Farm Report 9/27/23 - Where does our food go?

I was asked this week to share some photos of recipients and where our food is delivered. So I reached out to our gleaners for help with this and will continue to share as more photos come in.

Julie comes every Wednesday to pick up three or more boxes of organic produce to be delivered to three sharing tables in Harpswell–the Kellogg Church, Orr’s Island Library, and Cundy’s Harbor Community Church. Here is Julie and a friend picking up from G2G. Next, she meets at a central location in Harpswell to share food from other locations, and the three volunteers deliver and set up a sharing table at one each of the above locations.

Julie was happy to share photos of the work that is being done to support her community.

Another recipient was Plummer Apartments in Falmouth. Diane was eager to share with some of her fellow residents some of the beautiful flowers she has been working with at the farm this summer. Word went out, and Diane arrived with three big buckets of fresh dahlias, zinnias, ageratum, and snapdragons. Vases appeared, arrangements were made, smiles were shared, and donations to G2G were given. Thanks, Diane, for all you do.

Other projects this week included lots more seed saving. Melanie took on the task of preparing tomatoes for seed saving. We decided which varieties worked best in this challenging summer and are stockpiling those.

Our Waldorf 3rd graders came back on Wednesday to dig more carrots and take down tomato vines. Their boundless energy is always welcomed with these big projects. They are able to accomplish so much in a short time. Thanks to our G2G teachers, Carrie and now Melanie, for such great guidance and direction.

Lots of gleaning is continuing even as our season is slowing down. I mentioned we could use some extra gleaning help, and Jess arrived. Thanks to all of our gleaning teams for always giving us so much of your time and energy.

Seguinland Institute students also came to volunteer this week. They took down our entire tomato trellis system from all four plots, and now they are tucked safely away until next year. They also helped get some winter rye planted. Again, such a great help in a short amount of time!

On 9/23/23 we worked on plot 23! Does that have a special significance to anything? I don’t believe so, but my farm reports are starting to get a bit repetitive, and I just threw that fun fact in there because it really happened! We worked on plot 23 this past Saturday because it was time to take down Riley’s bean experiment. We pulled the plants and weighed each bed separately to give her this last piece of information to document and compare her findings. I am eager to learn which sugar kelp application worked out the best. Maybe we can utilize this application on more crops next year (just not beans!).

On to another project–cutting cardboard for the many 5th graders who are coming to do some lasagne layering on one of our plots next week. (5th graders are not allowed to use utility knives, and I think that is an excellent idea.)

We are flying through our cardboard inventory, so if you have any to share, we will take it. Brown cardboard and black ink only, please.

We will also be having more paper pot making parties this winter, so newspapers will also be appreciated. Nothing glossy, please.

ColbyCo. Engineering volunteers came and skinned another tunnel on Friday with the Fix-It Team. Thanks to ColbyCo. and our Fixers! We have one more to do, if time allows. These were all damaged from that storm that took out two of our grow tunnels last Fall. One is closed up tight, tarped, and ready for Spring. The other is full of a new crop of lettuce, chard, and kale.

It’s getting close to garlic planting time. We plant ours in late October. We do have extra for sale by donation. Suggested donation price is $10.00 per pound. The variety is Music, and we only have one size this year. We are at the farm 8-2 most weekdays and Saturdays.

This last photo I have had in mind all year–stacking Long Pie Pumpkins like firewood! When Carrie showed up to the farm with her orange sweatshirt on, I asked her to humor me with this photo op. No, that’s not a pumpkin under her sweatshirt, it’s our youngest volunteer waiting to arrive. Carrie is now on maternity leave from her farm activities. We will all miss you, Carrie, but we know where you live, and all of us are eager to meet this little one, as soon as you want us there. Treats and belly rubs for Zoey, too!