grow asparagus; two kinds of summer squash; 10 peppers; five or six tomatoes; husk cherries; cucumbers; leeks; cantaloupe; watermelon; bok choy; broccoli rabe; turnips; rutabaga; sugar snap peas; shelling peas; red, gold and russet potatoes; black beans; red beans; white beans; soybeans; Asian eggplant; Italian eggplant; tomatillos; okra; corn; sunflowers; zinnias; and hops. That's most of it." Kristiansen doesn't know why this year is different, but says everyone at the farm agrees the bumper crop is the best yet, even after a July storm that brought up to 8 inches of rain. "Some tomato varieties will split if there's too much water, but we haven't had much of that this year," he says. Kristiansen cites tomatoes as needing the most work to harvest, "by far," while Thorpe names squash as the most physically demanding. Of farmwork, she says, "You feel some pain when harvesting, and there's a burden that comes with working in the sun eight hours. But seeing the tangible results of what you plant, what you harvest and where it's going has made this one of my favorite jobs." During the winter, the team critiques the season. Thorpe has introduced spreadsheets to document yields and assess deliveries to food pantries. Food insecurity has not diminished since the pandemic. Recently, when a pantry couldn't pick up its weekly allotment, Davoren and Farley made a delivery. "There was a mad frenzy when we arrived," she said. "It was like those pictures you see of Gaza. It's a much bigger problem; it's systemic." Five years ago, the Philipstown Climate Smart Communities Task Force produced a map showing significant amounts of fallow agricultural land. "I would love to see more local land being farmed in a way that goes back to the community," Thorpe said. "And I think it's a similar situation across New York state."