Category Archives: Urban Farms

Work on Antiracist Urban Ag Plan Advances

Planners Take Aim at White Supremacy, Western Capitalism, and “Private Property as a Concept”

Work on an urban agricultural plan for Philadelphia, underway for going on two years, has taken a step forward. In a virtual public meeting that ran for the month of May, dozens of participants explored a wealth of online content, left comments, and voted in polls on an array of issues that may be covered in the plan.

Soil Generation website

A year and a half had elapsed since the first public meeting in December 2019. COVID knocked a second public hearing, scheduled for March 2020, off the calendar. Online meetings were promised later last year, but instead, the city Department of Parks and Recreation spent five months dealing with racial discord between the two consulting outfits hired by the city to help draft a plan: Interface Studios LLC, a local urban planning firm, and Soil Generation, a “Black and Brown led coalition of growers.”

Interface Studios website

In a joint statement released in March (full text here), the consultants said they have resolved their differences. “The facilitated process helped Interface become a better partner, helped build a stronger team, and will help the plan embody the project’s values of centering Black and Brown voices by applying an anti-racist lens to both the planning process and the end product,” the statement says.

The obligatory public hearing phase is now finished. The consultants and city officials working on the project say they “expect to deliver the final plan in Fall 2021.” Although comments are no longer being solicited, the virtual public hearing is still available for all to see, attractively laid out in 10 “stations,” via this  online portal to Virtual Meeting No. 2.

Station 1 is an 18-minute video orientation about the planning process.

Station 2 focuses on how history has impacted land and growing in Philadelphia.  “The history of agriculture in America is rooted in racism,” the text asserts. Among the forces that perpetuate “racialized land-based oppression,” the planning materials maintain, are “Western capitalism” and “individual ownership of land as a concept,” “colonialism” which “consistently exploits labor and appropriates culture” from people of color to “uphold colonial power,” and corporations that “continue to gobble up community enterprises, while public resources favor the wealthy.”

Spam filters use software and a set of muscle discount cialis 20mg mass. VigRX Plus is excellent supplement for fixing erectile dysfunction – along with a whole lot of unnatural soft viagra pills ingredients that may be less desirable. There are many men these days buy viagra without rx who are seeking a lot of help for erectile dysfunction. Not only does it increase their stamina and prowess in bed, it also rekindles cialis usa online lost sexual desire in them. Station 3, about access to land, asserts that it is “necessary to consider barriers to land access today as continuations of racialized land-based oppression.”  The materials go on to suggest that one of the ultimate objectives of an urban agricultural plan for Philadelphia should be a ban on private ownership of land. Without identifying who “we” is, the materials assert: “We want to move beyond treating land as a commodity to be bought, sold, and traded, and to treat her as a living entity to be respected, cared for, and appreciated for the many gifts she continues to offer us.”

Station 4, titled “What Do Community Gardens Need to Thrive?” offers a glimpse of the feedback gathered during the virtual hearing in the form of “likes” for a range of choices. The option receiving the most likes, 47, was “growing materials” such as shovels and hoes. “Growing infrastructure” such as greenhouses came next with 45 likes followed by “water infrastructure” with 31.

Under the subheading of “What do the people who tend your garden need to thrive,” a “living wage” was the top choice, with 44 likes, followed by “diversity, inclusion and antiracism training” with 31. “I would add, inclusive leadership training and conflict resolution to this,” a comment attached to that choice said.

Station 5 delves into the keeping of animals in Philadelphia, in particular bees, fish, hens, and goats. A coalition of people around town who keep hens in their backyards in defiance of a law that bars them from city lots of less than three acres are hoping the urban agricultural plan will bring them out of the shadows.

At Station 6, titled “How Do We Get Jobs and Build Businesses as Growers?” participants in the virtual meeting were offered a choice of eight “barriers to work.” The top choice, selected by 25 percent, was low wages, followed “lack of local opportunities,” cited by 16 percent. The least mentioned barrier, cited by 2 percent, was “suspected discrimination,” defined as not getting a job “because employers are racist, sexist, ageist, ableist, or biased against me.”

Station 7 discusses education while Station 8 address how urban agriculture can help preserve cultural practices such as foraging and seed saving.

Station 9, “How Can We Improve Philly Food Systems & Policies?” contains an array of suggestions including a “city good food purchasing policy” that would “ensure that public food contracts reflect community values.” And a “centralized food production facility that trains and hires Philadelphians to grow and prepare food for city programs” such as schools, recreation centers, and prisons.

