The Bear Creek Organic Farm Spring Plant Sale 2020! This event is our favorite time of year when we welcome hundreds of gardeners to our farm and greenhouses to shop for organic transplants.
We'll have over 500 varieties of organic plants available!
Plant Sale List Coming Soon!
Over 100 varieties of tomatoes and peppers! Plus dozens of varieties of herbs, beneficial flowers, strawberries, and just about every vegetable you can imagine from Acorn Squash to Sweet Corn, Cucumbers to Green Beans!
Grand Opening, Thursday May 14th, 10am - 5pm
Open Daily May 14th - June 13th, 10am-5pm
Open 7 days a week, 10am-5pm
Bear Creek Organic Farm
4012 Atkins Road
Petoskey, Michigan 49770
We are 2.5 miles east of Petoskey on the south side of Atkins Road
Because local farms, local food, local business, and local relationships matter. Because we work our tails off to make this Plant Sale and your garden a success. Because we are passionate about helping our community grow their own food with the highest-quality plants available. Because you deserve the best!
]]>Agency: Agriculture and Rural Development
For immediate release: March 27, 2019
Media Contact: Jessy Sielski, 517-284-5725
Program Contact: Peter Anastor, 517-284-5777
LANSING – During its regularly scheduled meeting today, the Michigan Commission of Agriculture and Rural Development elected new officers and voted to approve Food and Agriculture Investment Fund grants for 11 food and agriculture projects in Michigan. Including:
Bear Creek Organic Farm of Petoskey, Michigan, will receive an $80,000 performance-based grant to expand its year-round growing capacity for greens and living herbs. The company will invest approximately $432,500 for this project, which will include new processing space, new greenhouses and new hoophouses at their farm in Petoskey. The project will create five new jobs and will allow the company to invest in new technology and ensure Food Safety Modernization Act (FSMA) compliance. The company was launched six years ago and has grown to be a recognized leader in the farming, food, and greater business community; and it is the only farm in their area growing fresh greens 52 weeks a year.
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We are SO excited to be included in the 2019 group of recipients from this Agricultural Investment Fund. The planning stages for this capital expansion project have been 7+ months in the making and the support from the State of Michigan is incredibly good news for our business and our customers. We look forward to sharing more details as construction gets underway this Spring.
]]>Bear Creek Organic Farm is excited to announce that Brian Bates was just named one of Vegetable Growers News' Top 40 Under 40! He may only be 29 years old, but his energy and passion know no age limit and this honor recognizes the tremendous growth BCOF has experienced in its first five years.
The Fruit + Vegetable 40 Under 40 Awards honor 40 outstanding individuals across the nation making their marks in the industry. Brian was honored due to his active community engagement, intense focus on hyper-local sales, and growing Bear Creek Organics from a one person operation with no sales to 7 employees and $400k in sales in under five years!
We are honored by this award, and for those that know Brian’s passion and purpose, this award is hard-earned. He was the ONLY organic farmer on the list and one of the very few that started their own business.
Today is also officially the farm’s 6th birthday! Six years ago we signed the mortgage to make this fallow pasture into the farm of our dreams!
So today, we celebrate the Farm AND the Farmer who at 6 and 29 years old, respectively, are committed to a prosperous and delicious future together. This is just the beginning of our story, and we’re excited for what comes next!
From Ghost Peppers to Strawberries, Sweet Basil to Sungold Tomatoes - if you want the best organic garden in 2017 - start your season at Bear Creek Organic Farm!
Join us for our 3rd Annual Spring Plant Sale on the Farm! Come shop the largest 100% Organic Plant Selection in Northern Michigan with over 20,000 plants available! Our newly expanded greenhouse will be open for shopping for 17 days straight, with over 3300 sq. ft. of organic awesomeness ready to get your garden going!
We have:
Over 40 varieties of tomato, 20 varieties of pepper (including Ghost Peppers!), and over 30 varieties of herbs
1200+ Lavender plants
5000+ Tomato Plants
3000+ Pepper Plants
7000+ Potted Herbs
We will have growing tips, workshops & classes, organic compost for sale, and quantity discounts for large gardens.
