Interest in locally grown produce is helping boost a new generation of small farms in the Chilkat Valley.

The resulting bumper crop is giving residents more shopping choices, as well as supplying local stores, restaurants and even the Haines School with fresh produce. It’s also transforming the Haines Farmers Market, where offerings were once limited to gardeners selling off extra produce.

“I love having the larger-scale growers. They’re providing consistent, high-quality produce. They’re putting the farm in the farmers market and we’re becoming a local food source,” said market manager Suzie McCartney Nelson.

Small-farm operations started in the past few years include ones operated by residents George Campbell, Sally Boisvert, Spencer Douthit, and Rebecca Brewer. The list doesn’t include historic grower Chilkat Valley Farms, now a you-pick operation, or Whiterock Nursery, which started growing vegetables this year.

Douthit, 25, is leasing a piece of historic farmland on Allen Road and this fall is offering boxes of vegetables through a subscriber service similar to Community Supported Agriculture models elsewhere. Response has been strong, he said. He expects to sell 1,800 pounds in root crop shares. He’s also selling produce to stores and salad mix to a local restaurant.

Douthit apprenticed three years on a Fairbanks educational farm and moved here last spring, seeking a home in Southeast where he could pursue his passion. “Farming in Alaska is what I wanted to do. I had to decide where I wanted to do that.”

The enthusiasm of gardeners and other small farm operators he met helped seal his decision. He also was encouraged by local grocery store owner Dave Olerud, who was excited by the idea of local produce, he said.

“For the first year, it’s super slim what you’re making. With things established, I think you could make a reasonable summer income, but you have to work really hard at it,” said Douthit, who plans to supplement his income commercial fishing in the winter.

Small farming is feasible in Haines, partly because produce is pricey here, and locally grown product can compete because it’s grown using organic methods and fresh, he said. He plans to double his planted acreage. “The idea at some point would be to (offer) full-season shares, but that’s probably one year ofrtwo down the road.”

Campbell, a former Juneau landscaper who grew up in Haines, planted 3,700 potato plant and 2,700 cloves of garlic on a historic hay ranch at 18 Mile Haines Highway for harvest this fall. He’s selling his harvest at the farmers market, to local restaurants and the school.

“It seems like the thing to do here. The farming idea appealed to me because we’ve got land to do it and partly because it’s a challenge,” Campbell said.

Campbell said he’s growing garlic and potatoes because they don’t get munched by the moose that roam through his property. “(Those) are the financial crops we’re trying to go after right now. As small as we are, we can probably break even as long as I don’t run it over with a tractor or we have a blizzard in July,” Campbell said earlier this summer.

For now, Campbell said he’s making a little bit of money and eating higher quality food, but continued increases in the price of fuel or freight would “make it a go,” he said.

Boisvert, who launched Four Winds Farm on Mosquito Lake Road this summer, is hoping to offer a full-season subscription service like Douthit’s next year. A regular at farmers markets this year, she raises a variety of herbs, greens and vegetables and said she’s competitive with local stores for organic offerings.

“This year I’m seeing what does well and the timing of different crops, so I have a better idea of scheduling, and to plan for (offering) a full box. It’s a lot of work but it’s work I’d be doing anyway for my own use. It’s a savings in terms of my family’s food cost,” Boisvert said. If she can control her costs and find customers willing to meet her costs, the operation can be economically viable, she said. “It’s a community service, too,” she said.

There’s been some coordination between growers, and Haines Borough Mayor Stephanie Scott thinks there’s room for more. Scott, who sells flowers she grows, helped launch the farmers market here and has seen it become self-sustaining.

The next step, she said, may be securing a person such as a Vista volunteer to bring growers together toward goals like producing volumes that would meet resident and restaurant demand in mid-summer.

“I know I have zero interest in marketing my flowers. I usually wait for people to come to me. I imagine a lot of growers out there are like that,” Scott said.

Consumer demand for local produce has been evident since longtime farmer Bob Henderson took his produce to local grocery stores and it sold out as quickly as he delivered it.

“I don’t think we’re at capacity. I think we could sell to the cruise ships and Juneau and other communities in the region. We have more land and a better growing climate than anywhere in Southeast Alaska. We’re the promising spot for commercial agriculture in the region. We could do it, and we should,” Scott said.