When new Iowa Learning Farms farmer partner Wendy Johnson left Iowa as a young adult, she knew that her fate rested outside of an agricultural career. No one was more surprised than her that she was wrong. Today she is 12 years back on the farm and a leading voice on regenerative agriculture which she demonstrates on her diverse organic farm in Northeast Iowa.
Wendy grew up outside of Charles City with parents and grandparents that farmed. When she left Iowa she was looking for new experiences that were far removed from her farm upbringing. In 2010, she returned to Iowa with a goal of reconnecting with her agricultural heritage. Wendy and her husband John started Jóia Food Farm where they farm holistically and implement new conservation ideas. In addition, Wendy co-manages the family’s farm, Center View Farms Co, with her father.
It is an interest in the food system, how food is produced and grown, and its impact on the environment that motivated Wendy’s return to the farm. “I felt like I needed to be a part of it. Not just an outside person watching it. I could have some impact and be part of the food system and its potential change,” commented Wendy.
When she moved back to the farm, it was difficult to find other farmers that were thinking like she was. She joined Practical Farmers of Iowa and found a community with farmers across Iowa implementing conservation practices, focusing on local food and being resources for new farmers like her. She originally farmed organic row crops but decided to rotate the land to pasture for soil health and water quality and drainage concerns. Wendy has also helped to expand conservation practices on her family’s farm, a much larger traditional row-crop farm, to become more sustainable and regenerative by implementing 100% no-till, adding cover crops, and reducing costly inputs.
Jóia Food Farm is now certified organic and certified Animal Welfare Approved with grass-fed sheep and lamb, pigs, broiler chickens, turkeys, and a few goats and cattle. Products are sold direct to consumers. Wendy also custom grazes other people’s cattle to help regenerate the land and build organic matter. With a lot of emphasis placed on agroforestry, Wendy is developing silvopasture on her land through the integration of trees and grazing livestock on the same landscape. The pastures have a wide variety of grasses for the animals as well as a diversity of trees and shrubs including fruit and nut types. Practicing adaptive management grazing by moving the sheep and cattle daily, Wendy is able to maintain a vibrant and species diverse pasture. The pasture paddock size changes depending on the time of year, rain, and flora type.
Wendy describes herself as a beginner farmer always learning and enjoys the physical and mental challenges of farming. Wendy hopes for more diverse markets to grow in Iowa, which in turn would lead to more diversity in the landscape. “There are always problems to solve and you’re constantly learning, so your mind is just always being used in different ways,” said Wendy, “Farming, and agriculture in general, is an ongoing learning occupation in which one can never be stagnant.”
Protecting Iowa’s rich soil and educating others on its value as a natural resource is her privilege as a farmland owner but also her responsibility. A fate she wholeheartedly embraces. Young Wendy probably would be shocked by the answer she recently gave to a question of what she would want to do if she could do one thing every day for the rest of her life. Wendy responded, “I want and hope to continue caring for the land and the valuable natural resources we have in Iowa like our soil and water.”
Iowa Learning Farms 