Plant Trees at Alemany Farm
By The Farm Team | January 13, 2010
Want to get 2010 off to a fun start?
Please join us at Alemamy Farm tomorrow, Sat, Jan 9 as we continue the work on our native tree planting. As you might remember, this exciting collaboration with a Living Library is giving us the opportunity to create a visual and auditory screen from the freeway. The combination of native bay trees, native cherries, and native oaks will eventually make the Farm a little quieter and more private.
We will start at Noon and wrap up around 5 PM.
In addition to the tree planting, we will be doing some garlic weeding
and strawberry care.
Thanks, as always, for your efforts to make SF more food secure.
The Farm Team
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Strawberry Planting + Farm Fundraiser
By The Farm Team | November 19, 2009
Dear Farm Friends:
Please join us at Alemany Farm this Saturday, Nov 21 as we plant our 2010 strawberries. We will be putting about 300 plants in the ground, and we hope you are there to help us. We will also be sowing some of the last cover crop and building new compost.
Also, if you plan on staying in town for Thanksgiving, we hope you can make it to a fundraiser that a local bar, Riptide, is hosting for us.
Here are the details:
Wednesday, November 25th 8PM-2AM
The Riptide, 3639 Taraval St. @ 47th Ave., SF
http://www.riptidesf.com/
Wet Wednesday Benefit for Friends of Alemany Farm. Proceeds will help cover the costs of seeds, starts, and equipment for the 2010 season.
Please join Surfpulse.com at the Wet Wednesday benefit party for Friends of Alemany Farm. This month’s benefit will feature silly short films by the Aqua Surf Shop Crew (Silvin Morgan, Brian Musial, Aleks Petrovitch and Merle). This collection includes zombie surf flicks and a short in which stoned hippie surfers are hunted by inbred rednecks. The films start at 8PM sharp. At 9PM DJ Paul will be spinning, soul, funk, dub, breaks, hip hop and reggae. There will be plenty of free food and best of all there is no admission charge.
We will raise money with a $5 raffle for a Las Olas Surfboard (a biofoam 7′0” rounded pin single fin).
Other great prizes will be donated by Java Beach Cafe, Timbuk2, Red Vic Movie House, Mocha 101, the Pizza Place on Noriega and Jaimal Yogis, author of Saltwater Buddha. Sierra Nevada will also donate $1 for every pint of their beer that is sold and a portion of the bar sales and tips will also be donated.
Wet Wednesday is a weekly party at the Riptide on the last Wednesday of every month being a benefit for a non-profit or worthy cause.
Finally: Please note that there will be NO WORKDAY the weekend after Thanksgiving. We will be busy napping.
Thanks, as always, for all your work to make SF more food secure.
The Farm Team
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Harvest Festival THIS SAT + Growing New Gardens
By allyse | October 20, 2009
Dear Farm Friends:
We hope you can join us THIS Sat, Oct 24, as we celebrate our Fifth Annual Harvest Festival. The festivities will start around 11 AM and wrap up around 5 PM.
We will have plenty of food including a Somoan-style roasted organic suckling pig, veggie burgers, salads fresh from the farm, and Mission Pie desserts. But it’s potluck style, so please bring another side dish to share. Also, to reduce waste, please bring your own plates and utensils; we will have paper plates in case you forget.
Activities will include Alemany Farm t-shirt making; games for kids; bands and drumming; and garden tasks such as planting next season’s garlic.
While we celebrate a great 2009 season, we are also working with our partners to help grow new gardens in SF. The SF Parks Trust, along with Garden for the Environment, are working with the city to locate new plots of land to start community gardens. To find our more, please read the announcement below about upcoming planning meetings.
Keep it growin’,
The Farm Team
Garden City: How to find space to grow food in San Francisco
Three Part Workshop series
Have you been dreaming of starting your own urban oasis, a garden where you can grow you own food and find some piece of mind, but you don’t have any space and don’t know where to look to find some? This three part practical workshop series is for you. Attend one workshop, or all three. This workshop series is co-presented by the San Francisco Parks Trust and Garden for the Environment.
Garden City Workshop I: Finding City Land for a Garden
Date: Sunday, October 25
Time: 10 AM – 3 PM
Location: SPUR, 654 Mission Street,, San Francisco, CA 94105-4015
Cost: $15-$30 sliding scale
Pre-registration is required, and space is limited, so sign-up soon. To pre-register, please call (415)750-5110, or email julia@sfpt.org
Even though San Francisco is a very dense city, there are more open parcels of land than one would think. In this session, learn how to identify possible spaces for gardens in San Francisco, including city property, privately owned lots, school gardens, sidewalks and backyards. The basic pros and cons of each option will be explored. After a brief lunch break, workshop participants will venture out on a bicycle tour of gardens implemented in such spaces. All participants
should bring a bag lunch, water, and a bicycle.
