Have you driven by the Food Love Project recently and noticed something different? As of this spring, the farm is now the home of a new, improved greenhouse! With over three times as much table space to grow a collection of regionally appropriate and organic transplants, and even more area to provide education- the farm currently has dozens of crops in production that are just waiting for the ground to be ready!
The new greenhouse would not have been possible without support from: Soroptimist International of Grass Valley, the Welz Foundation, and Forever Flowering Greenhouses! And of course our amazing and inspiring volunteers Leo Chapman and Brianna Abundiz as well as Food Love Farmer Maggie for working tirelessly in the off-season to make this vision a reality. It really takes a village!
Forever Flowering Greenhouses sponsored the structure itself by providing 50% off on all the materials needed for the base. Their top of the line greenhouse models provide ideal growing conditions for a variety of crops. Other additions include passive ventilation; roll up sides from Vital Landscaping Supply and custom doors.
Thank you also to Rolf Johnson and Alegria Organics for
revolutionizing the Food Love incubation station! Thanks to their investment in infrastructure the farm can now start seeds months earlier than last year and can protect fragile baby plants during cold snaps.
The additional space also affords enough space to provide twice as many transplants to 22 local schools! This spring, schools who participate in Sierra Harvest’s Farm to School Program will pick up two trays of assorted transplants from tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, basil, cucumbers, mixed flowers, peas, greens and more.
Along with the new structure, the Food Love crew also designed fold up tables so that the space can be optimized for season extension. This innovation will allow the growth of late summer crops in the ground and will extend the growing season by 8 weeks! This means more warm weather crops available to visiting school groups and U-Pick shoppers in the fall.
Thank you to again to all the funders, sponsors and volunteers for ensuring a successful foundation to this program for years and years to come!
Come see the new Greenhouse for yourself this spring at Food Love plant sales at 16200 Lake Vera Rd., Nevada City! There will be an assortment of over 35 varieties of organic plants offered on Saturdays April 29th, May 6th and 13th from 9 – 12:30. All proceeds go to support garden education. Bring your friends and family, kids are always welcome. We now accept CalFresh SNAP benefits too!
If you miss our plant sales, then support the Mother’s Day weekend plant sale at the Miners Foundry on Sunday, May 14th from 9am – 3pm. More info here.