Dan's Introduction

Let's get to know each other a little better.
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Danoost
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Hi.

My name is Dan, I’m forty years old, and I’m one of the instructors in this course.

I farm a thirty-five-acre chunk of land in the Fraser Valley of BC. Twenty-five acres makes up an intensive, no-till market garden where we grow vegetables, fruits, herbs, nuts, and flowers. The remaining land is grazed by a couple Highland cows and just over a dozen alpacas. Seventy-five hogs are raised yearly on our farm. Most of our produce is sold to restaurants and at the farmgate in our market.

I’m married and have five children most of whom are involved in some aspect of our farm business which began in 2013. We have around ten full-time, hardworking employees.

You might be surprised that I also have a large home garden on the same property as our farm. I’ve always enjoyed gardening and I’ve taken up home gardening in recent years so that I can beautify my homeplace and relate to the challenges and opportunities home gardeners and balcony growers experience. It helps me keep this course real and personal.

The topic that I’m most passionate about besides gardening is food-security. I believe that most regions of the world can feed themselves using their own land, natural resources, local labor force and the sun as their primary energy source. I envision this future for my community, and I believe it can be a reality in yours.

Gaining food security to build human health and true wealth in communities takes hard work and is the primary responsibility of households. Families and small plot landowners will be the driving force as we work to revolutionize food, gain autonomy, heal the planet, build economic prosperity, and free ourselves from the yoke of the centralized, industrial food system.

This course allows me to channel my energy and expand my circle of influence to regions outside of my city. I hope to see the day when the food-producing landscape is populated with gardeners of all sizes, farming their own plot of land using human-scaled tools to produce food for their families and neighbors. I’m thankful you’re joining our gardening community to help us shape this future.

I’m going to work tirelessly to build a course that will empower you to maximize your production on the parcel of land, regardless its size, that’s been entrusted to you.

Enjoy the course.

Dan
TomF
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Hello Dan. My wife found out about your course through a co worker who has taken it. She got it for my birthday recently so I am psyched to learn more from a local. I started a garden two years ago after pulling a giant Rhododendron from our front yard that got decent sun. I can't eat the rhododendron . Once my wife recovered from the shock when she got home, she embraced the idea of the Garden and enjoys the fruits of our labor.

I have been learning a lot over the last few years via Youtube University and have focused on No Till growers, Charles Dowding, Huw Richards, Richard Perkins for smaller scale market or home garden and many other larger agriculture based regenerative ag leaders. My soil is coming around following no till practices but still have a lot to learn on succession planting and the best calendar to work with so with local guidance for the best relevance, I am ready to bite off some more in my garden. So far after getting my feet wet last couple of years, I think I now know what I don't know. I was watching a No Till Growers webinar over the Christmas Holidays and mentioned to my wife that there was a farmer from the Fraser Valley in it. She came over to watch and said, "Hey that's Farmer Dan! He is doing the course I gifted to you!"

I have just finished SoilFoodWebs foundation course and have the Certified Lab Tech program next. So getting more book smart without enough practical experience yet so looking forward to local mentorship and growing my grow space and tackling more stages, like doing my own starts for succession planting, with a bit more confidence.
Danoost
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Thanks for this, Tom. You're in a unique position knowing as much as you do about the soil food web. Do you have a microscope? I'm looking forward to your contributions to the course. Best!
Alicia
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Up until a few years ago we lived right down the road from The Local Harvest. I remember the early days of your kids selling veggies out of a small stand by the road! Thank you Dan for your commitment to food security in the community and beyond. I'm so thankful I can learn from you even though we are no longer in Chilliwack.
Danoost
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Thanks, Alicia.

It was nine years ago when we began selling out a roadside stand. Didn't know that the journey to get here would be so bumpy. But here we are almost a decade later still growing food. Couldn't have done it without the support of our staff and family and the incredible support from community.
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