Category: St. Clair Agriculture

Dayspring Dairy

Sheep-shearing, cheese tasting at Alabama’s only sheep dairy

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Susan Wall

It was like a cross between a fiber-arts convention and a school field trip. Some came for the free fleece, some to see the sheep, others to taste the cheese.

Sheep-shearing is an annual January event at Dayspring Dairy in Gallant, but this year was the first time it was open to the general public. “It gives us exposure and drives traffic to our products,” said Ana Kelly, who, along with husband Greg, opened Alabama’s only sheep dairy in 2013.

Their products are the cheeses, dips and caramel spreads that they sell at farmers’ markets in Birmingham (Pepper Place), Atlanta (Piedmont Park) and Huntsville (Madison City), and at their small farm store by appointment — or when someone drops by and tracks them down in the milking barn. Many people at this year’s event were regular customers from Birmingham who wanted the back story to the Dayspring products they buy. “Millennials want to know who makes their food and how the animals are treated,” Ana says. “About 150 people showed up. It was a great success.”

The Facebook “open house” invitation said 9 a.m. – 2 p.m., and by 9:30 cars and trucks were lined up on both sides of Dogwood Road to its intersection with Gallant Road. Both the barn and the small farm store quickly filled up with gawkers and tasters. Folks were wandering around the farm, some going into the pasture where the sheep, who were too young to be shorn, alternated between cuddling up to their visitors and cavorting like grade-school children at recess.

Folks had cameras around their necks and children in tow. The sounds of sheep bleating and chickens clucking mixed with the squeals of delighted children, while a shaggy white great Pyrenees strained on his chain in an effort to get some of the attention. Pecorino, Pec for short, has to be restrained around visitors until he learns some manners, such as not jumping up on people. Two other great Pyrenees, Brie and Camembert, were friendly but not as rambunctious.

Visitors came from Birmingham, Leeds, Pell City, Jasper, Calera, Madison, Goodwater, Atlanta and who knows where else, many of them spinners, weavers, knitters and crocheters who volunteered to help so they could get a share of the wool. They had to make their way past the farm store via a dirt path, carefully stepping over the cattle grate left behind by the former farm owners.

In the barn, the unsheared sheep waited their turn in a holding pen, temporarily crammed together so tightly they looked like a sea of fleece with bobble-heads. From there, Alex Bowen, a 17-year-old home-schooled kid who works part-time at the dairy, pushed them into a line between a wire fence and the back barn wall, then into a tip chute. The latter is a wooden platform with a side that drops so the shearer can grab them. The ewes strained against the fence, confused by all the commotion.

Daddies hoisted their toddlers onto their shoulders for a better view of the shearing process that took place in a large stall. Nibbleton Fuzzy was one of the “victims,” and master shearer Stuart Mathews wrestled her to the ground on her back, using his legs to hold her in place. Once shorn, a brown spot was revealed on her back. Close examination convinced Greg Kelly it was lice. “I’ve never seen that before,” he said. He tossed out Nibbleton’s fleece, and that of several other sheep that turned up with lice. One of the volunteers said that sheep lice won’t affect humans, and will die when the wool is cleaned in hot water, but no one really wanted to deal with it.

What’s in a name?

“I name them when I have a reason to,” Greg said, when asked whether he named each of the sheep. “Valentine was sickly when she was born, and we raised her at the house and she turned around on Valentine’s Day, so we named her Valentine.”

Eager volunteers hung on the door of the shearing stall, ready to grab their share of fleece. They laid it on a piece of wide-web pasture fencing stretched between two metal saw horses, where they picked out debris. A large pile accumulated beneath the makeshift “screen” as dirty pieces dropped through the holes. The good stuff was packed into garbage bags to be taken home, washed, carded and spun or woven.

“It’s not the best wool,” Greg said. “These are dairy sheep, they aren’t raised for their wool.” So, why shear them in the first place and why in the dead of winter instead of spring? “I should get a sign made,” he said, with a roll of his eyes that told you he’s answered that question umpteen times already. “Almost all of these are pregnant, and it makes for an easier birth,” he explained. “By shearing them in January, it allows them to re-grow their wool before the biting insects appear in the spring. The winters here are very mild, but this is also done this time of year in the North. We leave about 1 inch of wool, which is enough to keep them warm.”

After shearing, Greg and Jimmy Mays, who helps out on shearing and lambing (birth) days, dragged each ewe into a hammock against the wall, where they trimmed their hooves and vaccinated them. Everett Kelly, 14, son of Ana and Greg, prepared the syringes. The immunization is passed on to lambs in colostrum.

The spotless milking parlor is in the barn, where milk is pumped from the ewes and flows through stainless-steel pipes into the cheese-making room. That’s where Ana shines, and where daughter Sofia, 10, often helps by putting labels on the packages.

There was no milking or cheese-making going on during shearing time, but there was plenty of tasting and buying. Lilly Poehler, the Kellys’ goddaughter, helped out in the farm store, frying and browning tiny squares of the farm’s Halloumi, a Mediterranean-style cheese. Folks were leaving with sacks full of cheeses, dips, jellies and a caramel sauce that’s a lot like the milky-rich Dulce de Leche so popular in South America. Cheese with names such as Ewetopia, Shepherd’s Tomme and Angry Ram (a hot pimiento cheese) also jostled in their sacks, along with packs of Halloumi the Kellys gave away because their sell-by date was so close.