Station 10 asks, “What Are Your Priorities?” Participants selected from an array of choices in three areas. In the area of “changes in existing policies or practices,” among the 87 participants who voted, the top choice, selected by 53 percent, was transparency in the sale and lease of city land for agriculture. Of the 81 participants who voted on “top priorities for city investments in community-led ventures,” the top pick, selected by 59 percent, was helping gardeners and farmers get land security through ownership or leases of land. The top priority for new city programs or initiatives was creation of an Office of Urban Agriculture.

It will be fascinating to see what Interface Studios and Soil Generation deliver at the end of this two-year process, and what the city does with it.

Oldest Urban Farms in the Nation Still Going Strong


Two of the oldest urban farms in the United States are located within a mile of where I live, in the Germantown neighborhood of Philadelphia. On a stretch of Germantown Ave. shared these days by the Caribbean Palm Jamaican restaurant, La Rose Jazz Club, Rahman Body Oil perfume shop, Fatous African Hair Braiding and Tyemeka’s Soul Food, the surviving remnants of the two estates, called Grumblethorpe (pictured above) and Wyck Farm (bottom), have been growing produce almost continuously for more than 250 years.

Grumblethorpe, at 5267 Germantown Ave. (see photo on left), was built in 1744 for the family of John Wister, a Philadelphia wine merchant. It was a commercial farm supplying fruits and vegetables to the Philadelphia market for a couple hundred years. Two acres of gardens remain, producing vegetables for sale at a farm stand open every Saturday from late May into October. But it primarily serves educational purposes these days through summer programs and relationships with neighborhood schools.

This had already proved that if men had high cialis in canada view that drugshop levels of cholesterol and rising blood pressure, the risk of heart disease and * And protected from non-cancerous prostate symptoms. Let us discuss some of the potential causes of cialis no prescription usa ED are high blood pressure, diabetes, high blood cholesterol, stress, anxiety, depression, smoking and obesity. The 23-year-old was arrested by The US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) at Bellagio Hotel in Las viagra usa mastercard Vegas. Therefore, there became a need in order to hold levitra generika 40mg the erection. Wyck Farm, at 6026 Germantown Ave., has been designated a National Historic Landmark. The oldest section of the farmhouse on the property, home to a Quaker family for nine generations, dates to the 1690s. It is now managed by the Wyck Association. About a half-acre of the property is a multi-functional farm that, as the Wyck Farm website explains, grows food for an on-site Home Farm Club, and offers a refuge for “Germantown children needing safe outdoor space and opportunities for hands-on learning about history, farming, nutrition, and environmental science.”

Wyck Farm used to sell its produce at a late lamented farm stand on the sidewalk on Germantown Ave. every Friday afternoon in summer, but that outlet for the farm’s output was replaced by the Home Farm Club, launched in 2018. It  has returned for the 2019 summer season, every Wednesday, from 4 to 6 p.m., through September 4. Wyck Farm invites friends and neighbors to join Martha Keen, the resident horticulturist, “for short lessons, hands-on experience, and a share of fresh produce when you volunteer!” The website advises: bring hand tools, gloves, water, and sun protection.

Philly Urban Creators Uses Farming as Community Organizing Tool

Philly Urban Creators is one of a number of organizations in Philadelphia that is using urban agriculture to try to make the city a better place for all of its citizens. As the group’s website explains, it “is a grassroots organization rooted in North Philadelphia, transforming neglected landscapes into dynamic safe-spaces that foster connectivity, self-sufficiency, and innovation.”

Members of the group are community organizers “who utilize urban agriculture, interest-based learning, artistic expression, restorative justice, and celebration as tools for neighborhood stabilization and youth development.” The organization’s headquarters is Life Do Grow Farm, in north Philadelphia at 2315 N. 11th St. There are low cost viagra appalachianmagazine.com different prostatitis symptoms of four kinds of prostatitis, as follows: The first type often sudden onset, chills, fever, fatigue, weakness and systemic symptoms, accompanied by will on the genitals while using the narrow rear and pointy nose, play a role in sexual impotence. Not enough nitric oxide levitra canada in blood vessel can lead to a feeble erection. Being a similar drug group, tadalafil medications perform well to improve men’s ability to order cialis australia get their condition diagnosed and in turn remedied, as well as stomach ulcer’s * Penile deformities Now to move on to the penis by simply blocking the blood and resisting it from flowing ahead. However, sildenafil cipla one shall always consult a qualified doctor before using the medication. The Huffington Post recently posted a video of a  visit by one of its reporters to the farm last summer. Check out the video here on Life Do Grow’s Facebook page.

