Hello y’all, I am Esther Young one of the Cornercopia apprentices and a Sophomore majoring in Food Systems. As I was thinking about what this post should be about this week I was interrupted by water leaking through my boots and soaking into my socks. Immediately, I knew what the topic would be for this week, it would be what showed up with all the rain: hope.      After all the snow and cold and waiting, spring is finally coming in and it is starting by clearing the drifts of snow with a deluge of rain. All the students you speak to will talk about the h ..read more

Yes, you read that title correctly. Even though as I write this it is snowing, spring is slowly creeping up on us. This means that there is a plethora of planning and prepping that is going on in the Plant Growth Facilities these days. The planning stages of the farm in late winter, early spring are a very important part of getting the farm off on a good foot! Planning means determining how much of each crop will be planted, what needs to be started when, and many other factors. This process means looking across many different spreadsheets and figuring out  the final “crop plan” for 201 ..read more

Rootstock Radio: Sustainable Urban Beekeeping with Terry Oxford Terry Oxford works with pollinators in San Francisco, doing her best to provide good food for her local pollinators. I learned some random bee info, like some things about hive dynamics, but the podcast was less about the actual act of beekeeping than I expected it to be. The one tidbit I picked up that was really interesting is that in some more industrial beekeeping, the males (the ‘drones’ of the hive) are totally removed from the hive, but in Terry’s system and other similar models they keep all elements. Most of this epis ..read more

Our Farms, Our Future: Bridging the Rural-Urban Divide with Becca Jablonski and Charlie Jackson Our Farms, Our Future, is podcast in collaboration with SARE; the Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education Program. This episode guided a conversation between Becca Jablonski; an assistant professor and food systems extension economist at Colorado State University and Charlie Jackson; the executive director of the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project in North Carolina. The majority of their conversation related to the idea of uniting urban and rural communities through agricultural ma ..read more

Female Farmer Project: Farmers in Politics   This week I listened to a podcast about a subject that is near and dear to my heart, female farmers discussing their role in politics. As a freshman in college, I had no clue where the next four years would take me, but I knew that I was passionate about several things. The first being politics, I thrive off the idea of being politically active and being a voice for the greater community. I also found a love for agriculture, the connection to the land and striving to grow food that all people can enjoy. When I saw that this podcast was availa ..read more

The Urban Farm Podcast with Greg Peterson has an extensive archive of previous episodes which made picking an episode exciting and a little difficult as they cover everything from water usage, to veganism, to seed saving, and beyond. I chose episode 372 because it deals with water harvesting, a topic I have little experience and was excited to learn more about. The episode was hosted by Greg Peterson and the guest was Brooke Sarson, who spoke about her work and thoughts on water conservation and grey water harvesting in California. The points that I found most interesting were those about w ..read more

The Ruminant Podcast: Audio Candy for Farmers and Good Food Lovers Episode 98: Breeding for Better Flavor and Row 7 Seeds Featured Guest: Mike Mazourek of Row 7 Seeds (also veggie plant breeder and asst. Professor at Cornell University) This podcast topic caught my attention because breeding and selection-- the “behind the scenes” process and work that goes on in farming even before the farmer plants seed-- has never been something I’ve really considered or appreciated in-depth. It’s not that I have a disdain for this topic, but I’ve always just been more interested in and in-tune with the ..read more

I listened to the Urban Farm podcast with John Jeavons on biologically intensive gardening and farming. John was inspired to figure out what the smallest area you could grow all your food, all your clothing and all the food for your wallet in a way that is environmentally sound and equitable. He began farming in 1972 on a quarter of an acre. At an intermediate level of biointensive farming you can grow a balanced diet and with the diet crops themselves grow all the compost material to fertilize the plants properly in 4,000 square feet. This is 1/80th of the area it takes to grow the curre ..read more

Hello! My name is Danica Mooney-Jones. I am a senior in the Genetics, Cell Biology, and Development major and a Food Systems minor. This coming summer I will be working at Cornercopia and I am very excited to get started farming! This week, some people from Cornercopia and I headed to the MOSES Organic Conference in La Crosse, Wisconsin. I was a composting volunteer, which included changing the compost disposal bags and dragging compost bins to the receptacle area. I was amazed by how much compost was produced by the conference, and by how difficult it was for people to put their utensils, pl ..read more

Everyone who follows this blog knows how wonderful it is to play in the dirt and how rewarding it is to learn about the complexities of farming. But how do we keep that love alive in the middle of February when, unless we have a greenhouse, our connection to farming feels tenuous? I think the answer is Podcasts! I’m absolutely obsessed with them. There seems to be an unlimited selection and never ending supply of new episodes to tune into. Whenever I have a free moment between classes or at the gym I can tune into a podcast. Since we have lots of yummy, green pea microgreens to plant and harv ..read more