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Cherry tomatoes, one trombone squash, a lot of lettuce, a few collards, some broccoli, and some zucchini is what was on the hecka local table all from the Free Farm. Also, I picked 3 pounds of rocoto pepper from Treat Commons that were so beautiful (I myself find the peppers too hot). Neighbors brought oranges, rosemary, and lemons. Mike returned from Burning Man and brought some jam he made from blackberries he picked in Golden Gate Park. Someone else brought some apple sauce from that huge amount of apples last week. Our crowds remain big and it is kind of crazy that we get two shipments of food… so some people line up again to get some of the bounty that comes in around 2:30pm.

Rocoto Peppers and cherry tomatoes

I just updated our spreadsheet with the totals of how much hecka local produce since 2009 and we are up to 11,738 pounds.  Since this April the Free Farm has grown 1,750 pounds, almost a ton of food. Sometimes I wonder what my fixation is with weighing everything we grow or glean or that people bring us to share. Someone new that came by with produce to share yesterday actually asked me why I weigh things. For one thing I think I am the only one documenting this kind of information in San Francisco. I guess I am doing it mostly out of curiosity, kind of like why I got into trying to be a farmer. I just wanted to see how much food I could grow and give away in San Francisco.

I am not really a produce quantity queen.  I think what turns me on is the people that come and can get some great food . I like it even more when people who show up with some food they have grown too or picked from their backyard tree to share. I think we really need to put up a sign explaining what we are about, because we have so many new people who think the stand is just about giving away produce, and don’t understand that we are also promoting do it yourself gardening efforts.

By the way talk about food giveaways, from reading the Facebook entry for the Wigg Party, it seems that their food giveaway are still happening, after they took a break one week. It happens between 3-5pm on Sundays at Hayes Valley Farm. If anyone goes I would love a report.

I received some feedback on the words I wrote last week about the 18^th and Rhode Island Permaculture Garden.  I really appreciated Chris Burley’s comment that he published which makes a lot of good points about Permaculture and the importance of soil building. I have to disagree though, I think that the long term strategy of growing soil and a food forest is not in conflict with growing a lot of food in the meantime that can be distributed to people in need.  One positive thing that came out of last week’s blog is that Ian read it and went to visit the garden for himself (he was originally involved in the initial work there). I didn’t make it to the garden this week because I was finishing the grant proposal, so Ian harvested 3 ½ pounds of cherry tomatoes and a few zucchini and brought them to the stand.

I finished sending in a proposal for a grant from the San Francisco Park’s Trust to plant fruit trees in the park where the Farm Stand is. Soon I think there will be a community meeting where neighbors and park users can vet their feelings about this project and I am hoping I can get a lot of people out to the meeting to show their support. I think the main issue needing addressing is do we really need a fence around the area (a lot of people especially parents want to keep the area open for kids to run around in that area and most of us do not like fences). Park and Recreation wants the orchard to be under the control of the community garden adjacent to the area so the gardeners will maintain the trees not the under budgeted park staff. I think they want some kind of fence or way of making it seem part of the garden. So there might have to be some compromise, like a small fence with a gate that is always open. I will let everyone know when the meeting happens.

Also, check this out:
Saturday, September 18th, 2010
LIVING ON
Feel the Earth presents
A dance performance embodying the Iroquois Legend of
Las Tres Hermanas: Corn, Bean, and Squash.
A look at how nature and human move in symbiosis with one another.
Two Free Dance Performances:
The Free Farm
Gough and Eddy
@ 3:30pm
Esperanza Gardens
Florida St and 19th St
@ 5:30pm
“Let nature be the power that propels art, spirit, and creativity”’

During the recently passed dark years of our political system something faith based was given a bad rap in my opinion. These days all I am living on is faith (and grace).  Sometimes I feel like things are way out of control in my life, that things are out of my hands. I have to keep the faith.  I love that phrase. We have to reclaim the idea that faith is all of ours and that loving our neighbor is the simple practice we are engaged in.

So the Free Farm Stand and the Free Farm are faith based organizations. I am an advocate of a faith based society and economy. Sharing the wealth and all eating at the same table is what it is all about. It is all about the heart (and maybe keeping our spine fine too).

The other day Angie hung up an orchid plant in our bathroom and it had no soil just roots. I am amazed by it’s beauty and wonder how it works. Being a gardener a plant without soil is a mystery to me. But it reminds me of faith, that it does work somehow.

