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The cranberry is one of only three cash crops native to the United States, and northern Wisconsin boasts one of its largest ranges of habitat. John Stauner, owner of James Lake Cranberry Farms, believes cranberries’ natural suitability to the environment in the Northwoods is a good reason to grow the fruit organically.

A vice president at Northland Cranberries for 20 years, Stauner saw an opportunity to start his own growing operation when Northland began to sell its marshes. Having been involved with growing the fruit through conventional means, he decided to take on the challenge of growing without chemical fertilizers and pesticides. Of the 250 cranberry growers in Wisconsin, Stauner knows of only five who grow organically.

“When we looked at this property, we didn’t have the ability to expand and it wasn’t going to be the most efficient property,” Stauner said. “So we wanted to increase the value per acre and growing organic was one way to do that.”

The oldest growing bed at James Lake Farm was planted in 1950. In order to establish his farm as an organic producer, Stauner had to go through a strict certification process that involved waiting 36 months before he could produce organic fruit. Losing two seasons is not something most growers are willing to do, especially as the price of cranberries has remained high in recent years.

The decision to grow organic cranberries was not purely economic. Stauner said he loves the challenge of growing organic berries as well as the knowledge that he is preserving a wetland habitat in an environmentally responsible way.

But growing organically poses problems.

“The biggest challenge is weeds. If it’s a well-established canopy the weeds generally aren’t a huge factor, but long-term, weed pressure will remain one of our challenges,” Stauner said.

In order to control weeds, Stauner’s team employs a number of strategies that include extensive hand-weeding, spraying vinegar solutions, and regularly applying sand to the beds in winter.

“We develop strategies base on the weed species and target them at certain times during their growing process,” Stauner said.

Pests are also a problem, but Stauner thrives on the challenge of using his integrated pest management system to protect the plants. It’s one aspect of the closed circle approach to land husbandry that he feels makes organic farming such an important practice.

“I love the independence. I love the challenge of trying to grow organically,” Stauner said. “It makes you think out of the box and it makes you a better grower. We have to be much more ahead of the curve with the pest population because we don’t have that spray to save us.”

Because cranberries are a native crop, a number of pests have evolved with them over time, making them particularly well-adapted to annoying the plants, but the cranberries are also well-suited to surviving the winter. After harvest, when the first cold snap arrives, Stauner’s team floods the marshes, encasing the beds in a layer of ice that keep them safe from wind and frost until spring.

Stauner and his wife and partner Nora, employ 27 people during harvest time. Many of his seasonal laborers come to him by way of the Teaching Drum School, an outdoor school located nearby that focuses on native principles of ecology. But Jim Shepley, a local man whose father-in-law used to own the farm, and other locals are the backbone of the staff.

“We get an interesting mix of people. We have people who have worked the harvest for more than 20 years,” Stauner said.

During the growing season, the staff contracts to three salaried and six hourly employees. Farm managers Jacob and Ruth Searles run the day-to-day operation.

The farm, which is approximately 1500 acres, cultivates around 60 acres of berries. Cranberries are a water intensive crop that require between five and ten acres of wetland for every acre of cultivated berries. The berries use water for growing, for harvest, and for winter protection from frost.

Harvesting cranberries is a labor-intensive process. The beds are first flooded and then a machine with rotating rods is driven over them to dislodge the berries from the plants. Once all of the berries have floated to the surface, they are corralled and hand-raked towards a machine which lifts them out of the water and deposits them into gravity bins. The gravity bins are then driven back to the processing warehouse.

Processing the berries is a multi-step process. First the chaff is removed by blowers, then the berries are pressure washed and dried. When the berries are dry, they are conveyed along an automated line for sorting. The sorting line employs technology developed in 1923 alongside technology developed in 2007 to ensure the quality of James Lakes’ fruit.

The Bailey Mill used on by Stauner’s crew was most likely built in the 1930’s. The wood sorting machine operates on the principle that good fruit bounces and bad fruit does not. It’s like a giant wood plinko board. Stauner said the machine is still the best way to sort out bad fruit quickly.

After the fruit goes through the Bailey Mill it is sorted for size and then it passes through a state-of-the-art scanner that actually sorts by color. Thousands of berries pass through the color scanner per minute and the machine reacts to Stauner’s color settings and removes berries that are too green or white. Finally the berries are hand-sorted on the line and then conveyed into 1,200-pound cardboard bins. When 35 bins are full, a truck arrives from Green Bay and hauls them to a freezer. Nearly all of James Lake’s berries are sold at market as dried, sweetened cranberries.

Stauner said the demand for organic cranberries is expanding.

“Because supply is limited, there is a real demand for the fruit,” Stauner said. “I could sell four times as much as I grow, and that’s a good thing.”

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