Announcing!! Healthy Harvest Food Exchange!

Come one, come all to our first Healthy Harvest Food Exchange! On Saturday, June 13th at our regular meeting, members are encouraged to bring some local food for barter or sale. If you are a grower, bring produce from your garden or orchard. If you are a baker, bring home made bread. If you are a cheese maker, bring some samples. Any locally produced food is welcome. Those who would prefer to support local food by buying some should bring cash! With the talents and interests of our members we should be able to have quite a nice assortment of fresh, nutritious food. We can then revive the ancient art of market haggling - " I'll give you a dozen eggs for that loaf of bread..."

Minutes from the May 9th Meeting

Healthy Harvest met on Saturday, May 9th at 10 AM at the Bird House in Leakey. Six people attended. The first topic of discussion was the status of the Community Garden Project. Barb V. and Don W. reported that Sandra H. of the Garden Club was agreeable to having the Community Garden on Garden Club property, provided that details of finances and other issues could be worked out. Barb agreed to have further discussions with Sandra, with the goal of getting the project off the ground in the fall. Rick A. suggested that some way be found to determine whether there is enough interest among Leakey residents to justify further work on the project.

Next we discussed the Farmers Market idea. Rick A. reported that all indications are that Leakey presently is not a large enough city to attract professional growers to a Farmers Market. The consensus was that local growers could sell produce on an informal basis. Some growers are already selling at Canyon Charm, and the area near the Courthouse is another possible location.

The third topic on the agenda was a booth at the July Jubilee. J.P. has made arrangements for our booth and paid the fee. Members present thought that we should pass out information about the local food movement and about the interests, background, and projects of Healthy Harvest members. Barb offered to bring equipment so that we could show a DVD of one of Michael Pollans' talks. Further planning will take place at our June meeting.

Lastly, we talked about having work days at members' gardens/ranches/homes. Anyone who needed help could host a work day, and then later return the favor by working at someone elses' place. Rick and Sage are presently in need of help building their magnificent Coop II - Chicken Hacienda, so our first work day may be at their place. More information to follow about a Coop-Raising!

May Meeting Coming Up!

Healthy Harvest will meet on Saturday, May 9th at 10 AM at the Bird House in Leakey. Agenda items will include updates from the Farmers Market and Community Garden committees, as well as planning for our next seminar and our booth at the July Jubilee. Anyone interested in local, organic food is welcome to attend!

Many thanks to Wanda K. for hosting our April meeting/seminar and giving us a very informative tour of her forest garden.