I really don’t know how our Free Farm Stand works or the Free Farm either. I am humbled by the scene though. We are at the end of summer and we had the largest harvest yet in terms of weight at the Free Farm (164 lbs). It  partly had to do that we harvested a lot of squash (45 lbs of zucchini and 49 lbs of winter squash). One winter squash weighed 30 lbs. It was  from seed brought back from Peru from a friend who grew them in Santa Rosa. He called them zapallos (there is a photo of one he gave me last year in the post for November 23, 2009).   When we set up the table at 1pm there seemed to be more food on the hecka local table than the left- over farmer’s market table. For one thing, Produce to the People gave me 209 lbs of apples they picked from local trees and a friend picked about the same amount from a house on York Street. Neighbors also brought by lemons and more apples. It was too hard for me to weigh everything that came in that day. Yes it is apple season. We have a regular visitor from Vallejo who comes by and brings us fruit from her yard. This week it was apples. What is mind blowing is that she just drops off her fruit that is usually in some beautiful basket and then takes off without getting any vegetables (she did take a loaf of bread). Danny from Sour Flour brought two warm loaves of his freshly baked and delicious whole wheat bread. People dipped it in fresh salsa from tomatoes I think from Esperanza Garden that Alana brought.

So I know this is my weekly mantra by now, that I am also graced out by all the fabulous volunteers that we get every week that make this faith based operation work. And the people that come for food, waiting patiently in a line that goes down the block on Treat and around the corner on 23^rd St., are pretty wonderful too.

One disappointing thing that I am trying to direct my faith to and channel some grace upon, is the Permaculture Guild run garden on 18^th and Rhode Island.  I think I harvested the last four pounds of produce from that place that we will probably be getting for this year (maybe a few more pounds of cherry tomatoes). I put a lot of energy into that place (and so many others did too) and now it seems neglected and underutilized. It may take some guerilla garden action or something to get it back on track. At least most of the trees are doing well and the apricot tree has a few late apricots.

Talk about underutilized and neglect land. I suggested to the people teaching a Permaculture class at least two years ago that the land next to our community garden in the park where we run the farm stand would be a great design project for one of their students. A few student followed through with that suggestion and came up with a design for an edible landscape there. The plan has changed since then, but the basic idea is the same, to plant fruit trees and edible bushes in the neglected and unused spot against the south facing fence next to the garden in Parque Niños Unidos.  The idea behind this plan is to increase food security in our neighborhood. The organic yield of fruit will be freely distributed through the Free Farm Stand on Sundays as well as to local residents and volunteers that help implement and maintain the fruit orchard. Additionally, the orchard will be a demonstration and educational site for the neighborhood.

I am trying to apply for a grant due at the end of this week and I need a letter of permission from Park and Recreation in support of the project. I sent out a letter to neighbors last week that I needed them to send letters of support for the project, because it looked like I wasn’t going to get that letter from Park and Recreation until I hold a community meeting on the project, to get neighbors support. Now it looks like Park and Recreation is going to approach SF Park Trust about signing the grant application to indicate RecPark support conditional on the outcome of a community meeting to be scheduled shortly. One interesting thing happened as a result of writing to neighbors. A friend who runs a business in the area offered to match the grant with $1500 if we are able to apply.

I really feel like this is an exciting opportunity for all of San Francisco to move towards a more green and sustainable city, where fruit trees and bushes are more commonly planted, in backyards as well as in more city parks. Any letters of support would still be useful, especially if you live in the neighborhood and frequent the park. Please write the people below soon if you feel motivated (and if you don’t mind BCC me a copy). Thanks

MARVIN YEE, Landscape Architect
Capital Improvement Division
Recreation and Park Department
tel:  415.581.2541
fax: 415.581.2540
e:    marvin.yee@sfgov.org

Eric Andersen
Neighborhood Service Area Manager
Neighborhood Service Area 6
Mission, Bernal Heights
Tel: 415-831-6818
eric.andersen@sfgov.org

Joaquin.Torres@sfgov.org (415) 554-6723    (Mayors Office of Neighborhood Services-liaison to District 9)
david.campos@sfgov.org (415) 554-5144     (Board of Supervisors for District 9-Mission)

A sample email would be something like this:

I support the expansion of the fruit orchard that is in Treat Commons Community Garden into the neglected unused space adjacent to it. Please do everything you can to make this project move forward as quickly as possible.