In another life

Prior to buying their 33-acre farm in 2011, the Kellys knew no more about sheep or cheese-making than their visitors. The family lived in Birmingham, where Greg held a high-pressure IT job. Ana, a trained chef, had worked in the test kitchens at Southern Progress, then became a freelance food stylist after Everett was born. A few years later, they adopted Sofia from Colombia. They grew tired of suburban and corporate life and wanted something different. After visiting a goat farm in North Alabama to sample the cheese, the idea of becoming cheese-makers was born.

“We had a feeling we just wanted to start some type of cottage industry,” Ana said. “We had taken a little trip and stopped at a cheese-making plant in Elkmont. We discovered that they didn’t raise goats there, but bought the milk to make their cheese. We figured we could do it better by raising our own animals.”

There was already lots of good goat cheese being made here in Alabama, according to Ana, and cows were too big a leap. “Sheep are docile creatures,” Greg said. “They don’t smell, either. Sheep produce less milk than goats or cows, but its milder and richer.”

Greg trained at the Sheep Dairy School in Wisconsin, while Ana studied with cheese makers in Kentucky and Vermont. “He focused on the animals, and I focused on the cheese,” she said. Greg also went to shearing school in South Dakota. Why so far away? “Do you know of any shearing schools in the South?” he quipped.

Dayspring’s milk production resulted in 8,000 pounds of cheese last year, and the Kellys are shooting for 10,000 pounds in 2017. Their flock is a cross between East Friesian, the dominant dairy-sheep in the United States, and Gulf Coast Native, a breed that has adapted and thrived in Florida since the Spaniards brought their ancestors here in the 15th century. Lambs breed between the age of one-and-a-half and two years, and have a five-month gestation period. All the babies are born within a very busy, one-month window from mid-February to mid-March. “We had about 150 lambs born last year, and will probably have 200 this year,” Ana said.

Most of the boys will be sold, and eventually, the girls that don’t produce much milk will go, too. “We keep a milking flock of 100-125, but we may end up with 80-100 this year,” Ana said. “We have three to four rams, and each can cover 25 ewes, which only come in season one time a year.”

Their sheep graze all seasons on pasture untouched by pesticides or commercial fertilizer. The sheep are never given hormones, and the Kelly’s believe this combination makes healthier cheese.

“We milk our ewes from February through September, which provides subtle flavor changes throughout the milking season depending on the grasses growing in our pastures,” Ana says. “The rolling pastures of our land, along with our mild climate, give our cheeses a sense of place.”

Features

Hazelwood’s Greenhouses & Nursery

A quarter century
of growing nature’s
beauty in St. Clair

Story by Carol Pappas
Photos by Susan Wall

John Hazelwood squinted as a streak of sunlight parted cloudy skies above, accentuating the creases in his face – the unmistakable signature of a man whose earned them in a lifetime spent outdoors.

It is outside at Hazelwood’s Greenhouses and Nursery where he feels comfortable, fulfilled, surrounded by the flowers, plants, shrubs and trees he has grown. And all the while, he has nurtured a business others can enjoy, too.

For more than a quarter of a century, Hazelwood has been doing what came natural to him – digging in the dirt, planting a seed and watching his creations grow. He grew up on a nearby farm of his family’s, and his chores including gardening. Was he always interested in growing? Not necessarily. “My daddy took an interest in me growing things,” Hazelwood mused. “I had seven brothers and two sisters. He made sure we had plenty of work to do.”

The farm where he once labored as a boy has now become growing fields for the business he built a greenhouse at a time.

Atop a hillside in Pell City, almost hidden from view of passersby, is Hazelwood’s, the business that has become a tradition around these parts. His colorful handiwork at Mt. Zion Church is a hint you’re getting close. With a chuckle, he calls it his billboard, but it really is a ministry of his.

After high school, he enlisted in the U.S. Navy, intending to be an X-ray technician. But after four years, he figured he could pursue his future education on the GI Bill rather than re-enlist for another four years. “I figured out what I liked and what I didn’t like,” and as life has its usual twists and turns, he wound up at Auburn University, majoring in Agribusiness Education instead.

He taught in Lee County and in Odenville and eventually made his way to what is now John Pope Eden Career Technical School. He was principal his last 13 years before retiring in 2001.

Throughout his education career, he dabbled in growing. “I thought I would do a little on the side and raise some ferns,” he recalls. He bought an 80 x 25-foot, used tomato greenhouse and grew 400 ferns that year – 1985.

The manager at TG & Y, an old department store in Pell City, told him he would take them all at wholesale, but the deal fell through. He managed to sell them all, though, and people started asking if he could grow other plants. “It started snowballing,” he said.

In a couple of years, he bought another used tomato greenhouse, then another, and the business just kept coming…and growing.

In the early 1990s, he hired Harold Fairchilds, who was in the high school cooperative program. That was 25 years ago. He has been with Hazelwood ever since. So has Harold’s sister, Becky. Gayla, another sister, started a couple of years after that.

