Meet the Growers

“It’s something you say you won’t do and then you miss it when you’re away from it.” That’s what the general manager at Felix Zeloski’s Farm in Eagle River says of farming. A native of Wisconsin’s Northwoods and hailing from Irma, Ron Krueger grew up on his parent’s dairy farm. When he left for college to pursue a business degree at the University of Wisconsin-Stevens Point, he said he would never farm again. Little did he know that life had other plans.

Brothers Richard and Roderick Gumz formed Gumz Muck Farms, LLC in 1994 and are the fourth generation of Gumz family farmers. They grow, store and pack red potatoes and yellow globe onions for retail sale. The Gumz brothers raise red potatoes, carrots, field corn, soybeans and mint on 6,000 acres in three Wisconsin counties — Marquette, Columbia and Sauk.

RPE has been around since the ’60s. Started by the Wysocki brothers, RPE continues to be a family business — and one that holds itself to a higher standard as both a Healthy Grown® grower and shipper (Healthy Grown shippers must be certified annually). Why bother with the extra work involved with sustainability? Answers Russell, “We’re stewards of the land — and this is our opportunity to do good things for the land and good things for the industry.”

Nick comes from a family of farmers — he’s third-generation — but is now the only remaining family member who is a farmer. Together, he and his wife share responsibility for their 3,500-acre Wisconsin potato and vegetable farm, 400 of the potato acres are Healthy Grown certified. A member of Healthy Grown from its inception, Nick can appreciate how far the sustainable growing program has come. “It was a long process.”

Larry was raised on a family-owned dairy farm in Wisconsin — so you’d think farming would have been a natural career choice for Larry. In fact, it wasn’t. After completing college he set off on his own and became a CPA. Enter a series of life-changing events — events that brought Larry back to agriculture and a partnership in a small produce business that repackaged potatoes and onions.

Coloma Farms is a study of innovation and tradition — a 2,700-acre sustainable farm run by third and fourth generation growers, Steve and Andy Diercks. Steve grew up on a potato farm near Antigo, Wisconsin. He moved with his father, Robert, to the Central Sands Plains region in Coloma, Wisconsin, where they developed a great working relationship with the University of Wisconsin (UW) potato researchers — part of the first stages leading to the development of Healthy Grown®.

Bet you didn’t know this. One of Wisconsin’s Healthy Grown potato growers — Justin Isherwood — is an accomplished author. He is a man with a talent for words. So when you ask Justin about the importance of Healthy Grown and a farmer’s responsibility to the land and people, he is quite eloquent. “There has always been an ethic to the land, a righteousness to seek that balance of the economics of the field and woods, that sacred honor of keeping land well and productive,” he notes.