My name is Zoe DeWitt and I am one of four Food and Agriculture interns for the Spring 2022 quarter at the Evergreen State College. My area of focus includes the community garden spaces around campus, with a specific focus on the Medicinal Herb Garden at the Organic Farm. I have been working and learning in the herb garden for the past two quarters now and have found personal interest in herb growth, herbal medicine, and much more.
On this website, students will be able to track the progress of the Evergreen herb garden through the Spring ’22 season. Weekly posts will be created to highlight progress in the herb garden, and additional pages with history, resources, and pictures of the herb garden will also be provided.
Have questions or want to get involved? My email: zoe.dewitt@evergreen.edu
As I reflect back on my time as a Food and Ag intern, I wish to start by inserting sections of a reflection that I wrote about my highlights and personal learning from the Medicine of Community and Place program that I participated in during the time of my internship:
“…the plant botany, identification, and discovery list were super meaningful aspects of this program for me. Through my learning with these elements, I have realized that I think I want a big part of my future to include working outside in nature with plants. I want to have my hands in the soil, my feet exploring new paths, my eyes identifying new plants and making new connections. I am feeling incredibly antsy and stagnant in my education because of this, I feel like I’m at a point where I just want to get outside and learn, just like Vivian Mork told us to do. Discovering this feels very empowering, but also leaves me unsure of what to do about these feelings and nervous about cutting off other paths of interest to me. Either way, I am incredibly grateful for the exploration in these areas of herbal learning as, no matter what, they have played a part in shaping what I want my future to be.”
“These past couple months, I have felt insanely scattered when thinking about my future. What do I want to be doing after I graduate from Evergreen? Do I want to stick around for both my Art and Science degrees? Do I want to attend a more focused herbal institution to hone in on this new interest of mine? Do I want to attend an outdoor wilderness program that will fully immerse me in nature? Do I want to just drop out and work on a bunch of farms all across the world? All of these ideas have crossed my mind. However, I feel like writing the above reflection made me realize the true things I want for my future, so it was actually an insanely helpful passage for me to sit down and take the focused time to write. I want to be outdoors, learning in and with nature. I want to have my hands in the soil, working with plants and forming those personal relationships through my care and love for them. I’m antsy to just get out and do all of this, and because of that, I’m not sure if sticking around for two degrees or furthering my education at a different institution would be the best idea for me.”
While writing what I first thought was just gonna be a simple reflection on my participation in a highly meaningful program turned into a minor epiphany about what I think I truly want for myself in my future. Exploring all aspects of herbal studies through the Medicine of Community and Place program was so beneficial for me; it gave me insight into the different areas of herbalism that I could choose to go more in-depth on. So as I reflected on all of these areas of herbalism, I realized that what stood out to me the most was my hands-on work outside with the plants, studying botany by engaging with nature, digging in the soil and planting new herbs in the garden, creating personal connections between me and the plants I felt drawn to. Those are the things I want to be doing with my life, those are the aspects of herbalism I think I wish to focus on.
But what do these reflections on my spring quarter class have to do with my Food and Ag internship? Without fully realizing it, my internship was showing me what I wanted to do with my future as well. Having an herb garden space that I got to care for and tend to was really powerful for me; the garden was a space of respite, a safe haven of sorts, where I could breathe and take my time and pour out some love into these plants that were highly in need of it. This garden taught me to be a leader, taught me to get my hands dirty, taught me that it’s okay to take things slowly. Heck, it even got me a summer WWOOF job on a commercial herb farm that I am absolutely ecstatic for in the near future. I am so appreciative of everything that this opportunity has brought to me, including the clarity on what I want my future to look like. I am so appreciative of all the support and trust through this process, all the humans that have left their mark within this space. There are seriously no words to describe how meaningful this experience truly has been for me.
My deepest gratitude to all of my herb garden peers. <3
Due to Monday being a holiday, my last official day in the herb garden landed on this Wednesday. It was a heavier day, I hadn’t slept the night before and so entering the already overgrown herb garden with all of my big goals still waiting to be achieved felt a little upsetting. I knew that fully weeding and mulching the entire left side of the garden was out of the question; I hadn’t gotten the support I needed to make this happen and had become overwhelmed by all of my work required for the end of the quarter. It was a bit disappointing, but looking on the bright side, maybe it means that the replacement of the irrigation can occur more smoothly without the cardboard and mulch covering every bed.
