Redland Rambles

Farmer Margie, winter melons, and Mike Counts.

Last month I rode up with Farmer Margie to C&B Farms up near Clewiston to load up with fruit for the summer fruit sales. We came back packed to the rafters with melons. Loaded in the back were three boxes of cantaloupes (the last of the season this far south), and six big heavy boxes of some of the cutest round watermelons I ever saw. They are called “personal size” and it’s easy to see how one person could very easily gobble one up. And at the other end of the size scale, we snagged several ginormous winter melons that had originally been destined for Asian communities up north. Each one of the winter melons was about 20 pounds, but that is just a guesstimate.

The CSA got a lot of food from C&B Farms through the regular season. A quick look at the newsletters (you read and kept yours, didn’t you?) shows that we ate zucchini, celery, rosemary, strawberries, yellow squash, green beans and mint — to name a few things — grown there. Margie kept telling me that I ought to go up and visit C&B, so when she called me the other day about making the melon run, I jumped at the chance.

Snake Road wiggles like a snake.

We rode up up I-75 and headed west on a bright sunny morning with big puffy clouds in the sky. Margie spotted all kinds of things — an occasional bird perched in a dead maleleuca tree, big green shrubs studded with pale pink wild hibiscus native to the Everglades, and a golden brown snake rippling across the road. About an hour into the journey, we turned onto Snake Road (but didn’t see any snakes there). Swamp lilies grew in the canals on either side of the road as it turned and twisted past cow pastures dotted with cabbage palms and cypress domes. Swallow-tailed kites soared above. The sawgrass was in bloom, sending up long feathery clusters of small, reddish flowers. We passed through the bustling Big Cypress Seminole Indian Reservation, took a turn and found ourselves in the Devil’s Garden agricultural area.

C&B Farms in Clewiston

C&B Farms is sandwiched between Clewiston and the edge of the Everglades. According to owner Chuck Obern, the farm is 2500 acres in size, with 1500 acres that are tillable. Of that, 1000 acres are planted  conventionally and 500 acres are in organic production. Chuck offered us a quick tour of his farm, so Margie and I hopped into his truck and headed down a sandy road into the heart of the farm. One side of the farm is organic, and the other side is conventionally farmed. The two sides are separated by a large ditch and a row of of trees. Each side has separate farming equipment and packing lines, where the produce is rinsed and boxed, and there’s a separate organic section in the enormous cooler.

A 2-acre block of rosemary.

Mid-June is pretty much the end of the season and there wasn’t that much growing at C&B. It’s already too hot. We passed by two-acre blocks or fields of herbs — dill that had already bolted, marjoram, knee high sage, bushy rosemary, tarragon, oregano, spearmint, and parsley. We passed by long brown piles of compost, which is used mostly for water and nutrient retention, or as a soil conditioner. The soil is light gray and sandy, very sandy, and it’s amazing they can get so much to grow in it. We passed by blocks of cantaloupe, personal sized watermelons, and butternut squash.

Pumping station for drip irrigation. Barrels hold liquid fertilizer.

Crops are irrigated two different ways. There’s an automated double drip irrigation system (double meaning two lines of drip tape per planting row). Water is pumped from a ditch or a well, and liquid fertilizer is mixed in. A computerized system controls how much water is sent where and when. There’s also the seep irrigation system in which water is pumped into or out of the ditches to raise or lower the water table under the fields. The water seeps into the soil from underneath, rather than drip down from the top. Seep irrigation water is reused or recirculated several times before it is sent to a retention area. Excess water is treated to remove phosphorus before it is released back into a canal bordering the Everglades ecosystem.

During peak season, 500 workers are in the fields picking and packing. But at the end of the season, with a lot less growing, there are only about 100 workers. Fields were dotted with trailer-mounted portapotties complete with a handwashing and sanitizing station, as required by recent federal food safety laws. These regulations also require that workers can’t wear jewelry or bring outside food or drink into the fields.

The federal food safety act is actually many sets of guidelines that came about after the e. coli incident with contaminated jalapenos from Mexico a few years ago. Since then, domestic growers have to comply with stricter standards of produce handling cleanliness. To check compliance, a major food safety certifier comes once a year to check procedures, equipment, and records over a period of three days.

Mobile portapotties, with handwashing station, that are taken out to the fields.

Surprisingly, Central and South American growers do not have to comply with the same strict federal food safety laws as domestic growers. The vast majority of imported produce is not inspected. At most only one to two per cent (maybe even less) of the food coming in is checked for the same standards of cleanliness and safety, and pesticide residues. “There’s no traceability, no accountability,” Chuck complained. “And no guidelines. It’s not a level playing field.” Imported or “offshore” produce is priced less than domestically grown produce, and American farmers find it hard to compete. Their costs have gone up due to extra work and expenses meeting the new guidelines.

So what should a conscientious food shopper do? “Vote with your dollars,” said Mike Counts, the C&B sales manager. “Your dollar ultimately makes the statement. If enough people do it, they will change.” That said, we finished loading up and headed back out on the highway. One hundred miles later we were back at Bee Heaven, unloading fresh melons that had been picked just a few days before. Maybe it costs a little more to buy local and organic, but as you sink your teeth into those juicy fruits, you’ll have the satisfaction of knowing that you’re keeping a couple of local farmers in business.

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