Bounty Hunting!
Updated: Aug 9
Happy Farmers Market Week to all who celebrate!
I’m lucky to be able to escape the hell of a Texas summer and spend a few months each year in western Michigan where you don’t have to travel far to find a farmers market. There is one in the town where we stay, and three more only a short drive away. Almost every day of the week you can fill up on fresh local produce and products. The variety is breathtaking—asparagus, blueberries, cherries, dahlias, eggs . . . see where I’m going with this?
Our favorite meals are ones where everything on the table, including the flowers, comes from the farmers market.
Farms thrive in Michigan thanks to the Great Lakes “lake effect” weather and the highly fertile glacial soils left behind over ten thousand years ago. But they’re threatened. Ottawa County, where we are, lost 16% of its farmed acreage and 8% of its farms between 2017 and 2022. The reasons are myriad, many attributed to the difficulties all farmers face, but an additional factor here is that Ottawa is one of Michigan’s fastest growing counties. Ottawa is adjacent to Grand Rapids, Michigan’s second largest city. Nearby farmland is being gobbled up to meet the increasing housing demand. Small farmers, the ones who sell at farmers markets, are being hit the hardest.
images provided by Farmers Market Coalition https://farmersmarketcoalition.org
“Progress” always comes at a price. And local farmers are the ones paying it. The least we can do is show up and support them.
Tomorrow morning I’ll be doing just that. If you’ve got a farmers market anywhere near you, I hope you will, too!
To learn more about Ottawa County's farms and what's being done locally to help:
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