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Photo by John Wagner

Photo by John Wagner

Photo by John Wagner

Tanana Valley farmers these days are finding success means more than growing lettuce, barley and cows.

They’re cultivating personal relationships with their customers, cutting out the middleman and creating new local markets whose needs they can respond to quickly and effectively.

Customer met producer at Knopp’s Dairy during the Delta Farm Bureau’s annual Farm Tour this month. Fairbanks resident Pat Johnson got to stomp through barns housing the very same cows that generate the milk she stocks in her fridge.

“I didn’t realize they had such a huge dairy farm,” she said. “That surprised me.”

Long rows of black and white spotted Holsteins had just bedded down on fresh cushions of shredded newsprint, the first of three daily milkings complete. Working their jaws through slobbery mouthfuls of hay, they didn’t seem to much mind the guests.

Paul Knopp is the second owner of the dairy, which was built in 1984. Each of the 80 cows delivers eight gallons of rich milk a day, which is drawn mechanically from their udders and pumped directly to coolers. The milk is processed at Delta’s Northern Lights Dairy, then marketed throughout Delta and Fairbanks.

Along with cows, Knopp raises hay, a product he feeds to his dairy cows and which he sells. The farmer in turn supports other Delta agriculture, purchasing barley that he dishes out six times a day to his barnful of cows.

The symbiotic relationship is often found in Alaska farm country and is one of the things that fosters self-sufficiency in the state.

Farmers first cleared Tanana Valley fields in the early 1900s to provide food for gold seekers and hay for livestock. Commercial production began in earnest in the 1970s, and fluctuated in large part with market availability, said Jane Hamilton, Farm Bureau chapter secretary and state director.

The state, which offered land for farming, had its eggs in the export basket — a market that never developed.

“Now, we have a new group of farmers,” Hamilton said. “They’ve each had to find their own markets. They find their customers, and they grow for their customers now.”

That was the case at the Trophy Lodge, where owner Randy Wood laid out a true Alaskan meal for the tour group — buffalo burgers made from animals raised on his Clearwater Road ranch and processed in Delta. The lure of a meal of Alaska meat is something tourists passing by on the Alaska Highway jump at.

Likewise, Scott and Maribeth Miller sought out in-state markets for their homegrown beef and elk. The Misty Mountain Farm meat comes with what’s sure to be a stamp of approval for many diners — locally produced and processed.

And at The Garden Bed and Breakfast, Rick and Bonnie Stillie have a couple of target customers. They’ve found ways to use products grown at home to serve both sides of life as their business spreads roots into new fields.

For example, what started as a peaceful wildflower garden Bonnie could gaze upon from the dining room window is now an attraction in its own right.

Rick broke ground on a small pond three years ago. Now, water cascades gently into a pool, clumps of lush river grasses and delicate lilypads breaking the smooth surface. With a canopy of high branches, the serene setting is a place guests can go for real R&R.

Flowers overflow strategically placed pots in riotous waterfalls of color, representing one of the products grown in the Stillies’ greenhouses. Tender young plants nurtured through the year are sold as starters at local markets, while Bonnie harvests seeds for sale as well. Greenhouse tomatoes and peppers, plus rows and rows of vegetables, feed B&B guests and add to their market inventory. The combination keeps the Stillies busy, and coupled with hay meadows and a few other enterprises, equates to an agri-business, thanks in no small part to more people seeking out locally grown items.

The trend stems from concerns about energy use, the environment, dependence of foreign oil, healthfulness and more.

Alaska was walloped with a reality check after the terrorist attacks of Sept. 11, 2001, Hamilton said. For three days, the state froze as air and highway traffic stood still. Shoppers noticed dwindling stocks on store shelves and a new realization sank in — Alaska grew little of its own food.

“People started to think about the importance of Alaska agriculture again,” Hamilton said.

Locally grown, locally consumed is the new game plan. A close connection to buyers lets farmers tailor their production, alleviating some of the market woes of the past. But without the dreamed-of export industry, agriculture in Alaska can grow only as large as local markets allow.

The upturn is a welcome sign for Hamilton, who has spent a career supporting agriculture. Nationwide, fewer people are engaged in farming, and those who are typically work thousands of acres to supply mass retailers, she said.

Retired Minnesota farmer Wilber Werner was one of those. He was vacationing in Fairbanks when his granddaughter signed him up for the farm tour. Werner was a bit skeptical at first — Alaska hardly looks like farm country from the road — but by the end of the day, he was admiring the direct connection many small-scale producers have with their customers. That’s something that he doesn’t experience with commercial-level production in Minnesota.

“It looks to me like people do their thing here, and enjoy what they’re doing,” he said. “It has some potential.”

Franci Havemeister was on her first farm tour as the state director of agriculture. She too noted the Tanana Valley’s rich potential to fill the needs of nearby population centers, and said the more that Alaska can grow what it needs, the better. That lessens reliance on imports and can be better for the environment, she said.

The new trend is in keeping with the self-sufficient lifestyle found throughout Alaska. Many people with a little land are growing produce for personal consumption and often fattening a pig or cow through the summer for slaughter in the fall.

“People kind of do live off the land,” Hamilton said. “Between our salmon, our moose, our caribou and what we grow ourselves, we can be quite self-sufficient.”

With a little help from the farmers, that is.