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Home > Blogs > Farm Life and Local Harvest > Archives > 2010 > March
March 2010
Healthy Eating Research Grants
The Robert Wood Foundation has announced several grants for research into healthy eating to prevent childhood obesity. Any U. S. non-profit can apply. Please review the information for possible application for your program. All proposals are due May 13, 2010.
There are two upcoming web conference calls with regard to these grants. For more information, click here . Healthy Eating Research 2010 Round 5 and Rapid-Response grants A Web conference call for prospective applicants will be held on Wednesday, March 31, 2010, from 2:00-3:00 p.m. ET.
Healthy Eating Research 2010 New Connections grants A Web conference call for prospective applicants will be held on Friday, April 2, 2010, from 2:00-3:00 p.m. ET.
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School Garden Grant - Yes to Carrots
The “Yes To Carrots” product line is offering a “Yes To Carrots Garden Challenge”, which began 23 March and whose applications are due by 20 May 2010. The prize? A $5000 Seed Fund Grant which can be used to begin or revamp a school garden (schools K-8 are eligible).
Click here for rules and regulations.
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Ohio Childhood Nutrition Bill
Although it won’t hit the Senate floor until mid-April, the Senate Agriculture Committee passed a sweeping childhood nutrition bill just last week.
Here’s the Slow Food movement take, from their blog.
And here’s the overview, taken from a Senator Sherrod Brown press release:
On Wednesday morning [March 24, 2010], the Senate Agriculture Committee passed the Healthy, Hunger-Free Kids Act of 2010, landmark legislation aimed at ending childhood hunger, reducing childhood obesity, and improving school nutrition programs.
“During these challenging economic times, more families are struggling to put food on the table. We have an obligation to connect children with healthy, nutritious meals and to ensure they don’t go hungry,” Brown said. “This bold legislation is an important first step in ending childhood hunger and helping Ohio’s children develop healthy eating habits that will continue past their youth.”
Brown, who is Chair of the Senate Agriculture Subcommittee on Hunger, Nutrition, and Family Farms, is a leading voice in the U.S. Congress for eradicating hunger and improving childhood nutrition. His Hunger Free Schools Act, which would help reduce paperwork and enroll more students in childhood nutrition programs through direct certification, was the centerpiece of the anti-hunger component of the bill passed today by the committee. Brown’s bill would help more families enroll in the national school lunch program, one of the most important programs designed to alleviate childhood hunger.
The bill passed today would also:
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2010 Startup Community Gardens
Here’s the latest scoop on who’s starting new community gardens this year (so far)!
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New Urban Ag Discussion Page
Agriculture, according to American Heritage, “the science, art, and business of farming”. Farm, “a tract of land cultivated for agricultural production… [or] devoted to the raising and breeding of domestic animals…” So, the simple definition of urban agriculture is farming in the city. Some people get really upset about what this means, exactly - how big a tract, are you selling the products, etc. Not us - we just want to talk about all the exciting, cool aspects of farming in our urban areas.
So when, at the most recent potluck gathering of folks interested in urban agriculture, not too many people showed up. But we used the time to put together a Miami Valley Urban Ag facebook page (excellent suggestion, Kate, and thanks for knowing how to do it!). If you’ve been dying for a page to talk about all that stuff (chickens, zoning, woodchips and coffeegrounds, feeding the hungry and starting your own urban farm), take a look at the new facebook page. And share it with all your similar-minded, technology-embracing friends! Incidentally, the page is linked to Miami Valley Grown, dedicated to connecting eaters & farmers.
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Peas, potatoes & onions, oh my
The other day I mentioned that you still have time to start your seeds. But if that didn’t scratch your gardening itch, it’s time to get outside and plant cool weather crops! Oh, you lucky ones of the raised beds who do not have to wait for soil dry enough to till - and don’t have to worry about soil so wet that your seeds will rot! Go, go to your gardens with all seed packets containing the phrase “plant outside early spring, as soon as soil can be worked”, and plant those seeds/starts! (Of course you should design your garden first, so you know what goes where and when you expect to harvest, and if you’ll be replacing it with something else later, and so you’re rotating your crops, etc.)
