About Us

Who we are

BitzNPeace Farm is an experiment in suburban agriculture – larger scale than urban farming, smaller than classic rural farming, and adapted to the suburban space. Our goal is to support the people of Chelmsford and surrounding municipalities with educational, culinary, and open space benefits.

Our Mission

  • we will dedicate a quarter of our production to the needy
  • we will adopt sustainable farming practices. We will minimize the use of chemicals, but we won’t attempt to be 100% organic
  • we will improve the land on which we work
  • we will use, experiment with, develop, and showcase a blend of modern and legacy equipment, techniques, and technology
  • we will endeavor to show that farming can be successful in a suburban setting, using “bits and pieces” of land
  • we will make what we do and what we learn accessible to the people of Chelmsford
  • we must be modestly profitable to be viable, but beyond that, profit is not our primary goal
  • we will each spend no more than 40 hours a week (on average) running the enterprise

Our (very short) History

Through a mixture of happy coincidence and clueless optimism, BitzNPeace Farm was established early in 2020 by Nan Araway and Mike Raisbeck.
Nan has many years of experience in large scale gardening and landscaping. She grew up on a family farm in central Pennsylvania, and she can make anything green. She loves to experiment with starting and raising plants of all sorts, edible and otherwise.
Mike has loved the engineering aspects of farming ever since his first tractor 45 years ago. His hero is Harry Ferguson, the inventor of the 3-point hitch. He loves to gather, restore, and use old farm equipment, and to experiment with new concepts. The menagerie includes:

  • Isabelle – a late 1949 Ford 8N tractor (a “Red Belly Ford”)
  • Pierre – a 1953 Ferguson diesel tractor (a “Little Grey Fergie”)
  • Herman – an early 1949 Ford 8N (another “Red Belly Ford”)
  • Plows, harrows, a spreader, a tiller, and all manner of other tools
    Both Nan and Mike are engineers by profession, and Mike is a lawyer as well. Between them they have over 90 years in high-tech, Mike in software and hardware development and test, Nan in quality and regulatory engineering. Both have substantial program, project, process, and people management experience.

Bitz N Peace Farm currently comprises 10.5 acres

  • a 5-acre agricultural lease from the Town of Chelmsford
  • a 10-acre lease (2 usable) on Hunt Rd.
  • 2 acres at Mike’s house dedicated to 22 fruit trees, a green house, a small garden, some chickens, a sugarbush and a few hives of bees
  • 1.5 acres at Nan’s house, with a very nice berry patch and more bees

And we’re continuing to look for more “bits and pieces” of land to develop and cultivate.