Plant Sale Dates & Times as follows:
17 DAYS STRAIGHT!
May 18th - June 3rd
Monday-Thursday 10am-6pm
Fridays 2pm-6pm
Saturdays 9am-6pm
Sundays 10am-4pm
Memorial Day 10am-4pm
**BYOB (Bring Your Own Bucket!) to take home some certified organic compost for your garden! Fill as many 5 gallon buckets as you like for $3 a piece :)
FROM ACORN SQUASH TO ZUCCHINI:
Broccoli
Brussel Sprouts
Cabbage (Red & Green)
Cauliflower (White, Orange, Purple)
Swiss Chard
Lettuce (Romaine, Bibb, Butterhead, Oakleaf)
Spinach
Pickles
Cucumbers
Cantaloupe
Watermelon
Eggplant
Kale (Red & Green Curly, Dinosaur, Red Russian, Siberian)
Pie Pumpkins
Winter Squash (Acorn, Butternut, Delicata, Dumpling, Buttercup)
Summer Squash
Zucchini
Tomatillos
Tomatoes (Cherry, Heirloom, Beefsteak, Grape, Pear, Roma, Paste)
Peppers (Hot, Bell, Sweet, Heirloom, Rare)
Strawberries
Rhubarb
*NEW* ORGANIC FLOWERS:
Zinnias
Perennial Sunflowers
Black-Eyed Susan
Purple Coneflower
Blue Hyssop
Catmint
Germander Upright
Lemon Balm
Chamomile
Wild Bergamot
Lavender
For those of you that have followed us from the beginning, you may know we jumpstarted our farm with a crowd-sourced business loan for $10,000 through Kiva.org. Over 200 individuals contributed to this loan with an average loan of $48. This helped us complete our first hoophouse.
It was a supposed to be a 3-year loan. We paid it off 10 months early. Why? The farm is growing at a rapid rate, and we wanted to show our lenders how much of a boost it provided. In addition, by paying that one off so quickly, we are able to apply for a 2nd loan. And we have! We are 2 days into the 30-day fundraising process and have already raised 20% of the total. Sound interesting?
You can see the full loan here: https://www.kiva.org/lend/1249042
Otherwise, just keep reading for a description of the business development over the last couple of years and what we intend to do with the loan funds!
We decided to start this business to practice what we preach, become good stewards of the environment, and improve our local community. We started our business just about 4 years ago, and it has been one heck of a ride so far! Perhaps we were naive, but we did not realize JUST how much demand existed for local, organic farm goods. We thought we had some good ideas, but we did not realize just how fast we would need to run to keep up. We’re proud to have been profitable for the last 2 years, but our biggest challenge continues to be keeping up with demand.
This is actually our 2nd Kiva loan - we just finished paying off our first loan, in full and 10 months early. That trajectory is reflective of our business growth. The faster we can increase capacity and better serve our customers, the better.
Our future goals center around 2 things - our customers and our community. The better we can serve our customers, the more we can afford to take care of our community. Thanks to our 1st Kiva loan and our greenhouse and hoop houses, we have been harvesting fresh salad greens for 140 weeks straight. Continuously. This is what our customers want and we work tirelessly to make it happen. As our business grows, we are adding monthly farm tours, dozens of gardening and beekeeping workshops, and hiring more local talent.
We are proud to be our town’s first USDA Certified Organic Farm. We are proud to promote good business practices amongst our peers. And we are very proud that we have been able to help energize our community’s burgeoning local food scene.
This loan, in conjunction with other funding, will allow us to increase our greenhouse growing space by 50% (1200 sq. ft.)! It will help us accommodate more farm visitors by tripling our parking area, and improve our receiving area so we can receive truckloads of compost year round, as well as an increasing flow of deliveries by semi. Furthermore, this loan will support an enhanced farmers market presence as we continue to grow to serve our customers.
