ABOUT THE FARM
New Spoke is owned and operated by Janelle Plummer + Ross Spencer. We are first-generation farmers, excited to call Maine our home and grow food for our community. Janelle fell in love with farming: the physical work, the rhythm of the seasons, the endless snacks provided by the fields during her first season working on a farm in Arundel, Maine in 2012. She then went on to work on a number of vegetable farms across New England, cultivating that passion.
New Spoke Farm began in the spring of 2022 on a sunny, sloped piece of beautiful pasture in Gray after a winter of searching for land. We are grateful to steward this land with its deep and dark soil, in a time when affordable, long-term access to land can be hard to come by for beginning farmers. This land has a long history of agrarian use, once as part of a larger dairy, then a robust home garden, and now the fields of our farm.
In Nov. 2023, we signed a lease on an old farm in Western Maine, where we hope to establish New Spoke for the long term. More details coming soon!
HOW WE GROW
Our vegetables are certified organic by MOFGA - it’s official! We use no synthetic pesticides/herbicides or amendments, and choose our organic fertilizers mindfully in regard to global mining. Everything we use on the farm is OMRI-approved and selected with careful consideration to the health of insects, critters, people, plants and the land.
We currently grow on 1.5 acres, and utilize numerous ways to produce the food we grow.
We farm in a way that aims to build the soil through practices like cover-cropping, keeping the soil covered, and applying compost + amendments that build up nutrients and organic matter in the soil. Vibrant, living soil is what makes this sort of small-scale farming possible, and we know the land is our greatest asset and co-conspirator for the work of feeding each other & our community.
If you have any questions about how we grow, please ask ‘em. One of the greatest benefits of knowing your farmer is the chance for real, honest conversations about how your food is grown.
