Hope Amidst the Ashes

It's now been a little over 48 hours since Jen and I were roused by a frantic knocking on our door--2 days since a stranger announced "Your barn is on fire!" and 2 days since I saw the flames engulfing the the north side of our barn for the first time. That image and those words continue to haunt me, and while that night was one of the worst of my life, the ensuing 36 hours have managed to fill my heart with hope and love for the people around me.

Credit Scott Terell and the Skagit Valley Herald: we were in no shape to be taking pictures that night. link to the story: http://www.goskagit.com/news/local_news/bow-barn-burns-tuesday-night/article_3e125612-b218-11e4-8db5-73814bdd6309.html

The purpose of this post is give you an idea of where we will go from here. We've received an outpouring of support from friends, neighbors, and family members wanting to help us. Neither Jen nor I feel very comfortable at the thought of charity, but it didn't take us very long to realize that we were going to need help. Many people have suggested we do some sort of fundraiser, and after giving it some thought, we think that it makes sense given our financial situation. For instance, before even considering the costs of clean-up and rebuilding, we currently have $1000 of debt to repay tied to our recent investment in rabbits.

The last of the animals to leave the farm.

Firstly, we are grateful to Samish Bay Cheese for graciously offering to house our surviving livestock.  Roger, Suzanne, and Jim have been incredible, offering their time and equipment to allow us to trailer our pigs and steers to their farm and to help us set up housing. Although we lost one litter of pigs (one of our sows was farrowing when the fire began), our two other pregnant sows now have a safe dry place to farrow. We set up farrowing stalls today (and just in the nick of time, as the pig in the foreground below was going into labor when I checked on them this evening).

Now that are animals are safe, we can finally relax a bit. Tomorrow the insurance adjuster comes to view the rubble and give us their verdict. We are not confident the insurance will cover much of the damage. We had $16,000 of coverage on the barn after the $2000 deductible, but after reading the policy more closely, we are unsure if any of the structural damage will be covered because of "business use." Our farm is our lifestyle, and it is impossible for us to completely separate personal use of our buildings from farm use, especially when the barn was only 100 feet from our hose. Ironically, we were in the process of updating to a farm umbrella insurance policy for the entire property, although our main concern was always liability rather than property damage. Our hope is that our contents coverage will help us recoup some of cost of the non-farm equipment that was lost, but we face a $2000 deductible on that as well.

We are also faced with a major clean up effort that may be further complicated by what the fire marshals thought was asbestos tile siding. We have already been contacted by a local construction company who has offered to donate some of their time, but we are wary of the potential cost of cleanup of hazardous waste.

Jen and I feel strongly that we want to rebuild a new barn on the site. While it will never be able to match the size and aesthetic beauty of our treasured 1940's barn, we think a modest pole building will allow us to start over. We have done a bit of asking around and we anticipate a new structure will cost between $20,000 - $40,000. We have been told that we can have the structure of the barn professionally built and then finish the siding and roofing ourselves. To that end, we we want to have a barn raising party this summer. So many people have offered their help, and we think it will be fitting to involve the community that has supported us so lovingly over the last few days.

Generic pole barn pulled from the internet

Going forward, it's difficult for us to arrive at clarity as to what we want the farm to be in the future. The thought of raising rabbits again is very sad, and it may make the most sense for us to sell our pig herd. We have been working over the last few years to slowly build the capacity to ramp up our production of animals for meat, and now suddenly that capacity is gone. We still have the investment we made in organic garlic in the ground, and we fully intend to cultivate and harvest that crop this year (whether we have a place to dry, store, and process it is a question for June). What we do know is that we love farming, we love our community, and we are committed to the idea of healthy, humanely raised food. We want to continue to work toward nurturing that idea for the rest of our lives. Thank you all so much.

If you would like to support us in our efforts to rebuild please check out our fundraising page (www.gofundme.com/thoughtfulfood). Please continue to follow us on Facebook and on the Thoughtful Food website as we will do our best to keep everyone posted on our rebuilding progress and as our plans evolve.