Estimated expenditures: Greenhouse Expansion (trolley system, benches, fans, labor, etc) - $5000 Parking/Receiving Expansion (7500 sq. ft. gravel lot, labor, landscaping) - $4000 Market Improvements (bigger tent, signage, trailer modifications) - $1000
We expect these investments to increase our business revenue by 25%, with greenhouse revenues almost doubling this season. We continue to see increased demand for our products, with our ability to keep up being our main obstacle. This is a good problem, and a call we plan to answer!
In the last 3 years, our farm has gone from $0 in sales to almost $200,000 on less than 2 acres. We see this greenhouse expansion and increased operational capacity as a way to increase our labor force from a husband/wife team to adding 2 year round employees and another 1-3 seasonal workers. We’ve been growing quickly, but with intention - and we can see the path forward and this loan will help us get there.
]]>Boyne Honey:
This is our 2017 Good Food Award Finalist Honey! Selected as one of the best honeys in the nation, and the only official selection from the state of Michigan, our Boyne Honey is unfiltered, unheated, and never-blended!
Boyne Honey boasts diverse flora from a thousand acre forest preserve, located in the middle of Boyne Country. These bees were invited to this preserve as part of one of the largest native habitat restoration projects in the area. The evolving forest landscape has created a floral buffet ripe for the picking and that diversity is on full display in this honey. Boyne Honey is a dynamic woodland honey, naturally complex and earthy.
Flavor Notes: Oak, Pine, Walnut, Grass, Mint
THIS IS AMERICA: ANNOUNCING THE 2017 GOOD FOOD AWARD FINALISTS
San Francisco, CA (November 14, 2016) – The Good Food Awards could not be more proud to announce the 291 Finalists of 2017, representing not just the best of America’s growing food movement, but the best of America. At a time when the values our country stands for are in question, they exemplify all that is right from coast to coast: our proud immigrant history, stewardship of a rich and fertile agricultural landscape, a spirit of innovation and the daily choice to balance personal gain with the wellbeing of the commons.
Representing 14 categories and 38 states, all Finalists rose to the top in a blind tasting of the 2,059 entries from nearly every state and passed a rigorous vetting to confirm they met specific Good Food Awards standards around environmentally sound agriculture practices, good animal husbandry, sourcing transparency and responsible relationships throughout the supply chain. Amongst their ranks are Nadia Hubbi in California, a Muhammara crafter keeping her Syrian family’s tradition alive; Nacxitl Gaxiola in Brooklyn, whose company was created to honor the traditional salsas, moles, escabechese and adobes of Mexico; Paul Lieggi in Oregon working with the fishermen and women of the Nez Perce, Umatilla, Yakima and Warm Springs tribes to source hoop caught Chinook Salmon for his aromatic hardwood smoked salmon; and Ann and Dan Trudel, a husband and wife farmer and preserver growing and pickling organic brussels sprouts in the heart of rural Ohio. These 291 Finalists - and the hundreds of farmers, ranchers, fishermen and colleagues they collaborate with - are actively building the sort of world we want to live in.
The 200 Good Food Award Winners will be announced Friday, January 20, 2017, at a gala Awards Ceremony at the historic Herbst Theater in the San Francisco War Memorial, on the same stage where the United Nations charter was signed, and will be followed by two more days of celebration. Medals will be bestowed by renowned chef and activist Alice Waters and organics pioneer Nell Newman, tipping their hats to these exceptional food producers. A reception with the winning food and drink will follow the ceremony, offering both regional ‘tasting plates’ and small bites created by local chefs.
What is the Bear Creek Membership Program?
Like a membership to an exclusive farm club - this program is for folks who want access to special offers, discounts on their farm market purchases, and want to support a thriving local farm!
For only $15 you can join the loyalty program. You will immediately get a custom Bear Creek reusable shopping bag (pictured), with which, you gain access to discounts when shopping at the farmers market, on our website, buying in bulk, or pre-ordering.