Those things you can plant NOW (if your soil’s ready & dry enough!) include:
Onion bulbs & sets
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Gardeners Resource Calendar
Open this handout to find out what’s available to you in the Miami Valley gardening world this year; use it to save special dates. (For example, Cox MetroPark will host its annual Perennial Exchange on September 10, 2010! Information I, for one, am delighted to put on my calendar in advance!) Please share widely, and send to anyone who may be able to add entries to the 2011 calendar & ask them to contact me! Although most of the dates are confirmed, please check back with the sponsoring organization for more details!
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Starting Seeds
With this recent advent of spring & crocuses and daffodils and tulips popping up, some of the winter stir-craziness has subsided. However, if you haven’t already started seeds (for things that want a head start when you plant them in the garden), you still have time. Most tomatoes and peppers and many flowers recommend planting the seed 6-8 weeks before transplanting outside - if you start now, you’ll be right on time - if you’d started much earlier, and didn’t have the best of setups, you might be growing skinny, leggy seedlings, rather than thick, hearty ones!
The basic steps to planting seeds are pretty simple - I’ll give you a very brief outline here, but see the attached handout for more detail.
- Choose which plants to start indoors. Use seed packets or the internet to figure out “days to maturity” - how long before you can start harvesting fruit! Most warm weather crops get planted around May 15 in our area of Ohio.
- Choose & clean a container, add (sterile), moist potting soil
- Place seeds on top of soil & sprinkle a light covering of soil over them
- Label seeds with variety name & planting date
- Place containers in a warm spot to germinate/sprout (sun is not important yet)
- Keep soil moist but not wet
- Seeds sprout above the soil level (1-3 weeks)
- Move them to a sunny (south/west facing non-drafty window) or under a fluorescent light
- Provide 12-16 (ideal) hours sunlight per day, and darkness the rest of the time! It’s possible to grow seedlings without fluorescents, but easier to get tall leggy seedlings
- Keep seedlings moist but not wet
- Transplant up to individual pots, if desired, repeat steps 7-9
- Fertilize only after seedlings have first true leaves. Use a flowering houseplant fertilizer as often as once every 2 weeks, at half to one-fourth the recommended strength. If you don’t have ideal light, go easy!
- For about a week before planting in the garden, get seedlings used to a harder life - water less, keep cooler, fertilize less, then move to a semi-sheltered area outside, then work them up to full sun & wind. Then plant!
Park Seed has a really nice set of “Know Before You Grow” information, tips about various types of vegetable and flowers.
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Community Garden Registration
Community gardens in the Montgomery County area have started (or are close) to opening registration. Here are dates for the Possum Creek MetroPark, Wegerzyn MetroPark and Trotwood Community Gardens. For locations of other community gardens in the area, see the map on the MetroParks’ Grow With Your Neighbors page. For information about registering for a plot at any garden other than the three listed above, please call or email Luci Beachdell at Five Rivers MetroParks at 276-7053. Also, for a fun little note on why community gardens are so cool, look at this blog post, “Making [social] Change: Let Your Garden Grow”.
Wegerzyn MetroPark Community Garden
Returning gardeners have until March 25 to register for last year’s site. New gardeners start registering on Saturday, March 27. Cost is $20 for a 28 X 28 foot plot. The season is April 17 through October 3. Contact Wegerzyn MetroPark at 277-6545 for more information or in person at 1301 E. Siebenthaler Ave.
Possum Creek MetroPark Community Garden
Returning gardeners have until April 1 to register for last year’s site. New gardeners start registering on Monday, April 5. Cost is free for a 18 x 36 foot plot. The season begins as soon as site is plowed (April/May) and ends 1 October. Stop in at Possum Creek Farm, 4790 Frytown Road, for more details or to register. Please call 276-7062 prior to stopping in to make sure someone is at the farm!