For this final day of work, I tackled weeding the calendula bed with fellow Taste program friends, Laura and Cedar. We ripped out vetch and dandelion and these tiny blue-flowered plants that I still do not know the name of. It took two hours of work and two wheelbarrow loads of weeds to get the bed cleared, which felt like a satisfying day’s work after being unexpectedly caught in the rain halfway through. However, I am feeling uncertain about my calendula identification, the plants we left behind are the ones Beth had pointed out to me as calendula, I remember because of the fuzzy leaves, but the blue-flowered plants also had very similar leaves and appearances as well. I also spotted a lot of calendula seeds scattered across the soil’s surface, ungerminated. I am hopeful that what we left actually is calendula but am also curious as to what needs to occur to help the other seeds germinate.
A lovely pollinator friend on the angelica
Thursday, 6/2
Happy daisies!Look at our cute new packaging and labels!
After a final bake night celebration Tuesday evening, we had lots of deliciously decadent baked goodies for selling at our bake sale this Thursday. The club had used some money from previous sales to bulk order new packaging, and all of us were insanely pleased with how cute everything turned out to be. It was a slower day of sales for us but we were still able to make some wonderful community connections with people attending the market.
I also took a few minutes to meet with the herb-focused POF students to discuss their summer plans. I went over what my goals had been and the overwhelm that had caused me to fall short on some of these goals, and then I essentially handed off the reins to them for the summer quarter. I am very excited to see what they will achieve, it sounds like they’ll be focusing on replacing the irrigation, planting some new herbs, and hopefully getting access to the official herb garden WordPress website to add updates. And of course, they’ll be doing lots and lots of weeding, just like me.
Although Week 10 is drawing to a close and I have yet to finish my herb garden map updates, I am halfway done with them and promised the POF students that when I return on Thursday of Week 11 for the day, I will have the map to pass off to them. Giving myself a little extra time to get moved home and to turn in all of my work without the stress of this map will be very beneficial, and once I’m home, I’ll have all the time in the world to fully focus on getting it done.
As things wind down, I begin to feel the weight of leaving ride on my shoulders. I’m not fond of goodbyes, never met a person who was, but with half-empty boxes littering my room, I must face the reality of leaving this place that has become my home. I have felt lost for much of this year, out of place and on my own, but this past quarter has finally allowed me to find my spot, to discover where I fit in this massive community that we call Evergreen. And that spot is within the Food and Ag pathway amongst my Food and Ag peers, but more specifically, in the Organic Farm Herb Garden, this hidden gem that I have had the absolute honor of working within. The Herb Garden has been my teacher, my peer, my safe haven. I was so nervous at first, but now, here I am, wishing I didn’t have to leave this garden behind. I know I’ll be back soon, summer isn’t too long of a break, but missing the garden in all her summer glory is definitely weighing on me. I will forever be grateful for everything the Herb Garden has taught me this year.
Monday, 5/23
So much planting!
This morning in the community gardens was filled with so much planting, it was a really joyful day. We planted tomatoes, fennel, beets, corn, beans, and sunflowers; everyone had their hands in the soil working with the plants, digging holes, and layering compost.
Planting corn and beans in our Three Sisters plot
I really enjoyed working in our Three Sisters bed, learning about the relationship between the corn, the beans, and the squash as they grow together. In each dirt mound, we planted four corn plants in the pattern above, and then added two bean plants that will eventually wind up the corn stalks, using the corn as their support system during the growing season. This is such a cool interaction between these two plants, utilizing the space and the structure of one another to provide growing support. I am excited to hopefully see it when I return in the fall!
The pruned rose bush!
In the afternoon, Sarah Dyer and I returned to work in the herb garden, and we got a lot of good work done! We pruned back the rose bush at the entrance and tied it up to the arbor, we pruned the yew hedge to better access the first quadrant in the garden, and then we got to work on completely weeding the entire first quadrant. It is so satisfying to have this quadrant completed! The space is looking so wonderful, I have high hopes for finishing my remaining herb garden goals by the end of the quarter.
