You Are What You Eat—Be a Local

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Well folks, I finally bought the farm:

Land: 60 acres
Water: 35 million gallons, flood irrigation
Climate: 115 – 135 frost-free days

Who feeds you? What if you could get all of your food from people you know? You would know your food was grown right. Your money would stay local and come back around to you. You might have some food security come apocalypse time…

Taos County is big on local food. Our farmer’s market is the 3rd largest in the state.  Many restaurants make a point of sourcing local ingredients. There are thriving CSAs, growers’ cooperatives, and value-added producers.  Yet, nearly all of us still go to the grocery store for the majority of our calories. We survive on food from afar.

Our goal at Costilla Farm is to grow our own food—all of it.  Cereal grains, beans and peas, meat, eggs, dairy, maybe some fruits and nuts, whatever survives in this cold, dry, windy valley. There are plenty of excellent fresh vegetables available locally, so we’ll leave those to the experts (see Cerro Vista Farm).

I may be a fool to think we can do this, but it has been done here before. Not long ago this place was totally self-reliant. I know we won’t get rich farming in the high desert. One thing is for sure: we will get educated.

If we prove to be even slightly competent, we should end up with some extra food. That’s where you come in. If you live nearby, you will be able to get this well-rounded-100%-local diet. Just click the get fed button below and we’ll keep you in the loop. First come…first fed.

Get fed

Summer campers from Sangre de Cristo Youth Ranch jump with joy at the first flood flow on Costilla Farm

Elementary Students = Students In Their Element

When Ms. Annalise said she wanted to take her second graders backpacking I said, “Our backpacks are bigger than your backpackers.”  But doing the impossible is nothing new for the Kindergarten through 2nd graders at Roots & Wings Community School. It’s rare for even high school students to go into the wilderness overnight, even at the most ambitious and exclusive private schools.  And here we are at this little public school camping out for three days in the mountains with five-year-olds.

2nd Graders head back to civilization

It’s a credit to the teachers that—in a state where the Governor is bent on shutting down all but the largest and most average schools—RWCS continues to get as far out there as a public school can be. Take Mr. VanEvery’s first trip with Localogy as an example.  His 3rd – 5th graders were studying food systems. In a planning meeting, he told me not to shop for Wednesday dinner because we were going to harvest it from the mountain! Pit roasted goat and prickly pear cactus never tasted so good.

The Roots & Wings mission is to engage the head, hands and heart   ̶  enabling students to achieve more than they think possible and to take an active role in our ever-changing world. Students who spend their days in tidy rows of desks will find themselves woefully unprepared in the real world. The world is a dynamic place, and so too must be our schools!

A 4th grader growing a brain

Rewilding the Way

Todd Wynward and Tyler Eshleman led the first Rewilding the Way Wilderness Trek in 2016. The expedition gave adult participants an opportunity to step into the wilderness for a time of reflection, space from dominant culture, spiritual formation, and renewal of vision and energy for a lifetime of climate and justice advocacy.

Todd Wynward (Localogy Board Prez / Author of Rewilding the Way: Break free to follow an untamed God) and Tyler Eshleman (Tilt Program Coordinator) and some wild-ones have been to the mountain top.

Rewilding included backpacking deep in the Sangre de Cristo Mountains and rafting down the Rio Grande—grappling with the complexity of water in a place where water is so precious, yet is also squandered and polluted. The challenges participants faced on the trip afforded them a deeper understanding of the ways in which they engage with, and learn from, their own environment.

The Rio Grande, the Sangre de Cristo Mountains, and the people of this watershed have much to teach. The trek empowered those who participated to not only learn and become attentive, but to return to their own communities and act with a "rewilded" spirit.

GET WILD