The Fairchilds siblings make up most of Hazelwood’s greenhouses and nursery ‘family,’ and he credits them significantly with the business’ success. “I can’t replace those three,” said Hazelwood. “I’d have to close up. I don’t know how I’d do it.”

The Fairchilds moved to Pell City from Missouri and a farming background, according to Becky. “At the time, it was a job. I didn’t know I would fall in love with it.”

The same holds true for Harold. “I guess I’m just comfortable here. I like being outside doing something I enjoy daily.”

And Gayla’s assessment isn’t far from her brother’s and sister’s. “Obviously, I love it, or I wouldn’t keep doing it,” she said. “I like the outdoors. I love flowers, and I love color.” It was a perfect match for her family and for Hazelwood’s. “It was the closest we could get to farming,” she said.

Harold clarified: “It’s farming in pots.”

Changing with times

Over the years, as the Hazelwood hillside landscape changed – more greenhouses and cold frame houses and rows and rows of plants, flowers and trees – the business has changed as well. Choices grew quickly. “There are so many new plants,” Hazelwood said. “There are hundreds of new varieties every year. There are new colors, new everything. There are a couple of thousand petunias.”

Where people used to prune hedges, they now want landscape that is low or no maintenance. They pick dwarf plants. “They just don’t have time like they used to.”

But fortunately, he added, “people still like to plant trees, shrubs and flowers.” And their one constant is Hazelwood’s.

As for competition from big box stores, “we just decided to do a better job, have more quality plants at a good price and try to keep customers happy and satisfied.”

You’ll get no argument there from John and Helen Golden. They’ve been shopping at Hazelwood’s from nearly the beginning. “We’ve been buying plants here for our garden for years and years,” Golden recalls. Their favorite? “Roses,” they say, almost in unison, much like the way they talk about their shared experience at Hazelwood’s.

It’s like family serving family. It’s a trust factor, an ever ready smile and a helping hand, and one would be hard-pressed to replicate the chemistry they have with each other and with their customers. “They have good plants, and they are good people,” Golden said. “Becky is really good.”

Becky is easy to spot. She is always moving, whether it’s on foot or in a golf cart. You’ll see her toting a bag of potting soil, a plant or a cartful of essentials for the garden, all the while greeting customers with a deep South charm that belies her Missouri roots. Her attentiveness to customer service is unmistakable.

Gayla is much the same way, chattering away to customers as she creates beautiful container gardens. “I’m happiest when I’m creating,” she says. Even a work in progress seems to be good enough to buy. Her work table sign warns customers: “Please do not take plants off the table.” They seem to snatch them up as if they were a finished product, and the perfectionist in Gayla isn’t about to let them go too early.

Down in the lower part of the property, you’ll find Harold watering and watching over plants, trees and shrubs as if they were his children. “We just had a handful of shrubs when I started,” he says. Now they stretch as far as the eye can see on the property. “If you don’t like the heat, this is not the job for you. If you don’t like to get dirty, this isn’t the job for you,” he says. As for him, it’s definitely the job he loves. “I guess I’m just comfortable.”

In addition to Hazelwood’s extended family, his daughters, Shelly Martin and Kelly Staples, grew up working at the nursery. Shelly even pursued a career in landscape design after graduation from Auburn and does design work in Birmingham communities like Liberty Park as well as Pell City and surrounding areas.

Hazelwood does some landscape design work himself and is quick to offer advice to customers when needed. “Fall is the time to do landscaping,” he says. Like the Goldens, he has his favorites, too: Podacarpus for shrub; any variety of begonias for bloom; and “the old Magnolia” for a tree.

As Hazelwood looks around at the bustle of activity on this spring afternoon, recounting the journey that led him to a thriving business, he notes, “It’s something that just kind of happened. I didn’t intend to do it at all. It just grew out of starting something. I’ve been blessed. The Lord had something to do with it.”

Features

Working Breeds

Leeds trainers teaching dogs to herd sheep

Story and photos
by Jim Smothers

There’s a bond between people and their dogs like no other – a type of teamwork found in few other relationships.

That’s what got Kim Crenshaw hooked on dog training, and what led her to Doyle Ivie. Together they are offering a new avenue for that type of teamwork in this part of the state.

While Crenshaw is an experienced obedience and agility teacher and trainer, she wanted to see how her dogs would respond to the challenge of herding sheep. After a workshop with Ivie at his Farmington, Georgia, ranch she has brought him to her home and training center in Leeds to give more central Alabama dog owners a chance to introduce their pets to sheep herding.

He is of the generation that doesn’t think about dogs as members of the family—they are tools, there to do a job, and he’s taken it on as his job to train them.

“Most of the time, the dogs have never even seen a sheep before,” he said, “and some of the people haven’t either.”

About a dozen people came out for Ivie’s latest workshop in Leeds. They got to see how their dogs would interact with the sheep and how well they would respond to new commands for moving the sheep to specific locations.

“Everything out there can think, that’s the problem,” he said. The sheep, the dog and the person all have a mind of their own. “That’s where the dedicated training comes in. There are a lot of variables. Everything is moving here. With agility and obedience, everything is still.”

Ivie says he’s been “cowboying” all of his life and started training dogs about 20 years ago. It was during that time, while learning to use dogs to help move livestock, that he got acquainted with the late Bob Vest. Vest’s career and training methods are legendary in the herding dog community, and are recounted in The Traveling Herding Teacher.

