Organic Gardening Info from Peaceful Valley

Now up on our Freshman Farmer website, applications for next year’s first year farms.

Check it out here, and spread the word if someone you know is interested!

Our new class of Freshmen Farmers are up and running, and tilling, and planting. Read about the program and the 6 new organic farms that Peaceful Valley is sponsoring this season at www.FreshmanFarmer.com.

Now is a great time to sign up for delicious veggies, all season long!

Sign up for one of our Freshman Farmer’s CSAs right now:

Four Frog Farm in Nevada County, CA

DeepSeeded Community Farm in Humboldt County

EarthDance Farm in St. Louis, MO

Follow the links above and click on their website link underneath their profile!

Or find a CSA in your area here.

We are very excited to announce that applications for next year’s Freshman Farmer program are now available here. (more…)

I want you to imagine for a minute… more fresh vegetables than two people could eat, salads with five or ten different varieties of greens… imagine knowing that your produce has only been touched by one or two other people by the time it shows up on your table.

If these are not astonishing ideas to you… you must be eating locally, you must know your grower.

I’m three weeks into my CSA membership and already I am knee deep in greens. For real… Andrew (that’s my farmer), slow down there buddy! I’ve had a giant salad 3 nights out of 5 and I still have 3 big bags of mixed greens in my “crisper” drawer. Now if you don’t know anything about CSA’s you should read my previous post here.

Even though I complain in jest… I actually I love it! These first few weeks are like a warm-up, in the early season there are only a few kinds of veggies that are ready to harvest; greens, broccoli, radishes, and the like. So my box is loaded with ‘em. There is nothing like coming out of winter and suddenly you have more fresh garden goodness than you can eat.

As I crunch on salad and steam the greens I start to crave the squash and tomatoes that are on their way. Beets, turnips, kale, potatoes, carrots, peas, corn… oh sweet corn… my mouth waters at the thought of it.

Please I implore you… I’ve said it before… but once again; If you only do one thing for yourself and your planet this year…. JOIN A CSA!

Over at the Freshman Farmer Site, the next installment of our video series documenting Andrew Meyers’ first year farming journey.

Click here to visit the post.

From Freshman Farmer

“In each of the last two days I have seen a rattlesnake. In years past I considered this animal my enemy, out for my flesh and blood and possibly my car. Now we are devout friends. I encourage them to go after our mutual enemy, senyor Gopher. I like to believe that the rattlers are as vigorous in hunting the gophers as the Gopher Snakes are (aka King Snakes).”

Read the rest of the post here.

Just finished working on the next installment in our Freshman Farmer series. Watch as Andrew Meyers learns the ropes of working an organic farm.

Click here and go to FreshmanFarmer.GrowOrganic.com to watch the video.

Freshman Farmer is off and running. Over at the site I’ve put up the inaugural episodes in our video cast of Andrew Meyers’ progress in starting a fresh new CSA.

Andrew is a 23 year old farmer who Peaceful Valley is sponsoring in his first year of farming. We hope that by sharing his story, it will inspire and encourage a new generation of farmers to jump in and make a difference.

Click here to watch the videos and to read Andrew’s journal entries!

On Tuesday I got the opportunity to go up to Andrew Meyer’s farm, Wild Grace Organics. Andrew is the very first participant in Peaceful Valley’s “Freshman Farmer” program.

Andrew Meyers at Wild Grace Farm

Freshman Farmer is an initiative that Peaceful Valley took based on our understanding that farmers not only aren’t getting any younger, but younger people aren’t looking to farming as a valid career move either. So we’re “sponsoring” Andrew’s farm this year, giving him the equivalent of an employee discount on supplies that he needs to get started, and to grow a CSA for the season.

I’m making short videos to go along with his website, which is freshmanfarmer.groworganic.com. (as of this moment, March 13, there is not yet content, but keep on the lookout, an intro video is coming real soon!)

We will be checking in with him throughout the season to see how things are coming along, and what challenges and successes he is facing.

He will also be keeping a blog, regularly letting everyone know what is happening up at Wild Grace.

It’s such a cool program, one I’m really proud to be a part of. Each year we will be giving a young farmer a boost and interacting in a very positive and long term way, not just with the organic community, but with the community as a whole.

Other great things are coming out of this too, some I can’t talk about yet as they are not written in stone, but some, such as our retail store’s cooler being a drop off point for his boxes of veggies, that could really assist in making local food available and affordable for this community. Perhaps we will learn enough to be able to pass lessons we learn along to others.

Let us know what you think, if you’ve heard of anything similar regarding CSA’s, and if you have any questions!