Trotwood Community Garden
Returning gardeners have until April 2 to register for last year’s site. New gardeners start registering on Monday, April 5. Cost is $30 for a 25 X 25 foot plot. The season is April through November. Contact Karen Bailey at 854-7227 for information or the Recreation Division Office, 3035 Olive Road, Trotwood. We refer to the garden site as the Old Boys Baseball Field on South Broadway - located between 114 and 132 South Broadway in Trotwood.
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OEFFA - chickens, eat local year-round, etc.
For those of you who didn’t get a chance to go - or even didn’t get to go to all the sessions at the mid-February Ohio Ecological Food & Farm Association Conference, here are the last of the overviews of what was happening there - or at least some fun and informative tidbits from each. Thanks especially to Megan Croswell, Kat Christen, Mary Sue Gmeiner, and Carli Dixon, who shared their experiences with me! See the attached documents for the full overview of sessions from these folks - and handouts! Also, see the webpage where OEFFA has posted any handouts/presentations from the conference.
Chickens
Eat Locally Grown All Year, led by Mary Lou & Tom Shaw
Urban Gardening, led by urban homesteader Rachel Tayse (all I’ve got from this session is a handout on preserving; here are a few points
Grassroots Food Campaigns, led by Sarah Alexander of Food & Water Watch
Developing Community Kitchens, by Leslie Schaller of ACEnet
The Appalachian Center for Economic Networks is a shared-use facility providing growers with a place to create a value-added commodity, as well as business expertise for product development, marketing and distribution. Leslie Schaller of ACENet drew a map for the would-be developer of this kind of facility, with a list of considerations and potential failure points.
Transition Initiave, led by Mary Cunnyngham and Cindy Parker
If you believe that life as we know it is changing, due to peak oil and/or economic crises and/or climate change, then you may be ready to learn about Transition Towns. An essential part of a transition town seems to be an energy descent action plan. The town will be characterized by sustainability, resilience, permaculture ethics, and a renewal of essential skills.
finally, interesting miscellany:
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New Conservation Easements in the Twin Valley
(Brought to us by the Five Rivers MetroParks Conservation Department. Featured here because of the overlap of conservation and productive farmland.)
Reasons to do conservation easements instead of outright purchase include:
Both of the new easements are partnerships with the Three Valley Conservation Trust and the United States Department of Agriculture. Three Valley applied for and received the necessary grant funding that covered three quarters of the acquisition costs. Click here for more information on the Three Valley Conservation Trust.
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Retail Ready training for Buyers and Growers
Are you a local food grower, or do you know one? “Retail Ready” is a new program designed to teach best commercial business practices between growers and various retail markets. The Miami County and Greene County OSU Extension offices, along with the Ohio Dept. of Agriculture are teaming up to offer this training:
Tuesday, March 23 from 1-4 pm in the Buckeye room of the Greene County Extension office at 100 Fairground Road in Xenia.
Growth in demand for local foods, together with the growth in direct marketing by smaller-scale producers amplifies the need for grower training on what buyers need to more readily fit into their buying procedures. Most buyers are anxious to work with local growers to market their local products, but have also expressed frustration at the lack of grower awareness of their preferred buying practices. This training should help growers and retailers build more successful market relationships.
Retail Ready training was developed with generous assistance from the National MarketMaker program and the University of Arkansas Applied Sustainability Center.
For more information contact Brian Raison at raison.1@osu.edu or Beth Bridgeman at bridgeman.7@osu.edu or call 372-9971.
Producers will evaluate their readiness by reviewing resources and a checklist of various topics related to how to package, label, price, invoice, deliver, meet quality and insurance standards, and much more. Please let others know about this workshop. Cost is $30. Call the Miami or Greene County OSU Extension office, or mail your check, payable to: OSU Extension, 201 West Main St., Troy, OH 45373. Registration deadline is 3/19.
