Elmwood Stock Farm: The Bedrock Facts
Six generations of Kentucky farmers. At Elmwood, our family is intimately connected to the land we farm. Our nearly 400 acres just outside Georgetown, Kentucky, are a USDA certified organic operation. Conventional farming depletes the soil so every year it has less to give. We’re different. For us, farming is a way to make the land and the people who eat our food healthier and happier, for generations to come.
How We Got Here
Rotate crops and feed the soil. That’s where it started. Ann Stone and John Bell took over Elmwood Stock Farm from their parents in the 1990s. Organic certification didn’t exist. But we knew there was a better way to farm. Masking up to spray chemicals isn’t our idea of farming. So, over 15 or so years, we converted the entire operation to meet the international gold standard for clean food: USDA Certified Organic.
We initially sold at farmers’ markets, then deepened that relationship through CSA memberships. We’re still finding new challenges: perfecting our crop rotation, sequestering carbon through regenerative techniques, and helping people learn about the role that agriculture plays in their lives. Growing and delivering healthful, organic food is work that has value.
What We Believe
We’ve been entrusted with a rich piece of earth, and we work hard to make it better for generations to come. Stewarding the land is a calling. It’s not always easy to keep the developers at bay, but our members and customers—people who think it’s important that our animals are kept on pasture, where they can forage in the sunshine and improve the soil—make it possible.
That’s a relationship we love to cultivate, meeting folks face to face at farmers’ markets, welcoming them to the farm, and growing a wide variety of food that people are excited to cook for their families.
The Hands Behind the Harvest
Family farms are night-and-day different from corporate operations. Siblings Ann and John grew up on Elmwood Stock Farm, farming with their parents, Cecil and Kay Bell. Ann and Mac Stone met at a farming conference right around the time Elmwood was transitioning to a diversified organic farm and soon married. John and his wife, Melissa Bell, live on the farm, too, and are raising their children here—the seventh generation of family farmers. But taking care of Elmwood and our community takes a whole crew.