When shopping with the Bear Creek Bag, you will receive:
10% off of your produce purchases
10% off of potted herb and cut flower purchases
Buy 3 jars of honey and receive a 4th one free (a savings of 25%)!
10% off spring transplants for your garden
Special wholesale pricing on all bulk orders
**NEW** A special 10% coupon code to use for all online orders
There is no limit to these savings.
Additionally, by becoming a Bear Creek member, you will join our members-only email list and be the first to know about bulk veggie availability (tomatoes, basil, kale, etc).
All this for only 15 bucks?! It's true.
Shipping is only if you would like the bag shipped to you pronto! Otherwise, select "on-farm pickup" and we will get it to you at a time that is mutually convenient!
Link to Sign up here: http://bearcreekorganicfarm.com/products/bear-creek-membership-program-sign-up
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We at Bear Creek Organic Farm are deeply humbled and sincerely grateful to receive this honor! There are many businesses, farmers, and food advocates doing excellent work in northern Michigan on the local foods front and we are thrilled people thought our efforts over the last couple years worthy of this honor. From the bottom of our hearts, THANK YOU everyone for the continued support and passion for healthy, local, organic food!
A few words from the Conference about Bear Creek Organic Farm by community members who nominated Anne & Brian for this award:
"Anne and Brian have transformed what it means to be a local farmer. Not only have they built a sustainable and growing business model, but they do so with full transparency which gives people a reason to trust and know their farmer. They are models in the farming and business community. They are leading by example that farmers can earn a living wage."
"They give back to the community with their knowledge and with their produce. Held classes for children at their farm to help connect kids with their food, taught workshops on bees to help inform people of bee's important role, provided our town with the highest quality produce and honey, shared their financial records and business model to help others build a successful business, and taught art classes to the community. Not only do these two take time to mentor children with farm focused activities, they also coach basketball and teach art, keeping a strong presence in the community."
"They have brought hope. A hope that instills faith that there is still passion to spread the love of watching life's force grow with delicious food and healthy people."
For a full description of the event, Local Food Hero Award, and interview with Anne & Brian in the local newspaper please click here.
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But we didn't stop there! For all orders over $75, we will ship your order for FREE. Zero. Zilch. Nada. Honey lovers and Bear Creek Fans across the country can get the Bear Creek products they know and love, and pay nothing for shipping on $75+ orders.
We ship hundreds of orders a year, and when we listen to our customers, it is clear that no one (ourselves included) wants to pay shipping. This is no small challenge for a small business like ours, but we are willing to take it on and work our tails off to make sure that you get what you want, when you want, and not have to worry about shipping.
After all, the bees have already flown millions of miles to harvest nectar to make our precious honey, so free shipping for the last couple hundred miles of the journey is the least we could do! If you notice any quirks while trying to place an order, please alert us so we can fix any bugs that may be hiding behind the scenes.
It has taken hours of number-crunching, and multitudes of box designs, but we are confident that this labor will allow us to better serve you and eliminate any hurdles separating you from your Bear Creek Honey!
**And if you need to ship to multiple destinations for gift boxes and the like, please note that our shipping prices are designed for one delivery address only. If you would like to place a large, multi-destination order ($500+), please don't hesitate to contact us and we can generate a shipping quote that will be very competitive.
]]>We are honored to be featured in the August issue of Growing for Market!!
Four pages laying out exactly how we've managed the whirlwind of the last two years to get to where we are today! To make a long story short - hard work, debt, passion, and running this farm like a business startup. We like to think of ourselves as agripreneurs, and though we've got a long ways to go, it's amazing to be making a living, a profit, and making our wildest dreams come true!
Here's to living the dream!
This is a snapshot of the first page, a free link to the full article will be posted in September!
After back-to-back winters of devastating hive losses, Anne & Brian Bates of Bear Creek Organic Farm decided the time was right to step up their casual on-farm research, and apply for a USDA-funded, on-farm research project.
Through a research grant from USDA - SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research & Education), Bear Creek Organic Farm will receive $10,752 to explore their project - "Exploring Shelter-Based Options for Over-wintering Honeybee Colonies in Northern Climates to Reduce Winter Loss."
