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By Dale McDonald
The mountains around Boone, N.C., offer the climate and scenery Homesteaders love
With the Blue Ridge Parkway to the
south and Great Smoky Mountain
National Park to the west,
there’s no denying the beautiful
landscape that surrounds Boone,
N.C. Add in the climate, with its
mild winters and cool summers, and you have
a place, really a region, that more and more
people want to call home.
Passion for flowers. "What I love is that you can surround your home with natural areas," says Susan Wright, who lives near
Vilas. "There’s no need for lawns or traditional
landscapes. Our landscape is completely
natural, with beautiful wild flowers."
In fact, as owners of Shady Grove Gardens & Nursery, Susan and husband Brent Cochran are the local floral experts, growing specialty flowers that are rarely sold in stores.
At home, there are 2 acres of perennial beds, hand dug, hand weeded, and hand harvested.
On a nearby mountainside, more flowers
overlook a knoll where outdoor weddings,
wagon rides, and nature walks take place.
Susan sells cut flower perennials from
the nursery, fresh bouquets at the Watauga
County Farmers Market, and specializes in
'buckets' of mixed cut flowers, whatever
varieties happen to be best that day.
After buying the mountain property, Susan
says she has gained a real appreciation for
the nature lovers of the world.
"The weddings are really special," she
says, "because the wedding parties tend to be
pretty low key and they just love the setting. From the knoll you can see mountains in Virginia
and Tennessee. We’ll run into the brides
years later and they’ll thank us for helping
them have such a wonderful experience."
The wagon rides and nature walks are
relatively new, but growing in popularity.
Agri-tourism. "The whole agri-tourism thing is pretty interesting," she says. "Most people have to live in a city to make a living, but they are almost desperate to make contact with nature. The mountain is so quiet and peaceful...they just love the dramatic change from home. The mountain setting is more than flowers and butterflies and birds. It’s the
whole ecosystem at work, and our guests value
that. They also appreciate what we are doing,
trying to hang onto the land. People want
to support us, they enjoy helping us, because
if we succeed they have a place to go."
For Diane Cornett Deal, growing up
in the area was special. But it wasn’t
till she bought her farm in 1986 that
she really embraced life on the land.
That first year, her father gave her
1,000 Fraser fir transplants, and
suddenly she was in the Christmas tree business,
with a lot to learn.
"I immediately joined the Watauga County
Christmas Tree Association," she says, "and began taking classes. I learned all about soils
and fertilizer and pests. Then my brother suggested we buy some 6-inch seedlings, so I
did that. I ended up putting 30,000 seedlings
out that first year. Seven years later they were
ready for my first harvest."
People business. Each year the Cornett Deal Christmas Tree Farm in Vilas, N.C.,
sells up to 800 trees wholesale, but Diane
says it’s the 300 or so people who buy retail
that make the business so much fun.
"Most of my customers have been coming
here for years," she says. "Christmas is all
about family, and I think it’s wonderful that they bring their children and grandchildren
to the farm each year to cut their tree. They
value the experience, and really, they are
creating memories for all those kids."
The other part of Diane’s people business
is a beautiful rental cabin that’s nestled in
the woods with a gorgeous view of the valley.
Christmas tree cutters use it, and she has
hosted guests from as far away as England.
"It’s the whole farm experience they love," Diane says. "They fish in the pond, hike
around in the woods, and just generally enjoy
the seclusion. A lot of them talk about how
nice it is to get away from the hustle and
bustle of their lives, and find some real peace
and quiet without a schedule. It’s serenity
they’re looking for and they find it in the
woods. I’m glad to be able to supply that."
Peace. Of course, peace and quiet and
serenity go a long way for Diane, as well.
"I grew up in the country," she says, "but
eventually moved to town. When I bought
the farm I got all those qualities. When you
live like this you really get to know your neighbors. They become lifelong friendships
with a level of trust that is so different from
what people live with in cities. Give me the
forest, that rural feeling, and the wildlife that
is so abundant. My guests sure appreciate it."
Through a combination of technology
and hobbies, Diane Price has turned
her Todd, N.C., home into a rural
showplace. From the micro hydro
power generator to her free-range
chickens and Shiitake mushroom
production, Price lives the country life she’s
always been looking for.
"I've lived several different lifestyles,
from apartments to subdivisions, from cities to small towns," she says. "Here, I have
everything I want. The landscape is beautiful,
I can have all the animals that I love, and
the opportunity to do so many things with the
land while being environmentally friendly."
Power. Example one would be the micro hydro system. She first got interested in water power in the 1970s, but had no way to power
a turbine. The stream that now rushes by her
home changed that in one exciting meeting.
"I have a writing cabin in the woods that
I wanted to run power to, but it would have
taken thousands of dollars to bring in a power
line," she says. "So I called the Extension service and asked if they could evaluate
the stream for power generation. They said
I could do a heck of a lot more than power
the cabin. I just about fell over. That little
turbine powers the cabin and the barn, and
half the house. There’s virtually no maintenance
so it’s like a dream come true."
Simple. The system is quite simple. Several hundred feet upstream, the water is diverted into a 4-inch pipe. The turbine sits
in a small outbuilding near the house, where
the water passes through it and is returned to
the stream. There’s a bank of batteries inside
the house and a control panel that indicates
if everything is working properly.
"The turbine," she says, "was built by
Don Harris, from California, who is really
the father of micro hydro. I read about him
back in the 1970s, and when the system came
together and his name came up I was just
astonished. He even came to Boone for
a lecture and visited us at the farm."
Price is also all about enterprises. She
hosts a community garden, raises
mushrooms and eggs for sale, and
grows grapes for jams and juice.
The mushrooms started off as a
4-H project, and kept growing. You
start with fresh oak logs, then drill half-inch-deep
holes every 4 inches or so all around
the log. Then you fill the holes with Shiitake
spawn and cover them with cheese wax. Next,
the logs are placed in a shady area and mushrooms
emerge from nine months to a year
later, after the spawn spreads under the bark.
Each log lasts about five years without being
inoculated again, and Price has 150 logs in production
this year. That’s a lot of mushrooms.
"It was a great 4-H project," she says,
"and I just kept it going. I’ve learned to put
some of them into the creek, and they fruit
within a week or so. That way I can control
production so they don’t all produce at once.
The market has grown into restaurants, neighbors,
and the general public. Very steady."
Free-range eggs. The egg market is also steady, even with 40 chickens.
"I cannot meet the demand for my eggs,"
she says, "but it took a while to ramp up
production. When I had a chicken coop I
had terrible troubles with predators. We have
coyotes, foxes, bobcats, possums, raccoons,
hawks, and snakes, and they all love chickens
and eggs. The answer? Llamas. They are excellent
guard animals, and the chickens have
learned that when they are near the barn, the
llamas will protect them from harm."
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