Planning your Vegetable Garden

This workshop will help you to consider your space and design a garden that meets your needs and desires.
Saturday, February 13
Harwood Art Center
$5 – free to members of Harwood, RGCF, Gardeners’ Guild and the Action Buzz Garden

Dig Your Hands in the Dirt: Planting Your Vegetable Garden

What is the proper way to transplant a seedling? How should I lay out my garden? Should I plant in rows or use a different strategy? Get answers to these questions and more at this interactive workshop. Come with questions and leave with answers to dig in and get going right away!
Saturday, March 20
Rio Grande Community Farm
$5 • free to members of Harwood, RGCF, Gardeners’ Guild or the Action Buzz Garden

Staying on Top of Things: Garden Maintenance

Oh, the weeds! And the bugs! This workshop will focus on keeping up with your flourishing garden by providing you with strategies to keep things healthy and vibrant. When to supplement with natural fertilizers, integrated pest management approaches and more will be covered.
Saturday, April 24
Action Buzz Garden
$5 • free to members of Harwood, RGCF, Gardeners’ Guild or the Action Buzz Garden

Sustainable Solutions to Vexing Problems: Preparing for the Height of Summer

By June, gardeners are preparing for the extreme sun and heat of the high summer months. Come learn about ways to prepare your garden before conditions become too intense. Sun shading, reducing water loss, the best times to be out in the garden (for the plants and for you) and more will be addressed.
Saturday, June 19
Gardeners’ Guild
$5 • free to members of Harwood, RGCF, Gardeners’ Guild or the Action Buzz Garden

Seed Saving/Seed Swapping

Saving seeds from successful crops is an excellent way to ensure bountiful future harvests. Seed saving can also help you develop a strain that is ideally suited for your conditions. Come learn all about seed saving and, for those of you who have some to share, swap your favorite varieties with others. Why save seeds? What seeds can be saved? How should they be stored? What about cross-pollination? Join us to learn all about the remarkable life of seeds!
Saturday, August 21
Location TBA
$5 • free to members of Harwood, RGCF, Gardeners’ Guild or the Action Buzz Garden

Ann Bartuska, USDA Acting Under Secretary for Natural Resources and Environment, tours Rio Grande Community Farm on August 11, 2009. Bartuska was joined with New Mexico Natural Resources Conservation Service State Conservationist, Dennis Alexander. The visit happened after participating in an Agriculture Water Enhancement Program signing ceremony with the Santa Ana Pueblo. The full story was covered in the Conservation Showcase or you can download the PDF article.

On June 14, 2009, Rio Grande Community Farm hosted a small gathering to listen to Woody Tasch talk about how we might go about investing in local agriculture.  Tasch is the author of “Slow Money:  Investing as if Food, Farms and Fertility Mattered.”  Highlights of the evening include musings from Woody Tasch, delicious food from Savoy Bar & Grill, mingling with local farm advocates, a double rainbow over the Sandias and a coyote howling after the rain.  The Slow Money Alliance will be hosting a conference in Santa Fe, September 11-12, 2009.  For more information, go to www.slowmoneyalliance.org.  If you are interested in attending future events at the Farm, please contact us at info@riograndefarm.org.

Senator Tom Udall sent a letter of support to the Rio Grande Community Farm.  We are addressing climate change through sustainable agriculture and local food sales, water scarcity through our highly-efficient drip irrigation system, and health problems through improved nutrition for school children.  He wrote in his letter, “If you only addressed one of these issues, that would be impressive. But the work you do here addresses all three. The fact that a grassroots enterprise like this one can deploy a system with such potential to do good gives me hope for the future of our state and our region.”  View full letter

We would like to thank the following individuals and businesses for their help in making this event a success:  Marika Ray, Shastyn Photography, Alpha Graphics, Albuquerque Tent, Savoy Bar & Grill, La Montanita Coop, and Woody Tasch.

We are offering 2 workshops this fall.  They will be free for members and $5 for non-members.

Cool Season Gardening

September 12, 9:30-11:30 am
at the Barn at the Rio Grande Community Farm
taught by Farmer Deb Brubaker

New Mexico’s mild climate provides plenty of time to have a beautiful and productive garden year-round. Cool-season vegetables grown in the fall can often be more productive than in spring, with fewer insect problems and less variable temperatures. Join us to discuss the wide range of cool-season vegetables, chill protection techniques, successive planting, and more.

Composting

October 10, 9:30-11:30 am
at the Action Buzz Garden
taught by Walter Dodds from Soilutions

Description will be available soon.

Anne Cooper’s land art entitled Anitya, meaning “impermanence” in Sanskrit, was installed in February.  The work is comprised of 81 bowls made from terracottacolored clay harvested from her land near Chama, New Mexico. Placed in a 9 x 9 foot grid, the raw clay bowls contain seed balls depending on the seasonal rains the seeds may sprout: wheat, rye, oats, blue gramma, side oats gramma, gallenta, little bluestem and other dryland grasses. The bowls eventually dissolve, returning to and leaving red stains in the earth.

The installation is located within the community garden on the Northwest corner of Los Poblanos Open Space.  As expected the installation has been overgrown by vegetation.  If you are looking to find the location please download a map provided by Land/Art New Mexico.

Anne helped preserve the Los Poblanos Open Space from development during 1994 through 1997 when it was purchased by the City of Albuquerque.

Organic Farm Decides to Flood Less, a short article by the USDA’s Natural Resources Conservation Service about Rio Grande Community Farm’s installation of the subsurface drip irrigation (SDI) system.  NRCS interviewed our Director, Minor Morgan.  Learn more about this system.

This year’s maze will depict the two of the stages of the Monarch butterfly: caterpillar and adult butterfly. The Maze is open to the public every Friday evening and all day on Saturdays (including Saturday evenings) and Sundays.  Special events such as birthday parties can be scheduled to include a Maze visit.

Field trips for schools, community groups, corporate team-building or any other group wanting a weekday visit may be arranged by making a reservation. Field trips can also include Farm tours or educational activities provided by Farm staff.  To schedule your  group’s visit please call 345-4580.  Learn More

Rio Grande Community Farm grows healthy, organic food for the Albuquerque area, involves the community in the Farm’s operation, maintains wildlife habitat and supports local production of food. Our programs include a sustainable small farm, a one acre Community Garden, plantings for wildlife, the annual Maize Maze, educational and service-learning programs, and volunteer opportunities. We invite you to get involved in any and all of these programs.

Come visit the Farm!  Located at Los Poblanos Fields Open Space, everyone can walk the farm roads and enjoy both agriculture and wildlife at the same time.  Farm membership and volunteering bring additional activities and special opportunities.  Learn more about RGCF