Type of opportunity:

Sale (Owner Financed), Lease (1 to 5 Years), Lease (5+ Years), Lease with Option to Buy, Internship / Mentorship, Incubator / Mentored Lease, Business Partnership, Employment, Employment with Transfer. More info: We are really looking to live and farm sustainably with others. We do not want to be isolated in the country and hope to live on land with others. We have a current mushroom and produce farm on rented land and hope to work with others in some agreed upon situation. Property size is negotiable - the larger the better as we would love to work this venture with others. We do not have the current funds to purchase property but could in the next two years with our current farm business. We are open to stacking functions and partnering with other farm types to cycle resources and share systems.

Equipment & infrastructure:

Barn, Fencing, Well / Pond / Other water source, Greenhouse, Farmer housing, Farm equipment, Processing facilities, Cold storage (cooler/freezer). More info: We are looking for a place to move our current mushroom and vegetable production business. Not all infrastructure needs to be there, but obviously the more the better. The mushrooms would ideally need place for a small lab, temperature controlled colonizing space where shelving could be put in, and temperature and humidity controlled fruiting space. We could use a semi-buried basement, two car garage, buried shipping containers, or something else. For the produce farming we would like to use permaculture methods, little tilling, and put in long term beds utilizing waste products from mushroom production. We have irrigation equipment but would need access to water. Farmer housing is ideal!

Current production on farm:

More info: We would love to work with any current farm production. Permaculture emphasizes using waste streams from one production method to feed other crop productions, and mushroom and vegetable production fits well into many other farm productions. We have some limited experience with the following: honey production, livestock, orchard, flowers. We would love to learn more about these and other farm processes. We would also love to be part of the maintenance of other farm productions, like sharing milking duties or being able to care for production when others go out of town. We also have extensive experience with food production including commercial production and different fermentation processes

Current farming practices:

Biodynamic, Conventional, Certified organic, Transitioning to organic, Ecological production but not certified, None, the property is not being farmed. More info: We are open to current sustainable farming techniques as well as helping a conventional farm transition to more earth friendly farming techniques. We know many different farming operations can work in concert with each other and would love to see what cool projects can come to bear fruit!

Previous farming experience:

Volunteer, Employee, Manager

Number of years experience:

15

Other qualifications:

Farm business training. More info: Find Food Fight! Farm on Instagram. Between the two of us we have 15+ yrs of farming experience. We already have a functioning farm & sell mushrooms and some produce to 9 upscale Avl restaurants including Lab, Rhubarb, Vivian, and Roots & Fruits Market in Blk Mtn. Our biggest problem is lack of space so we can keep up with market demand. On our little rented property we cannot keep up with all the people who want to buy our mushrooms! Brandon heads up the mushroom production and has many connections in Asheville restaurants as he previously worked in that industry for ten years before starting this mushroom business full time. Kerry heads up the farming production & focuses on permaculture.

Production goals:

Flowers, Herbs, Orchard, Vegetable production, Woodlot or forest products. More info: We would like to expand our mushroom production facilities so we can keep up with demand. We are currently producing out of three different sites: our lab and home is one place, our rented fruiting space is at a friends house, and we also rent at a third location a one acre field for produce farming where we have a small CSA and donate vegetables to increase access to unadulterated vegetables. We would like to run our business in a worker owned co-op, teaching and learning from other farmers and work together to increase local access to real food. We see our competitors as big agriculture - we want to support all other small producers and help make real food accessible to everyone.

Personal experience and production goals summary:

We believe Western North Carolina has the ability to be food secure and that process starts with small farmers working together. We would like to share land with other farmers looking to positively contribute to the local real food movement so we can help each other out and all be part of positive change. We currently produce mushrooms and vegetables but hope to increase our production output by consolidating our efforts on one, larger, property.