You do not know how ecstatic I am to see this first quadrant fully weeded
Looking ahead, I am planning to fully weed and mulch the entire left side of the herb garden, including the inner herb spiral. I also spoke with Sarah Williams, Taste program professor, who informed me that we still have some program budget left over to be used, so I am currently exploring the idea of buying a new plant or two for the garden before I leave. I am considering valerian, an herb of personal interest to me due to its support of sleep and anxiety, but I will take a trip to the Olympia Farmer’s Market and to the Eastside Farm and Garden store to check out what else is available as well. Finally, I am also continuing to work on the updated herb garden map, and will hopefully be able to finish that at some point this weekend or early next week.
My last big step is to get back in touch with the Practice of Organic Farming students currently working with herbs so that we can hopefully create some sort of work plan while I am away for the summer. The last thing I want is for this space to go back to its wild and untamed state like last year, I have put too much work and love into this garden to let that happen again.
Happy me with the herbs!
Thursday, 5/26
Our largest batch of goodies yet!
Due to lack of availability, SCARF was unable to have a community baking night on Tuesday like usual, so I was a bit nervous about the number of bakes we would have to sell. However, this week, we had more items than ever before and we made almost double the amount of money from last week. It was super exciting to see our club community come together to individually support SCARF, huge shout out to Sarah, Laura, and Carlos for pitching in some delicious bakes. It was also super exciting to connect with so many community members and students during the sale, we gained two new SCARF members and almost completely sold out of all our goods.
Today was focused on the Community Gardens in order to support Sarah Dyer before the upcoming summer season. We planted leeks and potatoes and continued to weed and harvest out of the rest of our plot. There were so many worms of all shapes and sizes today, it was fun to find the baby ones as I was working in the dirt. After a bit of a harder weekend, this was exactly what I had needed to get my week started.
Together, with Sarah Dyer and Beth, I have come up with a plan for the rest of this quarter and my time as a Food and Ag intern. My finishing goals are to have at least the left half of the herb garden, including the center herb spiral, completely weeded and mulched. I do not think this should be too hard to accomplish, especially with Sarah Dyer and I planning to work together during some of our afternoons before the quarter is over. Another goal of mine is, again, to finish the updated herb garden map using watercolor and ink, which I am planning to get started on this weekend if I am able.
Finally, due to the amount of money still available in our program budget this quarter, Sarah Williams has allowed me to choose any new herbs for the garden that I am interested in adding, which I am super excited about. With support from classmate, Laura Reusche, I am planning on taking a trip to the Olympia Farmer’s Market and the Eastside Farm and Garden store to explore what our herb options could be for the end of the quarter. The two of us discussed herbs we would be interested in, which include specific sleep and anxiety support herbs such as valerian and passionflower. I am excited to have another chance at adding new plants to this special garden!
Tuesday, 5/17
Gluten-free peanut butter cookies!
Since last week’s bake night had gone way later than originally anticipated, this week, we arrived with a plan to tackle a few simpler bakes and hopefully be finished before 9 pm. This week’s bakes included cereal bars, dipped pretzels, vegan snickerdoodles, lemon poppy seed cake cookies, and 3-ingredient gluten-free peanut butter cookies. I also volunteered to make brownies the following evening to balance out the amount of cookies we had at the sale. Things ran a lot smoother this time around, everyone chose an item to take the lead on and we all worked together to get things finished just around 9 pm. It was a big success and I continue to be super appreciative of these community moments with my club friends!
Wednesday, 5/18
Wednesday’s volunteer hours began with a focus on the rhubarb and asparagus beds, where cardboard was laid down in order to add mulch over top. However, we ran into a couple of problems along the way: first, the farm truck got stuck in the mud before it reached the bed with all of our mulch, and second, the wind was blowing so hard that the cardboard kept getting swept up, crushing the fragile asparagus stalks as it landed. After finally getting the cardboard all weighed down with logs, we paused our mulching work to plant some extra asparagus plants that had not sold at the market stand. I really enjoy this part of the work I am doing, getting to lovingly work with a new plant and place it into the soil that it will grow in until it is ready to harvest is really satisfying for me. I am excited to watch the continued growth of these asparagus plants!
Our next challenge was getting the farm truck unstuck from the mud. This was probably my favorite adventure of the day, we got some concrete stones to try and wedge under the tires, as well as some excess mulch, and as Andrew hit the gas, the rest of us pushed from the back until the truck finally rolled out of the muddy hole it had gotten caught in. I really enjoyed the teamwork, but we did not attempt to bring the truck back out to the asparagus bed so the mulching was put on pause until a different day.
