Organic community
comes together for Wood Prairie
By Scott Mitchell Johnson
Staff Writer
BRIDGEWATER — Online contributors have come through for Wood Prairie Farm raising more than $30,000 to help owners Jim and Megan Gerritsen build a seed equipment repair shop.
The Indiegogo campaign recently concluded its 40-day run in high gear raising the necessary funds and — in the process — placing Wood Prairie Farm, a small family farm specializing in raising certified organic seed potatoes, in the record books among the 100 most-funded Indiegogo projects. The Bridgewater farm’s successful repair shop campaign ranks 84th out of the more than 15,000 completed Indiegogo projects. Indiegogo is the world’s leading Internet crowd-funding platform.
“The support offered to our repair shop project was nothing short of phenomenal,” said Jim. “This is proof positive that the organic community supports its own and is willing and able to stand up and help when a need is made known.
“I think what a lot of people miss nowadays is a sense of community, and the organic community really came together for us,” he said. “They know that we’ve been active in helping develop organic and in fighting genetically modified crops, and I think people supported us in our work and put their money where their support is. It’s an illustration of community supporting community.”
The money raised will allow the Gerritsens to build a 30 foot by 70 foot metal and concrete building with wood-fired radiant floor heat that will allow sons Peter and Caleb Gerritsen, the farm’s chief mechanics, to maintain and fabricate their vintage organic seed farm equipment.
“We’ve needed an on-farm shop for a long time,” said Peter, who is also pursuing a business degree at Eastern Maine Community College in Bangor. “We have a lot of older specialized equipment which needs steady maintenance. Now that we have funding we’ll get to work on building our shop.”
“We’ve never had a building dedicated to working on equipment,” Jim said. “This will allow us to spread the season of repair right through the winter whereas now we’re sunshine farmers who do the work during the summers. I think this will make us better farmers, and I couldn’t be happier.”
Caleb recently graduated from Central Aroostook High School and will be studying diesel hydraulic mechanics this fall at Northern Maine Community College.
Jim Gerritsen said work on the new building is presently under way.
“We hauled field rocks that we had stowed away just for this purpose to build a flat foundation. We laid out the lines and had a backhoe come in Monday to dig the footing,” he said. “Our plan was to get caught up with the crop by the end of July/first of August, and we’ll be focused on building this as much as we can up until around Labor Day, at which time we’ll start digging. We’ve got three or four weeks to get this building done.
“These Quonsets supposedly go together like an erector set. There’s literally five buckets of bolts that we’re going to put through. It’s all laser cut holes so it’s supposed to line right up,” said Jim. “Once we get the foundation done, it should bolt together really quickly. The building is designed for the snow load up here, so it will be good to have.”
The Gerritsens are active and have volunteered thousands of hours on behalf of the organic community over the past 30 years. Jim is president of the national trade group, Organic Seed Growers and Trade Association.
Wood Prairie Farm is located at 49 Kinney Road in Bridgewater. For more information, log onto www.woodprairie.com.