I just got back from Nevada City (an old mining town), just taking a much needed break and visiting two very close friends. It was cool and cloudy most of my visit and not the usual hot weather they get up there this time of year.  I did get a chance to walk in the woods and visit a creek and get into talks about the Tao Te Ching that I am currently reading (my latest meditation is that the three things we need in our lives are simplicity, patience, and compassion, including compassion towards ourselves). My friend David said that Americans talk about being out of our heads while the French talk about being out of our pelvis.  Good things to think about while walking in the woods relaxing. I also got a chance to visit a small farm, a beautiful back yard garden, and visit some nurseries where I scored some plants for the Free Farm. I fell in love with Phlox and made friends with a giant old walnut tree. It was for a lack of a better word a groovy experience.

I wrote to Pancho and asked him how the Free Farm Stand went last Sunday. Here is what he wrote:

In all these Sundays, I haven’t seen so many people gathering at the park.
Some stories…

• A 65 year old swung by with 30 lbs of giant fragrant yellow lemons. People felt the love when they saw them and every time I could, I explained that this man woke up early this morning to pick these lemons with his own hands and brought them to the stand… how do you measure that love?
• One of the Chinese women brought green tomatoes from her garden (and some lettuce and dry rice from the food bank).
• The stand was packed non-stop from 1230 to 1530hrs [that is 12:30 to 3:30pm). There was little food from food runners so there was no food by 1340hrs [1:40pm]. At 1410 hrs [2:10pm] the first truck from the other Farmers Market arrived and we start gifting the food at 1425hrs. Then the second truck arrived. My guestimate is that we gave food to close to ~350 people.
• Many first timers could not believe that this kind of project existed. It is always so refreshing to explain what the gift-economy and unconditional love is all about.
• A Mexican woman came at the 1400hrs [2:00pm] and I gave her a peach. She didn’t want to eat  it because it was bruised. I cut the ugly part and she tasted the incredible flavor of a summer juicy sweet peach. She stayed with her daughter and husband for the second round, all the time with shining eyes.
• I repeated the experiment of the peach with a young girl (5 year old with white skin) and her mom. The exquisiteness of peaches doesn’t know about the difference in the colors of skin.
• Wendy (Huen Son) gave recipes of bitter melon shoots and we stressed the point that it was very good for people with diabetes for it reduces the level of sugar in our blood. A lot of people were asking how to cook/eat bitter melon. What if we provide some sort of healthy dishes for people with diabetes?
• Jorge, the medicine man, came again and blessed us with sage and universal love.
• My friend Michelle (the partner of Adam who started The Local in Berkeley) came for the first time! She has been working in Farmers Markets for years and she was a great input to serve and organize the food during the second/third run.

Pancho also wrote about the Free Farm workday that I missed too:

At the Free Farm…It was a great day to connect with people in the neighborhood. Two women from the building came and both of them had incredible stories. The first one, Diana, had Italian origin and as such the love flowed naturally as we speak about different recipes and healthy food. Amy felt she was talking with one of her Italian relatives back in the East Coast, and we wanted to have a cup of tea with doña Diana. The second one, doña Rosa from the part of the Planet we call Chile (I believe), told us that she prays every day for us and for the crops to grow in the Free Farm. That was very sweet.

• Justine had her debut as Yoga teacher in the Free Farm and she said she can coordinate with Mike to have more Yoga. She said she will be able to commit for a couple of weekends a month.
• Page and Damon almost finished up the terraces and they are ready to receive a doses of compost.
• Some hot chilies were planted by the tomatoes.

Griff just created a Facebook page for the Free Farm (I created one for the Free Farm Stand before I left on my short trip), though I must admit I do not quite understand how you use Facebook. He also wrote a great update to the Free Farm that is at our website http://thefreefarm.org/

The movie Fresh, which I haven’t seen yet, has decided to give 1% of its income for 2010 to a”non-profit who is doing incredible things in the food world”. I applied for this money and there are  42 other applications, including the Hayes Valley Farm and Produce to the People. I guess if we make it to the top 10 (though I am not holding my breath)   you will be able to vote on the winner.  I think a lot of the applicants sound wonderful and some are doing similar work to us. It is fun to read about them: http://www.freshthemovie.com/blog/.

It is apple and pear picking time  and I wonder if there are any wanna be apple/pear  pickers out there that may want to pick some apples for the  Free Farm Stand? Please contact me if you are available and when. Last night I discovered a pack of about 8 raccoons in our walnut tree possibly gleaning (eating?) our walnuts. So if the raccoons can organize a harvest so can we humans