Geoff Nosach and Lizzy Hayes of Art & Craft were working on a small CSA and garlic farm in Pennsylvania, learning to build greenhouses, conduct direct sales, and produce and market specialty crops in their first jobs working on a farm. When they moved to Maine, they befriended caregivers who offered their help while Geoff and Lizzy got their footing, becoming caregivers themselves around 2015. They bought the cheapest property available on Craigslist. Bringing in electricity on-site was cost-prohibitive compared to solar, so a friend in that industry helped guide the system design, which was set up one piece at a time over 10 years.
Raised beds were the quickest way to begin farming the previously clear-cut property. They also have field rows that have been improved over the seasons with cover crops, leaf mulch, compost and extensive broad forking. Their most important plants are grown in a hoop structure that is open on all sides, with a covering that helps to protect the plants from rain, dew and frost.
Geoff and Lizzy say operations are “constantly challenging, dynamic and keep us on our toes, which we both enjoy.”
After starting over 400 seeds, about 54 varieties and 200 unique seedlings were worked this season. Half of those crosses were made on the farm, and they do in-house PCR sex testing to isolate their focus. Test plots are planted densely to sift through potential keepers — about 100 full-term plants in just 500 square feet. When I asked how this season went for them, they said it was “incredible, especially compared to last year, which was very wet, cloudy and cool.”
Some standouts in their eyes were plants like Puppy, a cut sourced from Best Friend Farms. “We’ve never seen her perform like she did this year, so we can expect a healthy amount of full melt and rosin,” Geoff said. They also were impressed with Haskap x Pie Eyed, a cross they made in 2022 and selected from a seed hunt last year. Lizzy said, “She was a real stunner: high yield of bud on the plant and high yields to hash. We love her.”
As Lizzy and Geoff work with a small but mighty team to help harvest over a few weeks and begin processing, they also invest in the future of the land, adding compost, amendments, and mulch to the overwintering cover crops on the beds. Garlic planting happens after Halloween, and they expect to plant up to a half-acre of garlic this year.
Victim to Meta’s recent sweep on Cannabis pages, I asked them how they’ve been managing that frustration. “As artists trying to create and curate our art, which our farm is part of, it’s upsetting to lose that collection of documented work and our platform where we share it,” Lizzy said. “Our reach is smaller now, but we’re more excited than ever to share our project because we think it’s beautiful.”
