About Us

Hi there! We’re Dave and Sheri and the kids and together along with Mom Redfearn we make up the Redfearn Family Farmers. We work as a family alongside a community of committed community supported agriculture members to grow healthy food in an environmentally responsible fashion. If you live in the Kansas City area, we’d love to be your farmers too.

Redfearn Family on Tractor CSA Independence

 

 

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What We Grow

We grow a wide assortment of naturally grown heirloom and hybrid vegetables and herbs that we supply in our community supported agriculture program members and to local farmers markets in Kansas City. We raise bees to pollenate our vegetables and fruits and to provide allergy-fighting, delicious raw local honey right here in Independence Missouri.
We’ve planted a young orchard and berry patch that will eventually supply apples, pears, blackberries, raspberries, currants, elderberries, apricots, plums and nuts for U-pick and for sale as a Community Supported Agriculture add-on or at local farmers markets.  We supply dozens of free-range eggs each day for sale to our egg CSA members. The chickens and guinea hens help control insect populations and help us compost our plant wastes.
In addition to the things you eat, we have planted hundreds of native Missouri shrubs and trees on our property to provide habitat and food for wildlife and prevent erosion from wind and rain. Wild flowers also dot the landscape providing a beautiful setting for all of us to enjoy and pollen and nectar for our bees and other beneficial insects.
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Our Story

[infobox]When we graduated from engineering school, we never dreamed that we would own and operate a farm. Both of us grew up suburban city kids in Kansas City and central Missouri, never having heard of buying local or ever having eaten organic food. Engineers favor efficiency, economies of scale, and the man-made chemicals science has introduced.

Our transformation to local and organic eaters and eventually farmers began in Changsha, China in 2003. When we moved to China we left behind the US model of year-round availability of all types of globally sourced, chemically impregnated produce at supermarket chains, and we were forced to eat locally supplied, seasonal, and organically grown produce at street-side farmer’s markets.

We absolutely loved the freshness and quality of the produce that was hands-down better than the food we grew up with. While in China we also gained an appreciation for cooked Asian greens—an appreciation that shows through in the vegetables we grow and offer today.

After five years eating a vegetable-rich diet of freshly grown, local, organic produce, there was no going back.

Upon our return to Blue Springs Missouri, our dissatisfaction with grocery store produce, even organic produce, led us to grow it ourselves. Friends wanted to share in the great produce they were enjoying on trips to the Redfearn home for dinner, so we started sharing weekly boxes of the harvest with our first Community Supported Agriculture season in 2011.

Over the next couple years, the garden and orchard engulfed our Blue Springs, MO yard, reducing our lawn to a mere postage stamp. The kids complained that there was no space to play and more people wanted to share in the bounty, so in January 2013 we moved the operation to a foreclosed horse-farm just down highway 7 in Independence, Missouri.[/infobox][/column]

 

 

At our new location the CSA is rapidly expanding as members share their experiences with their friends. The 2013 season proved to be a busy time for us as we welcomed another member to our family and quintupled our CSA membership. The expansion of our farm continued into the 2014 season with 41 members and 2015 season with 55 members.  For the 2016 season and our reworked membership options, we expect 75 or more members.  Won’t you join us?

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