Weeding in the lavender fields
We ended the afternoon in the lavender beds, removing lots of thistle and morning glory from the far end of the beds. Weeding is such relaxing work, and Beth joined us as well so it was another nice opportunity for all of us to connect as a community. I left the volunteer hours feeling tired but quite satisfied with all that we accomplished together.
Thursday, 5/19
Almost entirely sold out!
Today’s bake sale was a huge success! With nicer weather and a delicious variety of treats, we drew in lots of happy customers and raised over $100 for SCARF! We sold out of all of our brownies, peanut butter cookies, and lemon poppy seed cookies and donated the few items left at the end of the day to the campus food bank. I feel as if we made more connections with Evergreen students this week as well, we got 4 new SCARF members and continued to spread the word about our bake sale to whoever showed up. I also spoke with Beth about her plans to start a Tuesday market up on campus at the beginning of June, which may be something for the club to consider as it may draw in even more students if our booth is more accessible on campus. Either way, I believe our bake sales have been a huge success so far and I am extremely grateful for all the love and support that have gone into them up to this point.
This morning during class, half of us tackled the weeding of quadrants 2 and 5 in the Herb Garden. These quadrants were the two closest to getting fully weeded so I was hoping that we would have time at the end of class to get some woodchips laid down for weed suppression, but we, unfortunately, did not have enough time before class finished.
Layer of cardboard
Layer of woodchips on top
One bed complete!
Luckily, I was able to come back in the afternoon and finish up work in one of the two quadrants with support from Sarah Dyer. We tackled the last of the weeding before getting a second opinion on the woodchips from Caleb Poppe, farm caretaker and substitute for Beth as she is off on vacation this week. He thought that adding a layer of cardboard beneath the woodchips would be a better idea and then helped us locate the cardboard in one of the farm’s supplies sheds. Sarah cut strips off of the roll as I laid them down around the visible herb plants, maneuvering the pieces through the mass of agrimony to make sure all areas were covered. Then, we used three wheelbarrow loads of woodchips to spread over top. I was nervous about the final result but it actually looks really nice and inviting! Huge shoutout of gratitude to both Sarah Dyer and Caleb Poppe for their support in this process. Also, another huge shoutout to Carlos Orozco, a SCARF member who dedicated some time this afternoon to clearing the pathway between quadrants 1 and 5. The space is beginning to look so much better because of everyone who has offered their time to help beautify this area, I am beyond grateful and excited about it.
Our unknown plant – look at that leaf spiral in the center!
As our unknown plant continues to grow, I am amazed by the beauty of its leaves, the spiral they create in the center as the new growth unfolds. However, I am beginning to question whether this is actually a centaury or feverwort plant as we currently believe it to be; the photos of both of those plants appear nothing like what I see above. I am excited to do more exploration as the season continues.
Tuesday, 5/10
Baked goodies for our first bake sale!
Tonight was SCARF’s first baking night at the farmhouse! A small but mighty group of us gathered together to bake a variety of sweet treats for our upcoming bake sale on Thursday. I made a batch of snickerdoodles, Carlos made some yummy chocolate chip cookies, Joseph worked on our dipped pretzel treats, and Sarah tackled the rice crispies. It was really fun to come together as a club community, throw on a movie in the background, and just talk about food and life as we baked to support our growing club. I am starting to feel very connected with my club friends and I’m very appreciative of that!
Forgot to get a photo when Joseph was here as well but HUGE appreciation to Sarah, Carlos, and Joseph for all of their help!
Thursday, 5/12
SCARF’s first bake sale!
With all of the hardest work for the bake sale out of the way, all that was left to do on Thursday was set up our stand, make some signs, and sell our baked goodies. It was pouring rain, but Laura, Carlos, and I all worked together to get everything ready, and I think our display turned out to be very cute despite the crummy weather! Even though it was a slower day, we still fundraised over $60 and gained two new club members, which feels like a success to me for our first sale. In the future, having gluten-free items will be important, we received two requests for gluten-free baked goodies and I already have the perfect gluten-free cookie recipe to throw into our rotation. Huge shoutout to both Laura and Carlos for sticking through it with me in the rain!
