Farming. There’s always been small mobile slaughterhouses that cater to backyard poultry operations in Vermont and elsewhere, but when a poultry farmer wants to expand operations to over 1,000 birds, or go beyond selling at the farm or at farmers’ markets, there have not been many options. State-inspected poultry slaughterhouses are far and few between, and, if they exist, are already at full capacity. In Vermont, for example, there are only four state inspected poultry plants, and only one that accepts poultry from other farmers. Vermont’s state legislature realized that infrastructure roadblocks were preventing many farmers from moving to a higher level of production, so they took matters in their own hands. “With the ‘buy local’ movement there has been a need for more producers … but, unless the poultry producers want to set up their own processing plant, there have been very little options,” said Anson Tebbetts, deputy secretary for Vermont’s Agency of Agriculture, Food and Markets.
He grows shoots, he scores. Mark Haberer pinches a tuft of miniature greens growing in a tray. "Try these," he says. A few chews. "Curry? " "Cumin," he says. "Cumin greens. " Haberer is one of the engines behind Grow Anywhere, a Weld County farm that coaxes "microgreens" — tiny shoots of lettuce, carrot, arugula, onion, sorrel and more — out of air, using something called aeroponics. The farm is the only one of its kind in the world, says owner Larry Forrest. "It's beginning to become a farm," says Forrest, an optometrist. It hasn't quite taken off yet. When the seeds are still awakening, misters spray them twice an hour. Forrest sells 4-ounce boxes of microgreens exclusively to restaurants. "I'd love to sell this stuff to anybody, but it's a numbers game," he says. Forrest and others affiliated with Grow Anywhere call it a farm. Forrest buys rectangular, white grates, the kind that are used to cap fluorescent lights — he gets them at hardware stores — and places a mesh over them.
Vela Creations - HOME. The Urban Farmer. About City Farmer. Shoemakers, fashion models, computer geeks, politicians, lawyers, teachers, chefs … all city dwellers … all can grow food at home after work in back yards, community gardens or on flat roofs. For the past 36 years, City Farmer has encouraged urban dwellers to pull up a patch of lawn and plant some vegetables, kitchen herbs and fruit. Our message is the same today as it was in 1978 and will be relevant far into the future. This website is a collection of stories about our work at City Farmer here in Vancouver, Canada, and about urban farmers from around the world. The site is maintained by City Farmer executive director, Michael Levenston. Email: cityfarmer@gmail.com Phone: 604.685.5832 City Farmer’s first web site Urban Agriculture Notes (www.cityfarmer.org) has hundreds of pages of information about city farming. City Farmer teaches people how to grow food in the city, compost their waste and take care of their home landscape in an environmentally responsible way.
Permaculture Research Institute – The Channon – NSW – Australia – Permaculture education site – Permaculture Australia. Contact: Geoff Lawton: The Channon, NSW, Australia Visit Website The PRI is located on a Permaculture demonstration site in The Channon NSW, and is headed by Geoff & Nadia Lawton. We specialize in education & training worldwide. We also provide daily Permaculture news and info. Growing list of permaculture projects worldwide This will be the premier place to find out who is doing what, and where, in the permaculture world. You can search for projects by keyword, and/or filter to specific project types.
You can even constrain your search by climate zone, so you can find others working in similar conditions as yourself. As you search, you’ll see pins on the world map below appear or disappear to reflect your search results, and you can either browse the project cards or click on map pins to go to individual project profiles. If you have a project of your own, be sure to put it on the map! This Ad has been viewed 12341 times. Permaculture Principles. Sustainable Living on a Small Farm the Permaculture Way. Urban Farms Take Root | CommonDreams.org. SAN DIEGO, California - Juxtapose the word urban in front of farm and there’s bound to be a lot of head scratching. But in cities around the U.S. small-scale farms and garden plots are coming to life in unlikely places. Abandoned city lots, and neglected yards are being converted into vegetable gardens - as basic food literacy becomes part of the vocabulary of city dwellers.