Garden City Workshop II: Navigating Permits, Procedures and Building Community Support for your Garden
Date: Sunday, November 8
Time: 10 AM – 2 PM
Location: SPUR, 654 Mission Street,, San Francisco, CA 94105-4015
Cost: $15- $30 sliding scale
Pre-registration is required, and space is limited, so sign-up soon. To pre-register, please call (415)750-5110, or email julia@sfpt.org
After you find a potential garden site, what’s next? In this session, learn how to successfully navigate the procedures and permits relevant to your type of site. Learn how to effectively build community support for your garden project and cultivate a committed volunteer group to ensure your garden thrives. A panel of successful garden-entrepreneurs will share how they launched their projects and lessons learned in the process. All participants should bring a bag lunch.
Garden City Workshop III: Digging In: Getting your Garden Started
Date: Sunday, November 15
Time: 10 AM – 2 PM
Location: Garden for the Environment, 7th Ave. at Lawton Street, San
Francisco, CA
Cost: $15-$30 sliding scale
Pre-registration is required, and space is limited, so sign-up soon. To pre-register, please call (415)750-5110, or email julia@sfpt.org
You’ve identified a site for your garden, you’ve completed all
appropriate permits and built community support, now it’s time to dig in and create your dream garden. The day will start with a tour of the GFE where we will begin to build our garden skills toolbox. We will assess potential challenges and gain techniques for overcoming those challenges through basic garden design practices, plant considerations, irrigation systems, soil, compost systems, and much more! Don’t forget to bring a bag lunch!
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Alemany Harvest Festival Oct 24!
By The Farm Team | October 13, 2009
Dear Farm Friends:
Mark your calendars for Alemany Farm’s Fifth Annual Harvest Festival!!
On Saturday, October 24 we will celebrate another fantastic season at the Farm and all of the accomplishments we’ve had in the past year by growing organic food for SF communities and educating people about how to cultivate their own produce.
We will have a BBQ potluck with organic meats and veggie burgers, Farm-fresh salads and sides, bands and drumming, games for kids, and plenty of old-fashioned hanging out. Plus desserts from Mission Pie!
For those who want to get your hands dirty, we’ll be planting next year’s garlic and starting to sow our winter cover crop.
The festivities will start around 11 AM and go until 5 PM. The Festival is free, but donations are accepted to cover food costs and to help raise money for Farm materials.
Spread the word and keep it growing,
The Farm Team
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Alemany farm in the news, and upcoming volunteer workdays
By The Farm Team | July 27, 2009
Hello Farm Friends:
It’s a busy time at Alemany Farm these days. The farm was recently featured in a San Francisco Chronicle article, and co-manager Jason Mark made Mother Nature Network’s roundup of “40 Farmers Under 40.”
But of course we’ve been farming too! It’s the height of the growing season — we’ve got green beans coming out of our ears, more salad greens than we know what to do with, and a hillside about to explode with wild blackberries. As of a month ago, 15 households in the Alemany neighborhood are also receiving a free weekly CSA delivery of farm fresh produce, and we’re super excited about this program’s potential to grow community as well as food. There’s plenty for all, so come on out for one of our regular volunteer workdays and share in the bounty.
Upcoming volunteer workdays: Sun, August 2; Sat, August 8; Sun, August 16; Sat, August 22; Sat, August 29; plus every Monday afternoon. Everyone is welcome at Alemany Farm! This Sunday we’ll be working in the medicinal herb garden, among other fun farm tasks. If you’ve got a bunch of cardboard lying about, please bring it and we’ll turn it into sheet mulch.
On Saturday, August 8th, the Alemany Resident Management Corporation will also be holding a fundraiser BBQ to support their activities in the community. Please contact the ARMC for more information on this event.
As always, please don’t hesitate to get in touch. For all questions regarding horticultural management, volunteering, and group tours, email the farm team at community.gardeners@gmail.com.
And thanks, as always, for your work to make San Francisco more food secure,
The Farm Team
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Calendar Confusion: Upcoming Alemany Workdays
By The Farm Team | May 26, 2009
Dear Farm Friends:
We know, we know: It can be really confusing to remember that the Farm’s workday schedule is the First and Third Sundays of the month and the Saturdays In Between.
We have kept up this schedule for the last five summers to ensure that the garden is accessible to everyone, no matter what other plans and obligations you have.
To keep it easy, mark you calendars for these upcoming workdays:
Saturday, May 23
Saturday, May 30
Sunday, June 7
Saturday, June 13
Sunday, June 21
Saturday, June 27
Plus, every Monday afternoon.
So if you don’t have any plans to skip town for the Memorial Day weekend and want to have fun playing in the dirt, stop by tomorrow.
Thanks, as always, for your efforts to make SF more food secure.
The Farm Team
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Beekeeping and Lettuce at Alemany Farm
By The Farm Team | May 14, 2009
Dear Farm Friends:
If you’ve decided to skip Bay to Breakers this year — who needs AM drinking and crazy costumes anyway? — but still want to enjoy what is supposed to be perfect weather this weekend, then come to Alemany Farm’s next community workday this Sunday, May 17.
The folks from the CA Native Plant Society will be there helping to weed, water and mulch our ornamental garden in the education circle. We’ll also be doing some work in the medicinal herb garden to put in drip irrigation. As always, there will be other garden tasks such as weeding and thinning the green beans; planting out Brussels sprouts; and mulching the lower orchard.