Since last week was focused entirely on the Herb Garden, today’s class was spent in the Community Gardens with Sarah Dyer. We focused on weeding the beds where we will plant our squashes and tomatoes, which consisted of five overgrown beds filled with kale plants, comfrey, and lots of straw. It was tiring work requiring many hands working together with shovels and digging forks, it didn’t even get entirely finished in the morning hours of class. But the final harvest available to all of us was scrumptious for sure, I left class with a bouquet of kale, carrots, and a fennel plant to take home to my parents this coming weekend.
We also had the honor of meeting Sylvie, a retired Evergreen alum who was generously providing us with our squash plants and other starts for the weeded space. She shared the stories of each plant, sharing about the green kabocha squashes, mini peppers, and Cinderella pumpkins. Her enthusiasm around growing and saving seeds was inspiring, she was giddy to be able to share her and her friend’s plants with us. I am extremely grateful for her kindness and wisdom!
Planting our squashes! (Photo credit: Carli Fox)
In the afternoon, I came back to the community gardens to work with Sarah Dyer and Carli Fox in finishing the weeding project and creating the raised mounds for the squashes and other plants. It was an afternoon of more hard work, jumping on shovels to drive them through the clay-like soil and scooping the soil to create pathways and raised beds. In the end, we were able to plant 8 squash plants, saving spaces in between for more starts in the future. It was so satisfying to be able to place these plants into the soil after all of our hard work, I am excited to watch their growth as the spring season continues.
I am also very grateful for Sarah and Carli and the wonderful company we all shared while working this afternoon. Moments in which I am able to connect with my peers like this are insanely special to me, I feel our little Food and Ag community growing and I couldn’t be happier to be a part of it. Lots of love to everyone who has supported our efforts in the Herb Garden and Community Gardens so far this quarter!
The final beds and planted squash plants!
Wednesday, 5/4
The craziest root I have ever seen!
Wednesday volunteer hours began with a quick SCARF coordinator meeting with me, Sarah Dyer, and Gabriel Vesenka. We discussed our new club projects, which include fundraising for the club, a club logo design contest, and the Food and Ag pathway party coming up in Week 11. First, we are planning to begin running a bake sale during the Organic Farm’s market hours on Thursday between 3-6 in order to raise money for the club. Club members will bake goods Tuesday or Wednesday evenings and drop them off at the farmhouse so that I can set up the stand on Thursday and run it with Sarah Dyer until take-down. I am excited to hopefully create more opportunities for building community within our club through group baking nights in order to prep for the sale. We also have visions of expanding the market to be a mini campus farmer’s market, inviting other clubs to sell their goods at booths with us.
Second, we are planning a campus-wide art contest to design a Food and Ag T-shirt for the club to sell, as well as the design for the second edition of the Organic Farm cookbook. We will open the contest to the entire campus, and will have prizes for the winners of the chosen T-shirt design, cookbook design, and for the best art overall. I am excited to see what everyone creates!
Finally, with each pathway required to host a party by the end of the quarter, SCARF will be supporting the creation of bouquets for graduation as the Food and Ag pathway party. The bouquets will be put together mid-week during graduation week, and then will be sold along with the farmstand as graduates tour the campus with their families on their big day. I, unfortunately, will not be able to support in creating the bouquets, as I have to be moved off-campus by that time, but I plan to return on graduation day to help sell the bouquets and support my fellow SCARF coordinators before I fully depart for the summer. It is quite weird to think that my departure is only a month away at this point! All I can say is I am so proud of everything I have accomplished as a Food and Ag intern and as a SCARF coordinator so far, and I am so excited to see all that we accomplish in this coming school year as well.
Weeding in the rhubarb and asparagus!
After meeting with Sarah and Gabriel, we got to work in the rhubarb and asparagus fields, weeding dandelion, glass clumps, and a lot of pokey thistle plants. I connected with new friends and SCARF members and soaked up some sunshine during our first sunny day of weeding – I definitely cannot forget my sunscreen from now on! Thankful for everyone who continues to show up and share their time in supporting the Organic Farm and the visions of SCARF!
Our wonderful volunteers! (Photo credit: Sarah Dyer)
A wonderful sunny day of community, lavender, and lots of weeds!
