The Farm
Growing a Model Regenerative Community Farm
At our 42-acre farm in the heart of the island, we grow an abundance of food for our community year-round while supporting environmental health and resilience. Our farm system includes a 12 acre rotation of vegetable, grain, and forage crops, a 30,000 square foot greenhouse, a pastured poultry program, a diversified perennial orchard, and a community garden.
We donate the food we grow to islanders in need of food support, and offer summer and winter produce shares through our Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. Each year, we bring more than 1,000 visitors to the farm to help with the harvest and to learn about regenerative farming.
Our regenerative growing practices enhance soil health and nurture life on the land, and we partner with regional and national researchers and farming organizations to hone and share our model.
What is regenerative agriculture?
The goal of regenerative agriculture is to develop growing systems that mimic the natural ecological processes around us as closely as possible.
At the Island Grown Farm, we break down our practices into five key principles. Though we talk about them individually, all of these principles weave together.
Research, Innovations and Collaborations
As a nonprofit farm, we have the opportunity to innovate in ways that would be risky for commercial farms. Each season we strive to learn new methods, develop new tools that strengthen soil health, biodiversity, and productivity, and make the adoption of regenerative farming practices more practical and accessible to other farms in our region and beyond.
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American Farmland Trust Farmer Led Innovations: IGI designed and built an innovative strip tiller for planting crops directly into mulch and shared field trial results with regional farmers in a reduced tillage cohort. Several farms have replicated the strip tiller design and for use on their own farms.
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Momentum Ag Healthy Soils Challenge Grant: IGI was one of 10 New England farms testing the Clover Living Mulch (CLM) planting system in field trials shared with the farmer cohort.
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University of New Hampshire ADAPT Agroforestry study: field trials in the IGI orchard generating research-based recommendations to address challenges and opportunities for Food Forest design and adoption in New England.
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We are embarking on a 3-year Adaptive Management trial comparing crops grown in Clover Living Mulch (CLM) plus biochar vs. conventional tillage to measure soil health, moisture retention, compaction, yield, and economic impacts.
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A three-year pilot project developed by the Betsy and Jesse Fink Family Foundation, Martha’s Vineyard Pollinator Pathways brought together the scientific expertise of BiodiversityWorks and pollinator Ecologist Molly Jacobson of SUNY’s College of Environmental Science and Forestry with the commitment of eight Island farms, including Island Grown Farm, to regenerative farming practices. The project assessed the roles farms play in supporting pollinators – and developed actionable recommendations for how farms could do even more to support insect populations.
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A comprehensive guide for identifying, creating and maintaining functionally diverse habitat on farmscapes across Martha's Vineyard, to support native bee, butterfly and moth species at the greatest risk of local extinction. A year-long collaboration between IGI and Landscape Interactions, this Toolkit endeavors to make pollinator habitat creation easy and beneficial to the function of the whole farm system — inspiring landowners and land managers to view their properties as integral parts of a network of ecosystems that stretches into surrounding communities and across the wider region.
This work was made possible with support from The Betsy and Jesse Fink Family Foundation.
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Get Involved
CSA
Enjoy fresh, seasonal produce while supporting local agriculture through our Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) program. Flexible share sizes and sliding-scale pricing make it easy to bring home vegetables grown at the IGI Farm from summer through winter.
Community Garden
Grow your own food alongside fellow Islanders in our Community Garden at the IGI Farm. With 45 organic garden plots available to rent, gardeners of all ages and experience levels cultivate fresh produce while connecting with a supportive community.