“He was a good instructor,” Ivie said. “I learned a lot from him, and he insisted that I start helping people.”

At his ranch Ivie has a herd of just over 100 sheep. Keeping them healthy can be a challenge, mainly due to feet problems and parasites. He said livestock have to be trained to the dogs, too, so that their reactions to the dogs can help move the herd and keep it together.

“The entire herd doesn’t have to be trained, just enough to start the herd moving,” he said.

It’s up to the shepherd and the dog to direct their movement, whether it’s to the “way side” (counterclockwise) or the “by side” (clockwise).

He cautions that herding can be dangerous.

“It’s a contact sport,” he said.

It’s up to the shepherd to train his or her dog not only how to move the herd, but how to stop it. In training and competition, the herd is typically between the shepherd and the dog, with hand signals used for direction and to stop movement by having the dog lie down.

“When you get tired of having your knees knocked off, you’ll learn to stop that dog!” he said.

Crenshaw said there are some big misconceptions about herding.

“It’s not chasing,” she said. “Some people say their dog would be good at herding because he likes to chase bicycles or something. It’s not about chasing or nipping at them (the sheep). It’s usually trying to push the sheep back to the person. When you see the dog get behind the sheep and push them toward the person, that’s instinct. It’s really cool to watch.”

After the workshop, Crenshaw and Ivie took the summer off from working with the sheep. The summer heat is just too much for them. They plan to pick it back up in the early fall, but no date had been set as of this writing.

“I think everyone had a good time,” she added. “The beginners got a good taste of it, and there is nothing else offered in the Birmingham area for herding dogs.”

For dogs and handlers with herding experience, it’s a great opportunity to work with sheep.

Some dogs pick up on the skills very quickly, with an intuitive sense of how to move with the sheep. Others need more time to catch on.

“You can take five young dogs that have never seen sheep before, and some will turn on,” Crenshaw said. “Some don’t. Some seem confused. It can take a little bit of coaxing for them to know it’s okay to move them because they know they are not supposed to chase other animals.”

Crenshaw and Ivie both have extensive resumés in the dog-training world. Ivie has a background as a competitor, trainer and judge in organizations including the AHBA, AKC and ASCA among others. Crenshaw has been a professional trainer for more than 25 years and is a judge for agility, rally obedience and obedience competitions.

“Really, it’s all based in obedience,” Crenshaw said. You have to have a good relationship with the dog, to be able to read the dog, tell what they’re thinking, and communicate what their role is. All the dogs have to be good at walking on leash and have a great recall in agility or sheep herding.

“If the sheep are going where you don’t want them to go, you have to be able to call them off. They have to be able to go, come and stop. Those are skills you have to have with any of the sports. If you want to do hunting, a retriever has to have those skills, too. Those foundation skills of obedience are the foundation skills for all of the extra games you play with your dog.”

She added that a number of games and activities have been developed to encourage owners to spend more recreational time with their dogs, whatever the breed or instincts. Any dog owner should be able to find some type of activity suitable for his or her dog.

“Whatever dog a person has in their backyard, there’s something it can do and enjoy,” she said. “If it has a good nose for tracking, you can make a game out of finding lost things. There are so many dog sports that are so much fun and can get people and dogs off the couch. There are plenty of opportunities for physical and mental activities.”

The dogs and handlers at the latest workshop demonstrated a wide range of abilities and aptitudes for herding during the two days of working with the sheep.

“I think everyone had a good time,” Crenshaw said.

For more about Crenshaw and Ivie, visit
www.bhamdogtrainer.com and www.woodsendstockdog.com

Features

Fresh Produce Central

Chandler Mountain: The tomato capital of Alabama

Story Leigh Pritchett
Photos by Michael Callahan

Two pieces of white bread glazed with mayonnaise. Slices of a fat, juicy, vine-ripened tomato still warm from the sun. A sprinkling of salt and pepper.

A good ole tomato sandwich is a summertime delicacy.

And St. Clair County’s Chandler Mountain just happens to be known near and far as the place to get tomatoes.

Alabama Farmers Federation, in a 2007 publication, calls Chandler Mountain “The Tomato Capital of Alabama” because truckloads are transported from there on a daily basis during the months of harvest.*

In fact, “Alabama ranks … 12th in (production of) fresh-market tomatoes,” notes another federation publication.*

St. Clair County leads the state in vegetable and melon production, reveals a 2013 report of the Alabama Cooperative Extension System and Alabama Agribusiness Council.*

Those statistics are not difficult to believe when considering that Smith Tomato, LLC – just one of a number of tomato farms on Chandler Mountain – annually cultivates 100 acres, producing about 200,000 boxes of tomatoes. Each box contains between 25 and 30 pounds of tomatoes. That amounts to at least five-million pounds of tomatoes a year from a single farm.

Chad Smith – the 26-year-old farmer who runs Smith Tomato with his brother, Phillip, and father, Leroy — said their tomatoes are shipped to wholesalers within a 15-hour driving radius. The tomatoes travel as far as Miami, Fla.; Washington, D.C., and Dallas, Texas.

Smith said their Mountain Fresh, Roma, yellow, grape and cherry tomatoes end up in restaurants, stores and large farmer’s markets.

