In 1980, we acquired a feral jennet captured by the Federal Government in Arizona and she gave us jennet foals in 1981, 2, and 4. I still have these three sisters, (and the bones of their mother), here on the farm in Montpelier.

Lisa Mancauskas, who lives on Main street down stream of us, says in her letter to the Times Argus on July 18 2008: “When I first purchased my home on Upper Main Street, we had a beautiful brook running through our backyard with clear water and abundant brook trout. Over the past few years, due to the careless operations of Vermont Compost Company, the water flow has been reduced to a trickle, the brook trout are dead, and the water that does remain is polluted.”
These are very serious allegations. They are also demonstrably untrue.

We do not remove water from the brook, we do not impede its flow, and we expend much effort on systems to prevent the discharge of pollutants into the brook.
Ms. Mancauskas and others might want to consider these watershed facts: the Blanchard brook drains a small steep watershed of about 440 acres above Vermont Compost Company’s Main Street Farm. It is a torrent in the spring snow melt and it all but disappears in a dry summer. When it rains hard, the brook flows onto our land turbid from the run-off of the steep forested slopes, and the fields, roads, and activities up stream of us. 3000 cars and trucks rumble up and down Main street by our farm each day spewing anti-freeze, gasoline, diesel, hydraulic oil, brake fluid, air born particulates, fast-food packages, and etcetera, all of which flush into the brook.

In the winter the road crews begin the massive salt assault on the fresh water brook so that those cars and trucks can travel un-impeded by ice and snow. Each road, driveway and ditch contributes a bit of turbidity. Global climate changes have increased storm intensities and droughts and this little watershed is not exempt from those effects. The Blanchard brook is not a registered trout stream though it may enjoy some seasonal trout activity, particularly on its lower reaches. In other words, this small winooski tributary receives many insults, but not mostly from Vermont Compost Company.

We are very proud of the water management structures which we have built to control and utilize the effluents from our husbandry and composting activities. We welcome informed and constructive criticism of our practices and we have regularly enjoyed the scrutiny of the regulators and the peer review by other practitioners of our crafts. .. Further, Ms. Mancauskas and others should keep in mind, that the action of the Natural Resources Board in this instance is not related to allegations of water pollution, but to the definition of farming in act 250. No one has a right to pollute the waters of the state. Period.

Nothing about the farming exemption to act 250 exempts farmers from regulatory scrutiny by the Agriculture Department and the Agency of Natural Resources. Nor are they exempt from the judgment of their neighbors. What farms and farmers are entitled to expect, is that those folks who eat without farming, will accept the responsibility to study the issues involved, before condemning the folks who are growing the food, and then support improving the farming craft and crafts people.
We welcome neighbors to engage us directly when they have concerns, we are easy to find, and we look forward to the community process of imagining and building the gentle and beautiful farms of our future.
Sincerely,
Karl Hammer, President Vermont Compost Company

i hope that in a future time it will be said of the work of vermont compost company that, “they used the devil’s tools, but left it cool for mules”. by that i mean that we are developing land forms that will serve a post industrial farm even as they enable us to exist in the now of 53 foot tractor trailers. roman roads and aqueducts still carry freight and water 2000 years after that empire’s glory days. Maya terraces are still planted. we are using dinosaur sized earth moving machines burning re-cycled fry oil , canola oil in their hydraulic arteries and veins. we take responsibility for the soil ethics of the earth shaping we do. we at vermont compost company are committed to improving farmability of the soils of any place on which we work. in order to deconstruct industrial agriculture, we need to form a vision of another way of farming the future and then we need to eat while we transition towards that vision.

it was very heartening to see the many plant and produce vendors at the Montpelier farmers market with posters declaring their support and use of our potting soils and composts on their farms. the rest of the community should take heed from these folks who are working to build our local food systems about the importance of the potting soil infrastructure condemned by the recent NRB order. these folks are our working professional food growers. they think hard about these issues and their opinions should carry weight commensurate to the level of commitment they bring to their work.

in the food insecure, grain short world of now, a community that allows a farm operation that produces eggs without buying grain, that produces composts and potting soils, manages pastures, and now hosts a new market garden to be “cease and desisted”, is the victim of a suicidal obsession with definitions in law without respect to whole bio-systems. we are in an emergency about food self sufficiency folks. we need more chickens and more compost and more crops and more people working on the land

"Food will get you through times of no money better than money will get you through times of no food"

karl hammer with a nod to Fat Freddy, Furry Freak Brother

the outpouring of concern and support for us and our work has been very heartening and much appreciated.
We need farming definitions that enable us to move towards the goals of supporting ourselves by harvesting the sunshine on the lands we steward.
We inherit definitions that allow bringing grain from elsewhere, (Mars?) , pouring it into a box with a million hens in cages inside, selling the eggs elsewhere while allowing the excreta to be disrespectfully unused and to pollute.
blogging means posting when ya gotta go, off to farmers market…

greetings friends of soil life, friends of life.

the natural resources board of the state of vermont has achieved what no other power on earth had; i am blogging!

on monday, july 7th, a sheriff delivered an order from the NRB to " immediately cease any and all commercial composting operations, remove all compost materials and remove all improvements constructed for composting…"

this order is appealable to the environmental court and we will appeal it.

as i try to write a short story about the regulatory events of the last two years i find myself mired in all the quirky details of dealing with the many state and local officials who might have jurisdiction over composting and/or farming activities.

world events demand that we increase our local food production. this is both a true homeland security issue and an ethical imperative.

this order is not about any environmental hazard, it is about the definition of farming. this order is an opportunity to talk about whether we want to let inadequate definitions of farming override achieving the food security goals of our community. vermont compost company hens produce thousands of dozens of eggs each year without buying grain in a grain short world. we produce the potting soil that many organic farms use to start their seedlings. we provide the compost for many food growing efforts in the community

it has been important for us to realize that this is not primarily a legal issue, it is a pivotal part of the vital political question of how we will address the linked issues of energy, transport, food, carbon sequestration and regeneration of productive community that can sustain itself.