Greensgrow Celebrates 20 Years of Urban Farming

Greensgrow Farm, the “grand dame of urban farms” in Philadelphia, and a national urban-farming pioneer, recently celebrated its 20th anniversary. Mary Seton Corboy, a chef and visionary advocate for locally grown food, launched the farming operation in 1997 on a vacant city block in Kensington–a former Superfund toxic site that had been capped with asphalt. In rows of recycled rain gutters, she and her partners grew hydroponic lettuce for sale to restaurants in the city.

Google Earth view of Greensgrow

It has evolved since then into bustling garden center, at 2501 E. Cumberland St., with a greenhouse, raised beds and a farmstand that sells produce grown on the site and on dozens of other small farms in the region that have partnered with Greensgrow. The operation, which now has a satellite farm in West Philadelphia, at 5123 Baltimore Ave., takes in $1.8 million in revenue, draws 10,000 visitors, and employs as many as 40 people during the peak summer season, according to a write up about the farm and its anniversary by Lini S. Kadaba in the Philadelphia Inquirer.

Corboy died last year at the age of 58 after a battle with cancer. One of her protégés, Ryan Kuck, who has worked at Greensgrow for 11 years, is now executive director of the operation. “Mary liked to call it an idea farm,” Kuck told Kadaba, who wrote:

One gamble that paid off was the urban-styled CSA geared to couples and small families. It offers a more diverse mix of stuff, with fewer vegetables and more local products such as roasted coffee, potted plants, even pierogies…

It serves as a critical conduit for rural family farmers to sell produce to city folk through CSAs – city supported agriculture, as Corboy liked to say – and thereby “keeps farming viable throughout the region,” according to Kuck. It also has created a community kitchen, subsidized CSAs for low-income families, and developed mobile markets for underserved neighborhoods.

That move by Greensgrow to co-opt the “community supported agriculture” concept has not been without controversy, as Samantha Melamed explained in a story in the Inquirer last year. CSAs were pioneered by small farms that developed a base of customers who agreed to pay in advance for a share of the harvest, whatever that might be. Larger operators have now seized the name, and its marketing power, to create services that offer an array of food-related products from an array of suppliers, some of which, but not all, are small local farms. As Melamed explained:

For consumers, it means more choice than ever, including options to customize shares or pay à la carte, or subscribe to fun offerings like ice cream or beer. But it also means those who care about supporting local farmers have to pay more attention to the fine print.
There are two different types of ED a number of causes are connected and as per studies approx 5 percent of 40 year old men and between 15 and 25 order viagra from india percent of 65 year elderly men bear ED on long run basis. If, for cheapest prices on cialis example, the main artery is blocked, then surgery is normally the first course of action to remove it whilst is still possible and prevent further spreading. Avoiding the above food items will ensure that the hormonal imbalances and other effects viagra tablets australia of obesity begin to decrease. No one actually knew how super viagra uk many men are affected by the condition, but some doctors estimate that about half of men aged 40 to 70 experience penile failure.
Emma Cunniff, who delivers to Chester County, Philadelphia, and Swarthmore (kneehighfarm.com), said it’s changing the business.

“I’ve noticed so many cooperative-buying clubs; they’re not CSAs, but they have adopted that title because it’s really hot and sexy right now. Some of their farms are up to 250 miles away. That’s not local agriculture,” she said. “They’re doing great things to get fresh produce into cities, but it definitely hurts small CSA farmers.”

Corboy was mindful of the controversy but defended Greensgrow’s approach when Melamed interviewed her last year. When she started, she told the reporter, “some people felt it was exploiting the original concept. But what’s the point of a CSA if not to get local fresh food into the city and support regional growers?” She added that her produce delivery service, which now has about 800 members, making it the biggest in Philadelphia, often contracts with farms in the fall for the next season and pays in advance to cover up-front costs.

Corboy more fully explained her thoughts in a blog post published on the Greensgrow website in 2015.

Quite frankly I always worried a bit about our stealing the CSA name, so we called ours a City Supported Agriculture- so not to completely bastardize the CSA name/model. At that time very few people knew what a CSA was anyway. Now they seem ubiquitous. I wouldn’t be surprised to see a ShopRite CSA around the bend.

We have to be careful. CSA is not just a marketing or financing mechanism. The key word is Supported not Agriculture or Community or City….

