Clay Bottom Farm

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Goshen, IN
Clay Bottom Farm

We are a CSA farm in Goshen, Indiana. Home of the The Lean Farm. WWW.CLAYBOTTOMFARM.COM WWW. The farm has twice won Edible Michiana’s Reader’s Choice award.

Lean Book: https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Farm-Minimize-Increase-Efficiency/dp/1603585923 Ben Hartman and Rachel Hershberger own and operate Clay Bottom Farm in Goshen, Indiana, where they make their living growing and selling specialty crops on less than one acre. Their food is sold locally to restaurants and cafeterias, at a farmers market, and through a community-supported-agriculture (CSA) progra

m. The Lean Farm, Ben’s first book, won the Shingo Institute’s prestigious Research and Professional Publication Award. Link to Lean Farm Book: https://www.amazon.com/Lean-Farm-Minimize-Increase-Efficiency/dp/1603585923/ref=pd_lpo_sbs_14_img_0?_encoding=UTF8&psc=1&refRID=2DXZY6EGVAFEH3XZHYT2

10/02/2025

Air-pruned spinach. Air-pruned plugs—where the roots are pruned by exposure to oxygen—take off faster than plugs whose roots are bound and twisted. We transplanted this spinach, and Bridger onions, cilantro, kale, turnips, and lettuce yesterday in the winter greenhouse. Bring on some cold! 🙂 I’ll do deep dive on air pruning in a free webinar this afternoon (Thursday) 4ET, sponsored by . Hope you can join. Link in bio.

09/30/2025

We’ve been experimenting this fall with Japanese non-chain paperpots. We are getting some of the nicest transplants I’ve ever grown. As the final pic shows, the bottoms are completely open, so they air prune perfectly—no bound up roots, even on large/old plants. I’ll be giving a free webinar Thursday on how we use paper pots—plus a farm tour—this Thursday at 4EST. You can sign up on the website. See you then!
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Details for growers:
—The non-chain pots ship compressed, with options for 50, 72, 128-cell flats
—They open easily, and fill quickly.
—We use them now for widely spaced crops like kale and for home garden transplants. I plan to use the 50-cell option for spring tomatoes.
—They’re faster for me to transplant than standard plugs because I don’t have to wrestle plants out of plastic flats.

09/18/2025

Garden view, September 18, northern Indiana.

09/09/2025

As an experiment, I grew spinach through the heat of August, under a burlap shade cloth. Success (mostly)! Today it’s ready to harvest. The burlap cooled the area by as much as 11 degrees F on hot afternoons. Here are some details for growers:
—The burlap is 7oz weight from
—It is roughly equivalent to a 50% shade cloth, but superior because it stays wetter longer into the day—it holds onto dew well, as a natural (jute) fiber material.
—Additionally, I misted with line for 5-7 minutes four times each afternoon.
—On a few beds I lost about 10-20% of plants when I removed the shade cloth too early. Best to keep it on until/unless the daytime highs are mid-70s, I learned.
—This worked for both paper pot transplanted spinach and direct seeded.
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Looking to start a micro farm? I’m taking consultations this winter and my online course sale month is coming up in October. Happy fall gardening!

08/20/2025

For the first time, we are growing all summer/fall starts inside, in grow tents, so that our plants are sturdy and not heat-stressed. A few details for growers:
—these tents are Walden by ActiveGrow
—room is cooled to 72f with a mini split
—the last pic shows our paper pot cheat sheet
—most of these starts are paper pots, see my YouTube trainings if you want a deep dive on paper pots

08/06/2025

To reduce plastic waste, we are replacing poly shade cloth with rolls of 7oz burlap. So far, I love it. In my trials this summer, the burlap keeps conditions a few degrees cooler than traditional shade cloth (seen on the far left). It lays flat. I keep it pinned with a few sandbags. I bought our rolls from . Thanks to for helping to sponsor my research on burlap. Each week this fall I’m releasing a video on YouTube that takes a deeper dive into how we are replacing synthetics on the farm. Check it out.

07/26/2025

“Never drive by a farmers market again. Go in and support humanity.” —Neil Young

07/21/2025

More gardening without plastic: This summer I’ve been experimenting using burlap rolls as germination blankets, to replace poly alternatives (like row cover, landscape fabric, etc.). In short, it works brilliantly. Here I’ve convinced cool-season lettuce to germinate in the heat of late July. Here are some details:
—For best results, water your seedbed well before you place the burlap.
—I’ve achieved best results with the thicker 10oz burlap. This lays very flat and keeps the soil under consistently wet and cooler, while allowing oxygen and some light to filter through.
—Remove the blanket within 48 hours of germination to prevent leggy plants. Let plants enjoy fun in the sun!

07/16/2025

Here’s how I grow jumbo-sized shallots:
1. Start from seed March 1, transplant April 10 (zone 5b). I use paper chains to space them 4” apart. Conservor variety.
2. Shallots (and onions) are water storage vessels. I irrigate, just a little, daily, so the soil around the roots never dries out.
3. Harvest just when tops start to fall over, then cure in a dry place. Here they’re with our Bridger onions in the garage. Both keep well into winter and often through spring.

07/01/2025

Happy July 4 tomatoes! Marcelino proudly holds up a box of vine-ripened heritage tomatoes. Available all around town More details for growers:
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—Last season we planted dozens of varieties. For 2025, we chose the top three, to focus on: Abigail, Margold, Harvest Moon, plus Clementine and as a cherry.
—These are all grown with simple tall stake-and-weave trellising. No lean-and-lower, roller hooks/clips, qlipr, or other such systems this year, to save time. Managed chaos is the goal.

06/19/2025

Gardening without Plastic: This season we replaced our poly trellis netting with this jute alternative, suspended with bamboo, for cucumbers. This netting should decompose in the compost heap, alongside the cucumber plants, at the end of the season. Bamboo we cut locally. We sourced net from

06/17/2025

My next experiment in gardening without plastic is to use burlap as a replacement for landscaping fabric as a ground cover. Here I’ve put Thai basil into 10oz burlap. My tests this spring in the greenhouse showed that burlap effectively stops more than 90% of the weeds (grass will grow through), without the downsides of plastic. Burlap is easier to manage due to its weight—I just needed a few landscape staples. As seen in the pics, I cut small T’s with a scissors to create an opening for the plants. We buy from Jake Katz at Max Katz bag company in Indy. This is one of the few places that will certify untreated burlap, with good prices.

Address

340 Hackett Road
Goshen, IN
46528

Telephone

+15745388741

Website

http://www.claybottomfarm.com/

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