Luke and Terri Erb’s family business, Erb’s Farm and Flower, offers more than just plants and flowers.
Together with son Ezra Erb, the couple desires to instill in youngsters the love of growing. Erb Farm is a big supporter of the Bonduel School District garden, hosting June summer-school field trips annually.
The busy morning is full of activity.
Erb’s divide the youngsters into groups, with Ezra Erb explaining to them about chickens, poultry and baby geese. Luke Erb explains the ins and outs of bees and beef cattle. In the greenhouse, Terri Erb helps the young visitors pot up a plant and discusses heat, light, pest control and fertilizer; the basics of growing things.
“Far too many kids don’t understand where their food comes from or what plants there are,” said Terri Erb. “I feel that deeply ingrained in us, and that people don’t even realize that we’ve been missing, is a God-given connection to nature, the earth and spending time outdoors — that we just need to change some things that we’re doing as a society.”
On May 16-17, Erb Farm is holding its annual spring open house, calling it a customer appreciation event.
“My whole family comes to help. My daughters run the gift shop and my sister and I run the greenhouse,” said Terri Erb. “We offer free food both days in our little milkhouse, where my husband and dad serve the food and visit with people. It’s a fun, busy weekend. The kids have their own door-prize table and we put together little treat bags full of goodies for them.”
Also offered is an adult door-prize table with Terri Erb giving everyone their own unique flower and vegetable plant, partially in the hopes that she will get feedback on those unique samplings. Gardeners take them home to try and later, let her know how they fared.
Ezra Erb’s role is to monitor everything and fill in where needed, with general labor. He also raises Sebastopol geese, which have curly feathers.
“They have a unique gene — long, flowing feathers, kind of like angels’ wings,” said Ezra Erb. “They’re very chatty and personable, people enjoy seeing them out there. I also tend to a variety of chickens and we sell farm-fresh eggs, which come in a rainbow of colors.”
With a deep interest and appreciation in growing things, the Erbs were dairy farmers when their place went the way of a lot of small farms. Being a fourth-generation farm, their desire was to stay at the farm.
“My husband told me do what you always wanted to do, so we broke ground in December 2020 to start building our greenhouse and by the following April we’d grown a full crop in the greenhouse,” Terri Erb said. “We finished and put together the shop — all situated in the area which used to be the medium-age calf pen — and opened up.”
Along with family trials and happy times, including the emotional aspect of saying goodbye to the cows, the entire family helped plant.
“Working alongside family — especially that first traumatic year — planting together was bonding and a grieving release, which is very therapeutic,” Terri Erb said. “March, with the snow and cold outside but cozy and warm in the greenhouse, makes us feel extremely grateful and happy this is what we’re doing now.”
Terri Erb credits her faith helping her along, especially after the family sold the cows and branched out into the greenhouse and shop.
“God has his hand on us, absolutely — walking ahead in blind faith, knowing in my heart this is what I wanted to do,” Terri Erb said. “When an industry like farming completely reshapes itself, despite my husband being a man of traditional, stick-through-the-hard-times farmer guy, it wasn’t a matter of toughing out a few years. We needed to make a change.”
Terri Erb appreciates the support from surrounding communities and customers.
“They come in as new people and eventually become friends,” she said. “Beyond just having a customer purchase plants from us, our goal is for everyone to become very successful with their growing and not to feel that they don’t have a green thumb. We’re so happy to answer questions and to guide them.”
Everything Erb Farm and Flower carries has been heavily researched. Erb spends winters pouring over trial garden results, new introductions and evaluating things for ease of growing and reliability.
In January, Erb posts plant previews and pictures on their Facebook page, commenting on what’s unique about them. Customers peruse the posts during the winter, looking forward to spring. The visitors come in with an actual shopping list.
“Whether they’re just a little bitty gardener or an extravagant gardener, we love it. We’re here for them,” said Erb.
A full greenhouse of starter plants such as herbs, tomatoes, vining vegetables, peppers, cucumbers, kale, lettuce, and strawberries are offered for sale, with plants grown onsite - started from seeds or rooted cuttings - about March 1st. Also for sale are various hanging floral baskets and an extensive selection of unique flower varieties hard to find elsewhere.
The shop is stocked with gardening items such as seeds and seed potatoes, gardening tools and lawn art, but also full of cozy décor, fun finds and jewelry, varying by season.
The greenhouse and seed/gift shop are open 9 a.m. to 6 p.m. daily, 2-7 p.m. Fridays. To contact Erb Farm and Flower, visit them on their Facebook page, call (715) 758-6353 or email terb54107@yahoo.com.
A variety of vegetables and a unique range of flowers and hanging baskets are offered for sale at Erb Farm and Flower. The farm’s annual spring open house/customer appreciation event will be held May 16-17. (Kay Reminger)