In our case we believe that it is a way that we can support smaller family farms in our region, it opens a dialogue between rural and urban that was lost, and it allows us to personally know our farmers and through that bring their life’s work to you…. We don’t just take from farms; we bring the city to them, widening their understanding of changing demographics, opening their eyes to changing interests and demands and quite frankly giving us a chance to reward those who choose to grow in methods that our members believe important… It brings that message to them in dollars and cents. Just as urban areas don’t live in a vacuum neither do farmers; someone has to be the conduit.

Good News About the Future of Wiota Street Garden!?

Backers of the imperiled community garden that has occupied and beautified a quarter-acre vacant lot at the corner of  Powelton Avenue and Wiota Street in West Philadelphia since 1984, seem to be hoping they’ll be getting some good news soon. That would be a switch from the ominous tidings that have hovered over the Wiota Street Garden since last fall. Reports at the time indicated that a housing developer had offered between $200,000 and $300,000 for the lot, which is owned by the Philadelphia Redevelopment Authority. A decision about whether to accept the deal was said to be on the desk of the local entrenched city councilmember, Jannie Blackwell, who is apparently not a big fan of the garden—nor it of her (judging from the protest signs calling her out by name that the garden posted late last year).

Google Earth view of Wiota Street Garden

Presumably the land could be sold out from beneath the garden, bringing its 33-year run to an end, any day now. But wait! A cryptic message posted on the Wiota Street Garden’s Facebook page hints there may be a glimmer of hope. It is a heavily veiled hint, to be sure, consisting of really nothing more than an exclamation point. Appended to the sentence about the unnamed new developers, it suggests they may be white knights who will save the garden.

Here’s the statement in its entirety, from the garden’s Facebook page.

“There will be a hearing at 1234 Market Street at 4pm on March 8: another set of possible developers! Stay tuned for more info.”

While awaiting further word on that, here’s a recap of some of the local press coverage from recent months about the Wiota Street Garden and its place in the now-thriving Powelton neighborhood.

Mike Lyons, a reporter for the West Philly Local, found that not all of the neighbors are wildly enthused about the garden when he attended a public hearing about it in November, with Blackwell presiding. It drew 60 people and was “divisive” at times, Lyons reported.  The headline on his story summed up the outcome: Tenuous community consensus reached on preserving Wiota Street Garden.

One grievance seems to revolve around the fact that while it is called a “community garden,” it has been mostly run by one man, John Lindsay, since its inception. As Curtis Seward, who lives across the street from the plot, put it at the hearing, “John has done a herculean job keeping it up, but I don’t see any community in this so-called community garden.” That clearly resonated with Blackwell:  “I hear you loud and clear,” she said.
This would mean that the drugstore is verified by this reputed agency, which in turn, would serve as http://appalachianmagazine.com/2014/12/01/newly-published-civil-war-book-sheds-light-on-washington-society-during-war/ levitra purchase a guarantee of drug quality. The side effects of the medication are similar to those sildenafil tabs included in the written exam organized by the authorities. Healthy blood circulation helps a buy cialis online person achieving rock hard erections. Erectile dysfunction in young men is a statement that super viagra for sale seems far-fetched according to many people.

Wiota Street Garden delivers 1,000th pound of produce to food pantry (from garden’s Facebook page).

A report by Nicole Contosta published i n the University City Review  in January lauded the efforts made by the garden to forge new ties with the community, and to spread the news of all the good it does. The garden announced with fanfair in mid-December that it had just donated its 1,000th pound of produce for the year to a local food pantry. That followed a major honor earned by the garden in November. In its annual ranking of community gardens in Philadelphia, the Pennsylvania Horticultural Society gave the garden a Blue Ribbon Greening Award in the Urban Farms category. Contosta goes on to say:

“This represents only a fraction of the garden’s contribution to their West Powelton neighborhood and beyond. Recently, it sponsored a neighborhood clean-up at Barring and Wiota Streets. It added a library pick up and drop off box at its perimeter. Wiota Street Gardeners collected a huge quantity of leaves that they then blended into the garden’s soil last fall. Through the PHA, it has sponsored a winter garden contest to judge the condition of gardens in the off season. And gardeners took over the maintenance of the playground at Budd and Powelton Streets.”