Due to a faltering economy and numerous food scares, many U.S. households are asking two basic questions: ‘Where does my food come from?’ Followed by, ‘How do we pay for it?’ The recently established New Roots farm located in San Diego is part of an unusual experiment among food activists to bring sustainable agriculture within city limits. Open since mid-July, the New Roots Community Farm as the property has come to be called is a raw patch of land located on 2.2 acres of city property with the potential to supplement the diets of hundreds if not thousands of low-income individuals living in greater San Diego. History - Growing Home, Inc. Growing Home was founded in 1996 by Les Brown, then the Policy Director at the Chicago Coalition for the Homeless, in order to provide job training for needy Chicagoans. Les recognized that not only was the critical lack of living-wage jobs one of the major factors that leads to homelessness, but that a sense of purpose was also a necessary component of breaking out of the cycle of homelessness.
Founder, Les Brown Les wrote before he passed away in 2005 that “homeless people are often without roots. They’re not tied down, not connected, not part of their family anymore. Our organic farming program is a way for them to connect with nature—to plant and nurture roots over a period of time. Land to start the program was acquired in Marseilles, IL through the McKinney Act, which offers Federal surplus land for organizations working with homeless individuals, and the training program was piloted in 2002. Welcome to the Liberty Gardens. Local farms see green in '09.
Eat Well Guide :: Home. West Virginia Small Farm Conference to be held Feb. 24-26 | Farm and Dairy - The Auction Guide and Rural Marketplace. MORGANTOWN, W.Va. — The West Virginia Small Farm Conference will be held Feb. 24-26 at the Ramada Inn, Morgantown. In its fifth year, the conference will address the challenges and opportunities all small farm families face as they strive to manage their farm energy use, grow more profitable crops and animals and better market what they produce tailored to the consumer.
Local food movement The local food movement will be in action each day of the conference. Food from more than 25 West Virginia farmers will be connected to the conference for the first time to bring three days of local food luncheons, local food breaks in the morning and afternoon and one local food dinner to its participants. Continuing with the local food lesson, a pre-conference kick-off event, the Winter Blues Farmers’ Market, will be held from 4-7 p.m. Feb. 23 at the Ramada. Workshop focus Grant opportunities that make adopting these new technologies easier will be reviewed as will energy tax credits. Keynote speaker. Recession grows interest in seeds, vegetable gardening. By Bruce Horovitz, USA TODAY Hard economic times are acting like instant fertilizer on an industry that had been growing slowly: home vegetable gardening. Amid the Washington talk of "shovel-ready" recession projects, it appears few projects are more shovel-ready than backyard gardens.
Veggie seed sales are up double-digits at the nation's biggest seed sellers this year. What's more, the number of homes growing vegetables will jump more than 40% this year compared with just two years ago, projects the National Gardening Association, a non-profit organization for gardening education. "As the economy goes down, food gardening goes up," says Bruce Butterfield, the group's research director. "We haven't seen this kind of spike in 30 years. " At W. Burpee is taking pains to craft its marketing to fit the times, says Ball. "Seeds are God's microchip," says Ball. •Park Seed. Says Yates, "Every time this country goes through a recession, there is a surge of folks who want to get back to basics. " Vegetable gardens crop up in Seattle parking strips. Originally published July 25, 2009 at 12:00 AM | Page modified July 25, 2009 at 7:38 AM We've all heard the foodie mantra: Eat Local.
It's going gangbusters in grocery stores that increasingly tout local produce. Now, area government has gotten involved, too. No, the City Council isn't pushing expensive arugula. "I think there's a real transformation happening," said Branden Born, assistant professor of urban design and planning at the University of Washington. Some of this shift involves research projects and nonbinding resolutions, which are essentially invisible to ordinary citizens. It used to be that planting anything but grass in the strip between the sidewalk and the curb required a permit, even if it was just a spray of flowers or a few carrots. This year, the Seattle Department of Transportation (SDOT) changed its rules.
Last year, the city issued 22 permits for parking-strip gardens. "We get the sense that people are really embracing it," Sheridan said. 'Eat your yard' Down on the farm in Bay View : The Bay View Compass. July 31, 2009 By Casey Twanow Fish, sprouts, and veggies In the open, light-filled space of a repurposed factory, Will Allen, a towering urban farmer and CEO in a sleeveless hoodie, declared, “Urban farming has gone from a movement to a revolution.”
