Fresh, home-grown, chemical free, free range goodness

Sugar Creek Family Farm

About Us

Phone: 515-689-0389

E-mail: theglannfamily@wildbluepella.org

Text Box: I (Abby) grew up on a very small farm in Warren county. Everything I knew up until a few years ago, I had learned growing gardens and raising animals with my parents, especially my father. I took that knowledge, and a love of being at home with my children and living simply and applied them all together to start our first venture into a CSA. I had known about the idea for a number of years, but had not been in a place where I could do anything (we lived in town). For a number of reasons, we were able to buy an acreage on the edge of Polk, Marion and Warren counties last summer. I put in a large garden to test the waters as far as whether growing things was even feasible for a few years. It did wonderfully. We then worked on putting in fruit and nut trees.

To contact us:

Seeing that everything was progressing well, I decided to just jump in. I had done some research into what other area CSA's did, and modeled around them some. 2007, our first year, was definitely difficult. Mr. Murphy hung around quite a bit more than we would have liked. I got pregnant-not a huge deal, but the timing made it necessary for me to ease off some of the work I would normally be able to do. We also  dealt with the tiller breaking and the crazy frost at the beginning of April, right when we would have been putting in crops. That set the season back several weeks. We ended up having only greens in the beginning, but in the last few weeks the bags were heavier and heavier. The year was definitely not our norm, or anything like I expected. Everything that happened was out of my control, though, which is part of the CSA experience-you buy into the farmer’s ups and downs. If it’s a great year, you have produce coming out of your ears. If it is trying, as our first was, then you still get a great selection, but not as much as those bumper crop years.  Because it was our first year, our prices were very low, $250 for a full share, as compared to most others which are around $400. In 2008 we bumped the price up to $300 for new members, We have had a pretty nice variety of vegetables, but a few crop failures from weather. Otherwise, we are small, run by me, with a little help from my husband as needed, and not quite help from my daughter and son. We have chickens and ducks that provide egg . We are organic, but not certified. I also only grow heirloom/open pollinated produce for sustainability issues. We have big dreams of running the whole operation off of solar and wind power, using rain water as the main source of water for the garden. In the meantime we do the best we can.  We decided after 2008 that our family, being as young as it is, as well as numerous other situations that running a CSA is definitely in our future, but not going to work in the present. We have a lot of years ahead of us on this farm, and right now market and farm stand sales are far more realistic in what I can do while taking care of kids and family. We intend to stay small to maintain relationships with our buyers, but to grow in what we offer, hopefully connecting with other farms to offer things we cannot provide, like beef, pork, sheep or goat’s milk, cheeses, honey and so on. If you are in Marion, Warren or Eastern Polk county and grow sustainably, let us know! We would love to connect with you!