Guldan Family Farm

Today I'm talking with Tim at Guldan Family Farm. You can follow on Facebook as well.

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00:00
Did you know that muck boots all started with a universal problem? Muck? And did you know that it's their 25th anniversary this year?  Neither did I. But I do know that when you buy boots that don't last, it's really frustrating to have to replace them every couple of months.  So check out muck boots. The link is in the show notes. The very first thing that got hung in my beautiful kitchen when we moved in here four and a half years ago was a calendars.com  Lang calendar.

00:26
because I need something familiar in my new house. My mom loves them. We love them. Go check them out. The link is in the show notes. You're listening to A Tiny Homestead, the podcast comprised entirely of conversations with homesteaders, cottage food producers, and crafters and topics adjacent. I'm your host, Mary Lewis.  A Tiny Homestead podcast is sponsored by Homegrown Collective, a free to use farm to table platform, emphasizing local connections with ability to sell online, buy, sell, trade in local garden groups, and help us grow a new food system.

00:56
You can find them at homegrowncollective.org. If you're enjoying this podcast, please like, subscribe, share it with a friend, or leave a comment. Thank you. Today I'm talking with Tim at I think it's Guldan Family Farm, but I could be pronouncing it wrong, and he's in Newall, Minnesota. Good afternoon, Tim. How are you?  Good afternoon. It's pretty close. We say golden like the golden color, but you know what? We don't know for sure. So as long as it's close to the term, hey you, I answer to it. And it's too and well.

01:23
Yeah, you must be a dad. You must get hey you.  I've been a hey you for a long time.  Between there was a day at the farmers market a few years ago my wife was actually saying  Tim, Tim and then it went to Mr. Golden, Mr. Golden because I was a teacher at the time and then finally she said hey you and I noticed and turned around and I said what do you need? It was a it's a joke that doesn't die anymore.

01:45
Oh, I know.  mean, I've had four kids and if they can't get my attention, they're like, hey, and if that doesn't work, say, hey, you. And I turn around and like, why are you being rude?  So yeah.  I always ask about the weather  at the beginning of the episodes, but I don't really need to ask because you're in New Ulm, which is not far from me. And Minnesota is having the first most glorious spring day we've had since last spring.

02:12
It is looking finally like it's here. We had a couple of tease days earlier on, but yeah, today I'm sitting at a beautiful 77 and sunny on a nice calm,  maybe two mile an hour breeze day. So I have no complaints in my end.  My husband's been outside almost all day and he just put out the open  farm fresh eggs farm stand farm stand signs about half an hour ago. Oh, Yep.

02:38
We're very excited. This is the earliest we've had the farm stand open and we've had the farm stand for this is the third year. So this is great. We have we have bedding plants for sale this year.  And  this is probably the first year since we moved here four and a half years ago that we're going to have asparagus for sale before the farmers market opens. Very nice.  Always a happy good day when you have asparagus.  Oh my God. This is

03:07
This is the summer we have been waiting for. moved here in August of 2020. And with grand plans to have a farm to market garden and do all the things. And what we didn't take into account is that when you start from scratch, you have to build infrastructure. So that's what the last three years have been spent on. Yeah, there's that minor detail.  So this is the summer that we have been.

03:33
working toward for three and a half years. We're so excited. Okay, so this podcast is not about me, but I just had to get that out or a joke on it. Tell me about yourself and what you guys do at your farm. Well, my name is Tim Golden and I'm, we, I am now the proud owner operator of Golden Family Farm. I'm actually the second generation running the vegetable version of this farm. Although the farm itself, excuse me, has been the family since the Homestead Act one way or another.

04:02
And so we're pushing close to 170 years in the family.  And as it sits now, I'm operating 25 acres of fruits and vegetables.  Very nice.  Do you have the,  I don't know what it's called. It's a thing they give you when you buy a home that lists the original plot and who signed the paperwork for it. Do you have that for your place?  I have, I believe it's.

04:28
I don't know if you'd say it's original, if it's reproduction, but it is a certificate, you know, that has the President of the time, President Buchanan's signature on it, dedicating this, you know, the portion to the owner at the time, which would have been a, I believe it was a Joseph Reinhart was his name. So it's kind of cool. We've got that hanging in the hallway. Nice. Yeah. Our thingy, whatever it's called, there's a specific name for it, but I can't think of it right now. President Lincoln was the one who signed ours.

04:59
Oh, nice. Yeah, I was reading back through it I was like,  honey, did you see this? And it was the very first owner. And I showed it to my husband and he was like, as in President Abraham Lincoln, I said, Yep.  My parents found the certificate  actually buried in the wall of the original house that was here. They had hoped to salvage it, but it was beyond, beyond  repair.

05:26
And so they were trying to find things out. found all sorts of weird knickknacks in the walls and whatnot. And  that was one of the specialty items. Yeah, it's I love history and knowing that President Lincoln was the one that signed that piece paper is really cool to me. So I'm always thrilled when people know the history of their property.  OK, so so what  I don't even have to ask the question correctly.