Allen made this observation July 8, when he was present to watch the newest members of the revolution-1,200 small yellow perch-arrive at Sweet Water Organics. Sweet Water is a nascent commercial fish farm opening at 2121 S. Leading Edge of Change Sweet Water is evidence of the changes rippling through the way we eat. At the epicenter of local change is Growing Power, the two-acre urban farm on Silver Spring Drive that Allen founded in 1993. Fraundorf, Lindner, and Godsil are following Allen’s lead, growing fish and plants in a three-tiered aquaponic system. On July 8, Sweet Water’s owners ceremonially poured the first yellow perch into an 11,000-gallon raceway, a long channel cut six feet into the building’s concrete floor. Building the Vision. SWEET WATER ORGANICS. Old News Made New Q: Is your building for sale? A: The building at 2151 S. Robinson has been for sale off and on for a few years now and the owner is currently looking for a tenant for the half of the space that we no longer use for our growing, education and community events.
Sweet Water's operations take place indoors and on an adjacent property that is not part of the lease at 2151 S. This entry was posted on March 08 2013 Embedded Reporter CVI Benefit 3/10/137:00 pmThe Coffee House631 N. 19th St., Milwaukee (map) This entry was posted on March 07 2013 ReciproCITY #1 Alan W. January 2, 20137:00 pm - 10:00 pmSweet Water Organics2151 S. ReciproCITY Communiqué #1 Start off 2013 with radical art history and practice, and join us for the inaugural event at a new experimental art space in Milwaukee. Presentations by: Alan W. Www.facebook.com/ReciproCITY.MKE Alan W. More info on ReciproCity at: This entry was posted on December 29 2012 $2 Admission, children are free!
Growing Power. Home Buyers Are Drawn to Nearby Organic Farms. The Starter Garden - A Manure Primer. Ohio church serves God, community with small-scale urban gardening | Farm and Dairy - The Auction Guide and Rural Marketplace. NORTH LIMA, Ohio — Members of Common Ground Church Community in North Lima, Ohio, have the opportunity to begin their Sunday mornings a bit differently than most churchgoers — by watering and weeding in the church’s adjoining greenhouses and gardens. Common Ground began in 2006 and, as a newly formed church, needed a place to call its own. Members decided to purchase Mellinger’s Garden Center, which had gone out of business earlier that year, and its 31 acres. Although members of the church and pastor Steve Fortenberry considered tearing down the greenhouses to make room for church parking and activities, they quickly formed a new plan.
“We asked ourselves, ‘How can we use what we have to bless the community?’” Said Fortenberry. After researching and hearing about programs focused on helping at-risk children, adults with special needs and communities with hunger issues — all through gardening, members at Common Ground knew the greenhouses served a purpose. Model Research ‘Fresh Stops.’
How You Can Start a Farm in Heart of the City | Environment. January 8, 2009 | Like this article? Join our email list: Stay up to date with the latest headlines via email. The following is an excerpt from The Urban Homestead: Your Guide to Self-sufficient Living in the Heart of the Cityby Kelly Coyne and Erik Knutzen (Process Self-reliance Series). Imagine sitting down to a salad of peppery arugula and heirloom tomatoes that you grew yourself. My husband Erik and I have done all of this in our little bungalow in Los Angeles, two blocks off of Sunset Boulevard. Though we have fantasies about one day moving to the country, the city holds things that are more important to us than any parcel of open land. When you grow some of your own food, you start to care more about all of your food.
A little history The idea of urban farming is nothing new. The United States once was a nation of independent farmers. SPIN-Farming. SPIN – A New Way to Learn to Farm. SPIN stands for s-mall p-lot in-tensive, and the SPIN-Farming learning series teaches you how to take a backyard, front lawn or neighborhood lot to new levels of productivity and profitability that go far beyond traditional home gardening practices. Whether you want to farm professionally, or produce a significant supply of commercial-grade crops for your family and friends, follow the system that has already launched thousands of new home and community-based farm operations throughout the US and Canada. Here are SPIN-Farming's Key Characteristics: Production based Sub-acre in scale Low capital intensive Entrepreneurially driven Environmentally friendly Close to markets SPIN-Farming's systematized approach to farm learning gives you everything you need to start producing food that has all the nutrition of farm-grown and the value and quality of store-bought.
Here are the advantages to SPIN-Farming: It is non-technical and easy-to-learn. MYFARM. A Plan to Add Supermarkets, and Fresh Food, to New York City’s Poorer Areas. Inner-city L.A. hungers for good grocery stores | csmonitor.com. By Daniel B. Wood, Staff writer of The Christian Science Monitor / October 10, 2009 East L.A. resident Olga Perez has to take two buses to a store about eight miles away to get fresh fruits and vegetables, or decent cuts of meat, for her family. Skip to next paragraph Subscribe Today to the Monitor Click Here for your FREE 30 DAYS ofThe Christian Science MonitorWeekly Digital Edition "The only thing I can get at my corner store are spoiled or expired," explains Ms.
