EDMUNDS – Last winter, at the same time that researchers at the Universities of Maine and Vermont were working on a joint study of the cost of producing organic milk, Aaron Bell, 28, and Carly DelSignore, 26, took their first delivery of dairy cows.

After an absence of nearly 30 years, cows were back on Tide Mill Farm, a diversified operation between Machias and Calais on Cobscook Bay that raises all organic products: vegetables, fruits, herbs, chickens and turkeys, pork, and now, milk and beef.

And despite the study’s results – that it actually is less profitable for organic milk producers than originally thought – Bell and DelSignore are committed.

“It’s not just about bringing a pure, organic product to the local market,” Bell explained last week. “It’s about strengthening the economy of Washington County.”

It is too early to tell if Tide Mill’s organic milk sales will be profitable – the couple have been milking only since last November – but across the country, organic sales are the fastest-growing segment of agriculture.

Organic milk sales reached a half-billion dollars in 2005, and yet the biggest threat to the industry is a shortage of raw milk supply.

In Maine, the percentage of organic to conventional dairy farms is the greatest in the nation.

“We have 20 percent organic,” Rick Kersbergen, a professor with the University of Maine Cooperative Extension, said Monday. “There are 63 organic dairy farms and 358 conventional farms.”

“The top three reasons people buy organic milk are their concerns about how growth hormones, antibiotics and pesticides [used in conventional dairy farming] are going to affect their health,” Caragh McLaughlin of Horizon Organic, the nation’s leading brand of certified organic milk, said recently. “Demand for organic products is tripling every four to five years.”

Kersbergen said the national demand for organic milk is so strong that the three processors serving Maine – H.P. Hood, Horizon and Organic Valley – “are fighting tooth and nail for every processor they can get.”

Organic dairy farmers that recommend another farm to convert to organic get a $1,000 bonus, Kersbergen said. If a farmer wishes to convert to organic, which can be up to a three-year process, some processors are paying $1 a hundredweight for the milk now being shipped to other conventional processors in exchange for a guarantee that they will get the organic milk at the end of the switch.

Kersbergen said that he is impressed that Hood’s trucks are making a seven-hour round trip to serve the only two Washington County dairy farms, both organic facilities.

The study, which was funded through the U.S. Department of Agriculture, the two state universities, and organic milk organizations in both Maine and Vermont, was able to serve a purpose beyond taking at look at organic profitability.

“The study was originally going to be used to prove that organic milk was more profitable,” Kersbergen said. “It was going to be used as a tool by the organic industry to sign up additional producers.”

Instead, when it showed that organic farmers pay considerably higher prices for grain and labor, the study was used as leverage with organic processors to get farmers more money for their milk.

“They all got a 20 percent increase,” Kersbergen said. Today, conventional farmers get between $14 and $15 per hundredweight. Organic farmers get about $27.28. Kersbergen said that he has just finished gathering the raw data for 2005 and expects those figures to show that the profitability of the Maine’s organic farms is solid.

The study also confirmed that organic farmers pay 200 percent to 300 percent more for organic grain than conventional farmers pay for standard grain, mostly because it has to be imported from outside of Maine.

Bell said all his organic grain is purchased and trucked in from Canada.

Based on that, Kersbergen said he was able to obtain a second USDA study to research the profitability of growing organic grain in Maine. Already, several farmers are looking into siting an organic grain processing facility.

“There is a huge marketing potential to convert to organic,” Kersbergen said. “It looks more and more profitable. This can be a viable option for many of Maine’s dairy producers.”

At Tide Mill Farm, a nine-generation farm founded in 1765, Bell and DelSignore have a mission: to earn a living together, growing and providing nourishing food while promoting healthful lifestyles, partnership with the land and strengthening the economy in Washington County.

It’s as much about a life-style, Bell admitted, as it is about a business plan. “We have as good a chance as anyone of making a difference,” Bell said.

In the 1950s, there were a dozen dairy farms within shouting distance of Tide Mill Farm. Today only two exist and both have recently gotten into milk production.

“Maybe this will be a resurrection,” Bell said. “I still believe we can have a resource-based industry in Washington County, even though it may never be what it used to be.”

At one time, three-masted schooners would sail into the bay right up to the farm and trade for grain, Bell said. “Washington County had twice the population at the turn of the [20th] century. People had to feed themselves and there were hundreds of coastal farms,” he said.

Dairy used to be a part of Tide Mill Farm, Bell said, but his father and grandfather sold the cows in 1977. “They were conventional farmers, and they were going under every day,” he said.

Bell said that the family had hefty startup costs to get into organic milk production, but DelSignore added: “We are paying our bills, even though we are juggling.” The family – which consists of Bell, DelSignore, and three small children – milks about 50 head of mixed-breed cows. “The Jerseys have a higher butterfat level and the Holsteins help out with the volume,” she said.

“The market wants organic and is willing to pay for it,” Bell said. “We are optimistic. We don’t want to see Washington County or rural America fail.”

DelSignore said it may be up to her generation to jump-start the county’s economic revival.

“This is such a great place to raise a family. The youth that I’ve met would really prefer to stay here, run their businesses and raise their children.”

“It’s an interesting time for Washington County,” Bell said. “I think we are on the edge of something.”