05:53
Are you having the farm support the farm or do you have a job outside of the farm? The farm supports the farm. However, I do have another job in my off season that works out enough that I need something to do, of course,  actually.  I for quite a few years, I juggled.  I was also a full time teacher  and tried to do this at the same time. So the months of September, October, and obviously, you know, April and May were just the end of me. I could not continue doing that.

06:22
And so finally had things squared away enough that I made the plunge, put it all on the farm end with just thoughts of, you know, getting my CDL and driving school bus in the off season like my dad did. Well, as it turned out, they ended up having some full-time seasonal work where they could use help in the shop. And so it works out really nicely right now. I have a sort of an open end agreement that when the farm season winds down, I just sort of pick up working full-time in the shop, working on maintenance on school buses.

06:48
And when the farm ramps up, I just sort of casually start disappearing from the shop to go back and focus on the farm again.  Well, that's good work if you can get it. It  works well.  So what do you grow at the farm?  Oh, gosh, that is the money question.  As it sits, I'm at about 50 different crops with about 150 different varieties within that.  So as we see everything from asparagus to zucchini. Oh, from A to Z, yeah. Yep.

07:15
Okay. Like fennel. mean, I'm not growing fennel. Sorry. No.  Well, we grow fennel. we'll get that covered.  Apparently people love it for the base of the plant for stir fries. Stir. I didn't know this because fennel tastes like licorice to me. So I don't really eat it. I'm the same way.

07:38
Oh, in the background, my dog is losing her mind because we put the open sign for the farm stand out today and I think somebody just pulled in and she is a very good watchdog. So for anybody listening, that would be Maggie, the mascot of a tiny homestead. Well, that's a positive.  Our  quote unquote guard dog is the worst one on planet earth. If you show up in any random vehicle and he sees you, Boomer will just simply smile and say, hi, welcome, make yourself at home. And that's about the extent of it.

08:07
Well, you don't have a watch dog. You have a welcome dog. Exactly. Yeah, we specifically wanted a watch dog for our place and we got her at a day shy of eight weeks old. She discovered her bark at about six months old and she has never lost it again.  Fair enough. So and that's okay. It's not too bad on the recording. So it's fine. She's doing her job. I appreciate her very much.

08:34
Yeah, exactly. There's always weird noises when I talk to people on the podcast because everybody has a farm or a homestead. So they have dogs or they have donkeys or they have cows. You never know what you're going to hear. So who do you sell your produce to? Do you send it out to a broker or do you sell it at farmers markets or what do you do? We are still the main outlet for it. So we go to farmers markets in Mankato three days a week once it opens.

09:03
and then also in New Ulm two days a week. And then we also have a CSA program with around 150 members, give or take, depending on the season.  And then every now and then I've got a few restaurants that I like to support where I can. So we have a couple of little deals where  I trade food for their cooked food. So that works out pretty well in the end too. That's amazing. We don't have a deal like that yet, although you just gave me an idea. I'm going to have to look into that. Just got to have a little credit on the  refrigerator somewhere and say, hey,

09:32
I'm here for breakfast. What can you make for me?  Yeah, absolutely. That's brilliant. I'm going to lose my mind because she's not usually this loud and it's driving me crazy.  Okay. So do you guys have animals on the farm too or is it just plants? It was just plants for quite a while and then about,  I want to say about close to seven years ago now,  I had the harebrained idea to bring cattle back here like there had been for many, many years ago.

10:01
And so I started a small scale beef cattle operation where I max out at about, you know, 11 or 12 animals and just try to keep that rotation going, selling direct to the consumers on that end by the quarter. And it's been a nice, you know, little sideline business. Any more and it would become an ordeal. I try to stay away from those. I like to keep it as just nice little, if I can keep that side job to 15 minutes a day or less on shores, that's fine with me. Awesome. You sound like you love what you're doing.

10:29
I feel like you are just tickled at what you've chosen to do. definitely enjoy it. You know, I grew up doing this. Actually, my parents started the vegetable version of this operation back in, I believe, was 1987. And I was only a hair over two years old when we planted the first few strawberry plants. And there was a lot of learning the hard way of figuring out what can you do? What can't you do with various equipment pieces? What are the losing battles? What are the winning ones? And so I like to say

10:57
When people say we must really know what we're doing, that's not the case. We've just gotten lucky many, many times and kept a record of when we've gotten lucky and find the patterns to what works and what doesn't. And so it's, it's been on my mind for a long time that I wanted to take this over. And so when I had the opportunity to do it, jumped at it and really haven't looked back since. And I think you told me when, but I forget you told me at the beginning. When did you take it over?  I officially took over the operation. Oh gosh, I would say close to now.

11:27
About eight or nine years ago,  my oldest daughter Olivia had  been born the previous year when I took over and I was still living in town. And so the first year that I was officially running it on my own, I was still living in town, heading out to the farm back and forth several times to make everything work out. Then thankfully the next year my dad said, you know what, how about we just trade?  And so  thankfully I was able to be around the family a lot more by actually living on the farm as opposed to having to run back and forth.