The round trip costs her $5 and limits what she can carry home. And because she works until 6:30 p.m. most nights, Perez doesn't often have the time to make the trip and get home in time to cook for her family. It's a situation the Alliance for Healthy and Responsible Grocery Stores, a city-wide coalition of 25 community, faith-based and environmental organizations, is trying to change. Many of her students come to class either malnourished or jittery from sugar in sodas and fast food, she says. Blog: How food shapes our cities: Carolyn Steel on TED. Pavement to Parks - Allison Arieff Blog. AMD OPEN ARCHITECTURE CHALLENGE LAUNCHES TODAY! Local Roots Market & Cafe.
Ohio Proud | Made in Ohio - Grown in Ohio. Cuyahoga Valley Countryside Conservancy. Lean studies, lean times. Home is where the heart is – and the money, too. Detroit: Urban Laboratory and the New American Frontier. Sweet Juniper! Grown in Detroit - Eastern Market. Don't Fear the Dozer. Next Steps for Shrinking Cities: Results of the Planetizen Brainstorm. Flint to consider ordinance changes to enhance urban agriculture - Get Healthy in Genesee. Urban Harvest | GOVERNING. PASTEURIZATION: Pulling the Plug on Scientific Fallacies Undergirding Our Industrial Food and Drug Culture. The Green Taam (The Green Taam) Northeast Livestock Processing Service Company.
Mobile Slaughter/Processing Units. Urban Chefs - Columbus. On the House | Jim Welker commentary: Tool Library welcomes borrowers in Columbus. The Columbus Dispatch : At the crossroads. The Panther Garden » About Our Garden. Prairie Fruits Farm and Creamery. Seeking Self-Reliance, Americans Raise Own Chickens. Green Edge Organic Gardens. Green Edge Gardens. Benton Harbor Local Food Plan Powerpoint on DVD. Home Town Farms. Keeping Urban Farmers Safe. Survival Acres Dehydrated Food, Storable Food, Emergency Food, Freeze Dried Food, Dried Food, Bulk Food.
Forging a Hot Link to the Farmer Who Grows the Food. The Columbus Dispatch : Neighborhood grocer. New Jersey Dining - Raising Their Own - Of Course It’s Fresh - The Chef Grew It. East End Food Co-op - Pittsburgh, PA: A member-owned store and vegetarian cafe for organic, natural foods. Giving cafeteria food a makeover. Local Dirt: find, buy, and sell local food. Www.foodfarmsjobs.org. Gardening Can Be More Than Just A Hobby! The Columbus Dispatch : Plantings, not shingles, gaining favor as cover for houses. Best friends find work together farming - in a storage container. SustainUSA. FamilyFarmed.org - Welcome - Peirce: Set the table to celebrate a 100-mile Thanksgiving | Chron.com. EATING LOCALLY IS HARDER THAN YOU THINK. Burgerville. Indie Grocery Stores Beat Back the Bigs. Online - Potluck puts focus on local food. Living on the 100-Mile Diet. Do The Local Notion: Today's Big Story. Go Local! Yes Magazine Table of Contents Winter 2007. Living Local « On the Wilder Side.
Op-Ed Columnist - Lettuce From the Garden, With Worms. The Most Innovative Small Farm in America. Pocket farm could end up dying on the vine. SPROUTING OFF. Google's Michael Jones on Google Map's Parcel Layer. Explorer - Sonoma County, Calif. - Explorer - Sonoma County, Calif. - On the Trail of a Sustainable Feast - Travel. The Food Issue - California’s Food Banks Go Locavore. OP-ED CONTRIBUTOR - You Say Tomato, I Say Agricultural Disaster. Full circle of food. Tarsitano Winery. Cows Grazing in the Rumpus Room - Allison Arieff - By Design - Opinion - New York Times Blog.
Woodland Urban Farm – A Diversified Urban Farm in Columbus Ohio. Local Food Fuel Local Economies : Santa Fe Complex. Top USDA official gets serious about local/regional food systems. Rural Grocery Store Initiative. Local Foods Conference Presentations.