Tilth & Timber finds community in Castine
Tiny farm has big local impact
A double rainbow over Tilth & Timber in Castine. Photos courtesy of Tilth and Timber.
Aug. 17, 2026
By Annie Means
CASTINE—When Troy and Cindy Dickens started Tilth & Timber, a 1.5-acre farm in Castine, they knew it would be hard but rewarding work.
“You know you’re not going to get rich starting a small farm,” Troy said.
Though that may be true, since starting their farm in Castine, the Dickenses are certainly wealthy in community.
“The second the farm popped up in Castine, people were excited about it and asking how they could help,” Troy said.
Before moving to Castine, the couple had a variety of careers. Troy worked in the environmental field, and Cindy was a teacher. She used her summers off to dip her toe into the organic farming world and quickly fell in love with it – so much that she transitioned to farming full time. Troy soon followed her, and after gaining some work experience, they launched the first iteration of Tilth & Timber Farm in 2019 in Massachusetts.
They then decided to relocate, scouring New England for a plot of land big enough for a farm where they could live with Cindy’s siblings.
“And this one kind of popped up,” Troy said of the Castine farm, where they moved in October 2020.
The Castine farm turned out to be the perfect fit, in a community with an already established appetite for local food and agriculture.
Though Tilth & Timber isn’t certified organic, it's a no-spray, zero-pesticide operation that prioritizes compost and soil health over synthetic fertilizers. The Blue Hill Co-op is one of their largest clients, alongside several Castine restaurants, including Dennett’s and The Plant Shoppe.
When not selling directly to stores or restaurants, Tilth & Timber operates a roadside farmstand open 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. every Saturday year round. In the summer and harvest season, the farm has additional open hours every Friday from 2-6 p.m. from June through October.
Cindy Dickens with a fall harvest.
In addition to running their roadside farm store, Tilth & Timber also offers CSAs, or Community Supported Agriculture packages.
“We have 50-60 families that have farmshares with us per year,” Troy said.
CSAs, or farmshares, became popular in the 1980s and help provide security for local farmers, for whom the profit margins in farming have been historically small. With CSA’s customers pre-buy weekly farmshare packages of produce at the beginning of the growing season to ensure farmers have enough investment to buy seeds, compost materials, and other equipment.
Tilth & Timber offers a variety of CSA sizes, and unlike other farms, they let customers choose exactly which vegetables go into their weekly package.
“People like the freedom of getting to choose what they want each week,” Troy said.
Back in Massachusetts, when the couple was first farming, they used to pre-pack CSAs for their customers but found it was both time intensive and unintentionally wasteful.
“What farmers don’t see is the waste on the back end,” Troy said, “where the same vegetables, like turnips, pile up unused week after week.”
Whether it’s customers buying CSA shares or restaurants contracting with the farm directly for produce, it feels like the Castine community really wants the Dickens family farm to succeed, Troy said. For the town of Castine, Tilth & Timber is major way for residents to access hyper-local, fresh food.
Troy said his customers tell him how much they love his produce and are eating more vegetables than ever before.
“It’s great to feel valued by your customers,” Troy said.
To learn more about Tilth & Timber, and to reserve a CSA share for their upcoming growing season, visit the farm’s website.
The Dickens are also raising their two children on the farm.
