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From the left, we are Carly DelSignore (holding Ruthie) and Hailey, Henry, Paige and Aaron Bell. The Bells have farmed on Tide Mill Farm in Down East Maine since 1765.Our mission is to earn our living together growing and providing nourishing food while promoting healthy lifestyles, partnership with the land, and strengthening the economy of Washington County, Maine.
Please join our campaign to raise $25,000 to help finish the construction of a USDA inspected poultry processing plant on our farm. We have a $100,000 budget gap remaining on this project, and anything we raise above $25,000 will further help us close this gap. Your gift will support organic family farms in rural Maine.
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At Tide Mill Organic Farm we produce dairy products, beef, turkey, pork, vegetables, seedlings, and Christmas wreaths. Dairy and poultry are our two largest operations. A poultry processing plant will help our farm as well as others in the region. With a USDA inspected plant nearby, other farmers can raise poultry for us, earn more income and contribute more food to help our community be more sustainable. We can also process birds for families who raise poultry for their own freezers.
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WHY ARE WE BUILDING A POULTRY PROCESSING PLANT?Our new poultry processing facility will allow us to:
- Provide a steady income to the farm
- Raise and sell more chicken year round
- Increase turkey production
- Process more than 20,000 birds a year
- Add more fertility to our fields from chicken manure
- Contract with neighboring farms to raise chickens
- Sell poultry out of state
- Process chickens for 'back-yard' farmers
- Work in a facility that is efficient and easy to clean
- Never process Thanksgiving turkeys outdoors in November again!
PASTURE RAISED POULTRY
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Our chickens live in pens protected from predators and are moved to new grass every 24 hours adding fertility to our hay fields. We also feed them certified organic grains.
THE POULTRY PROCESSING FACILITY
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Building a USDA processing plant is expensive! But it will allow us to expand our business in ways that benefit our farm, our community, and customers throughout Maine and beyond. A local contractor is helping us build the facility and the winter poultry barn. We've done all the site work ourselves and supplied lumber from our farm to keep the costs down. But we still need to raise more money, and we need your help to do it!
THE WINTER POULTRY BARN
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We are also building a heated hoop house with openings to the outdoors to raise chickens during the winter months.
Farming At Tide Mill Since 1765
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Members of the 7th, 8th and 9th generations of Bells live and work on the farm. Aaron's father, Bob, and Uncle Terry operate Tide Mill Enterprises, a forestry and blueberry harvesting business. Aaron's cousin, Rachel, buys milk from the farm and makes delicious organic cheese, kefir and yogurt at Tide Mill Creamery. Together we employ more than 32 people in our County, which has the highest unemployment in Maine.
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In 1990 with help from Maine Coast Heritage Trust and Land for Maine's Future our family put a conservation easement on the farm, limiting future development here and forever protecting the land as farmland.
TESTIMONIALS:
"Our customers say this is the best poultry they've ever tasted!" Brian Worcester, Sawyer's Market, Southwest Harbor, Maine
"Tide Mill Farm's high quality chicken never disappoints. Carly DelSignore and Aaron Bell are leaders in the organic farming movement in Maine, and when opportunities arise for them to better the future of their farm and others, they do so. It is a rare treat when our values and our taste buds agree on quality. I wholeheartedly support their efforts." Marada Cook, Crown of Maine Cooperative, Northern Girl and Fiddler's Green Farm
CREDITS: Thanks to Amanda Kowalski for the campaign video (www.amandakowalskiphoto.com), Jane Bell for her fabulous photographs, and Brian Fitzgerald and Beth Warner for their photos in the Gallery.