Not far from Smith Tomato is Rogers Farm, operated by Dwight Rogers.

Rogers, a tomato farmer for nearly five decades, sows approximately 15 acres of them each year. Among the kinds he offers this year are Mountain Fresh, Florida 47 and grape tomatoes.

A “truck farmer,” Rogers grows peanuts, peppers, squash, cucumbers, corn, pole beans and cantaloupe on another 15 acres of his farm.

Tomatoes, though, constitute 70 percent of his business, he said.

Rogers’ tomatoes and other produce are sold at his shed and through a farmers’ market in Birmingham. From the farmer’s market, Rogers’ tomatoes ultimately end up in produce stands all over North Alabama, he said.

Tomatoes’ paradise found

Chandler Mountain is situated in northern St. Clair near Ashville and Steele.

“(It) is quite unlike any other in the Appalachian Range,” explains Mattie Lou Teague Crow in her book History of St. Clair County (Alabama). “It is a small, rock-rimmed, boat-shaped mountain, 1500 feet above sea level, and it is approximately seven miles long and one and a half miles wide. Its summit is a plateau of silky loam which grows tomatoes and beans to perfection.”*

Mike Reeves, regional extension agent in commercial horticulture for Alabama Cooperative Extension System, said Chandler Mountain offers farmers good soil, an ample water supply and the advantages of elevation. Because of elevation, there are fewer incidents of frost on the mountain than in the valley. That permits farmers to plant earlier in the spring and harvest later into the fall.

Jamie Burton, who retired after more than 60 years of growing tomatoes, said the altitude promotes cooler temperatures.

“In hot summertime, it is about five degrees cooler on the mountain” than in the valley, said Burton, who cultivated 75-100 acres in tomatoes on Burton Farm. Tomatoes, he continued, do not fare as well in temperatures greater than 95 degrees.

Rogers said air circulation on the mountain also benefits tomatoes.

“Feel the breeze,” Rogers said. “We have a breeze almost all the time.”

That, he said, helps to keep the tomato vines dry.

A way of life

The tomato farmer does the bulk of his work in 10 months each year, but gets paid during the four months of harvesting and selling, said Smith.

The days spent preparing, sowing and reaping, though, are frequently quite long, Smith said. A farmer might work more than 10 hours during daylight and then commence spraying after dark when it is better for the plants. Before the night ends, he may be loading a wholesale truck until 1 a.m. Four hours later, he is back in a field spraying until sunrise.

Rogers said there are times when he is up at 2:30 a.m. to get his tomatoes to market in Birmingham and may not finish his day of farming until 10 or 11 p.m.

Added to the long hours are other necessary aspects of the business, such as USDA inspections and new regulations to learn and follow, Smith said.

During the growing season, a tomato farmer really cannot take a vacation because of all that must be done, Burton said.

Nonetheless, “You don’t get bored of it,” Smith responded. “You get to do a little bit of everything.”

The growing season spans from April until the first frost (generally October). During that time, 50,000 to 80,000 tomato plants are sown every three weeks on the Smith farm. There are a total of seven planting cycles or “settings.” This staggered schedule produces a crop of mature tomatoes almost constantly.

“Most of the time, we can plant (a setting) in a day,” Smith said.

However, staking the plants in order to tie them and hold them upright takes longer.

“That, right there, really is work,” Smith said.

In a day’s time, it is possible to stake about 40,000 plants — or 10 acres, he said.

The cost to sow 100 acres — including expenses for plants, equipment, supplies and labor – would be at least $1 million, Smith said.

Because of all the time, effort and financial resources required to be a tomato farmer, Smith said a person has to be completely devoted to it. It has to become “a way of life. You’ve got to have the will to want to do it.”

Added Esther Smith, his wife, “Then, you pray you come out (well) in the end.”

One hailstorm, Chad Smith said, could doom a whole crop.

“Weather’s the biggest factor” that the farmers face, Smith said. “The next biggest thing is the market.”

Market prices for tomatoes fluctuate frequently, which means farmers could experience either “feast or famine” at harvest, Reeves said.

Last year, for example, the market price was low much of the season.

Smith said 85 percent of the tomatoes reaped on his farm last year brought a price that was either below cost or at cost. As the last 15 percent was being harvested, the market price rose significantly, which balanced the equation.

A changing legacy

Eighty-six-year-old Hoover Rogers of Chandler Mountain retired from tomato farming only four years ago.

He farmed for years and years, even while he was an educator and principal.

“It was hard work,” Rogers said, “but it was enjoyable.”

He said he has seen many changes occur in the science of producing tomatoes — from cultivating with mules to using tractors, from dealing with drought conditions to providing irrigation, from sowing on the ground to planting on raised, plastic-covered rows.

“The way of fertilizing, the way of spraying has really changed the last 15 years,” added Dwight Rogers, Hoover’s nephew.

Even the number and size of the farms have changed. Burton said there were more farms when he began tomato farming. Although fewer in number now, the farms tend to be larger.

Smith explained that the current method of planting on raised, plastic-covered rows is called “plasticulture.”

Creating “plasticulture” rows is done with a special attachment for a tractor. That attachment gathers soil into raised rows, lays irrigation line and spreads plastic over the rows, while directing more soil onto the edges of the plastic to secure it. All these tasks are done simultaneously.

