• thegardenlifeandtimesofjustinhusher.blogspot.com/

Member since: January 21, 2012

A Little About Me

My name is Justin Husher. I’m a third year, first generation Cleveland Farmer, where I own and operate two distinctive small farms. They’re aptly named Old Husher’s Farm and Old Husher’s Perennial Expansion Farm. Therefore, I’m sometimes aptly called Old Husher aka Old Hush aka the Old Dirty Farmer. The farms total about 28,000 square feet in size, which is about a third less than an acre. The two plots are separated by about 10 miles; and to get from one to the other, I have to crossover Cleveland’s Mythical West to East Side Divide.

I formally got into plants in the mid-90s during my undergrad. I earned a Botany degree from Miami University in 1998 and did some amazing things as a senior. These included a plant collecting expedition to Guyana, South America complete with beans and rice every single day and river trips in dugout canoes with Amerindians. Less gloriously, I also performed some basic research on mushroom spore discharge, which turned into a publication for the prestigious Mycologia (nerdy mushroom science journal). It is my humble opinion that this research helped form a base for some of famed mushroom author, Dr. Nicholas P Money’s work.

After college, I moved to Portland, Oregon, where I camped/hiked/backpacked for five years and hob-nobbed through some mostly dissatisfying corporate jobs. I kept dreaming of owning a farm some day. Filled with family and affordability concerns, me and the missus moved to her hometown of Cleveland, Ohio in 2004. Turning a recession frown, upside down, my attentions began to learn and focus on Urban Farming in 2007.

I always thought I’d be bored with city living at this point in my life. Bored with things like rock n roll, micro brews, restaurants, museums and the Theater; and, I’d be living out in the country, owning a small little farm somewhere. At the tender ripe age of a third of a century-plus, that country living farm is a far cry from anything that I want (no disrespect to my fellow country farmers). Rather, I see Urban Farming as an integral part of the new food frontier, working on micro-plots and decentralizing distribution; and I’m completely excited to be a part of this new wave. Plus, I still get embarrassingly, energetically enthusiastic about live music, and the barrel-aged brewing revolution is just upon us now. Everything starts on small scales.

Some Hyperlinks:

http://thegardenlifeandtimesofjustinhusher.blogspot.com/

http://www.freshwatercleveland.com/devnews/oldhushersfarm022411.aspx

http://pubget.com/search?q=authors%3A%22Justin%20Husher%22