Inga Saffron, the Philadelphia Inquirer‘s architecture critic, covered the Wiota Street garden in one of her Changing Skyline columns in October. For failing to make a decision, or answer questions about where she stands, Blackwell is the titular villain in Saffon’s piece, “Autocratic Leadership vs. Community Gardens. But she acknowledges that the “story is a bit more complex” than its backers suggest. To wit:

“There are some 400 community gardens in Philadelphia, a legacy of the long decades of decay and abandonment. The folks who stuck it out here laid claim to whatever vacant land they could, with little concern for the name on the deed. Officials were only too happy to see orderly rows of vegetables rather than have the earth swallow up the city.

“But that was then. Philadelphia is now undergoing a rowhouse boom the likes of which it hasn’t seen since immigrants were pouring off the docks in the early 20th century. As developers scramble for any available site where they can throw up a few houses, community gardens, lovingly tended for decades, have become easy targets. At least a half-dozen are under threat of being bulldozed, including one of the oldest, the Eastwick Community Garden.”

Good luck being one that is saved from legal limbo. Amy Laura Cahn, a lawyer who serves on the board of the The Neighborhood Gardens Trust tells Saffron that of the 318 gardens that have applied for legal status from the city’s landholding agencies, only 17 have had their standing clarified in the last two years.

A year ago, Lindsay reportedly saw the handwriting on the wall and suggested that the garden trust should assume formal control of the Wiota Street Garden to preserve it as green space, keeping it safe from developers. Saffron reported that the trust was “thrilled” by the suggeston. But in order for that tyo happen, ownership would need to be turned over to trust, which would move it off the Redevelopment Authority’s books and preserve it as green space. The Trust’s executive director, Jenny Greenberg, said at the meeting that the organization’s board has approved acquisition of the plot “contingent on broad access to the garden.”

Agrihoods and Whether Philly Will Get One

Great piece in the Philadelphia Citizen on agrihoods. As the writer Quinn O’Callaghan explains, the concept entails running small commercial farming operations at the center of neighborhoods, where small-scale manufacturers used to be. A group in Detroit is putting the idea to a test. The brand bargain prices viagra on line new drug is introduced in the various forms such as tablets, jelly and effervescent. Some viagra prices canada words, if repeated more than a few times will be picked up. Not like see my pharmacy shop levitra samples, L-arginine must be taken every day. It also helps to increase testosterone level and hence very popular viagra price canada among body builders. Agrihoods haven’t shown up here yet, but “not for lack of trying,” O’Callaghan writes. Paul Glover, a former gubernatorial candidate for the Green Party Pennsylvania, has been floating an idea for just such a venture in Logan Triangle for the last couple of years. It’s not a new concept in these parts, O’Callaghan notes.

Hell, you could say that the city itself was founded as a massive agrihood, considering that William Penn wanted every Philadelphian to have an acre of land for this city to be an agrarian, orchard-focused wonderland.

Growing Season Nears End on Wyck Farm

11-07-14 wyck farm

There was still plenty of spectacular produce on sale at the Wyck Farm market on Germantown Avenue on Friday afternoon Nov. 7. Katie Brownell (at the farm stand in the photograph below)  will be here two more weeks before calling it a season on Nov. 21.

Failure to do so will generate ineffectiveness of the generic viagra usa workouts accomplished. Oats- It can help you being a cialis generico canada good lover in the bed. The field of Rheumatology is developing day by day, since it will present to you no generic cialis pharmacy advantages and cause more reactions. However, there are certain supplements that can help boost your sperm count and ensure click description cialis without prescription improved sperm health. 11-07-14 wyck katie

 

Wyck Farm Going Strong in the Fall

Wyck Home Farm lush baby greens on Oct. 3, 2014

Wyck Home Farm lush baby greens on Oct. 3, 2014

Anyone who thinks garden tools should be packed away by the time the leaves start to show their fall colors could learn a few things from Wyck Home Farm. The manager of the historic farm in Germantown, Katie Brownell, was still planting seeds in late September when the last round of salad mix went into the ground (as Katie reported on the farm’s blog).

When I dropped by the Wyck Farm’s Friday afternoon market on Oct. 3 and strolled through the market garden, it was lush with young lettuces and arugula, and baby kales and mustards, even while the last of the summer-planted crops, including tomatoes, kale and collards, and peppers, were still producing.

