Category: Urban Farming

We’re now in the eighth month of the COVID-19 pandemic, and millions are struggling to maintain their incomes and housing. But even before the pandemic started, one Chicago nonprofit, the Urban Growers Collective, was working to address residents’ struggles to access another basic necessity—fresh, healthy food—and the current crisis has only emboldened that work.

From mid-March to the end of September, the group delivered nearly one million pounds of produce to more than 25 partner organizations across the city, including Howard Brown Health on 63rd, Grow Greater Englewood, and West Side Mutual Aid, says UGC development associate Brandon Lov. That number, Lov says, includes produce boxes UGC delivers directly, as well as deliveries the group coordinates with its partners, including prepared meals and boxes of fresh produce, dairy and meat as part of the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Farmers to Families Food Box program.

READ THE FULL STORY: https://www.chicagoreader.com/chicago/amid-covid-19-urban-growers-collective-distributes-nearly-one-million-pounds-of-produce/Content?oid=83220311

COLUMBUS — Jodi Kushins, of Over the Fence Urban Farm, knows she doesn’t grow a lot compared to some farms. She feeds about 20 households through her CSA program, with 2,500 square feet in her yard and her neighbor’s yard.

“It’s like a drop in the bucket,” she said. “Seeing a semi truck full of produce and then thinking about the very, very tiny amount of food I’m able to produce in my yard definitely gives me pause.”

READ THE FULL STORY: https://www.farmanddairy.com/news/more-than-a-token-urban-agriculture-not-gonna-feed-the-world-but-has-much-to-offer-close-to-home/626629.html

MANILA, Philippines — Struggling to put food on their tables through weeks into quarantine due to the new coronavirus pandemic, residents of Barangay Payatas in Quezon City have found a new reason to band together amid the scarcity of food aid and jobs.

They have transformed concrete walls, backyards and empty lots into urban food gardens — where patches of green, leafy vegetables keep their community vibrant despite months of lockdown.

“It also gives us the motivation to wake up every day to see how our vegetables are doing. It would make us smile to see our lettuce leaves or eggplants grow by the day,” said Gilda Rollamas, one of the volunteer mothers of Ina ng Lupang Pangako Parish.

Read the FULL STORY here: https://newsinfo.inquirer.net/1340874/urban-poor-families-set-up-food-gardens-to-cope-with-hunger-amid-pandemic

SOUTH CHICAGO — Right as he’s detailing his urban farming work, Gregory Bratton abruptly stops and says he’ll need to continue the interview later.

Bratton is working with volunteers at one of the many South Side gardens he cares for, and he breaks up his interview answers to share knowledge and give directions to volunteers. His priorities lie with the garden.

“Make sure you put that in the story,” Bratton said before hanging up the phone. “I’m a busy man.”

He certainly is. The 68-year-old master gardener — 69 in a few weeks— works on 86 gardens across Chicago. More than 20 are on the Southeast Side.

READ THE FULL STORY: https://blockclubchicago.org/2020/09/24/this-south-side-gardener-is-behind-more-than-200-urban-farms-across-chicago-and-hes-not-slowing-down/

A developer is building a small “pocket neighborhood” in Kennedale with modern farm homes and lots of outdoor space where people can grow their own food and meet their neighbors.

“Millennials want that living experience. People don’t want to mow their yards anymore. They want a smaller, compact home that is cute and modern looking, creating a cottage feel,” Sumpter said in an interview.

The Moderno is designed with a “pocket neighborhood” concept where the homes face inward often into a courtyard or an open space where neighbors can gather and get to know one another. Pocket neighborhoods are popular in the Pacific Northwest, Sumpter said.

READ THE FULL STORY: https://www.star-telegram.com/news/business/growth/article245902885.html

Hayley Dunning – The mental, physical and community benefits of allotment gardening are invaluable to city dwellers, but allotments are in short supply in London.

This is one of the conclusions of a new paper by Imperial College London researchers in the Centre for Environmental Policy, published in Urban Forestry & Urban Greening. MSc student Ellen Fletcher and Dr Tilly Collins assessed allotment supply and demand in London, finding plots are shrinking while tens of thousands of people remain on waiting lists.

Forty-one London sites have closed completely in the past seven years and with over 30,000 people now estimated to be on waiting lists, there is on average a delay of four to five years before receiving a plot. To try and meet this demand the number of individual plots has been increased as surrendered plots are often now split into ever-smaller units.

