‘Crop Mob’ takes over Triangle

About eighty people spent their Sunday with their feet in the mud, shoveling and digging rice paddies on a farm that wasn’t theirs.

The crowd was participating in the latest Crop Mob event at Edible Earthscapes farm in Moncure, about 25 miles south of Chapel Hill.

The movement, which originated in the Triangle, gathers people interested in agriculture and sends them on mass farming missions.

What is a ‘Crop Mob’?

A crop mob is a group of people from the Triangle who gather together to work and learn together on a farm. Anyone can participate in the crop mob project. No money is exchanged.

No fertilizers or pesticides are used. Participants work together on a sustainable farm and share a meal at the end of the day.

For more information,
visit cropmob.org or e-mail info@cropmob.org.

The mobs provide much-needed help for owners of labor-intensive small farms that typically don’t use machinery, fertilizer or pesticides.

“We hear all the time that crop mobs are farmers taking advantage of free labor,” said Kristin Henry, who works full time on Circle Acres farm in Silk Hope. “But it is more about knowing where your food comes from. People are so disconnected with the food they eat.”

The nearly 80 crop mobbers at Sunday’s event was the most the group had ever recorded. The practice surged in popularity after The New York Times featured the group in an article Wednesday.

Many who showed up weren’t farmers by trade. They were students, physical therapists, activists, educators, waitresses and chemical engineers.

But they all said they wanted to get closer to nature and to feel more connected with the food they eat.

Haruka Oatis and her husband, Jason, owners of Edible Earthscapes, had the mobbers help them make rice paddies in their large, dry-grass field.

Dozens of crop mobbers shoveled out mud to make the paddies even and slapped the walls to pack the soil down, leaving them to dry in the sun. Two hours later, the vaguely delineated parcels had turned into defined rice paddies, ready for planting in a few months.

First-time participant David Hayes said he recently became interested in agriculture.

“I’m concerned by the fact that we see so few farms here and that the majority of the agriculture is so unhealthy,” he said.

Crop Mob doesn’t charge for the farmwork, but the hosting farm owners offered dinner and snacks to the participants.

Sarah Carr, a dreadlocked UNC-Chapel Hill English graduate student, said Sunday was her second time participating.

“The first time I pulled out some nasty invasive grass,” she said.

Participant Link Shumaker, who holds a master’s degree in chemical engineering, brews his own bio-diesel to fuel his car and heats his cabin — which doesn’t have electricity — with wood.

“I make less than $5,000 a year, and I have never been happier,” he said.

Contact the City Editor at citydesk@unc.edu.