11:56
Yeah, that gets to be a real grind because you're on the road so much and then you're spending so much time at the farm that you get home and the kids are like, who are you? Where'd you come  from? And the perk is now I can just stop in the house for a quick bite or eat and see them playing around in the yard. They'll come out and visit me when I'm working in the nearby or they'll run up to the field with me. So it's nice to have them having those same opportunities to play around outside and see things happening and be around me as much as they want to that I had when I was a kid.

12:25
Yeah, one of the things that I really appreciate about this lifestyle, whether it's homesteading or farming or ranching or whatever, is that dads are around so much more and you can be so much more hands on and in the presence of the kids because my dad worked as a person who repairs medical equipment at hospitals and he worked, he left the house at like 530 in the morning and he didn't get home till 530 at night and

12:54
When we were little, we didn't really see him. And then when we were in school, we were doing homework and then hanging out with friends. So weekends were like prime time to hang out with dad, but he was always working on something. So I would have really liked to have spent more time with my dad when I was a kid. And I love him. He's fantastic. But it would have been really nice to know him better when I was growing up, if that makes sense. I'm  really.

13:22
I'm very excited about the fact that men are now more in the child raising part than just moms. And I can't say I'm taking any credit here because my wife definitely does.  She's around the kids way more than I am on her schedule as things go. you know, it's nice that we're both able to work together to make things happen. She has supported me in making that transition from careers to doing this. She knew it was on something I had wanted to do.

13:51
And when we were even dating, even for a warner said, here's what I'm already doing, you know, when my parents were still running it.  my plan is to take it over. So we  were able to work together and make this still  make this dream still happen. And she's still able to follow her career path. And I'm still keep mine going. And the farm's still standing to this day. So I call that a win. Well, one of the things in your story that's amazing to me is that you're doing.

14:17
You're doing big scale farming, but you're doing it in a small scale way for selling it.  Cause most people who have as much acreage as you have are doing, you know,  field crops like corn or soybeans or whatever. Yep. And that's what it's not good for the, for the earth to do that as I've been told.  Well, we've

14:41
There was a book actually, I'm trying to think of the name of it, that my dad had that he showed me when I was in high school. And it's called, How to Make $100,000 Off of 25 Acres. I believe it's what it's called. It came out, I want to say in the early eighties, like 1983 or something like that is the year on it. And I remember I bought, I found it online a couple, a few years back. I remembered that my dad had it and I bought a few copies, gave it to some of friends of mine who were also, you know, in sort of similar lines of work, if you will. And it really just outlines what

15:11
Another person's vision was on how to use that amount and utilize it to the best of its potential with still catering to alternative style farming, if you will.  And as much as I'm not following a lot of what that book proposes,  because their  big focus there was actually not on farmers markets.  A big piece is being located near suburbs and getting people to come to the farm. And we're actually

15:35
I'm almost 180 degrees off of that. I don't want people coming out here  except for custom orders.  Cause I mean, the big difference that the book mentions and it's absolutely accurate is the labor end on the way that we operate. And so I'm very grateful  that I'm able to hire, um, depending on the year, anywhere from 12 to about 20, um,  youth, whether they be middle or high school, or even sometimes young adults, that'll work for a few mornings a week.

16:02
And there's a few more that stick around for a few more hours and help with cleaning and sorting  and helping at farmers markets. And so  the biggest reason that I can give that we're able to be successful doing this is because I am able to find the help and that without the help that I have, if any of them are ever listening, I could not do this without them. And so I always have to make sure that I am  constantly being very appreciative and grateful and taking care of my workers to  keep them happy, to keep them out here. You are a good man, Tim. Good job.

16:32
Thanks. Okay. Your voice is getting rougher and rougher as we go. So I think we're just going to make this a short one so your voice doesn't give out completely, I do have one more question. started a new thing on the last episode that I recorded two days ago. At the end of every episode from now on, I'm going to ask the person I'm talking to, to tell me a word that describes your place. What word would you use to describe your farm?

17:00
Oh,  one word.  Mm-hmm.

17:08
I'm going to go with legacy. All right.  Big piece of that was that this whole idea was my mom's  background of how are we going to survive the 80s farm crisis? And she threw out the idea, let's try strawberries. And that turned into let's try kohlrabi.  And before we knew it, we were able to transition completely out of  your commercial grains and able to keep this farm going.

17:33
and turn it into the success that has managed to stay up until today and hopefully will be into the near future. think legacy is a fantastic word and it is entirely appropriate here. And I love that you're carrying it on. That is wonderful. Tim, thank you so much for your time and I would love to have you back when you're not just coming off laryngitis and we can talk more. I'd love to be back. All right, cool. We'll set it up for fall when you're not as busy.

18:01
Sounds wonderful. Well, thank you again for the invite and you take care. All right, you too. Thanks so much. Yep. Bye bye. Bye.