Then, another tractor attachment punches holes through the plastic and into the soil. Finally, a tomato plant is placed by hand into each hole.

Smith said the plastic inhibits weed growth, holds moisture close to the roots and keeps the plants off the soil, which decreases the risk of disease and damage.

Yes, tomato farming requires an enormous amount of work. But “when this gets in your blood, you like it,” Dwight Rogers said. “Just the smell of the dirt when you start tilling the ground” keeps him farming year after year.

Tomato farming on Chandler Mountain has a legacy of being a family tradition. Hoover and Dwight Rogers’ family, for instance, has been farming the same land more than 100 years.

This past summer saw three generations working at Smith Tomato.

“Now, we’re getting grandkids involved in it,” said Kathy Smith, Chad’s mother.

Kista Lowe was reared in the tomato farming business like her brother, Chad Smith. As an adult, Lowe worked elsewhere for 15 years.

Yet, her heart kept recalling the excitement she felt when heavy picking commenced and all those boxes of tomatoes started arriving at the packinghouse. She missed it so much that she returned to the business three years ago.

Esther Smith understands why that would be the case. She grew up in tomato farming in Florida and enjoys everything about the process. “You look forward to it in the winter.”

Although Burton retired from tomato farming 10 years ago, and the farm responsibilities have passed to subsequent generations, the desire has not subsided.

Even now, Burton still gets the urge to go out and grow tomatoes.

A tasty attraction

Growing tomatoes for wholesale distribution is certainly a major part of Smith Tomato’s business. Yet, the farm is actually a multifaceted undertaking.

While wholesale shipping is being handled at one end of the farm’s packinghouse, there is laughter and lively conversation in the tidy produce stand at the other end.

Seven days a week from July to October, Kathy and Esther Smith and Kista Lowe can be found at the produce stand, which is open to everyone.

In addition to tomatoes, peppers and cucumbers grown on the Smith farm, the stand sells produce from neighboring farms.

The three ladies spend their days handling phone calls and attending to customers from many counties and numerous states.

“They’re either coming or calling all day long,” Kathy Smith said of the patrons.

Some are new customers and some have come back year after year.

On one August morning, H.J. Hamilton of Sylacauga explained why he travels to Chandler Mountain to get tomatoes. “I come up here because they have such fine tomatoes and such friendly people.”

Robert Bowman of Hiram, Ga., said he has been purchasing from Smith Tomato for years. This was his second buying trip in a week.

It was the first visit for Glenda Karr of Ashland, and she liked what she saw.

A relative’s comments about Smith Tomato had awakened the interest of Eunice Bowden of Anniston, and she had to check it out.

James Campbell of Argo had the bed of his truck loaded with tomatoes that he and others in his group had gathered from one of the fields.

“They’re the sweetest tomatoes I’ve ever tasted,” Campbell said.

For about 15 years, Campbell has gone there to take advantage of “u-pick,” which is Smith Tomato’s invitation for people to gather tomatoes for themselves. The cost to do so is nominal.

“All our fields get turned out to the public to pick their own when (we) get finished shipping them,” said Kathy Smith.

“U-pick,” for some customers, is a fun activity and is treated almost like a vacation. It is not unusual for individuals to drive as many as three hours for the chance to glean because they enjoy going into the fields so much, Chad Smith said.

For those who may have limited financial resources, it is an opportunity to get fresh produce for a small amount of money, Lowe said.

Then, there are people who minister through “u-pick.”

Kathy Smith said missionary groups gather the tomatoes to help feed people in need.

And after they finish gleaning, group members seek blessings for the farm.

“They pray over our fields for a good crop next season,” Lowe said.

For more information about Smith Tomato, LLC, visit its Facebook page or call 256-538-3116. Dwight Rogers may be reached at 256-490-4535.

*Information used with permission.

Shel-Clair Farms

A world of cattle drives, scenic trails

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Mike Callahan

With the strains of “Rawhide” swelling inside their heads, 18 intrepid cowpokes slap their hands on their thighs, kick their horses and yell, “Head ‘em up, move ‘em out,” as they ride off to round up the herd.

“I’ve always wanted to say that,” one of the cowgirls remarks.

It’s all part of the annual cattle call at the Shel-Clair Farms, a 1,000-acre spread that straddles the borders of Shelby and St. Clair counties off U.S. 231 South. Owned by Ralph, Randy and Wayne Bearden, the farm and ranch is home to row crops, horse boarders, trails and fishin’ holes. It’s also home to 150 to 200 cows that have to be mustered for weaning, pregnancy checking and vaccinating every spring.

“I started the roundup in 2009 as a way to get the cows to the barn and have some fun at the same time,” says Randy Bearden, farm manager. “We skipped last year because someone got hurt in 2013. But we decided to try again this year.”

No one got hurt this year, and everyone seemed to have a great time. Twelve of the 18 riders were Shel-Clair boarders, who are accustomed to cantering among the cattle without incident. Rounding them up from the various fields and meadows and pushing them to the pasture near the old corn silo is another matter.

“Stay behind them, because they’ll turn the opposite way if you don’t,” Randy tells the group before it heads out one steamy Sunday afternoon in May. “Don’t run them, because some of them are pregnant.”

