Farm Party!

Last week was a whirlwind as we at the farm prepared for the annual Farm Party.

Every third Thursday of August, Garden City Harvest hosts a night of farm fresh food, hep music, drinking (local beer, wine, and chai...of course!), and dancing for the entire community. Everyone who biked (and there were hundreds), got three dollars off admission. Woohoo!

Quite the moral-boosting, community-gathering, fun(d)raiser!

From the celery's perspective.

The food tent! I know exactly where the beef, carrots, zucs, cucs, and salad came from, how many GALLONS of olive oil and vinegar went into the marinades, and just how fulfilling it is to be there for every step of the process. Seeding, planting, watering, harvesting, cleaning, processing, serving, eating!

One of our darling pigs!


The entrance off of Duncan Drive.


Dinner is served! Enjoy the hand-picked and -arranged flowers!


Bicycle parking gets priority. Cars are away--lining the road.


Friends everywhere!


Handy implements reduce the toil. Rest for the evening.


View from the northeast corner.


This part of the field, now ready for cover crop, already gave us plenty of peas, brassicas, and mustard greens earlier in the season. Now it's time to rest and replenish.



Moonrise over festivities.


The fun continues well into the night. A job well done!

Western Montana Fair Time!!!!

Not to be missed!

Heritage Turkeys, Pigs, and Apples

We went to visit Bosco, who supplied the PEAS farm with our pigs, and learn about the operation he's molded over the last twenty years just outside of Hamilton.





On a gorgeous plot of land, the friendly man who loves Jerry Garcia and goes by a single moniker has united the rooting and pooping activities of pigs with the pest control and picking-apart skills of turkeys to revitalize and fertilize the soil beneath the century-old apple orchard now under his care.



If you want an easter turkey, a Christmas ham, or a good swig of hard cider, this is the man to know. Over the years, what morphed as an idealist home/side-job into a full-time passion litters the yard around the barn with old pluckers and racks for freshly-defeathered heritage turkeys. Within the barn, stacks of old wooden apple crates and industrial cider presses fill the space from floor to ceiling. You can taste the joys of fall just looking at all of the hand-me-down tools and supplies.





With luck, we'll be back in a couple of months!

Bees Knees!

Oh no! I can't forget the bees!



There is a small orchard in the Northwest corner of the PEAS farm, and a couple of weeks ago, the people who have been caring for it (Dan and Jenna) came up for a visit and to share their knowledge and experience with us.



I can't wait to get some of these scientifically intriguing, awesome pollinators in my own back yard.

Empanadas

As mentioned earlier, the weekend farmers markets are THE place to go on Saturday morning. Throngs of people pulse through the veggie-laced aisles, shoulder to shoulder, from sun up until high noon.

Recently, a second market opened up. While the original Missoula Farmer's Market is busy on the north end of Higgins with a plethora of vegetable offerings, the Clark Fork River Market buzzes a few blocks away with plenty of value-added food system members as well as raw produce vendors. Cheese on your left! Bison on your right! Lemon curd blueberry waffles straight ahead (delicious!)! Live music under the bridge!
It's certainly electric.


(I could only get away from the booth before the market opened, so imagine this with hundreds of people chatting, perusing, and filling the space between vendors.)

This summer, I wanted to get my hands involved in another part of the food system. So thanks to a tip from a friend in May, I've spent plenty of time working with Kim at her Empanada (an Argentinian stuffed pastry) stand at the Clark Fork River Market. I've also been prepping the fillings with her Friday afternoon, using mostly local ingredients, many of which have come from the market and the people I've been visiting with the PEAS kids this summer. It's been an amazing opportunity to not only get to know more food producers and the very vibrant farmer's market scene in Missoula, but also to become intimately involved with turning raw ingredients into a beloved local food product.

Clark Fork Organics

We spent some time visiting Josh's family's farm. As if directing the student work at the PEAS farm as a teacher with the university isn't enough, there's a whole other food race happening at home. It is a business that helps support a family of five, so much like Ploughshare Farm where I worked in MN, efficiency and accuracy are the goal and long, tiring days are the means by which one gets there.






Kim, to whom Josh is married, runs the farm, directs the work of several interns, and juggles a massive amount of harvesting (and everything else) that needs to be done on a regular basis to provide beautiful, healthy food on time to several fine restaurants in town, the Good Food Store, the Saturday Farmer's Market (where EVERYONE goes EVERY weekned), and more.





It's exhausting just talking about it, but seeing their children so involved, mentally and physically in the work, is a good indicator of the positive impacts running a farm can have on people. They understand where food comes from and where it goes, they understand how to get it from point A to point B, and they have been raised interacting with the physical world and the neighboring community in very involved ways...giving them a maturity, intelligence, and appreciation for things well beyond their years.

Produce in the Paper

We have some awesome visitors at the farm this week from New Orleans, where access to healthy, real food is a MAJOR issues. They've come to see the model that Garden City Harvest has successfully set up and continues to expand. A few representatives will go down and visit them this fall.

And their visit made it into the paper! As did a photo of us weeding!!!


Photo by MICHAEL GALLACHER/Missoulian

Ahhh. The glamor of our daily work is clear now.

Water from the Heavens

One of the major reasons, a recent visitor suggested, that our plants are so healthy on the farm is our water. This may be true. Montana is arid. 10-13 inches of rain during the season is average. With a creek running nearby and a couple of wells, the farm has a complex watering system which involved lots of drip lines, a few soaker hoses, and some long, heavy pipes (known as hand lines and main lines -- seen as a silver pipe in the grass of the photo below, and rain birds seen spraying water in the photo below).



