What's New at Green Heron Tools

Three months, hours of planting, four batches of garlic scape pesto & several blogs’ worth of news since last we wrote. It’s 6:30 a.m. on a gorgeous morning of what promises to be a sweltering day. The chicks we brought home 6 weeks ago are adolescents, fast outgrowing the dog crate they’ve been living in. We’re already on the second iteration of their outdoor tractor, adding a second story to accommodate a roost (all 6 crowded onto the roost in their dog crate is quite a sight Despite all being “pullets,” one has already experienced a voice change & managed to croak out a semblance of a morning crow . . . (uh oh. . . oh no!) We’re hoping none of his flock-mates follows suit.

Meanwhile, we’ve been making great progress at Green Heron Tools. The shovel we’ve been working on for almost a year is nearly ready for manufacturing, and we hope to have it available sometime this fall. Designed explicitly for women, it will capitalize on women’s lower-body strength, offer a number of features to promote easier digging, be made to last, & come in three sizes to best fit your body. Perhaps most importantly, it incorporates what women from throughout the U.S. have told us about shovels and seeks to remedy commonly cited problems (too heavy! too long! too hard to get into the ground!)

Would you like to be among the first to have one of your own? And, better yet, have one for free? Then help us name it! That’s right: We’re looking for an appropriate, catchy name for our new shovel. If you have an idea, email it, along with your name and contact information, to greenheroncustomerservice@gmail.com. Please put “shovel contest” in the subject line. If we choose your name as our favorite, & are able to trademark it (meaning no one else has already used it), you’ll win a brand new Green Heron Tools (fill in the name) shovel for women! (The GroundBreaker, the best name we’ve come up with so far, courtesy of Ann’s daughter, was already taken

In other fabulous news, we recently learned that our second grant proposal to USDA’s Small Business Innovation Research grants program has been approved! This grant will allow us to design a safer, easer-to-use alternative to the traditional full-size walk-behind rototiller. The project will start this fall, and we extend our heartfelt thanks to all the women’s agricultural organizations, sustainable ag organizations, public health folks, researchers & individual farmers, market growers & gardeners who supported our request. We’ll do our best to make you proud.

Finally, our first-ever catalog is now at the printers. If you’d like one, or know someone who would, please send an email with “Catalog request” in the subject line to greenheroncustomerservice@gmail.com.

Wishing everyone a great summer (during which we will again try really hard to write more often!!) & freedom from late blight!

Hoeing weeds between raised beds

Weirdly warm weather has given us a head start on spring chores, but an even bigger boost has come from one of the “perks” of being in the tools business: We finally own some good tools! If only we’d had them a few years ago, at the peak of our market growing . . . Instead, we had lousy tools. And a wheel hoe like the one I’m using here wasn’t even in our consciousnesses. Most of our weeding was done while sitting, squatting (or, I’m embarrassed to admit, bending over at the waist, one of the very worst / least healthy postures in all the land), pulling the weeds by hand. At some point in the season, the weeds inevitably won. And — good news and bad news both, related to the weeds and not — we couldn’t grow enough of our heirloom produce and greens to satisfy the demand.

Today, Green Heron Tools takes enough of our time that we no longer do markets, though we still grow plenty — for Ann’s son’s restaurant, for the 4 Fs (friends, family, freezer, fresh eating). And scarcely a day goes by when we don’t fantasize about how much we COULD grow, now that we have better tools. (Especially after one of us uses the wheel hoe.)

Meanwhile, the economy continues to suffer; food prices are up; and many people (ourselves included) are reluctant to spend more money than absolutely necessary. Is this any time to be growing a business that sells high-quality tools? Which is to say, tools that are not cheap?

I sure hope so.

Quality tools work better and last longer, which makes them a better investment than cheaper tools. Moreover, most tools on the market are a poor fit for most women. Ill-fitting tools and equipment take a toll measured less in dollars than in aches and pains, frustration, wasted time. And doing without — like we did for years — incurs a cost of its own. The dance of life is a continual (re-)balancing act; only we know when we can’t afford to buy something, when we can’t afford not to, and when either choice is OK. . .  At least that’s what I was thinking about this morning as I put down the newspaper and went outside to get some fresh air, clear my head, and wheel-hoe a few weeds.

– Liz

Leo & Gertrude size each other up

Our booth at PASA

It is hard to believe that it is the end of February! What a great month it has been even if the weather was brutally cold and the snowfall remarkably above average. Our Phase II grant to develop a female friendly tiller was submitted on time and sent along to the USDA with some positive energy. The final report for Phase I is not quite done, but we actually achieved more than we promised the Department of Agriculture. We (Liz, my daughter Chris and I) attended the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture conference at Penn State University on Feb. 4-6 in State College. It was the first time we presented our products to farmers and the response really was more than we could have expected. This conference is always so full of positive and hopeful participants that one feels better just being there. So many people stopped to talk to us and discussed tools. We also had a chance to share our philosophy and explain the tools we chose to offer on the website. People were just great….some even suggested tools that are needed but not available for growing on small farms. We are considering developing two that were suggested. We were only able to attend a couple workshops as we were kept busy so much of the time. PASA workshops are really top notch and one can learn so much, but the networking, just talking with other growers, is enriching and every year we come back with new (or old) ways of doing things.

