Posted on 06/27/2008 2:15:14 PM PDT by Gabz
Clint Brown began planting vegetables at age 4. His then babysitter, a retired gentlemen with an interest in gardening, got him started.
Now 17, Clint has his own gardening business -- a venture that began four years ago with a bumper green bean crop and success at the Le Mars farmer's market.
"He sold them so fast,"said Audrey Brown, Clint's mom. "I think that's what got him hooked."
Clint's gardens are on his parent's Audrey and Steve Brown's farm west of Merrill.
In April 2006 Clint got serious about his gardening business by building his first high tunnel structure, which is a large, hoop building covered in plastic, to plant his vegetables inside.
"If they were outside the would get blown by the wind," Clint said.
The sides of the high tunnel roll up and down, but the temperature inside is not regulated like a greenhouse.
"When it isn't sunny out there, it isn't warm in here," Audrey said.
Clint's two high tunnels, the second one being completed this year, are a total of 3,744 square feet in size. They house 400 tomato plants, 290 pepper plants, green beans, leaf lettuce and snow peas to name a few.
Having the high tunnels for protection from the wind allows Clint to extend the growing season for his vegetables.
For example, most people plant their tomatoes the third week in May and can eat them around the end of July through September.
With the wind tunnels, Clint's growing season for tomatoes begins about the third week in April. Tomatoes are ripe in June and last through mid-October.
This year's growing season has been a little different.
"This year we are behind," Audrey said. "We haven't had consistent days of sunshine."
And that phenomenon is affecting many vegetable producers around the state.
Even the more than 6-foot-tall tomato plants growing inside one of Clint's high tunnels have been slow to yield their fruit.
And the ones growing in an outside garden are about 1/3 as tall as the others. Steve wanted to see the production difference between the indoor and outdoor plants.
"We're experimenting," Audrey said. "We're seeing what wind really can do."
Even though the growing season has been stunted, Clint has had success selling other vegetables like carrots, lettuce, spinach and radishes at the farmer's market in Sioux City.
"He was selling in Sioux City the first Saturday in May," Audrey said. "Most of these crops are already gone and these are the second crops."
Clint plans to bring some items to the Le Mars farmer's market opening day this Saturday from 8 a.m. to noon at the Olson Cultural Event Center. The market will also be open from 3 to 6 p.m. Wednesdays throughout the growing season.
Audrey said most of their offerings this Saturday will be items like rhubarb and jalapeño jellies along with minimal produce.
But that will change as the summer progresses and the days warm because in addition to Clint's indoor gardens he also tends an additional about 3,700 square feet outside.
"It's amazing what can be produced in the square footage he has," Audrey said.
Audrey and Steve help, but the business is Clint's and each year his profits have exceeded his expenses.
"I am the tomato connoisseur," Audrey said. "These two don't eat tomatoes."
Throughout the years as Clint's interest in planting vegetables grew into the booming business it is today, Audrey couldn't be more proud of her son's accomplishments.
"I think it's exciting," Audrey said.
Clint will be a senior at Le Mars Community High School this fall.
He has already taken some agriculture classes and plans to take more along with business courses to learn as much as he can to help his gardens continue to grow.
Clint likes his gardening business, but he doesn't know for sure what the future holds.
"It's a hobby," Clint said. "And to make some money."
LOL! I should have kept reading :)
I want to see that.
Meanwhile, I didn’t kill the maters this year - leda won’t let me touch them. heheh.
My wife said the jars of tomatoes looked like art. Dark reds from the Early Girls and pink from the Arkansas Travelers. I told her she will appreciate the art better in January or February when we eat them!
Smart move on leda’s part.
As for my tree -— you were parked next to the danged thing for nearly 3 days last July
LOL!!!!
I was on your roof, dang it - only part I saw of that tree was the top.
I missed the entire discussion.
What discussion, there was no discussion. The Japanese beetles decimated it last year.
Well, if there was no discussion, how would I know you have a fruitcocktail tree, silly?
I’m sure I’ve mentioned it to you in the past.
You probably did - at my advanced age, I tend to forget things.
heheh.
Way to go, Kiddo!
The few years I’ve had my Farm Stand have been very lucrative. I made $2K alone on Raspberries one summer, though that’s a labor-intensive nightmare I really don’t want to go through again, LOL! (MIL feels the same way about strawberries.)
Husband added 60 crowns of asparagus this season, so in another two years we’ll have plenty of asparagus to sell at top dollar; also a labor-intensive crop, but worth it. :)
If anyone has the right setting, I’d encourage you to sell started plants in the spring (try “heirloom” tomatoes; they’re still all the rage!) Herbs also sell really well, as do cuttings from any of your houseplants or geraniums, especially the scented ones.
Make pesto and jams and jellies later in the season to sell. Herb-infused honey sells well for me, too. Gabz and I have made some tidy profits on those items even though we’re many states and half a growing season apart. :)
I LOVED my years in 4-H! :)
Never did get to raise any animals, but I was a sewing fool for a few years there. Never won more than a 2nd-place ribbon, but it was still fun!
Only thing I can get to grow around here is kids and dogs.
In fact, the dogs killed me dang yard. Grrrrrh.
Ain't nothing prettier! My Mom refuses to eat canned tomatoes, though. As a kid, she was dirt poor and many times "dinner" was a bowl of stewed tomatoes and homemade bread. I tell her that she was spoiled, LOL!
My Grandma (her Mother) was Queen of the Roadkill. That woman could make a meal for ten out of two boiled potatoes and whatever she found on the road that day. I miss that woman.
I heard a rumor that you did a great job reclaiming said yard this past week. ;)
I’m not sayin’ where I heard that...
i’ve still got high hopes for the mater patch.
dogs havent decimated it yet and it’s got green
and growing maters and a sprinkling of blooms.
i’m doing good to just keep the holes filled in
and the grass cut these days for the rest of it.
mr patton isn’t always the most observant fella...
Iowa? Isn’t that the state that handled their recent flooding catastrophe without whining and DEMANDING immediate aid from the feds? and were not these citizens of the Heartland also prepared prior to the crisis?
Hmmm....same people who cling to their guns and bibles!
LOL - still one more tree to cut down, a shed to build, a new patio to construct, cords of wood to split and haul from all over town - dang busy for a city kid, aren’t I?
Stop whining, wife! LOL.
Are they the odorless kind? LOL!
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