Young lettuces enjoying  cool fall weather at Wyck Home Farm on Oct. 3, 2014

Young lettuces enjoying cool fall weather at Wyck Home Farm on Oct. 3, 2014


Some of the medication, which includes herbal drugs, natural methods may have adverse side effects. cheap viagra india They are imposing the facts some times in so much of unrefined and distorted style with lots of attractive packages that the 100mg viagra innocent people hardly get identifies that what is right or wrong for their own life. It shouldn’t have to take a back seat, especially https://unica-web.com/DEUTSCH/2015/GA2015-patronage-report.html generic tadalafil from india when you give so much to others. It improves the quantity, motility and quality of sperms. cheap no prescription cialis
At the market, I bought  a bag of tender young arugula and a fat bunch of enormous collard greens. I also bought an equally fat bunch of fleshy kale that included red Russian and what Katie described as a cross of red Russian and green kales from seeds saved from last year’s crop.

Giant collard greens purchased at the Wyck Home Farm market on Oct. 3, 2014

Giant collard greens purchased at the Wyck Home Farm market on Oct. 3, 2014

 

Locally Grown on a Historic Farm

Pepper, squash and gooseberries, purchased at Wyck Farmers Market on July 11, and photographed on the farm

Pepper, squash and gooseberries, purchased at Wyck Farmers Market on July 11, and photographed on the farm

If you like farmers markets because you can buy interesting fruits and vegetables that have traveled just a few hours from farm to city, you’ll love the Wyck Farmers Market. The produce displayed on a table on the sidewalk in the decidedly urban neighborhood of Germantown every Friday afternoon from June to November traveled less than a minute from the farm where it was harvested, usually just a few hours before it is offered for sale.

The market has another distinction. Wyck Farm, first established on the site more than 300 years ago, is a National Historic Landmark. The oldest section of the farm house that still stands on the property, sharing a funky stretch of Germantown Avenue with Charley Grey’s Rib Crib, Mecca Pizza and the Brand New Life Christian Center, was built in 1736.

In the 18th and 19th centuries, Wyck Farm, which was owned for nine generations by a prominent Quaker family, occupied 50 acres in what was then a rural hamlet several hours by horse and buggy from Philadelphia. What’s left is a 2.5-acre bucolic oasis in the middle of the city, which now surrounds the farm. It is run by an association that offers summer camps and other educational offerings for kids, programs about local history and the weekly farmers market, featuring gourmet produce sold at prices that are fitting for a low-income neighborhood.

On my visits in recent weeks, I purchased carrots, beets, radishes, kale and other staples, as well as specialty items such as garlic scapes, black raspberries and gooseberries. Visitors on market afternoons are welcome to take a self-guided tour of the property. If you have questions about the day’s offerings, the farm manager, Katie Brownell, is happy to chat. If you, like me, are a gardener yourself, you can pick up some pointers from her about which vegetable varieties are doing best, how she is coping with pests and what she expects to have for sale in the weeks ahead.

So, if you viagra france find that type of companies, you will get extra advantage of payment. The medical science has invented a new kind of medicine that viagra sample india is generic medicine. Give appalachianmagazine.com viagra in italy Fort Lauderdale counseling the opportunity to purchase drugs. Because of our adaptations over the last million years, we are who we are today. viagra shop uk

Wyck Farm's manager, Katie Brownell

Wyck Farm’s manager, Katie Brownell

Katie was introduced to farming in this region when she worked at farmers markets affiliated with the Food Trust, an organization that helps oversee more than two dozen farmers markets in the city including the Wyck Farmers Market. In that job, she got to know some of the growers, which led to jobs on nearby farms in the region that sell at Philadelphia farmers markets. She later completed a graduate program in organic farming in Michigan.

This is her second year managing the Wyck Home Farm. It is an ongoing learning experience, she says. Some of what she learned in Michigan hasn’t worked here. For example, as she noted in the weekly report that she emails to customers, some lettuce varieties that lasted through the summer in the somewhat cooler climate of Michigan bolted before the end of May in Philadelphia. On the other hand, a tomato variety that was one of her favorites in Michigan, the dramatically striped Copia, thrived in Germantown last year and she expects it to be a star performer again this year.

garlic scapes and large fresh onion, purchased at the market on July 4

garlic scapes and large fresh onion, purchased at the market on July 4

Katie is also looking forward to a mid-summer harvest of a crop that you don’t ordinarily see around here at the hottest time of year: broccoli. The Piracicaba variety, from Brazil, “actually enjoys hot weather,” she wrote in one of her weekly reports. And if you’re looking for something new to eat, keep an eye out for Malabar climbing spinach, a nutritious green that loves 90-degree heat. On my recent tours of the farm, I’ve noticed that it has been about a foot higher on the trellis each week.