After these basic instructions, the weekend drovers take off in search of their hoofed subjects. Some of the cows are down in the hollows; others are in the woods cooling off. As soon as a few are spotted, the whooping and hollering begins.

“Woo-hoo, get on out of there, girls,” riders yell at the reluctant cows and calves. “Giddy-up, whoop whoop. Move along.” Once a few of the animals start moving, the others follow. A handful are insubordinate, however, and try their best to avoid the horses. They double back into the woods and stop in the streams to avoid capture, forcing mounted participants to split into teams to rally them.

During the three-hour event, riders pass an abandoned, barn-shaped house built during World War II that has almost been reclaimed by Mother Nature. They climb a ridge, where a bunch of folks watched Alabama play the University of Florida several years ago on a giant, flat-screen TV run by a gas generator. They stop briefly at the creek that was full of trout until the river otters ate them, then listen to cows bellowing from a nearby pasture. A slight breeze moves the tree leaves and tall weeds, making the humidity a little more bearable.

“The creek runs out of a spring where the water is crystal clear and never gets above 63 degrees,” Randy says. “It has a few bass and bream now.” The Beardens also have an 8-acre lake on the opposite side of the farm where they allow the public to fish for a fee.

It’s their day job and more

Randy cuts about 400 round bales and another 1,000 square bales of hay each year to feed the cows. If there is an abundance, he will sell some hay, but the herd uses most of it. The number of cows varies when some go to market or have babies. He tries to keep 150 mama cows and two bulls all the time. “Most cattle farms in the state have only 30 to 40 head,” he says. “But this is how I make my living. I don’t have an off-farm job.” He says the money he gets from leasing 110 acres for row crops pays the taxes.

He sells the cows at the Ashville Stockyard, and one obstreperous specimen is about to make that trip a trifle early if she keeps trying Randy’s patience. “That’s Number 36,” he says of the stubborn mama who insists on running away from the horses and the herd with her calf at her side. “She does this every year,” he adds, as disgusted as a mother who can’t control her toddler’s tantrums.

Randy’s family started farming in Shelby County in 1929 when J.E. “Ned” Bearden opened a dairy farm in Helena. Ned and his wife, Irene “Ma” Bearden, raised six children on that farm. Their son Ralph and Ralph’s sons, Randy and Wayne, started Shel-Clair Farms in 1972. Tired of getting up before dawn for milking or at 2 a.m. to repair a broken well pump, they closed their dairy business in 2005 and transitioned to a row-crop and beef-cattle operation. They added horse trails and boarding in 2007.

They have developed 12 miles of scenic trails that cover rolling hills, cross small creeks, ramble through forests and pass by a waterfall. The trails have names like Open Range, Ridge Mountain and Hurricane Mountain. The Haunted Swamp, part of the Hurricane trail, is so named because of the cow skulls hanging from trees and various bones scattered about. At least, that’s Randy’s story.

The trails are well-marked, unless the cows have knocked down some of the signs. Day riders, who are just as welcome as the boarders, can’t pass the farm’s Sycamore Sally without stopping for photos in the huge tree’s hollow trunk. That may change, though, because Randy found a snake inside the tree recently.

When he’s not rounding up cattle by horseback, Randy rides through the property in a red Ford pickup with a Blue Heeler named Blue on the bed’s tool box. Blue paces back and forth, trying to keep his balance. Randy says he has only fallen off once.

After the roundup, which took twice as long this spring as it normally does because some of the cows were less than cooperative, Randy treats riders to pizza and soft drinks at his new barn.

Sharon Jones of Leeds, one of the farm’s original boarders, is a veteran at the Bearden roundup. “I ride by myself a lot, so I really enjoy riding with a group,” she says, between bites of pizza. “It hypers my horse up, too, so he’s more fun to ride.” Madison Sharp, 18, a recent graduate of the Alabama School of Math and Science in Mobile, is another boarder who has done several roundups. “It’s fun,” she says. “It’s interesting to watch my horse think.”

It was Jackie Cockrell’s first roundup, and she brought along her 11-year-old son, Colton. “It was very exciting,” says Cockrell, who keeps their horses at her own farm in Leeds. “I would do it again next year.” Colton agrees. “Yeah, that was fun,” he says.

For more information about riding or fishing at
Shel-Clair, visit its website @ shelclairfarms.com

Features

Texas Longhorns

Welcome to Springville’s Lazy M Farm

Story by Elaine Hobson Miller
Photos by Wallace Bromberg

Mack Morgan greeted recent visitors to his Lazy M Farm with a huge, longhorn steer named Moonlight on a halter and lead rope, as if the steer were a horse and Morgan was about to saddle up for a ride.

“Keep an eye on those horns,” Morgan cautioned, stating the obvious. “Approach him from the side.”

It has become a tradition for motorists traveling U.S. 11 through Springville to stop at Morgan’s Lazy M Farm to take pictures when the longhorns are out. Lured by the horns that give the breed its name, they call Morgan to inquire whether he has sold them if they are in one of his hidden pastures. This tradition may soon go the way of the romanticized Old West that the breed symbolizes, however, as Morgan downsizes his longhorn herd in favor of the more profitable Brangus.

