Converting Lawns to Micro-Farms
Do you dream about becoming a farmer…making a living with your hands in the soil, being outside far away from the confines of the cubicle, working your own piece of land and growing nutrient-dense food that you want to eat?
That’s exactly what I have set out to do this summer. However, it is very different from what you would expect when it comes to the traditional farming model. It is small; it is in the city; it is low tech; it is being done on land I don’t even own. It’s a paradigm shift.
In Camden County, New Jersey, Daniel Cortes (that’s me) engages in small-scale, bio-intensive production that is efficiently and effectively managed in a way that brings in income.
As a Web Developer and Linux Systems Administrator, I realize the importance of systems thinking and how important it is to dissect larger problems into solvable smaller problems in order to move forward. This is essentially what I do on my micro-farm. Everyday I pay special attention to what works and what does not.
To be successful as a modern-day farmer you need to be more like a modern-day tech entrepreneur than a peasant agrarian of yesteryear. The image that you have in your head of a farmer and the farming lifestyle isn’t the image of reality that is going to get you where you want to go. The traditional farming model is broken and it doesn’t work.
As a next generation of farmer, I bring a different model to the table and at the end of the day it’s all business when it comes to running my farm. The lifestyle is there, but the business comes first.
I convert back lawns, front lawns and side lawns into food producing micro-farms whose produce I sell at farmers markets and interested chefs. I would love for you to visit my first plot and see it for yourself.