Today was by far my favorite day in the Herb Garden this quarter. With both Sarah Dyer and Beth away from the farm, I was in charge for the morning, so I took this opportunity to lead some wonderful hands-on work within the garden. But first, I led a brief orientation of the space since my knowledge of the area and the plants has grown quite a lot in just this quarter alone. It felt really cool to be able to identify every plant within the garden almost by sight alone; now that spring has arrived and things are growing again, I have really been able to home in on my identification skills which is something I am quite proud of myself for.
Four new lavender plants!
Today was also a very exciting day because it was the first day that we have been able to plant something new within the Herb Garden: four new lavender plants! I feel very prideful around this as well; not only has this class been giving back to the garden through weeding, but now we have given back through the addition of new plants that will hopefully grow tall and strong for future students to enjoy and learn from. I am excited to nurture these plants throughout the rest of my time at Evergreen, I know that since my hands helped to plant them within that soil, I will have a deeper connection with them than with any other herb in that garden.
Finally, the community building of today really brightened my morning. I don’t know why I have felt so disconnected from my peers throughout this entire year, but today was the day where I felt the closest with all of them. We were chatting and laughing and sharing stories the entire time; it was wonderful to feel the garden come alive with the joy of community paired with hands-on work and care. I also feel like the connection my peers were able to make with this space today was stronger than before as well; one of my classmates remarked to me, “This is relaxing. I never thought I’d enjoy the smell of dirt.” It warms my heart to know that people are growing and learning in this beautiful area that has gone neglected for so long.
SCARF Budget Meeting
This evening contained the Student Activities Budget Proposal Meeting, which I ended up having a larger role in than originally expected. With support from Maleah Upah, a presentation of our proposal was put together and we worked together on sharing it with the S&A Board. I covered the budget for the Community Gardens and Herb Garden and Maleah took charge on the Demeter’s Garden budget, which is our biggest priority due to safety issues getting in the way of any work getting done. Overall, the presentation was received well and we are now anxiously awaiting to hear how much money our club will be receiving.
Wednesday, 4/27
A friend in the Community Gardens!
Instead of joining the rest of our SCARF volunteer crew at the Organic Farm, a small group of us met in the Community Gardens to support Sarah Dyer and have a chiller afternoon of work. We weeded a particularly “jungle-like” bed within our class plot, filling a wheelbarrow to overflowing, before planting a mix of onions and carrots, as well as some lovely nasturtium plants bought from the farm. It was nice to take a breather during a stressful week, to connect with close friends and work at our own pace on a simple task. I was appreciative of Sarah’s invitation to help out.
The finished bed vs. the mountain of weeds
Friday, 4/29
Replanted angelica plants!
Today, I met with Beth to go over Herb Garden plans for the coming week. We decided that finishing the weeding of Quadrants 2 and 5 would be beneficial, as they are the ones closest to being finished and once they’re fully weeded, a layer of woodchips can be placed down to help with future weed suppression. We also decided to move some stray angelica plants back into their section, but I need to make a decision on how large I want this section to be, as the angelica has spread quite a lot and already taken over the spot where motherwort used to reside. This leaves the opportunity of replacing the motherwort if desired; Beth says it would be easy to grow and purchase.
After our meeting, I tackled some weeding along the edge of Quadrant 2 and then moved the stray angelica plants to the open spaces within that quadrant. It felt nice to lovingly work with the angelica, carefully lifting them from the soil to be placed back into a better home. I am feeling a large amount of joy around finally handling and caring for the herbs in the garden, it’s a loving connection with the plants that I was deeply lacking in these past two quarters.
Due to illness, Monday morning class with the Taste program was cancelled. It was unfortunate to miss out on a day of work, but with heavy rain pouring down, it might not have been the most fun day of work anyways. Take a breath and prepare for what’s next!
First draft of an updated 2022 Herb Garden map
I used this downtime as an opportunity to draft a sketch of an updated 2022 Herb Garden map. I filled it in to the best of my ability and will finish it later this week after visiting the garden to confirm the last herbs I am unsure of. It is so exciting to see this map come to life, I have hopes of the final draft being down nicely in pen and with watercolor to roughly resemble the version from 2017. My digital art skills are very limited so hand drawing and painting are what I am deciding to stick to!
Wednesday, 4/20
Newly created woodchip paths through the strawberry beds!
