Farmers’ Market: Delphinium Blue Farm

    “What is a cackleberry?!” a visitor will ask; few notice the biggest clue, a cracked yellow egg making up the background of the sign at the end of the driveway of Delphinium Blue Farm on the Garfield Road in Ashland. Inquiry of owner Anne Chase brings a grin and an explanation that a “cackleberry” is part of a family story. “When I was small, I would ‘help’ my dad around the yard and in the garden. I knew that if I planted a strawberry, I got a strawberry crown and if I planted a raspberry, I got a raspberry cane. My dad told me that if I planted an egg (a cackleberry, he called it), I would get a chicken! And I believed him because I was a little kid and he was my dad. So now I am just ‘goofing’ on him!” The sign hangs where “Dad” will see it each time he drives by, which is frequently because Daughter’s farm is just down the hill from his and on the road to town.
    Delphinium Blue Farm was designed in Anne’s mind during 20 years “away,” first in college and graduate school and later, working in other agricultural enterprises. “All the time I was working for someone else, my mind was returning to the place I really wanted to be and the job I really wanted to do, like the dormouse in the bed of chrysanthemums with his paws pressed tightly over his eyes, imagining his beloved delphiniums that had been taken from him.” The farm’s name derives from a children’s poem, The Dormouse and The Doctor, from “When We Were Very Young” by A.A. Milne of Winnie-the-Pooh fame. In providing an explanation, Anne recites lines like she is still read to at bedtime … I’ll pretend the chrysanthemums turn to a bed; Of delphiniums (Blue) and geraniums (Red)!
    Twelve years ago, the stars aligned … her marriage ending, her current job “the pits,” her dad retiring and putting the property up for sale … and the farm began to take shape. “I went to Borders and bought a how-to book. We cleared a field and I designed and built a house and then a chicken coop and then a barn and then a second chicken coop. When I got stuck, I sat down on a pile of lumber and thumbed through the book and scribbled on scratch paper until I figured it out … plumbing, wiring, roofing, stairs. It’s all still standing, so I must have done OK.”
    The laying hens are cage-free and have daily access to outside runs delineated by electrically-charged, portable fences moved to fresh pasture every few days. The same fence protects bee hives from bears. Perimeter fences surround the barnyard and her partner, an 82-pound Akita named Sassy, limits visits from coyotes, foxes, coons, skunks, and other nocturnal prowlers. Larger livestock are part of near-future plans.
    “Meat sheep to start, though I am sure I will wind up with a milk cow or two, however often I give myself a stern talking to … milk cows need to do just that every twelve hours and there is just me to get it done. But dairy animals are my first and greatest love … I miss them!”
    It had been a long time coming, but the farm is coming along. Anne currently sells eggs, honey, and stewing hens from the door yard, drives a weekly egg delivery route, delivers eggs to customers while visiting her “day job” on the UMPI campus. (To order, leave a message: 435-7182). During the summer months, she brings fresh eggs every Saturday to the Presque Isle Farmers Market at the Aroostook Centre Mall. Sometimes Sassy comes too. But then they head home to the next project or the next puzzle to be solved, to develop “for real” the picture she has carried in her head for so long.
    Editor’s note: This weekly column is written by members of the Presque Isle Farmers’ Market. For more information or to join, contact their secretary/treasurer Steve Miller of Westmanland at 896-5860 or via e-mail at beetree@xpressamerica.net.