I am excited and looking forward to connect with 3 different individuals that I know will have a lot of valuable advice and perspective that I hope to incorporate into my plans as I move ever forward.
#1 — This first meeting in my docket is with Lane Selman, the director of the Culinary Breeding Network (creators of NOVIC) and a professor at OSU. Lane has been working on expanding the Organic breeding efforts of PNW vegetable varieties and has been working with the primary plant breeder, Jim Meyers, at OSU. The work and connections that Lane has been a part of in the last few years has been hugely valuable through aiding in the implementation and dissemination of responsible plant breeding and seed saving practices.
We will be talking about seed varieties that I should focus on growing in this upcoming season’s variety trials; it makes a lot of sense to me to grow similar varieties that the Culinary Breeding Network are growing so that we can only expand the data and information that we have for a particular variety. I know that Lane will have boundless info and advice to give me.
#2 — The second person that I will be meeting with Heather Rudich who is the farm manager at Grub, a food cooperative in Olympia, WA that focuses on ag-education to younger students (k-12), while still providing large amounts of food for the greater Olympia community. Heather has been so kind as to offer some donatable seeds to us and is excited about the prospective work that I am planning.
#3 — And last, but not least, is Chris Nolte who was the previous Evergreen Community Garden coordinator. I have so many questions about how to effectively coordinate this space and Chris will undoubtedly have many of the tricks and beta used for running the CG as smoothly as possible, making my life a whole lot easier!
I will post details about these meetings as they take place so stay tuned!