This week’s volunteer hours consisted of almost two hours of shoveling and raking woodchips to fill in the muddy paths in the strawberry beds and to create a nicer trail from the entrance of the farm. It took many loads of woodchips and many mud-caked boots to get the entire task accomplished, but the end result made Beth exceptionally happy and will support the Practice of Organic Farming students as they begin to plant strawberries.
This week also welcomed two new SCARF coordinators, fellow Food and Ag intern focused on reviving Demeter’s Garden, Maleah Upah, and Gabriel Vesenka, a loyal club member who will help our club with advertising and making connections with the campus. These are exciting times for SCARF as engagement and excitement is expanding every day!
Friday, 4/22
Butch cuddled up in the farm office
Today, I met with Beth to come up with work plans in the herb garden for Week 5. Some of our goals include weeding (of course), moving and containing plants to their specific areas, adding any farm-provided plants such as echinacea or germander that have died out, and laying woodchips over fully weeded quadrants to help with weed suppression. It was really nice to walk through the garden and have Beth help in identifying plants I was unsure about, we even found one plant that not even Beth was 100% sure about. I am very excited to see continued growth as the season progresses!
Feverfew
A stray oregano plant
Alchemilla
What are you?!
Centaury?
Beth believes this plant to be centaury but we will keep our eyes on it as the season progresses!
After meeting with Beth, I stayed for an hour to finish filling in my updated garden map and to prep the area where we will plant our new lavender friends. It was really exciting to have a finalized first draft of the map and to see which quadrants might have new plant opportunities available within them. It also felt nice to get my hands into the soil and do some weeding so that my peers on Monday get the joy of putting these new plants straight into the earth. Feeling very grateful after this drizzly morning of light work and inspiration.
Finally, our first day in the herb garden as a class! The weather held out for us this morning so after spending some time weeding with Sarah in our community garden plot, I took a group over to the herb garden to start some weeding there as well.
The lower left quadrant at the beginning of class
We focused on the lower left quadrant of the garden, which contains lovage, elecampane, and an excess of lemon balm, which Laura and I will be using for our essential oil distilling workshop in Week 7. After an hour of work, we had filled half of a wheelbarrow with weeds.
The lower left quadrant at the end of class!
I also personally took on the task of weeding the tansy patch today. Tansy spreads like crazy once it is introduced to an area, so containing the amount in the herb garden will be an important task throughout the spring and summer seasons.
Unweeded
Weeded!
The containment of the tansy
Butch enjoying the freshly weeded tansy patch
In the afternoon, Sarah hosted a work party for the community garden that I was happy to attend. The weather turned sour pretty quickly, but our group of six attacked the community garden greenhouse even in the cold and rain, removing pile after pile of trash, sorting seeding trays and pots, coiling old hoses and drip tape, and so much more. Wasp nests were knocked down, the home of a mouse was invaded, weeds were torn out and woodchips were laid down. It was a lot of work but we got it done, ending the afternoon by lugging the file cabinet of seeds from the toolshed all the way into the greenhouse. The space looks so much nicer now and will hopefully get some more use. It was a satisfying day of work for both the community and herb gardens!
The cleaned and organized community garden greenhouse!
Looking ahead, I am excited for what is to come. I met with students in the Practice of Organic Farming program who are interested in getting involved in the herb garden, which has solved my worries about the garden going untended over this summer. I am also beginning drafts of an updated garden map modeled off of the map from 2017 so that we finally know what herbs are where and what possibilities the garden might hold for new plant additions in the future. Finally, I am hopeful to begin including weekly plant articles for my peers in the Taste program to accompany the weekly class preparation plans. These articles will provide some basic growth and medicinal overviews for plants of my choosing, and will hopefully spark any inspiration that my peers may have in working with these plants. Huge shoutout to my peers in the herb garden today, I am deeply grateful for the extra support and enthusiasm to work within this special space.
Wednesday, 4/13
The Equity Symposium – Tending Seeds Tends People
Trays and trays of newly seeded plants!