One of four separate honeybee-research grants approved in four different states across the Midwest, Bear Creek's project intends to test the opportunities present in utilizing existing farm structures as potential enclosures to increase the chances of honeybee colony survival through the long, harsh, winters found in North Central United States.
In partnership with fellow farmer and beekeeper Jonathan Scheel of Scheel Family Farm (Petoskey, MI), the joint-farm research project will evaluate the cost, success, and management considerations (labor, equipment, scalability) for each of five different shelter options with a two-part control.
The shelters were selected based on likelihood of on farm availability and degree of protection. To derive meaningful results and account for hive variability, four colonies will be placed in each of the five shelters. The five shelters include: 1) straw-bale enclosure, 2) calf hutch, 3) unheated hoophouse, 4) standard shed, and 5) an unheated pole barn. The two-part control consists of four hives with no protection whatsoever, as well as four hives wrapped as one unit in a roofing paper-style pallet wrap – the most commonly suggested over wintering technique.
Each shelter option plus control will have wireless data-loggers embedded within the hive that will record the temperature and humidity inside the hives every hour from November through April. These data-sets will be analyzed in conjunction with an on-farm weather station recording the same environmental data (plus wind speed, direction, and precipitation) to compare how hives in different shelters respond to harsh-winter weather conditions.
This project acknowledges the tremendous importance of managed honeybee colonies as part of our agricultural system and aims to provide concrete data and accessible conclusions to be shared with beekeepers of all sizes interested in ecologically sound, ethical opportunities to achieve and/or enhance profitability.
According to Bates, "after we lost 60% of our colonies in 2012-13 and 90% in 2013-14 – customers and beekeepers began asking us the same questions we were asking ourselves – isn’t there somewhere we could put the hives that would protect them from the elements? We were not content losing this many bees. Not for our business, and certainly not for the bees!"
Bates was especially intrigued following a conversation with friend and beekeeper, Jonathan Scheel - "he put three of his hives inside his hoophouse last fall and while they seemed weaker than some of our outdoor colonies in the fall, all three survived. Was this dumb luck? Or is there a significant opportunity here? Those are the questions we need to answer."
While the data-recording does not formally commence until Fall 2015, Scheel and Bates are starting 28 new hives this May to be able to use for research over the winter. "This is only the beginning" says Bates, who also has plans to construct a 1,200 sq. feet "Honeybee Hotel" this summer to test indoor overwintering with his regular hives.
Following the the findings of this research project, there are plans to host a Northern Beekeeping Strategies Summit in late summer 2016 featuring speakers and beekeepers for an on-farm field day at Bear Creek Organic Farm, in Petoskey, Michigan.
Brian Bates shows a successfully over-wintered hive to members of the Little Traverse Bay Beekeepers Guild.
Bates does't know whether the work will ever be "done," but the goal of this research, "is to focus on the majority of beekeepers, those who keep their bees locally, maintain small to medium apiaries, and are therefore faced with the long, harsh winters typical of our region. If we can mitigate this problem with some ingenuity and existing infrastructure, then we can boost winter survival, reduce operating costs, increase business viability, and demonstrate a model of beekeeping that does not depend as heavily on massive transportation costs, and southern bee factory farms.
Approximately 95% of all beekeepers maintain fewer than 25 hives, with many managing only a couple hives - this research project is for those beekeepers. Beekeepers with 10,000 to 80,000 hives don't need to over-winter hives up north, they can afford to load them on semi-trucks and take them south for the winter. We want to bring the research home for the majority of beekeepers in an accessible, low-cost, and innovative fashion. That's our goal."
For more information on Bear Creek Organic Farm, their bees, and their research, visit www.bearcreekorganicfarm.com and follow them on Facebook by clicking here.
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This hands-on marketing workshop will help fellow farmers and food producers get acquainted with Facebook, kickstart their social media marketing, and take their Facebook page to the next level.
