So Taliaferro met Gene Coy, the scion of the apple-growing family out of Clintondale, and went to work for him, essentially managing things. “I was trying to build sweat capital and was using my engineering skills, all the time working with the Farm Credit Union to see if I could get my own farm.”
But there was no capital for farming. And Coy couldn’t help his protege either. Taliaferro worked for Coy for six years and then an acquaintance from his Crist Brothers days resurfaced in John Nye, who owned Trickle Ease, a trickle irrigation company that specialized in huge projects for high-density planting around the world. So in 1991, Nye sent Taliaferro out to Michigan to learn the system. He then traveled the world with Nye to install these huge irrigation systems. “It was a great job,” he says. “I received a master’s in agriculture with them. Worked with the Cornell experimental farms in Geneva, New York, with Rodale, was in Peru, working 80 hours a week, every day, got to know college biology professors, but…” and it was a big but for Taliaferro…”I had no family life and I wanted my own farm.”
He left Trickle Ease and began working for Baldwin Orchards while he and wife Robin traveled the county looking for a farm. “Jack Baldwin was a shrewd businessman and had started going organic in the early 1990’s, so I had a plan derived from my time with them,” Taliaferro says. “They were a small diversified organic farm that did direct marketing. It was something I wanted to emulate.”
Enter the proverbial “two guys from Jersey.” Taliaferro reflects: “These two guys wanted to be farmers and had bought this acreage at the end of Plains Road. They knew nothing about farming, but it was when everyone wanted to be farmer. Robin and I came by here and it looked like a shit-hole. It was an old apple farm and there was nothing here except a broken-down shed. Otherwise, nothing to look at and no one did. But the soil was great. Near the [Wallkill] River. And I had a vision. I also had the background in this, with all my experiences in farming, irrigation, equipment maintenance and all that. The price of land was falling just then due to one of the recessions and I made them an offer for the 45 acres. We wound up buying it for a song, with 30% down and with the two guys holding the note for five years. Then we started from scratch.”
The first thing Taliaferro did was buy a John Deere, the Ferrari of farm tractors, and started farming on three acres. The next year it was up to 18 acres, as Taliaferro and family built everything, scrounged around to find and refurbish old equipment and started their Taliaferro Farms CSA in 1999 with 28 members. They are now up to over 150 shares, with 225 families involved. “The CSA bankrolls us, so we’re constantly on the edge financially,” says Taliaferro, explaining that the banks don’t give loans to small farmers. “There’s no money for agriculture because they see it as such a hit-or-miss proposition. So we’re under-capitalized and everything costs out here. Equipment repair, labor (Taliaferro employs ten people), housing. The constant negotiating for repairs can be a big headache when the margins are so small…You see, this part of it is all new to me. I’m not a capitalist. The business of it can be overwhelming. I guess it’s like, ‘How do you make a fortune? Start with a fortune’. ”
Taliaferro Farms produces ten varieties of tomatoes, six varieties of heirlooms; seven varieties of summer squash; five of melons; three of beets; 13 of lettuce; eight of beans and peas; 25 of greens, chards and ppinach; two of cucumbers; three of eggplant; 12 of winter squash and pumpkins; 15 of herbs; six root crops and radishes; 11 of potatoes; six of onions; seven of cole crops; five of peppers; eight of miscellaneous crops (celery, fennel, asparagus, etc.); 16 of flower annuals; and 10 of fruits (apples, strawberries, raspberries and blueberries) on its 45 acres. There are close to 70 pieces of farm equipment that needs maintaining.
“It’s a labor of love, but I am mortal,” says Taliaferro, as we drive around the farm in his old, dirt-encrusted truck. “But I am mortal,” he adds, laughing, “and despite all the good things that have come my way and all the positive things I’ve tried to do on the farm, with the food-shed and all that, I am trying to figure out a way to lessen the load. Create an exit plan for me and my family. Maybe show some young couple how to do this, show them how it works and then help them do it. Lease it to them. Even work a regular week for them. Mentor them like I was mentored.”
Dirt is good. It is authentic when so much of our present existence is not. Check out the Farmer’s Farmer out at the end of Plains Road. He’s the big gruff guy covered with it.
For CSA membership information and Taliaferro Farms new membership card — a new way to support the farm a little at a time — call 542-3379.
I like the photograph portrait very much. 85mm lens?