For those of you who took the first beekeeping workshop last month, there will a second beekeeping class starting at 1 PM with a chance, hopefully, to look in the hives.
At the end of day, we will have mounds of lettuces, pak choi, onions, artichokes and strawberries to harvest and take home.
And if you really feel like wearing a costume to the Farm, that’s cool with us.
Thanks, as always, for your work to make San Francisco more food secure,
The Farm Team
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Alemany Farm = Community Hero
By The Farm Team | May 6, 2009
Dear Farm Friends:
We wanted to share with you the exciting news that Alemany Farm, our volunteers, and the staff at the Alemany Resident Management Corporation have been honored with a Crissy Field Community Hero Award.
We hope you can join us this Sat, May 2 for an awards ceremony at the Crissy Field Center, starting at 11 AM.
You can learn more by visiting:
http://www.parksconservancy.org/our_work/crissy/award_recipients.asp
During the coming year, there will be a video presentation at the Center that shares with people how we’ve used the Farm to promote food security, environmental education, and neighborhood empowerment. Big thanks to everyone who has volunteered at the Farm — you’re the heart and soul of our community.
Then mark your calendars for these upcoming workdays:
• Sunday, May 3. Tomato, basil, pumpkin, and pepper planting.
• Saturday, May 9.
• Sunday, May 17. Beekeeping workshop (for those who attended Beekeeping 101) plus irrigation installation in the medicinal herb garden.
• Saturday, May 23.
Keep it growin’
The Farm Team
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Upcoming Workdays + Farm Visits
By The Farm Team | April 24, 2009
Dear Farm Friends:
First, many thanks to all of you who came to Alemany Farm for our 3rd Annual Earth Day BBQ last weekend. It was a great way to bring together San Francisco’s diverse communities, and we hope you had as much fun as we did.
If you missed the BBQ, no sweat, because we still have plenty of spring activities coming up. Including these weekend workdays:
Saturday, April 25: Workday with the last of the spring tillage.
Sunday, May 3: Planting tomatoes, basil, peppers, pumpkins.
Saturday, May 9: Regular workday.
Sunday, May 17: Installing the irrigation system in the medicinal herb garden, plus a workshop on beekeeping hosted by the SF Beekeepers Association. This is Part II of the workshop that occurred on April 5, a chance to go inside the hives.
Also: Don’t forget our regular Monday workdays, every week, 1 PM to 5 PM.
A Note on Visiting the Farm: As a public park, Alemany Farm is open dawn to dusk 365 days a year. But please keep in mind that Alemany Farm is a secluded, off-the-beaten-path kind of place, and that you should use your best judgement when stopping by. We encourage you make sure that you only visit with a friend or two, and that you use the same caution that you would when hanging out in, say, McLaren Park or the less-visited areas of Golden Gate Park.
Thanks for your efforts to make SF more food secure.
The Farm Team
PS: If you don’t have plans for tonight, check out a program happening tonight called Climate of Change: Global to Local Solutions for a Resilient Bay Area. The event will include food, music, and discussion about creating a sustainable Bay Area. Sponsored by our friends at Bay Localize.
6 PM - 8:30 PM, First Unitarian Church of Oakland, 685 14th Street.
For more info visit www.baylocalize.org.
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The Revolution is Growing…
By The Farm Team | March 23, 2009
Dear Friends:
Long before the Obamas put in a vegetable garden at the White House (pretty amazing, right!), city-wide volunteers and members of the Alemany Community were working hard to make the Farm a living example of neighborhood empowerment, food security, and ecological sustainability.
The seeds of that labor are receiving some gratifying recognition this week.
On Saturday, March 28, Alemany Farm will be recognized (along with Tom Ammiano) at the Bernal Heights Neighordhood Center’s 30th Birthday Bash. This should be a really fun event, and we hope you can join us at the Bay View Boat Club beginning at 7 PM. Tickets start at $30. For more info, visit: http://www.bhnc.org/hpEvent/40234612.html or call Mei Le at 415.206.2140 x148.
And in a recent essay in The Nation magazine, SF-based writer Rebecca Solnit, thinking about how progressives can and should respond to the financial crisis, plugs our little operation as part of the solution:
“Organic, urban, community-assisted and guerrilla agriculture are still small parts of the picture, but effective ones–a revolt against what transnational corporate food and capitalism generally produce. This revolt is taking place in the vast open space of Detroit, in the inner-city farms of West Oakland, in the victory gardens and public-housing of Alemany Farm in San Francisco, in Growing Power in Milwaukee and many other places around the country. These are blows against alienation, poor health, hunger and other woes fought with shovels and seeds, not guns. At its best, tending one’s garden leads to tending one’s community and policy, and ultimately becomes a way of entering the public sphere rather than withdrawing from it.”
You can read the whole article at: http://www.thenation.com/doc/20090323/solnit
… Stay part of that revolution on our upcoming workdays: Sat, March 28; Sun, April 5; Sat, Apr 11; and Sat, Apr 18.
Peace,
The Farm Team
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