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Radish on the Radio visits Roots Organics

SARAH GARDNER: Before Matt Case was growing organic veggies, he was a retired diesel mechanic from the Coast Guard studying to be a mechanical engineer. Then a house plant changed his life.

MATT CASE: I guess I always had the passion to do it, it just never came out until, seriously, I bought a houseplant. Then one houseplant turned into 100 orchids, and then a year later I had a three acre garden, and then all my attention, as soon as I started growing veggies, it was like alright this is what I really want to be doing. Now Matt is the grower behind Roots Organics in Cordova, Illinois, and can be found most Saturdays throughout the summer tending his stand at the Freight House Farmers' Market in Davenport. But the vegetables he grows fill plates throughout the Quad-Cities area every day of the week, delivered in coolers as CSA shares and served up at restaurants like the Faithful Pilot in LeClaire. If his operation continues to grow as planned, his organic vegetables soon will be stocked at regional Hy-Vee grocery stores and offered to employees at local businesses. For Matt, the goal simple.

CASE: When I first started, I just wanted to grow everything under the sun. I wanted to grow red sweet corn and every color of everything there was, just because I had no idea what worked good for me. But now I've figured out, a lot of those specialty crops, they're awesome, but I'm leaving that up to the growers that are strictly farmer's market. I'm trying to grow more food for the masses, you know, because that's my whole idea, is to get as much healthy food out there as possible, because that's what's really needed.

GARDNER: All this, from a farm of little more than 13 acres and a farmer who has been in the business for just five years. Learning to cultivate a wide variety of vegetables from seed to harvest, but that is only the first step in establishing himself as a farmer. He's had to learn which of those vegetables sell well and the right mix to grow. He's also had to work out a delivery system to get his produce to his customers. And he's had figure out what pieces of equipment fit his budget and the small size of his farm. A farm field is a long way from the open sea, but his training in the Coast Guard has helped.

CASE: It did in the sense of the discipline side, you know, and also I was a diesel mechanic, so the mechanic side really helps. Starting out on a farm you got to be able to work on your own equipment, because I could afford to pay somebody extreme rates to work on my equipment. Not only that, you have to be able to come up with a thing like, I've got get this done but I don't have the thing to do it, you've got to fabricate it or make it. That's a lot of farming, is just coming up with it on the fly, making it happen.

GARDNER: Recently, Matt completed the process for his farm to become USDA certified organic. At the farmers' market, anyone can walk up to his booth and talk to Matt about how his veggies are grown. But to sell at supermarkets, he needs the certification to assure customers these veggies have been grown from organic seed, in organic ground, without the use of synthetic fertilizers and pesticides. No matter the hard work, Matt wouldn't have it any other way.

CASE: I can't, I couldn't imagine doing anything else. I mean, I'll do this for the rest of my life. There's no doubt about that.

Community
Sarah J. Gardner is the editor of Radish magazine, a publication serving western Illinois and eastern Iowa with a focus on local foods, environmental stewardship, and building healthy and resilient communities.