We have looked at all of our seed catalogs and have chosen new heirloom varieties to try this year. After the devastating year we had last year with the late blight and the multitude of fungi we are so looking forward to this growing season. And although the snow is still over a foot deep on the beds I am envisioning putting in the peas, lettuce etc around the 15th of March.

Our three chickens have finally decided to start laying and we are getting three eggs a day now. What other pet has a gift for you every morning? This is our second group of chickens as we got our first two in Oct. 08. Sophie and Gertrude were such good pets and layers. They would follow us wherever we went. They rode on the wheelbarrow and even climbed on the garden tractor. They would come up on the deck and look in the patio door window at the cats. They really kept the cats entertained as well as us. In Oct. 09 I went out to clean up some of the plots and I thought how quiet it was, but the girls never did wander very far so I wasn’t concerned. I called for them several times but they did not run over looking for the tortillas I usually took them. I started to search and since there had been reports of 2 dogs attacking chickens in the area I started to feel very anxious. Then I found the feathers, only feathers left of my little friends. It had to be a hawk as only feathers were left and we live near Hawk Mountain, so named because it is on a major migration route for hawks and other raptors. My heart was a bit broken, even though I knew that there were risks to having free-range chickens. They really gave me a lot of joy and asked little in return, just water, food and their special organic tortillas. I do understand that this is the way nature works and I do accept that as there is no other choice, but that will never mean I will get used to those losses or that I will not grieve each time it happens. We bought three more chickens later that month and named them Blanche, she lighter in color than the other two, Rosy, she is much redder than the others, and Hilda because we thought she looked like a Hilda. Don’t know these girls as well as the other two, as it is cold out and we are keeping them in the fenced run till spring and we can keep an eye on them.

There is so much to learn about life and nature when you grow and raise animals. It is quite humbling to realize how little control you really have over things, like the weather, which for farmers and growers determines how well they will live for the next year. Maybe the lesson is to realize what you do have control over and what you don’t have control over and to accept what you cannot control and excercise your perogative to the best of your ability. The hard part is accepting what we have no power over, but it feels more peaceful when we finally do.         — Ann

Hi and apologies for not staying up with updating our blog. We are staying busy finishing up with our Phase I USDA grant, which allowed us to develop a hybrid spade/shovel and a push/pull hoe. We are still testing both tools in the lab but have to wait for a warming trend so we can have more women farmers try them so that we can make any changes for the final design. It has been such a rewarding process. We could not have found a better team anywhere. It has been a pleasure to work with Aaron, Andy, Angie and Jesun. We want to officially thank them for their commitment to the project. We also want to thank the women farmers (Erin, Patti, Linda, Chris) who volunteered to test the prototypes. It was a commitment of 3-4 hours of shoveling, yes three to four hours. Yikes! Happily, we had no injuries but for some tired backs and legs. Also want to thank the PA WAgN members who tested at a field day at Red Cat Farm in Lehigh County. We received great input from the 15 participants.

Now it’s time to apply for Phase II of the USDA grant, which would allow us to design a tool to do the work of a tiller. We are hoping for something a bit different than what is out there, so that women will have something they can use safely and effectively. The USDA wants to see letters from women farmers and market growers who would use this new tool, so we are asking anyone who is interested in a better tiller to send us a letter of support so we can include it with our grant application. You could just say that you support the development of the new tiller, why you do and even if you would be willing to test it for us. We would be so grateful for your support and letter. If you’re willing to write something, please send it to us at Green Heron Tools, P.O. Box 71, New Tripoli, PA 18066 or email us at info@greenherontools.com.

Gee, the grant is due Feb 1 and our final report for Phase I is due 15 days later, and we are going to the PASA Conference in early Feb. and the seed catalogs are here. Thank goodness!! Something beautiful to take our minds off what seems like an impossible schedule. Have already found several new heirloom tomatoes and cucumbers. It reminds me that this weather (high in the 20s with wind chills in the teens) will not last forever.

Volunteer farmer Erin McKinney testing prototype

Although we promised to write more often, our good intentions have been overtaken by all the exciting work associated with our USDA-funded tool design project and with getting our e-commerce site ready for a grand opening in a few short weeks. We’re so grateful to all the women who’ve helped by recommending tools and other products appropriate for women farmers, market growers, gardeners and others whose livelihoods or passions involve working on the land. We’re also incredibly grateful to our product testers — those who’ve helped already and those who’ve emailed to say they’d like to help in the future. Thanks to them, we’ll be able to start out offering approximately 40 products in 8 categories — all tested and/or evaluated by women. Also thanks to them, we will NOT be offering a number of products that disappointed — didn’t work, didn’t hold up, or otherwise didn’t meet our standards.

As part of the celebration of our grand opening — and just in time for Christmas shopping — we’ll be featuring baskets (actually hods, perfect for harvesting) containing a sampling of our products. Cost for the items in the hod will be lower than if purchased separately; we hope it will be a great way to introduce our products to you.

As for the USDA grant . . . the first prototypes are ready to be tested. Much more on this later! Meanwhile, be sure to check back late this month or in early November to visit our brand new e-commerce site.