It is said that farming is a profession of hope. If that is the case, then Colchester Farm has been cultivating hope since 1751. Situated off a winding country road in the heart of Plympton, the eight-acre slice of heaven has a rich history of turning out vibrant, beautiful crops and feeding the community. Owned by Mary Ann Barrow -descendant of the Barrow family who started and tended the farm for generations, Colchester Farm is one of the regions oldest farms and an integral part of Plympton history.
Centuries later Colchester Farm is still thriving and feeding locals with the best of the best produce. Present day goods are started, nurtured and harvested by Jim Lough who operates the farm. Known to the town as “Farmer Jim”, you can find him ushering bountiful harvests from the barn to the farm stand and interacting with customers -often times knowing them well as regulars. “Farmer Jim” Lough, however, was not always a farmer.
With a background in lab management for cardio research in Boston and New York for eight years, Lough found himself called back to his agricultural roots. Lough grew up in Middleborough helping his father deliver eggs from their egg farm. Lough also worked at Freitas Farm picking blueberries. While immersed in city living Lough was drawn to the smaller restaurants with menus that were limited but offered high quality, locally grown food. He recounts, “I loved those places that were little city restaurants with like eight things on the menu but they had lines out the door because of the quality of what you were served.” Lough decided to come back to the farm communities he knew so well and try his hand at farming.
Once settled in the area again, Lough discovered Colchester Farm. At the time, Barrow was leasing Colchester Farm to New England Village -a residential community-based organization dedicated to serving individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. New England Village hired Lough to be the farm manager for Colchester Farm. After a few years, New England Village dropped the lease and transferred it to Lough who now leases and runs Colchester on his own.
Colchester Farm is long known as a vegetable farm from the beginning, but Lough established the current day honor-system farmstand and pick-your-own sunflowers every August. Overflowing with the freshest produce straight from the fields, Colchester is a hub for anyone looking for produce harvested at its peak. “I am all about quality over quantity,” Lough explains, “I offer limited produce -the classic New England vegetables that everyone likes, but I make sure they are the best quality.” Any produce that is slightly less than perfect in Lough’s eyes is offered in discount baskets but will taste just as delicious because it has been grown in the best conditions.
Colchester Farm sits in a slight basin that has been catching mineral-rich drain off from the nearby wetlands. With nutrient dense, compost accumulating soil that would make any gardener or farmer envious, Lough works with the land to bring out the full potential of every crop grown there. “We do butter and sweet corn, Sugar-Cube cantaloupe, tomatoes, squashes, peppers, eggplants, cucumbers -it’s all picked at its peak so it tastes amazing.” Lough doesn’t just harvest the crops at Colchester Farm, he starts many of the crops offered at the farmstand from seed. “All the tomatoes are started from seed in the greenhouse with space heaters underneath the tables and then little tents of plastic covering are placed over the hoops above the table to create a little greenhouse in the greenhouse for each plant. It is a lot more energy efficient than running heat into the greenhouse.” Lough then transplants about 1,000 seedlings from the greenhouse out to the fields once the danger of frost has passed.
In addition to greenhouse starts, Lough direct sows many of his crops as well. “I planted about 35,000 corn this year. It’s our main crop and that’s because it is the best corn you will ever eat,” he assures. Often encouraging people to eat it raw on the cob, Lough stands confident that a sweeter corn can’t be found anywhere else. Another draw to Colchester Farm is the August pick-your-own sunflowers. The cheerful patch of late summer blooms is peppered with happy bees bounding from flower to flower and then flying back past the small pond on the farm to the rear fields where beehives are kept. “The honey from these hives tastes like corn and sunflowers,” Lough remarks.
As anyone who has tried to grow food knows, planting your crops is just the beginning of the effort required to yield a profitable harvest. From disease to pests to wildlife, Lough is constantly working to keep things healthy and abundant. “I don’t even have a commercial pesticide license so I really keep chemicals to a minimum and only apply things as ground applications if needed to make sure the food stays disease free but without a bunch of chemicals on it.” With tomato and squash fields nearly entirely devoid of disease or decay it is apparent Lough’s methods are working well.
As for keeping the local deer at bay, Lough’s approach is unorthodox though endearing. “It’s because of Dapple. Dapple my donkey is my deer control,” Lough explains. “For some reason she reacts when she senses deer in the field and her braying scares them off. And here in the sunflower patch is apparently as far as her braying noise travels because this is always the exact spot where they start eating,” Lough gestures to a clear line of sunflowers eaten and sunflowers untouched. A local celebrity of sorts, Dapple earns her keep not just in spooking the deer from the fields, but in entertaining the customers who stop by to offer donated farm stand treats in her designated container where customers are invited to add a carrot or ear of corn or apple that Lough will later give her. “She is very dramatic and she expects gifts from anyone who visits her. If you don’t have any then she basically wants nothing to do with you,” jokes Lough.
When asked what is in store for the future of the historic Colchester Farm, Lough explains that the barn was renovated last winter and readied for possible rentals for local gatherings and events. “The barn is all cozy and ready for anyone to rent for things like workshops or parties. We want to start hosting some things here as well so be on the lookout for those announcements.” In addition to plans for community gatherings, expansion is also on the horizon for Colchester to offer enough to keep up with growing demand. “It took a while to get going,” Lough explains, “But three years in and the farmstand is catching up financially and we have established a steady customer base -some of the customers are former employees of the farm who have a history here.”
With a history as rich as Colchester Farms has and an innovative, industrious farmer committed to merging time tested farming practices with modern day techniques to compete with the demands of the current day consumer, it looks like Plympton will be blessed with many more years of inimitable produce and farm-stand immersive opportunities to make the farm to table connection personal. “I love seeing the same faces come weekly -sometimes multiple times a week, and knowing I am offering them the best that I can,” Lough says in between greeting a familiar customer at the farm stand. Driving away from Colchester Farm, munching on raw, fresh-off the stalk sweet corn that is truly the best I have ever tasted, Farmer Jim can rest assured that Colchester Farm will continue to stand the test of time as an integral part of Plympton.