We hope that you can join us this Saturday, Mar 6 to celebrate Arbor Day.

Alemany Farm is serving as the host for the SF Department of Public Works’ 10th Annual Clean Team event. Starting at 9 AM, people will be gathering at the Farm to break into different work teams. Some groups will stay at the Farm to plant 25+ new fruit trees and work on gardening projects. Other groups will travel to Holly Court, the Alemany Housing Development, Brotherhood Way, and neighborhoods throughout Districts 9 and 11 for other gardening and clean up tasks.

In addition to work projects, there will be an eco-fair featuring local environmental and community groups. We will have game for kids. Around Noon there will be a BBQ lunch for all volunteers.

Please come and join us. … And for those of you who want to avoid the crowds, please come to our regularly scheduled workday on Sunday, Mar 7 or Monday, Mar 8.

Thanks, as always, for helping to make SF more food secure.

The Farm Team

You know how when you throw a big party or a potluck and you have to clean up your house before the event, even though you know you’ll have to clean up the house after the event as well? That’s sort of the place we’re in at Alemany Farm these days.

On Saturday, March 6 we will be hosting the SF Department of Public Works’ 10th Annual Clean Team & Arbor Day Celebration. Starting at 9 AM, volunteers will plant fruit trees, work on gardening projects, spread woodchips, remove weeds, paint out graffiti, pick up litter, and beautify neighborhoods throughout Districts 9 & 11. At noon, there will be a BBQ lunch. The event will also include a green resource fair with plenty of awesome local groups, music, and fun activities.

We’re very excited to partner with SF DPW and SF Recreation and Parks Department for this event, which will attract up to 300 people. This is an important chance to show off the Farm to many people who don’t even know it exists — which is why we’re working really hard in the coming weeks to do some extra beautification.

So we’re hoping you can join us at our upcoming regularly scheduled workdays: Sunday, Feb 21; Mon, Feb 22; Sat, Feb 27; and Mon, Mar 1 as we get the place looking really beautiful. Upcoming projects will include mulching the paths in the lower garden and orchard hillside, weeding our ornmamental native gardens, planting some new natives, and orchard care. At the end of each workday, there will be plenty of collards, kale, chard and cabbages to harvest and share.

Please come out and help us clean up for the Clean Up.

… And if you’re interested in learning more about urban food production, please apply for our 2010 Apprenticeship in Ecological Horticulture. You can download the application at www.alemanyfarm.org. Some applicants have been unable to fill in the PDF; please feel free to fill in your responses in either a Word doc or in the body of an email.

Thanks, as always, for all of your work to make SF more food secure.

The Farm Team

Dear Farm Friends:

As you know, the volunteer coordinators at Alemany Farm try to use
every workday as an opportunity for skills sharing and community
education. But many people remain eager for some more structured
learning.

So we are very pleased to announce that for the second year in a row,
Friends of Alemany Farm will be offering an Apprenticeship in
Ecological Horticulture.

To apply, please complete the application (PDF | WORD) and return it to:
ecologicalhorticulture@gmail.com. We will only be able to accommodate
30 people in the class. The application deadline is March 1.

The 11-month course will take participants through the seasons,
covering key garden and orchard tasks that occur in Spring, Summer,
Autumn, and Winter. Apprentices will learn core principals of food
production such as soil fertility and composting, propagation and
planting, seasonal tree care, water-wise irrigation, plant
identification, integrated pest management, and crop planning. The
hands-on training —using our vegetable gardens, herb gardens, and
orchards — will cover several methods of sustainable horticulture.

The Ecological Horticulture classes will start on Saturday, March 20
and will take place the third Saturday of every month at Alemany Farm.
The workshops will take place from 10 am to 5 pm, with a generous
break for a potluck lunch.

We look forward to receiving your application!

Thanks, as always, for your work to make SF more food secure.

The Farm Team

PS: Don’t forget our upcoming volunteer workdays: Saturday, Feb 13;
Monday, Feb 15; Sunday, Feb 21; Monday, Feb 22; and Saturday, Feb 27.

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

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

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!

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

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

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

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