Schultz Valley Farms

My husband, children, and I farm and operate around 200 acres with my husband's parents in the Bremen area.Our family believes in producing farm fresh quality products for consumers in the local community. We believe it is important for consumers to know where their food comes from as well as educating consumers about the important role that agriculture plays in the community. One of our primary goals on the farm is to improve our farming technique to make us more efficient in what we are raising. In maintaining these goals we look at ways to increase yields, improve time management, and ways to maintain the land around us. In continually improving our methods, we are constantly educating ourselves in new practices in farming. Some of our current practices include intensive grazing of our cattle, spring developments, crop rotation, strip cropping, drip irrigation and cover crop management. It is important for us to live off the land and be self-sufficient from the crops and animals that we raise. As being young farmers it is important for us to work towards providing sustainable agriculture to the community. As our operation continues, we believe it is important to become more efficient in what we are doing not only to save us time but help preserve and maintain the environment around us. Our farm continues to work and improve on conservation practices to help maintain a positive relationship with the farming operation, wildlife, and land around us. On our farm we produce beef, eggs, hay, grains and produce. Our produce production has increased over the years and we grow between 50 to 100 types of fruits, vegetables, herbs and flowers to consumer. Within the 50 to100 types of fruits, vegetables, herbs, and flowers, we will carry many varieties for consumers to choose from. For example, we will have 75 to 100 varieties of tomatoes, 15 to 20 types of peppers, 5 to 7 types of potatoes, a variety of melons and squash as well as many other vegetables and fruits. In our garden, we try to incorporate the most efficient way of using space to maximize yields so each year we continue to improve on our growing practices. We have also added a hoop house to increase production which has allowed us to provide produce to consumers about month or so sooner. We also try to produce as natural of a product to consumers as possible. In doing so we do as much hand weeding as possible, apply natural fertilizer and compost from the barnyard, and hand pick as many bugs as possible. However, sometimes these practices don't eliminate the problems and we have to use other sources to save a crop in which we try to find the most organic and safest way of eliminating the problem. For it is important to us that all our produce is of good quality, has great taste, and most important safe to eat.