Mike Emers has raised vegetables and cut flowers on his Rosie Creek Farm near Fairbanks since 1997. With his wife, Joan Hornig, he grows more than 70 varieties of flowers and a wide range of vegetables for shareholders in a community supported agriculture enterprise and for sale at the Tanana Valley Farmers Market. As market president, Emers has helped organize the group of Alaska producers to make the most of their products and sales strategies. Moreover, Emers created a network of Fairbanks-area vegetable growers who meet monthly to communicate about issues of interest and cooperatively order supplies.

A proponent of using native plants on the landscape, Emers received Western SARE farmer/rancher grants to refine propagation techniques for native legume seed. His work built upon research conducted to revegetate oil fields on Alaska's North Slope; his protocols for germinating and growing out legume species such as Astragalus alpinus proved to be of great interest to landscapers and state agencies charged with vegetating disturbed landscapes. Emers and Hornig regularly offer the farm as a tour stop for University of Alaska events.