Once they had their first child, Molly and Jesse Jimerson knew they wanted to raise their family on a farm. Molly had dabbled in agriculture as a young adult but took a different pathway after college. Jesse was a skilled carpenter and mechanic. Living in Nevada, they were growing weary of wildfires putting Jesse out of work for weeks on end.
“We both knew that farming was something we could tackle together, and we started looking for ideas. Should we do livestock? Should we do produce? And we spent a couple years noodling over a bunch of ideas. Then we looked at Christmas tree farming and decided that was where we were going to jump in,” said Molly.
The pair had the opportunity to purchase Piper Mountain Farm in the central Maine town of Newburgh. Started by the Corliss family in 1978, the Corlisses sold the farm in 2019 to a retiring Navy commander, but he quickly flipped the 200-acre property with its 30 acres of Christmas trees to Molly and Jesse.
Arriving from Nevada in spring 2022, the pair hit the ground running and added 3,500 four-year-old Balsam firs from Downey Tree Farm & Nursery in Quebec. The vast majority of the standing trees were Balsam fir, with a spattering of older Frazer and Korean firs, so they stuck with the status quo. They currently have about 25,000 trees in the ground.
All of their trees are sited on a south-facing slope in 17 blocks with a town road dividing the fields. The western side is larger, with rows running east and west perpendicular to the slope. The eastern side is wetter. While the soil retains more moisture, it also promotes root rot.
With this growing understanding of the nuances of the landscape and soil conditions, they are prioritizing removing trees from these wet sections in anticipation of transitioning those blocks to pumpkins or perhaps a U-cut gladiola or mixed cut flower fields.
While they do have diversification ambitions, the couple is primarily focused on improving their soil and incorporating organic practices with the goal of growing colorful, aromatic trees for their U-cut operation. The pair are Maine Organic Farmers & Gardeners Association Journeypersons in a two-year program offering technical assistance and business planning for new farmers.
In 2023, Jesse mixed 50 lbs. of clover seed with sand in a cement mixer and gravity spread it onto a half-acre seedling block. “That block is doing very well. I did not spray it this year, but I just kept trimming down the clover,” he said.
He stopped mowing at the end of September to increase its chances of coming back in spring. If he had the resources, Jesse would like to replicate this cover cropping strategy on all of the blocks, selecting different legumes based on soil type and conditions. He would also like to find a more suitable spreader for the blocks with more mature trees because the seed tends to bounce off the mature trees rather than disperse in a predictable pattern.
Insecticides are currently not used at Piper Mountain. An Extension agent recently pointed out some hemlock wooly adelgid (HWA) infestation in about 50 trees. Jesse’s strategy is to remove these trees during the stagnant part of their lifecycle when the pest is burrowed into the tree.
Four generations of Maine families have been coming to Piper Mountain for their Christmas trees. Now, the Jimerson family are raising their next generation on the farm. Photo courtesy of Molly Jimerson
Last spring, Jesse removed some of the diseased trees before the HWA emerged and then burned the trees. He also plans to girdle some of the trees because research shows that when a tree is girdled, the pest dies along with the dying tree.
“I don’t want to use pesticides because not only is it a headache to have to learn every angle about using it and the dangers – I just would prefer to leave it be and do more mechanical or better practices,” he said.
By focusing on mowing, Molly and Jesse are also working to reduce herbicide use. They use a B2320 narrow Kubota with a four-foot bush hog. It takes about a week for Jesse to mow the 30 acres of trees. Since the land is hilly and there are small trees interplanted with larger ones, he needs to move slowly and methodically. He has his eye on a Ventrac mower and also dreams of fabricating a more efficient mower that would work on the hilly terrain and allow him to quickly finesse his way around each tree.
“Where some old school growers might chastise me for not doing what I could do to get the fields sprayed, I’m finding a lot of benefit from not spraying,” Jesse said. Specifically, he said that the color of the trees is much more vibrant than it was a few years ago.
While they are spraying less, because the majority of their business is U-cut eliminating herbicide use is not practical from a customer experience. “It’d be a bit crowded with the plants that would be joining our Christmas trees,” joked Jesse. This season, they anticipate selling about 2,000 trees; 90% will be U-cut and 10% pre-cut.
Wreaths are also an important component of the business – wholesale, retail and online. During the 2023-24 season, they shipped wreaths to every state except Kentucky and Wyoming. Total wreath sales are usually around 3,000 per season with tips coming from Piper Mountain as well as being purchased.
Demand for their U-cut in central Maine is strong. Molly and Jesse also benefit from the customer base the original owners helped to establish dating back to the late 1970s, and they said that the Piper Mountain tradition extends four generations in some customers’ cases. Horse-drawn sleigh rides, a food truck, cider and donuts and a well-curated gift store also help to draw in customers.
“Tons of people always lets us know how many years they’ve been coming and how they just can’t have Christmas without their Piper Mountain tree … We’re trying to make everything really family friendly,” Molly said.
And with a young family themselves – they now have two children – the Jimersons are eager to curate memorable family memories for their customers.
by Sonja Heyck-Merlin
