The pumpkin patch started in 2000. Cooley and a friend grew 10 acres of pumpkins for a wholesale buyer, but when the price offered suddenly dropped, Cooley told the driver to turn the truck around and bring them back for direct sale at the farm. Cool Patch Pumpkins now features 40 acres of pumpkins, all sold retail, a 43-acre corn maze, as well as a kid zone with go-carts and a hay pyramid. Other activities are a scarecrow contest and a pumpkin smash. Every year, to minimize pests, the pumpkins are rotated with the corn. A big painted hay-bale tractor and bright signs direct the crowds to the farm, right off Interstate 80.

Matt and his brother Mark have created a new maze every year for the last seven years. First they plant field corn on the entire plot, later than for a normal harvest (sweet corn is not tall enough). Then Mark plots the maze map on an Excel spreadsheet on his computer, creating a grid of squares. When the corn has grown to about a foot high, the brothers lay out the grid as 2,000 squares on the field, with flags at the corners of each square. They follow the map to mow 5-foot paths, and print maps to help maze-goers navigate the twists and turns. After the Halloween season, the corn is usually harvested for feed in November. 

 

Inside the maze are three elevated platforms for viewing, named Ford Fortress, Starbucks Station and Ducati Island. Although none of the named companies sponsor the Cooleys, a photo of "Ducati Island" was posted to a motorcycle racing site, which sent 30,000 online visitors to the Cool Patch Pumpkins website.

Cooley says that the maze and pumpkin activities are usually about 10 percent of the farm's annual income. The agritourism operation is very labor-intensive to build and take down, and means hiring an extra 15 to 20 people every weekend as well as a security crew of 8 or 9 for the maze after dark. The first few years the operation lost money, but now it usually makes a profit. Cooley says the trick is to figure out how to get people out to the farm. He says hiring a public relations professional was worth the investment, since resulting newspaper and magazine stories have brought customers from the Bay Area, Sacramento and even Las Vegas.

 

Unfortunately, the windstorm on October 13 destroyed this year's corn maze. Cooley estimates that half of the expected October income is lost, even though the pumpkin patch and other activities are still open.

Pig Races - Vierra bought three cute piglets this year from a local pork producer, and keeps them in a run at the pumpkin patch. He contracts with a local vendor to operate the popular races, and feeds the pigs all the pumpkins they can eat. After Halloween, he'll fatten up the pigs for butchering.

Dave's Pumpkin Patch also offers punkin chunkin (pumpkins shot from a cannon), pony rides (through a contracted vendor) and a hay maze for little kids, as well as a corn maze designed and cut by a company that specializes in this service. Vierra says that all his pumpkin patch and corn maze activities together add up to about 30 percent of his annual income.

 

"It's not for everyone," he says. "It's a whole different mentality."

 

The rest of the year Vierra grows melons, squash, peppers, tomatoes and greens for wholesale and farmers market sales. He reports this has been an average year for pumpkin patch income. There have been more customers than last year, but per-customer spending is down.

Corn bath - Matt Cooley offers a rustic "swimming pool" of shucked corn kernels, perfect for playing and digging in the kids zone at Cool Patch Pumpkins. (Kid zone admission is $3 per child.)

The Hoes Down Harvest Festival at Full Belly Farm in the Capay Valley of Yolo County was 22 years old this year, and those years of experience have grown a well-organized festival rich in authentic rural-urban connections.  This year's festival coordinator was second generation Full Belly farmer Hallie Rivers, daughter of farm owner Dru Rivers.

"It was a great year," said Hallie, "maybe even the biggest." She estimated the paying crowd at 5,000 to 5,500 people ($20, $5 for children), with more people camping overnight than ever before ($20 per car to camp in the walnut orchard). Children and adults learned farm crafts and skills, played, danced, ate, drank, shopped at craft vendors' booths and at the all-organic farmers market, dipped in the river, and toured the 200-acre diversified organic farm on tours led by the farm's four owners.

Hallie was one of less than 10 paid staff members putting on the annual extravaganza. She started as coordinator at half-time in April, with the job becoming full-time for August and September. About 20 community members, many of them Capay Valley farmers, volunteered countless hours organizing the event, and much of the food was donated by local farmers. About 350 volunteers were the main weekend workforce, prepping and serving food, setting up and staffing the popular children's craft and games area, washing thousands of dishes (no disposables here), and everything else needed. Volunteers received free admission and free camping Saturday night. 
 
The Hoes Down Festival is organized as a benefit for the Ecological Farming Association (EFA), which puts on the EcoFarm Conference every January. In addition to EFA, Hoes Down profits benefit agricultural organizations including local FFA, 4-H clubs and Community Alliance with Family Farmers. Equally important as the money is the chance to educate and share.

 

"To walk around and be able to see kids playing, getting to know the animals and learning about the farm, makes me know we're doing the right thing," Hallie said. 
 

 

Illinois, Louisiana, Kansas, North Carolina, Oklahoma, Utah and Virginia have or are considering legislation that limits liability to agritourism operators. The Arkansas Agritourism Initiative has information about these laws. The National Agricultural Law Center has published information about state-based agritourism legislation.

Are you interested in the possibilities for limited liability for agritourism in California? The Small Farm Program will be investigating this issue further. If you are involved in working for limited liability for California agritourism, or are interested in updates on this research, please contact Penny Leff, (530) 752-7779.

Operators often think they can stop the tractor in an accident, especially if the tractor is moving very slowly or no difficult tasks are being performed. The most common comment from people involved in tractor runovers is how quickly they happen.

 

The Childhood Agricultural Safety Network is working to spread the message, "Keep Kids Away From Tractors." Read more about safety and risk management for agritourism.

The UC Small Farm Program has set up an e-mail listserv, hosted by UC Davis, as a simple communication forum for agritourism operators and associations, farm advisors, tourism professionals, county regulators and anyone else involved in the business of agritourism.

The results of the brief survey in the last AgTour Connections newsletter showed that those who answered the survey wanted to communicate with others statewide about agritourism, and also showed that e-mail was the preferred method. We hope you might find the listserv useful for this communication.

 

Please sign up and feel free to use this unmoderated e-mail connection to post your announcements, ask questions of others around the state, or to share your thoughts about any aspect of sharing farms and ranches with visitors for education and enjoyment.