People who have never driven it call Iowa flat. Drive an hour south of Des Moines and it stops being flat — the last glacier quit right about where the city sits, and everything below that line is older, rougher ground that never got ironed out.
That line does the sorting on this page. North and in town is the Des Moines Lobe, the black-dirt plain the ice left behind. West is the Raccoon River country out through Dallas and Madison counties, where the orchards are. South and southeast is the drift plain — hills, timber and pasture, and the kind of farming that goes with them.
One ring so far, drawn about an hour out from Des Moines, and it never leaves the state — there is no state line within an hour of that city in any direction. 10 farms in it, every one read off its own website or Facebook page before it went in.
A ring is drawn by drive time, not by county line. This one reaches Nevada going northeast and Chariton going south — and a farm carries the country it’s actually in, not the country of the city it’s near.
And the standing rule, on every page of this thing: call or check their own page before you drive out.
The black-dirt plain the last glacier laid down and quit on. Des Moines sits on it, Story County runs out flat to the northeast, and the two farms up here are both places you pick from — apples inside the city limits at Urbandale, and about every berry that will grow in this state out at Nevada.
One ring so far, and it starts here — drawn an hour out from the city in every direction it makes sense to drive.
The ring is named for Des Moines because that’s the drive people are measuring. Only two of its 10 farms are on this ground; the rest are west and south of it.
All three are in the ring above. All three are also the reason people drive west out of Des Moines on a Saturday in the fall.
Dallas County ground along the Raccoon, and the Madison County farmland that runs south off it. It is the orchard end of this ring and the creamery end both — apples at Adel, bottled milk at Woodward, vegetables and garlic at Earlham.
The older, rougher half of the state, south of where the ice stopped: hills, timber, creeks and pasture. Five farms down here, and the mix tells you what the ground is good for — grass, livestock, evergreens and pumpkins rather than row after row of orchard.
Two of these sit at the far edge of the hour or a touch past it. Blue Gate is farther still, down at Chariton — it stays in because it drives into Des Moines every Saturday in season.
Farming Marion, Warren, Lucas or Madison and not on this page? Tell us who to call.
Nothing here yet. The ridge of wind-blown soil that runs the whole west edge of the state is its own kind of ground and its own kind of farming, and we haven’t read enough of it to write it down. Council Bluffs and Sioux City in their turn.
Farm out on the hills? Send us your place and you’ll be in the first batch.
Also empty, and it’s the corner of this state we most want to get to — the driftless country up around Decorah and the dairy ground either side of it, where the ice never came at all. Cedar Rapids, Dubuque and Decorah when we get there.
Know the country up there? Tell us who to call.
Every farm on this page is here because somebody read its own words and wrote them down. If that’s your farm and we got something wrong — or if you’re not on here at all — we want to hear from you. No fee, no ads, no catch.