Minnesota Farm

Do you know Featherstone Farm’s two secrets to nutritious organic vegetables for their CSA community and wholesale customers?

Fern and Dale Peterson started raising free range turkeys in the rolling hills of the Cannon River Valley in 1939. Their turkeys have always been free range and antibiotic free. As trends in commercial turkey farming changed, Ferndale Farm didn’t.

Welcoming visitors of all ages, Nate and Tracy enjoy being a destination for multigenerational families, fermentation aficionados, or day trippers just looking for a change of scenery — their front porch, also known as the Keepsake Cider Tasting Room, truly is a family-friendly site

“We are just a family farm working at preserving our livelihood that is built on a love for good tasting food and creating memories with our family on the farm or around the table,” reflects Tina of Backstreet Market in Gibbon. “We want people to have a great experience eating together. We are so lucky that our products have a place on our neighbors’ tables. That personal connection keeps us going and makes all the work worthwhile.”

An especially unique attribute of the Forever Green Initiative is its focus on commercialization, adoption and scaling. “Broadly speaking, we think of three areas of work: strategy, landscape, and market,” explained Colin. “We need many businesses sourcing these crops, making products and moving them to consumers, either as ingredients or as finished products.”

On a rise in southern Minnesota that Rachel Davis’ ancestors called Poverty Knob, Kalvin, Rachel and their two young children (soon to be three in January!) raise a myriad of mushrooms at their ten acre solar- powered farm.