“The beef market has gone up 150 percent over the past two years, and longhorn meat is too lean for most folks,” Morgan explains. “It’s a matter of supply and demand. There are so many old farmers getting out of the beef cattle business and no young ones replacing them.”

Morgan has always had cattle. His father raised Herefords before him, and Mack began raising longhorns 30 years ago so he could practice his roping skills. Soon he started selling them to other ropers and rodeo companies. He held roping events at his own arena behind the trees on the north side of U.S. 11. “We held round robins, where every header (the one who lassos the horns) ropes with every heeler (the one who lassos the hind legs),” he says.

Born 56 years ago in a former plantation home reduced to its rock foundations years ago, Morgan lived in that house six months, until his daddy decided he wanted to be off the road. There were five slave houses around the property when it was a plantation. Look closely, and you’ll see the remains of one at the edge of the woods behind and to the right of the stone enclosure that Morgan now uses for pens and hay storage.

Morgan started out riding bulls when he was 13 to get out of doing farm chores. He hitchhiked to rodeos in Mississippi, Georgia and North Alabama before he was old enough to drive. “Five boys from the Springville area all started riding bulls together around 1972: Clayton Bromberg, Barry Long, Doug Downing, Mark Cousins and me,” he says. “We taught ourselves, went to bull riding school, too,” he says. He went into the sport to prove a point to his father.

“I worked for him and was cutting grass, stacking hay on the side,” he explains. “I went to a rodeo and thought, ‘I can do this, and if I can win, I won’t have to cut grass.’ And it worked.” He also went to saddle-bronc riding school, but his heart was in bull riding, which won him more money than the broncs.

“As a teenager and through my 20s and into my 30s, I could win enough on weekends to support my lifestyle,” he says. “I knew my limitations, though, and I knew the bulls.” The only major injury he suffered was a separated shoulder, but his arthritis reminds him of the ones he either wasn’t aware of at the time or that have faded into distant memory.

From bull riding, Morgan went to team roping and “did pretty good,” he says. “There were lots of Saturday and Sunday ropings around Alabama.” Rodeoing became an addiction, one that helped him preserve his farm all these years.

He hasn’t roped since his knee replacement a year ago, although a back operation the year before had already slowed him down. “It had become more of a hobby than competition by then anyway,” he says. “I can rope if I have to, though. I have a couple of Quarter horses. But the cows are so gentle they follow me across the road to the other pastures.”

Longhorns are known for their gentleness. Originating from an Iberian hybrid of two ancient cattle lineages, they are direct descendants of the first cattle brought to the New World by Spanish settlers in 1493. Their horns grow from the base, and their life spans are as long in years as their horns are in inches. Cows live into their 30s, bearing calves into their mid-20s. Steers live even longer because they don’t have the stress of calving.

Scalawag, 23, was a roping steer for many years, “back when I was good,” Morgan says. He has kept him around because of his 94-inch horns. “He won me a belt buckle a year ago,” he says. Horn length competitions, it seems, are quite common among breeders.

Steers have longer horns than the cows or bulls, because when gelded, their hormones turn away from muscle-mass and toward horn growth. Morgan’s biggest steer in terms of horns was Spike, who had a span of 104 inches when he died. “The world record a few years ago was 111 inches, but it probably has been beaten by now. It’s all about genetics and putting the right cow and right bull together.”

Due to their innate intelligence and gentle dispositions, longhorns are increasingly being trained as riding steers.

Moonlight, 16, who Morgan calls his “sweetest” steer, rides in area parades. “Sweet” is hardly the adjective most folks would use for a 1,400 pound animal with a horn span of six feet, but Morgan says longhorn steers are low-key and easy to handle. “Each has its own personality, and they come in a variety of colors,” he says. (The Texas Longhorn Breeders Association of America says there are no two alike.) “There are lots of speckled and spotted ones, solid whites, solid blacks, black-and-white ones, red ones, each with a different color pattern.”

Like the longhorns in Gene Autry’s Back in the Saddle Again, who feed on “the lowly Jimson weed,” Morgan’s herd will eat just about anything. They are a hardy breed, and will graze in hot weather and in the woods, even eating leaves. “But they won’t put on weight,” Morgan says. “Longhorns are the leanest of beef cattle, and not that tasty because they don’t marble. They don’t have the fat that other beef cattle do.”

Even though he doesn’t rope or ride any more, he keeps the cows because they force him to maintain the 380-acre farm that his father bought in the 1950s. Without the cattle, there would be a lot more bush-hogging, which would give him less time for his “real job,” that of landlord.

“I own two apartment buildings on Highland Avenue near St. Vincent’s Hospital in Birmingham, and I go to work every day,” he says. “I work all the time.” He cuts hay with only occasional help, and finds it stressful to keep all his machinery running.

“We’re real involved in the Springville Community Theater, too,” he says of him and his family. His sister, June Mack, is founder and director of the theater. Mack used to act there and still builds sets and whatever else his sister needs him to do.

“My wife and I have raised two boys on this farm, and it helped send them to college,” he says. One is at Virginia Tech now, the other is about to enter Nashville’s Belmont University. As to whether they will continue the family tradition, Mack can’t say for sure.

“One son is an Eagle Scout, and we kid him about turning it into a Boy Scout Camp when I’m gone.”

Features