CARIBOU – Kyle and Michele Blackstone have operated a successful, 400-acre potato-growing operation on the Hardison Road for six years.

During this time, they also have been raising their two boys, Ben and Breen, have renovated their farm home, bought another farm with a more modern potato storage facility and upgraded a huge, old barn that is more than 100 years old.

Blackstone’s efforts as a grower of processing and seed potatoes on a windswept hilltop farm overlooking the Aroostook River were lauded this past week by the Maine Potato Board, which named him 2002 Young Farmer of the Year.

“It’s nice to be recognized by the industry,” he said Saturday while sipping coffee in the kitchen of their home. “Farming’s a natural thing for me.”

Along with being a farming wife and mother, Michele Blackstone teaches special education at the nearby Opportunity Training Center. Her hobbies include decorating their cozy home with refinished antiques and raising chickens and two riding horses.

The young couple bought the former Red Smith Farm in 1994 and put their first crop in the ground in the spring of 1995. Most of their potatoes are sold to McCain’s Potato Corp. and Penobscot Frozen Foods in Belfast. They have one full-time farmhand and several part-time workers they use as needed.

“I grew up on a farm, so did Michele,” Blackstone said. “We’ve had to work hard rebuilding this farm.”

After high school, Blackstone took a carpentry degree program at Northern Maine Technical College in Presque Isle. After one year, however, he returned to the farm, deciding construction work was not for him.

He has used those skills, though, to rebuild their farm home, and the couple has redone the entire house, wiring, plumbing, windows, doors, hardwood floors, pine ceilings and antiques.

Quiet and unassuming, the couple are nonetheless proud of their accomplishments. They talk easily about what they’ve done with potatoes and small grains, their home and the huge barn that stands at the end of their driveway.

It took nearly 40 gallons of red stain this year to make the barn a visible landmark for a long way as travelers meander up Hardison Road from the East Presque Isle Road which runs along the Aroostook River.

Their home is encircled by the fields from which they harvest 300 acres of processing potatoes, 100 acres of seed spuds and rotating crops of small grains.

The Blackstones, like many Aroostook County growers, can’t put a dollar value on the equipment they own, “but there is a lot of it,” Blackstone said.

“We are always trying to improve the farm and equipment we have,” he said. “We find better ways, less costly ways to do things, and I try to increase production.

“Like most farmers, we try to show a return on our investment and work,” he said. “Farming is in our blood.”

The 35-year-old Blackstone is following in the footsteps of his father, Orman Blackstone, who is still farming at 67, and his 94-year-old grandfather, John Bourgoin, who farmed most of his life.

Michele Blackstone also is from a three-generation farming background. They both said their farming background may go back more than three generations, but three generations of farmers are still living.

Like many Aroostook County people his age, Blackstone remembers picking potatoes behind a two-row potato digger. His father was one of the first farmers in Aroostook County to try mechanical harvesters.

“It must be in our blood, because we all farm,” he said of both their families. “We just can’t seem to stay away from it.

“It’s a good life, and we know we have work to do every morning when we get up,” he said. “We just keep our eyes open and do the best we can.”

Along with older relatives, the couple also has brothers and nephews in the industry, all living within a short distance of their operation.

The Blackstones own 500 acres of farmland and rent other land to keep their operation going. They’ve purchased other small area farms as they have become available in the last six years. A recent purchase included a ventilated warehouse to open more markets for his seed potatoes.

Blackstone is optimistic about the future of potato growing in The County.

“It looks good, positive,” he said. “It’s what you make of it.

“There are opportunities here, you just have to keep your eyes open,” he said. “You do the best you can with what you have.”

“There are markets out there,” Blackstone continued. “You just have to find them, and get your products there.”