Coan's Dusty Acres Tree Farm
Est.
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2008
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The Farm Rebuild
John and I met at Cummins in 2005 and it has been quite the ride since. To his mom, Deb, and i buying, selling and raising horses, to steers and now Christmas trees. Coan's Dusty Acres has been an official ongoing project since 2008. I wish we had taken more pictures years ago to show the amazing transformation.
We initially started with making hay to sustain our horses, and eventually the steers, and selling what we had extra. We added raising one beef steer for ourselves in 2014. Which in turn, over 10 years, ended up with us raising 14 per year. And in 2017 we started our Christmas tree journey. Which all started when we went to a local tree farm for our first choose and cut as a family.
We, as in the Coan family plus many others, started upgrading things as we could in between working full time at Cummins. Steve (son/brother) started the siding project on the house and we, John and I, started the transformation of the rest of the farm, with help of course from many, many people. Family, friends... we can never say thank you enough ❤.
We pulled out the fence line and started the process of building the Christmas shop area in the spring of 2020. With the help of many, we were able to build the shop, pavilion and get the parking lot squared away to open November 1st of that year. It was a whirlwind year, but well worth it.
On top of all the building and residing of the house etc, Steve spent his time working on our AMAZING light show. Another person we could never thank enough for all the time and help with everything as he has been there with us from the start. He was our muscle to throw hay into the loft before we had elevators, 4000 square bales in one summer, do NOT miss those days. He's helped to load/unload steers. He's helped plant trees and build/fix the things and equipment around the farm, as well as the endless hours of work he does on the light show. He is invaluable to us, as well as many others, with or without the use of his giant cranium. 💕
We look forward to many years of selling trees and helping to make memories for families along the way. All the hard work put in, makes the Christmas season extra special to us and we look forward to creating those special memories for years to come!
Below are some picture slide shows and videos of the farms progress over the years. Each picture/video will play for you. Or you can click on them and shuffle through them as you would like.
Slide show of farm upgrades. Captions under pictures.
This ad from 1927 was found from previous owner looking to trade the farm for a beach front property in Florida. More info in the picture.
This is the front of the house as Steve was working to tear off the siding. Old clap boards under the white aluminum siding.
Fence is in! It looks so much nicer, and the horses have more pasture room again since we took a good portion to build the Christmas shop and parking lot.
This ad from 1927 was found from previous owner looking to trade the farm for a beach front property in Florida. More info in the picture.
Slide show of the Christmas shop build. Captions under pictures.
This picture was taken standing by the barn looking toward the road.
The pasture coming from the house driveway before we started the Christmas shop project.
The end of another fabulous season. We couldn't have done it without these people, and more not included.
This picture was taken standing by the barn looking toward the road.
Slide show of the trees. Captions under pictures.
April 22, 2018 - We planted 500 trees, all by hand with an auger. Between the deer and us not knowing what we were doing, only about 125 survived.
April 22, 2018 - We planted 500 trees and put an electric fence around them to 'keep the deer out'. It did not work. Between us not knowing what we were doing and the deer. We lost all but about 125 trees.
April 16, 2024
April 22, 2018 - We planted 500 trees, all by hand with an auger. Between the deer and us not knowing what we were doing, only about 125 survived.