Since last spring, we’ve been actively working on a new project funded and supported by Southern SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education) entitled, “Local food needs local seed: increasing production and use of locally adapted seed with a farm to community network.” The main goal of this project is to collaboratively work with local farmers…
In this age of disconnection, food has the power to bring us back together. The seeds we sow, the food we grow, and the meals we make together create the fabric of a flourishing local food web. One of our favorite units offered through our Youth Collective begins unsurprisingly, with a seed. We observe seeds…
How the Seed Was Planted In 2015 we had an ambitious idea: what would happen if we tried to combine our beloved Everglades currant tomato with a dwarf variety, Tanunda Red? This is a very wide cross of tomato types and traits! Everglades is a different species altogether (Solanum pimpinellifolium) and is the wild ancestor…
Several years ago, Melissa was connected to Jerome Feaster through a mutual friend, Bricky who manages the historical farm at Morningside Nature Center here in Gainesville, Florida. She’d heard about his family’s variety of heirloom mustard greens that had been saved for many years, since at least around the time of the Civil War, if…
Are you a woman farmer in Florida looking to expand your business by developing a food product? This free online program might be for you! The Farm2Food Accelerator empowers Florida’s women farmers (including ranchers, producers, growers, fisherwomen, beekeepers and other related agriculturalists) to become more resilient by providing practical tools and knowledge to increase income…
2020: A year of Relief, Recovery, and Resilience When food insecurity intensifies, local markets shift and shudder, online learning becomes the new way to connect, and home gardens spread like seeds in the wind – we all remember why local food community matters. The global food system staggered and revealed its weakness. But local producers,…
As the Sandhill Cranes return to the prairie, they remind us that it is time to reflect on another year past and what our future holds. Their arrival seems even more poignant as we approach the end of what may be one of the most difficult years in memory. Like so many in our community,…
When COVID hit it became glaringly obvious the food system was broken. We knew to some degree it wasn’t working, but it took the gears screeching to a stop in our economy. Overnight, milk was being dumped, produce was being left to rot, animals being killed because there wasn’t room to keep them. It wasn’t…
2020 has been a challenging year across the globe, in our community, and here at Working Food. In March, when the full realization of the pandemic hit, Working Food sprung to action to help our community with food access, while simultaneously shifting the way our programs operated. We had the opportunity to work with new…
Written by Melissa DeSa It’s been a whirlwind since the last seed dispersal in February when shortly after, COVID struck and sent all our energies frantically re-aligning to keep both our doors and hearts open to this community during the crisis. Although it has been a rough ride to say the least, it presented an…