Preparing our Donation Farm for the Fall Season
We’re getting our donation farm ready for the upcoming year! Each season, our farm provides fresh, nourishing produce for neighbors throughout our community.
During the 2024-2025 garden season:
135+ volunteers helped cultivate bountiful gardens, gaining hundreds of hours of hands-on gardening experience and sharing the harvest with the community.
5,000 lbs of organic produce was donated to reduce food insecurity.
5 local partners, including UF Health Shands Pediatric Clinic, received regular fresh food donations.
Over 450 households received free, locally grown produce.
We take a summer break each year to give both our gardens beds and staff time to rest and rejuvenate. Beginning in late August, our farm leads Meg and Stephan turned over our Giving Garden farm from its summer slumber to become crop-ready for our fall season.
In north central Florida, our primary farming season runs from September through June. Over summer, we let hardy cover crops grow, which do not require irrigation or maintenance, and brings quality nutrients to the soil, replenishing it for a productive following season.
By late August, we “chop and drop” the cover crops, keeping roots in the ground to protect the integrity of the soil and the healthy soil habitat that nourishes our plantings. We then plant directly into the dropped summer crops, allowing for those crops to decompose and help to build soil structure and provide nutrients to the beds.
We add top soil (quality soil made from composted food) and plant each seedling and seed with worm castings for a little extra support. We use these regenerative farming methods, mimicking the cycles in nature, to grow organic food that is robust and nutrient-dense throughout the long, 10-month season.
Progress as of August 24, 2026 - The Giving Garden Farm after hours of work done to prep the beds for the next season.
Progress as of August 31, 2026 - The Giving Garden Farm ready for the next season!
We’re grateful to Keep Alachua County Beautiful (KACB) for donating this beautiful top dressing to our Giving Garden Farm, sourced from local company Gaston Mulch.
We’ll add this top dressing over the chopped cover crops, giving our new plantings even more nutrients and organic matter as everything breaks down and feeds the soil. It’s one more way we’re working to build healthy, living soil at the farm. A big thank you to KACB and Gaston Mulch for helping us grow!
top dressing delivery from Gaston Mulch, donated by Keep Alachua County Beautiful
Volunteer at the farm
Want to get your hands in the soil and contribute to our local food systems? Our weekly volunteer days at the Giving Garden Farm start on Thursday, Sept. 10.
Join us the following times every Thursday throughout the year, excluding major holidays:
September - October: 5:30 - 7:30 PM
November - March 18: 4:30 - 6:30 PM
March 25 - Mid June: 5:30 - 7:30 PM
Learn more about volunteering below!