Bear Creek Organic Farm is excited to partner with Cyndi Kramer - market master of the Harbor Springs Farmers Market - to offer this two-hour workshop on how Facebook and other social media platforms can drastically increase brand visibility, market outreach, and expand a farm's customer base. Farmers live interesting lives, and Facebook offers a great platform for producers to share their story, update customers on their progress and products, and offer a glimpse into the behind-the-scenes reality of what it takes to produce all of the awesomeness that is local food in northern Michigan!
The workshop is limited to 15 participants, and attendees will leave with an understanding on how best to maximize their social media efforts across various platforms, along with some strategies unique to their brand and business structure.
Whether you want to improve your current social media efforts, or have not yet taken the plunge to get your farm or food business on Facebook, this workshop is for you! Instructors Anne & Cyndi have years of social media marketing experience and have dramatically increased their farm and farm market visibility through the use of Facebook, Instagram, and other social media outlets.
Instructors: Anne Morningstar (Bear Creek Organic Farm) & Cyndi Kramer (Harbor Springs Farmers Market)
Date: Saturday, March 7, at 3:00 - 5:00pm
Location: Bear Creek Organic Farm
Click HERE to register for the workshop!
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Here's an excerpt from the Petoskey News-Review that ran in Friday's edition (1/23/15) celebrating and sharing our continued winter greens harvest! Hooray for kale production 52 weeks of the year!
From the News-Review:
"During the summer there is no shortage of abundant fresh fruits and vegetables.
This doesn’t have to change during the winter.
Not only do the kinds of produce people purchase change in the winter, growers change their techniques as well.
“The trick for winter growing is planting in the fall,” said Brian Bates co-owner of Bear Creek Organic Farm in Petoskey. “Winter harvest depending on the crop, is planted in mid August to mid September to guarantee something through the winter.”
In the winter the most inherent challenge is the amount of light, Bates said. Something that normally takes 40 days to grow could take 120 days. Once plants receive only 10 hours of daylight Bates said it becomes more about keeping them alive.
Buildings such as a hoop houses assist farmers in growing during brutal Michigan winters. A hoop house is a structure made of a series of large metal or wooden hoops covered with a layer of heavy greenhouse fabric. The hoop house keeps plants warm by being heated by the sun.
“It’s about 14 or 15 degrees outside today, it’s 75 degrees in here (in the hoop house),” he said. “There is no heat source in here. On a sunny day the sun warms up the house. On a cloudy day it doesn’t get nearly as warm but protects from the wind.”
Bates said they have kale, chard, spinach and arugula planted in the structure. He added that winter is a great time for an organic grower because insects and weeds are non-issues.
“It’s an interesting reality,” he said. “What you do have are rabbits, mice and voles. They can run rampant. I know if you plant root crops like radishes and carrots they love it. They don’t seem to be as interested in the kale.”
Winter planting is about trying to capture as much heat as possible, Bates said.
“The most important thing is average temperature over 24 hours. How cold it gets at night, isn’t so bad if it’s getting to 70 degrees (in the hoop house) during the day. This is really critical. Inside the hoop house we have many little hoop houses. They’re about 18 inches off the ground and are made of fiber glass or wire hoops. Which make little tunnels over each bed inside the hoop house.”
There is a special fabric that’s breathable pulled over each row. On a sunny day they pull it back and right as it starts to cool off, they cover the plants again.
“That’s really key, to prevent moisture, which can spread disease,” he said."
Sunny day, fabric rolled back, 75 degrees inside! Notice snow buildup on sidewalls.
Starting to cool off in the afternoon, low tunnels covered for the night.
Starting June 13, we will be attending the Downtown Petoskey Farmers Market every Friday from 8:30 - 1:00.
We'll be at the Downtown Boyne City Farmers Market every Saturday from 9:00 - 1:00.
We will also be attending the Harbor Springs Farmers Market every Wednesday from 9:00 - 1:00.
In addition to these regular markets, we love sharing our farm and apiary with folks -- this summer we will be open to visits arranged by appointment.
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