Daily Inspiration: Meet Kelsi Zahl

Today we’d like to introduce you to Kelsi Zahl.

Hi Kelsi, thanks for sharing your story with us. To start, maybe you can tell our readers some of your backstory.
OUR STORY

Our story begins with Linda and Aaron Rogers and their need for healing, organic food. Linda Rogers is a homesteader, childhood development specialist and healer in Northern Wisconsin. It had always been her dream to have a market garden, so it was not surprising that her son Aaron Rogers, was also deeply passionate about creating one as well.

In 2015 “The gardens” formed at Trails End Campground. Aaron excavated and built the garden beds, while Linda and helpers built the soil and grew the food. The garden was absolutely beautiful on the campground and continued to grow and grow.

Aaron continued to build garden spaces featuring beautiful rock walls with agates. Soil & Soul Farm LLC. formed in 2018. From inception, the farm has been women led. Linda would empower her gardeners to think critically, teaching while working, not only the task at hand, but about the microbial balance of the soil and role that each plant plays in the microbiome of the garden. Each year we would finish the season by learning and practicing food preservation.

The farm continued to grow more and more food, plus a beautiful apple, peach and cherry orchard. Aaron sprinkled rock flower beds all around the campground which Linda and her sisters filled with cuttings from their gardens in Wisconsin. In Summer of 2020, it took about 6 hours a day to finish watering all the beds with the watering truck. The project had expanded far beyond what we could have imagined.

We needed a better system. This was when Adam and Melissa Millsap joined our team. They brought with them a decade of experiential knowledge, operating Urban Roots, a small production farm in Springfield, MO. They came on board in 2021-2024 and started building infrastructure and systems that would make the farm function more fluidly. During this time, Katya Little began working with the farm and learning from the Milsaps, and still resides as our Field Manager.

In 2024, the farm was fully functioning with an underground irrigation system pulling straight from the surface water which was flowing into the pond. Our greenhouse and tomato house were moved to their new locations on the Northwest side of the campground lake.
The farm plots can be seen by bike on the magical trail that weaves through the orchards, past the blueberries, past a farm bed, then past the flower terraces, past the greenhouses, past the pears, past the cherries, past a farm bed then back around to the entrance of the farm.
The farm is solar powered, with a generator back up. In 2024 the farm was run by 2 people with volunteer help. The amount of veggies that were grown, processed and sold with hardly any waste by such a small crew was inspiring. Katya led the farm into a new season of growth, implementing everything she had learned the 3 years previously with the Millsaps. The farm can now function with efficiency, as we cruise from bed to bed in our golf carts around the campground.
We are starting the building process for a Center for Food and Well being on the farm/campground. Visitors will be able to enjoy the farm food for brunch and dinner, with take away options. Can you imagine going camping and eating fresh, gourmet, organic whole food? With a nice shower? And even glamping? Massage? Yoga? Pilates? Farm classes? Folk arts?

They say be the change you want to see in the world, we are trying to live by that principle. And the story goes on…

Would you say it’s been a smooth road, and if not what are some of the biggest challenges you’ve faced along the way?
Let’s talk about the watering truck for a moment. The watering truck was the Bain of my early farm existence. Every day it required filling. The water trailer was attached to the pick-up,
then driven by the lake then turned on and filled up,
then driven to a bed,
then connected to a sprinkler,
then run for a few hours,
then move it to another bed, then run for a few hours, and repeat 5-6 times.
Well, Murphy’s law, naturally the water pump would always have special mechanical needs, or the sprinkler heads would be plugged, or the person learning to back up the trailer would jack knife it or cut a corner too short.

Appreciate you sharing that. What else should we know about what you do?
My expertise is the interconnectedness of all things. For the past 10 years I have been studying in depth fascia, the human body, soil, plant medicine, yoga and meditation, chanting/toning/resonance. I am proud to say that I have been self employed for 10 years and set industry standards for yoga and massage in Northwest Arkansas, and I have completed a full fascial dissection, specializing in the organs, pelvis and low back. The bodywork, structural integration, is life changing and my clients consider part of their health care team.

The 10 years before that I was a theatre artist based in the southwest. I am proud to say I have performed in 26 states as well as internationally. I studied in depth movement and dance, storytelling and human behavior, physical psychology and somatic bodywork, songwriting and script writing, voice, chanting and toning/resonance, improvisation and devising, and last but not least recovery and mental health.

At the beginning of a new decade, I find myself transitioning into a new role. Currently I am offering health retreats and private health camps, building a summer camp for children at the farm, co-running the farm, and writing a book about the interconnectedness of our body and our environment. I have lived in all time zones of the continental United States and am ready to live in a restful space. In the solace of the Harbor, I have created a space for myself and other artists to retreat and do deep work. A place people can relax and detox from their lives, resting, eating healing foods and soaking up the soul medicine.

What are your plans for the future?
We are hoping to continue to build our farm team and community through building a Center for Food & Well Being. We added 150 blueberry plants last year as well as a blackberry bramble and larger composting space. We hope that people will keep coming back to the farm, to spend the summer in this pristine nature and grow food with us.

If you are interested in learning and growing with us, we have a few spaces left for our summer intern program. Losing is provided for 5 hours of farm work a day.

We are looking forward to our Fall Color Retreat: Folk Art & Food Preservation that takes place in the beginning of October.

Contact Info:

• Website: https://upsoilandsoul.com
• Instagram: soil_and_soul_farm
• Facebook: Lake Effect Farm