READ THE FULL STORY: https://www.imperial.ac.uk/news/204133/thousands-chasing-london-allotments-supply-dwindles/

HollandSentinel.com – The urban environment is dominated by buildings, pavement, lawns, and other non-natural elements. We constantly struggle against nature to maintain our built environment, especially our lawns and gardens.

This can include the use of fertilizers and pesticides that, if used improperly, can cause environmental harm. Our built landscapes can also be very water intensive, which can lead to high demand on our public water utilities.

However, there are ways to work with nature to create an attractive, low maintenance landscape that will help protect the environment, conserve water and provide places for urban wildlife.

Gardening with nature starts with careful planning. Take an inventory of what you already have.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE: https://www.hollandsentinel.com/news/20200914/living-sustainably-put-nature-to-work-for-more-effective-gardening

PressDemocrat.com – If you like gardening, Santa Rosa is one of the best places in the country to be.

That’s the conclusion of a new nationwide survey that ranked Santa Rosa fourth in the nation for urban gardening. LawnStarter, an Austin, Texas-based lawn care company, compared 150 of the most populated cities in the U.S. for a variety of factors, including the number of garden clubs, community gardens and nurseries and the number of days of sunshine and length of the growing season.

Santa Rosa’s good scores placed it in the top tier, outranked only by three cities in The Sunshine State — Miami, Orlando and Tampa, Florida.

When it comes to the number of nurseries and garden centers per 100,000 residents, only Miami and Salem, Oregon, have better shopping opportunities for the green thumb crowd.

READ THE FULL STORY: https://www.pressdemocrat.com/article/lifestyle/santa-rosa-is-a-top-spot-for-gardening-in-the-us/

Julie Pritchard Wright grew up on her family’s two-acre property in the hills of Cupertino, where her father grew grapes and fruit trees, and kept bees and sometimes chickens, while her mother tended a large vegetable garden.

“Whenever I smell the scent of tomato leaves, I think of her,” Wright says. “She also grew many kinds of flowers, and I grow many of the same varieties.”

Wright considers her own 5,000-square-foot San Rafael garden as an “urban homestead” where she can cultivate a sustainable, organic and “locavore” lifestyle, and nurture plants that, in return, nurture her and teach her patience, observation and mindfulness.

In keeping with her lifestyle, Wright likes to line-dry her laundry, can and ferment her own foods, host sausage- or salami-making gatherings, practice no-till gardening and some permaculture principles, and plans to eventually replace her lawn with edibles and exchanges her homegrown produce with Marin neighbors at the San Anselmo Garden Exchange.

READ THE FULL ARTICLE: https://www.marinij.com/2020/09/11/an-urban-homestead-that-nurtures-nourishes-educates/

NOLA.com – When it comes to vegetable gardening, understanding the seasons and the proper time to plant various crops is so important to success. Although it certainly doesn’t feel like it, we are gradually transitioning into fall — and that affects what we can plant.

Cool fronts may begin to make their way into our area this month, bringing welcome relief from the heat. Still, daytime highs regularly reach the 80s and 90s well into October. During this transition period, warm- and cool-season vegetables rub elbows in the garden.

READ THE FULL STORY: https://www.nola.com/entertainment_life/home_garden/article_9b5e1e60-f177-11ea-9de3-176c3d5c2ceb.html

EcoWatch.com – When I call Chef Q. Ibraheem to discuss urban farming in her own cooking career, she’s in the middle of placing an order for microgreens from a small farm in Lake Forest, a ritzy suburb just north of downtown Chicago. Now’s a great time for her to chat, actually, because the Chicago-based chef is immersed in what she loves, sourcing ingredients as locally as possible.

MB.Com – Sometimes, a farm isn’t just a place where crops grow. Sometimes, it can be a place of conservation and rejuvenation.

Artana Farm & Eco-Sanctuary is one such place. Located in Iba, Zambales, Artana is a family-owned, non-commercial agricultural estate that includes various planted crops,farm animals, a guesthouse for rent, an area dedicated to the preservation of native trees, and various farm tourism activities.

“Artana is a portmanteau of our parents’ names, Arturo and Ana Achacoso,” says Beng Achacoso-Pascua, a freelance voice talent and retired network executive who owns the farm together with her mom and seven siblings.

“All our lives, we had always referred to our farm as ‘Zambales,’” she says. In 2014, after our father passed on, my seven siblings and I came together to vote on an appropriate name for our farm-which we all acknowledged as the retreat we all loved, and our parents’ legacy.”

READ THE FULL STORY AT: https://mb.com.ph/2020/09/06/family-farm-is-also-a-tree-sanctuary-and-a-home-for-rescued-taal-horses/