As part of the Equity Symposium on campus, Sarah Dyer, with support from the rest of the Food and Ag interns, students from the Taste program, and Food and Ag faculty, hosted a wonderful workshop titled “Tending Seeds Tends People.” In this workshop, inspirational examples of student success within the Food and Ag pathway were shared, before a community seeding was hosted with support from Beth, the Organic Farm manager. I shared the story of how I wound up in this Herb Garden internship position before accompanying the group to the farm to help with the seed planting process. I worked with spinach and nasturtium seeds and learned that to encourage growth from a nasturtium seed, it is helpful to give the seed a small scratch. It was a bit time-consuming but I got it all done!
“KNOW WE LOVED YOU IN ADVANCE.”
Thinking about this quote from the end of Walidah Imarisha’s Equity Symposium presentation reminds me of the work I am doing in the herb garden and the work we are doing as a class within the community garden. We are planting the seeds and tending them for future students, students we may never even meet, so that they can experience the same joy and passion that all of us are experiencing right now. This is a beautiful connection, one that showed up intensely within our afternoon seeding workshop at the Organic Farm. We came together as a community of friends and strangers to plant seeds for even more strangers. We are sharing the gift of fresh plants with our greater community, our peers, and ourselves. How wonderful is that?
Working in the high tunnel!
After the seeding workshop, I stuck around to support Sarah in cleaning things up and to participate in the farm’s volunteer hours. We worked on turning the soil in one of the high tunnels, trapping pesky weeds beneath the overturned heaps. As a big surprise halfway through working, giant flakes of snow began to drop from the sky. Snow in April?! Absolutely unheard of. Luckily, the high tunnel kept us dry while we worked and everyone got to experience a bit of snowy magic on the farm.
Today, we had class in one of the worst storms I have ever seen. One second, the sun was smiling down on the land, and the next, hail and rain came pouring down in sheets. I was lucky to catch breaks in the fury as I walked to and from class, and even luckier that Beth had a collection of plans for our class in the greenhouses so that we could stay out of the rain.
While a bit disappointed that we were unable to work in the herb garden, I was quite happy to get some greenhouse work in to support Beth, and was also happy to still be working with herbs, specifically some little potted lavender plants. Our task was to tear out the moss and weeds that were taking over the little pots of lavender so that they were ready for selling at the first market stand on Thursday. With freezing hands, we pruned the little plants and added fresh soil to their pots, beautifying them before the big day of selling. It was a relaxing task and offered lots of time to get to know some of my new peers. Huddled in the greenhouse together, we worked quickly as rain pounded on the plastic roof above us, swirling down in sheets outside.
With a break in the storm at the end of class, I dipped into the community garden to gather some over-wintered kale that Sarah Dyer had pointed out last time I was in the garden. Last week, I made some delicious kale chips with the leaves I gathered so I returned to my apartment again this week to do the same thing. Tossed with oil, salt, and pepper and put in a 300-degree oven for 15-20 minutes, this is a super simple way of making a tasty kale snack and takes up almost no time at all! Plus, the end result is quite delicious indeed!
Current favorite community garden snack: kale chips!
Wednesday, 4/6
Another dandelion root to be proud of!
Volunteer hours at the farm felt a lot livelier this week with 6 volunteers attending plus three of the Food and Ag interns (myself included). With the establishment of SCARF, Students for Community Agriculture and Regenerative Farming, Sarah Dyer and I have been able to announce these volunteer hours and draw interested students in to support the farm and our visions for the club. We finished the second side of the high tunnel we were weeding last Wednesday, a task that went a lot faster with so many hands working! We fed the pulled weeds to the chickens, a snack they were very excited about receiving. It was a wonderful day of work, and wonderful to meet so many excited volunteers and club members.
SCARF
To create more engagement around agriculture and community farming around our campus, Sarah Dyer and I started a student group titled SCARF (Students for Community Agriculture and Regenerative Farming). The mission of SCARF is as follows:
The mission of SCARF (Students for Community Agriculture and Regenerative Farming) is to provide the Cooper Point Community with an inclusive and regenerative space in which to both cultivate their knowledge and the land at the Evergreen State College.
We have many goals for the future of SCARF, including workshops on everything from mushrooms to beekeeping to soil science, potential movies hosted at the Organic Farm, and supporting the reestablishment of the Evergreen Harvest Festival coming this fall. We are a small but mighty group so far, I have high hopes for everything we will be able to accomplish, even in our first quarter as a group! We officially meet during farm volunteer hours on Wednesday, but this will most likely expand to another session that can focus specifically on the Community and Herb Gardens as well.