We don't have these pipes laid out in permanent positions, that would be expensive and ridiculous. We rotate them by hand four times a day. Someone has to move those pipes.

That's why we all end up with nice biceps by the end of the summer. A pair of students each week is responsible for moving the lines, rotating where the water flows, drips, and sprays, and generally getting to know the farm in a brand new, wet, and dirty light. I had a great partner in Erin, so we actually enjoyed it. Although we don't plant, harvest, or weed on the weekends, it was our responsibility the following weekend to keep the water going (and feed the chickens and pigs, of course).



It's pretty here. Especially early on a Sunday morning.

Farms & Gardens

So, this summer I'm working at the PEAS Farm up the Rattlesnake. I'm receiving credit for the graduate program I start this fall. This opportunity is available due to a partnership between Garden City Harvest, a non-profit in Missoula that has several farm and community garden locations throughout town...mostly in "urban settings" right within town...and often in neighborhoods with lower incomes, and the University of Montana.

A major issue for people on tight budgets is that the food they have access to is only found in the corner convenience store or in the nearest big box store. Here, they may find "cheap" food, but that cheapness is reflected in their health...which eventually becomes VERY expensive. You can simultaneously appear obese and be malnourished. It's horrifically common.

The farm I work at is a bit out of town and in a wealthier neighborhood, but it is also the largest open space (about 9.5 acres, a former dairy farm) that has become available to the nonprofit and was an opportunity not to be missed.
There are seven community gardens scattered throughout town with plots available for a very reasonable price to the public.
There are three farm/gardens, PEAS being one of them. We visited River Road and Orchard Gardens, which also sell some CSA shares in addition to having community garden plots. An additional farm is cared for and hosted by a youth home in the area.





The vigor, happiness, and curiosity exuded by each garden manager (Greg and Sarah) that we met with was intoxicating and enviable. Nonprofit work may not pay much, but if you organize your life around what you want and what you need, it can be one of the most fulfilling ways to spend the short time you have on earth.

Big Skies, Rivers, and Fun

We had the opportunity to drive down to Big Sky where all of John's brothers are living this summer and run around the old stomping grounds, spend some time with family, and get Mabel out and about.



Mabel did great hiking along/through the river, up mountainous terrain, and through the sagebrush. I can't wait until we have more space for her to explore.



Chris and John went fly fishing!



I look forward to the next chance to take a mini-trip and hang out with family. :)

Fruit!

We drove down to Paradise and visited the most wonderful groves of cherry, peach, and apricot trees tended by a former environmental consultant who always dreamed of growing fruit. In an ideal location, Tom's fruit grows well (albeit with the occasional pests from poorly tended neighboring trees...but hey, the larvae that are deposited as eggs and grow near the pit are almost entirely made up of cherry ANYWAY!).



All of the trees get some water, pruning, and observation. The fruit is carefully observed, cared for, and then EATEN! Delish!

It's a relief to know that even in colder climates and shorter growing seasons, orchards are an option. YUM!!!!

Wheat and Weeds

In Big Sandy, MT Bob Quinn lives and raises grain and vegetables. We visited him last week and were introduced to a world where imagination, research, intelligence, and farm work come together to grow ancient varieties of wheat (his Kamut has done well), dry land vegetables (yup...he doesn't water his corn, squash, potatoes...and we're in arid Montana), and various types of green manure to build healthy soil.

Really cool stuff. Most of his acreage is organic, and many of his grains are more nutritious than those that you find on the average grocery store shelf (which are bred for high yields to keep immediate costs down, not bred for high nutrition to keep the real costs down). Get your hands on some kamut or durum. It's out there!

Back in Missoula, we got to hop into the garlic patch to harvest and bring it to cure in the barn for the next 2-3 weeks. After that, they'll be good to store for 4-6 months!




Yum!



The kids visiting the farm this week for camp challenged us to a weeding battle (what a fantastic idea...they were so excited!). We fought tooth and nail (with the corn and quack grass and soil that is). The kids came out on top by two pounds and won the popsicles.





We'll get them next time!

Growing

A couple of weeks ago we visited Foothill Farm, where Julie and her family grow vegetables, hay, and meat. With a beautiful location at...you guessed it...the foothills of the Mission Mountains, they have a good deal of garlic and tomatoes growing for the cooperative and plenty of other produce for market. Up until this year, Julie used her work horses to tend the fields. Her passion for using animal power as opposed to petroleum was clear, but as her husband works 45 minutes away and her daughter is still quite young, the constant practice the horses needed proved too much. She has an amazing deal going, though. Her parents have recently retired and joined her to work part-time in the fields and a young sharecropper lends her hands as well.



We also recently brought Mabel up to the PEAS farm to have some free-roaming leashless time (over 9 acres of it!). She did quite well. Turns out she has some secret running skills and is still trying to figure out what to do with cats.

Deliciously Edible

A few months ago I had the pleasure of visiting several people in and around the Twin Cities involved with the food system. From a dahlia and tomato grower, to an educator, to a bike-powered veggie delivery service, each person had their niche in bringing good food from dirt to home.

Short articles (in the 'notable edible' section) about each entrepreneur appear in the latest edition of Edible Twin Cities.

Online, you can find the one about what Lisa over at Two Pony Gardens is doing to bring food and flowers to people who desire them, to educate urban youth about nature and the source of their food, and to host harvest dinners at her farm in partnership with filmmaker/chef Daniel Klein of Perennial Plate.







In the magazine (which you can find at your local co-op, brew supply store, farmers market, or vineyard), you'll find out more about Velo Veggies and the FriendChip Farm Program.

They're doing great things! So are you!