Late July Newsletter

[John]

Good Afternoon All everyone,

My name is John Costa, the new volunteer coordinator for ECO City
Farm. I have been operating for two months in this role. So far this
has been a busy summer. It is our first summer growing season. We are
also running two summer programs for students. One of my tasks as the
volunteer coordinator is to make this newsletter cater to you.

Starting with this issue, we are going to try a new approach with this
newsletter. The different voices on the farm will start to post their
thoughts and ideas on our blog. The newsletter will include links to
the blog post for each item on the newsletter. refore, we will post
the title and a link to each topic in the newsletter.

We would love to hear your thoughts and opinion on what you think
about the new format, the content, and volunteer opportunities.

Sincerely,
John Costa
Volunteer Coordinator

* ~ECO City Farms*
*4913 Crittenden Street*
*Edmonston, MD 20781*
*ecocityfarms.org* <http://ecocityfarms.org>
*Volunteer Hours:
Thursday 8a-12p
Saturdays 9a-3p (9am Orientation, 1pm Potluck, 130pm Tour or Workshop)
*Facebook and Tweet Us!*
* Quote:*
**
Plants convert solar energy into food for animals (ourselves
included), Then
the wastes from those animals, along with dead plant and animal
bodies, "lie
down in the dung heap," are composted, and "rise again in the corn."
This cycle of light is the central reason that composting is such an
important link in organic food production: It returns solar energy to
the
soil. In this context, such common compost ingredients as onion skins,
hair
trimmings, eggshells, vegetable parings, and even burnt toast are no
longer
seen as garbage, but as sunlight on the move from one form to
another.
~Susan Sides, Mother Earth News
~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~
At The Farm (By Christian)

Yes, we still farm under the sun on these 100 degree days. We do have
shade cloth on some crops, some super soakers, and eat lots of melons,
but its still unbelievably hot out there. Beyond our tans, we’ve been
working to keep crops hydrated with our new drip irrigation system.
Somehow we still have some cooler-weather crops, like Radishes and Pea
Shoots, in spite of the weather. We still have those, and other
vegetables to offer, like salad mix, beet greens, cherry tomatoes,
green, yellow and purple beans, arugula, italian and thai basil,,
sunflower shoots, and some more. Please stop by the Riverdale Park
Farmers Market from 3-7pm on Thursdays to experience the season’s
abundance, as well as to drop off your compostables. Its been awhile
since we said anything, but if you have come to market, you’ll know
that we have made a community drop-off point for compostables that
we’ll take to the farm to process. We are mainly looking for your non-
animal-based kitchen scraps, but come by market with your questions
about what else we can take.

While we’re talking about compost, our worm system has been boosted
now that we have incorporated Bokashi into the system. Bokashi refers
to “fermentation” in Japanese. Its an anaeorbic form of
decomposition. Typically, we’ve wanted our composting at the farm to
be aerobic. Anaerobic usually means stinky when it comes to compost,
but this method actually harnesses anaerobic bacteria in a sealed
container and produces broken-down organic matter that smells a bit
like sauerkraut. After 2 weeks in a container, the food waste doesn’t
look like crumbly, brown compost, but is chewed up by the bacteria,
which is ideal for our worm system. Worms feed off the bacteria on
rotting organic matter. If you throw some fresh lettuce in a worm
bin, the worms may take some time before decomposing it because its
not inoculated with much bacteria. With bokashi, its been a feast for
the worms. The rate of consumption and the increase in our worm
population has increased significantly. We are still playing with
this, but its had positive results and we hope more people will
explore bokashi. In the grand scheme of things, this could be an
effective large-scale method for composting our “waste” in urban
areas, all contained and smelling like pickles.

News:
1) Summer Programs:
ECO City Farm is managing two summer programs for students this year.
Seed to Feed is geared for high school students in the Ports town
area. It is a six weeks program with an objective to expose the
students to the food system. The other program is part of DC Public
Works. It is s geared for college students. We are hosting three
Howard University students. They are learning about composting to do
outreach with local communities on the benefits of composting. More
details on these programs and what the students learned from it will
be available for you in the next newsletter. Here is a link to a photo
journal from when “Seed to Feed” Celebrated Bastille Day with Mark
Haskell, http://www.ecoffshoots.org/seed-to-feed-celebrates-bastille-day-with-mark-haskell/

2) Bread for the City’s Roof Garden. http://www.ecoffshoots.org/bread-for-the-citys-roof-garden/

3) Studies show Roundup causes Birth Defects,
http://www.ecoffshoots.org/studies-show-birth-defects-from-roundup/

Events and Opportunities
1) ECO City Farms' Events and Opportunities
a) Community Seed Exchange, July 29, 2011 6 – 9 pm
http://www.ecoffshoots.org/community-seed-exchange/

b) Certificate in Commericial Agriculture program through the Prince
Georges Community College - http://www.ecoffshoots.org/certificate-in-commercial-urban-agriculture/

c) New Saturday Volunteer Schedule is as follows:
9:00 - 9:30 am Check-in
9:30 - 10:00 am Orientation
10:00 - 1:00 pm Work
1:00 - 3:00 pm Potluck/event*

* We will be posting the event schedule on our blog starting in
September

2) Other Events and Opportunities
a) Neighborhood Farm Initiatives - Job Posting,
http://www.ecoffshoots.org/wp-admin/post.php?post=2815&action=edit

b) Rainbeau Ridge Farm - Internship, http://www.ecoffshoots.org/internship-rainbeau-ridge-farm/