5 ECO-FRIENDLY PEOPLE OF INTEREST
BY Camille S. Yates
Photos by Ed Drondoski
Valarie Quant’s 40 acres of heaven are covered
50
in rows of yellow squash, zucchini, beans,
strawberries.
Quant and her husband, Brian, own White
Rabbit Acres Organic Farm in Vero Beach, which
they started in 1999. Their farming is free of pesticides and
instead they rely on crop rotation, biological pest control and
composting to maintain soil productivity and control pests.
“People are realizing that more and more contaminants
are being found in foods sold at commercial grocery stores,”
says Quant, who started the organic farm with her husband,
Brian, in 1999. “My husband I also became concerned. We
knew that if you want fresh, local produce, then you have to
grow it yourself. That’s why we started the farm.”
The Quants first started farming clams near the Fort Pierce
Inlet. They were doing well raising clams, but when the inlet
was dredged that changed things. “The water quality was
ruined,” she says. So after three years of clam farming, Quant
and her husband headed for higher ground. They are now
organic farmers on 30 acres of land in western Indian River
County. Their neighbor lets them use another 10 acres next
door to raise grass-fed beef and lamb.
This past fall, White Rabbit Acres became a community
supported agricultural project in which members buy a
share in the farm’s production for a growing season. “The
first time we asked for volunteers to help us plant, we had 80
people show up,” Quant says. “It was pretty chaotic trying
to show that many people how to plant tray seedlings, but
it just confirmed to me that people really do want to grow
their own food.”
Quant’s goal is to make organic foods affordable to the
average person. She says that although some people think
organic farming is a new, trendy thing, chemical farming
is the new technology. People have practiced organic farming
for centuries. She spends all of her daylight hours either
managing the farm or tending to the organic shop where she
sells fresh organic fruits, vegetables, meat and eggs that she
recently harvested from her land.
When the locals come to the farm, they seek out Quant’s
expertise on pest control and fertilizer. She teaches all of the
community farmers to use fish emulsion and seaweed to
provide nutrients to the plants and organic peppermint soap
to keep the bugs from eating the tender vegetables.
“My husband makes sure that all of our equipment is
running well,” she says. “You’d be amazed at the amount of
maintenance this farm takes. He also makes his own fuel.”
All of the farm’s tractors and other mechanical equipment
run off of bio-diesel that Brian has produced from recycled
vegetable oil. “We want to do as much as we can to make our
environment healthy,” Quant says.
The
ORGANIC
FARMER
LIVING GREEN