The snow was still clean and white outside, crunchy underfoot. The late winter snow wasn’t bound to last long, warmer weather in the forecast would soon turn it to mud. But it didn’t really didn’t matter much inside this greenhouse a few miles south of Webster City.

“Come in, take off your coat,” welcomes owner Bridget Chambers. “It’s almost 100 degrees in here,” her smile as warm the temperature in that greenhouse.

Chambers, the daughter of a World War II decorated veteran, has taken on a crop that hasn’t been seen in Iowa since the war years. She’s growing hemp and producing CBD oil, which she sees as a blossoming industry that can benefit many people with new forms of pain control and management.

“It’s beginning to be seen as a superfood and really can be used for all types of purposes,” Chambers says. ‘It’s eventually going to be a third crop for a lot of farmers in Iowa.”

In the early decades of the 20th century hemp was a fairly common crop in Iowa, often used in rope production.

Hemp was first outlawed in the United States in 1937, but the original ban would not last long. World War II saw shortages in almost every industry and farmers were tasked not only with growing enough food to feed the nation and its allies, but to provide other materials that could be used in the war effort. Silk from milkweed was used to help make lifejackets. Hemp came in to play to make rope, some of which went into parachutes.

From 1942 through 1945, an estimated 400,000 acres was planted to hemp nationwide. Farmers needed a special permit and the hemp could only be used on behalf of the war effort. When the war ended, that special allowance for the growth of hemp expired.

It wasn’t until the 2018 Farm Bill that hemp was legalized once again, according to Chambers. At first, it was only on a trial basis and in certain states. Iowa opened up for the planting of hemp in 2020 and Chambers jumped onboard that year.

“We knew it was coming and we had been planning for it,” she recalls.

Hemp seedlings get their start in her greenhouse before being transplanted into a small tract of former CRP land that she took out of that program in order to make her hemp organic.

Normally it takes at least three years for farmland to qualify as organic, meaning that no chemicals have been applied for three years. Since the few acres she withdrew from CRP hadn’t been farmed for 18 years, she was able to grow organically from day one.

Chambers is a strong believer that hemp should always be organic.

“It doesn’t have to be, but it really should be,” Chambers said. “Hemp is so efficient at pulling contaminants out of the soil that in some places it’s used to remediate polluted soil.”

She’s still working on the crop rotation plan and harvested enough hemp in 2021 that she plans to plant only cover crops, along with pumpkins and squash on the three to six-acre tract this spring. Crop rotation is another requirement to keep organic certification, and Chambers simply says it’s the right thing to do for the land.

As for the legal use of hemp and CBD oil, Chambers has seen first-hand how it can benefit people.

“My nephew uses it for relief from cerebral palsy,” she says. “It relaxes his muscles.”

Being able to grow an organic CBD product that safely alleviates a little bit of her nephew’s suffering, is a joy to Chambers. Likewise, she did some early research with her brother, an orthopedic surgeon in South Carolina.

“South Carolina was an early test state and he had some patients that, for one reason or another, couldn’t use opioids for pain management when they had joint replacements,” she explains. “He thought, what am I going to do for them? He needed to treat their pain and they got through joint replacement using CBD.”

Chambers has branded her CBD products under the Blue Stem Organic Hemp name and offers CBD oil, a sports balm, scented body oil, softgels and gummies.

For processing, she and her husband, Brian Gilbert, drove the harvested hemp to an organic facility in Oregon in 2021, but is open to finding a closer organic facility in the future.

While the farm will be in cover crops this year, her greenhouse will stay busy with bedding plants, hanging flowers, vegetables and more. She’ll be open for shoppers in May and June at the

greenhouse.

CBD products are available at MyMedmart and Gilbert Flooring in Webster City. To learn more about the products visit her website at bluestemhempfarm.com