Whispering Bear plants first crop – 400 Trees!
How do you start a farm in 2022 in the middle of a forest with no house and no barn? The same way it’s always been done, some praying, some planning, and a lot of family participation! On September 29th we began the process of planting our first crop – Christmas trees!
Before we could put a shovel to the soil, we had to first lay out the grid so that each tree would have lots of room to breathe and grow. So we were off to the Crozet Hardware where we bought several rolls of 500 feet of masonry line. Then we carefully laid out 10 rows, each 8 ft apart. Who would have thought the Pythagorean theorem could be so useful to make sure our rows were square!
What we did not count on was the fact that the soil was hard packed due to prior timbering activity in the area and the trucks compacting the soil. So my 75-year-old father who is as healthy as Superman took out the pickaxe and hand hacked each hole to give these little trees a better start in life. I followed behind carefully planting each tree and placing the soil so the tree stood up straight. We did all this with our own hands, a pickaxe, and a shovel.
That is how 100 Frazer Fir, 100 Eastern White Pine, 100 Canaan Fir and 100 Norway Spruce began their new life in Central Virginia and Wildwood Tree farm was born on September 29, 2022. Follow us and watch these trees grow and aspire to be that beautiful tree that may be in your living room someday soon.
Of course no farmer can do anything without thinking about the weather and we had the added excitement of trying to get 400 trees in the ground before Hurricane Ian hit the next day. I was relying on rain to provide the water we needed to let these little folks get started. The next day Hurricane Ian hit with a fury and left 2 inches of rain on the property for each day following. On the third day we went back and only two or three trees had fallen over in the hard rain. We carefully replanted those – no tree left behind!
