cookiesinheaven

is looking for a few good farmstand peeps.



Fairview Gardens is a non-profit educational farm located in the heart of the suburban community in Goleta, CA. We are preparing to open up our store-front farm stand, last open in 2009!! Our goal is to offer up a space in which our community can get the best quality goods around, focusing on local artisans and farmers as often as possible. We are excited to establish our hub of wonder, the farm stand being not only a way to provide a one-stop-shop farm experience, but also a means of educating and welcoming our fellow land-lovers to this space. We are looking to hire 3 (three) clerks to work the farm stand: one full-time and two part-time clerks. To name a few, duties will include customer service, stocking of groceries and vegetables, and receiving orders. We are accepting resumes at this time and welcome you to turn yours in ASAP, as we are looking to open up ASAP. We welcome and encourage you to bring your resume in person, and come see the farm if you haven't already! Resumes are to be given to the attention of Adam Henry. We will also welcome resumes via Email. Thank you! Hear from you soon!

Labels: Fairview Gardens, Farms, Goleta, jobs, Organic

Labels: Coffee, Farms, Goleta, Santa Barbara

Strawberries pre-Chocolate Dipping, a photo by santa barbarian on Flickr.

Santa Barbara County produced agricultural crops valued at nearly $1.2 billion in 2011, a slight decline from the previous year but still the sixth straight year the total exceeded $1 billion, according to the county Agricultural Commissioner’s Office.

Strawberries were the top crop, with a gross value of more than $366 million, followed by broccoli at $126.8 million and wine grapes at almost $77 million. - Noozhawk

Labels: Agriculture, California Agriculture, Farms, Santa Barbara, Strawberries

Labels: Carpinteria, Farmer's Markets, Farms, Shepherd Farms

Labels: Edible Santa Barbara, farmers, Farms, local, Santa Barbara

Labels: farmers, Farms, Joel Salatin, Organic

Residents with backyard citrus trees in quarantine areas are asked to not remove fruit from those areas. 

All of Ventura County has been placed under quarantine for the Asian citrus psyllid (ACP) following the detection of two psyllids in the eastern and western portions of the county.

The first ACP was detected in a trap in a citrus grove in the La Conchita area, along the coastline. The second was detected in a trap in commercial citrus near the community of Santa Paula, approximately 20 miles east of La Conchita.

The quarantine measures for Ventura County also include 312 square miles of Santa Barbara County, from the county line in the south almost to Goleta, and eastward into mountains in the county.

Additionally, virtually all of western Riverside County west of the Coachella Valley is now under quarantine following detections of the pest in the Redlands-area. - Western Farm Press

Labels: citrus, Farms, fruit, quarantine, Santa Barbara, Ventura

Labels: factory farms, Farms

Labels: Carpinteria, cooking classes, farmers, Farms, Santa Barbara, Shepherd Farms, Slow Food

Labels: Carpinteria, Farms, Jams, Organic, picnic, Strawberries

Labels: El Capitan, Environmental, Farms, Llamas, Organic

Labels: farmers, Farms, Food, Outstanding in the Field, YouTube

Labels: Co-op, CSA, Fairview Gardens, Farms, Goleta, Organic

Joel Salatin, fulltime family farmer of the highly successful Polyface Farms, and recipient of the Heinz Award for Environmental Leadership, is one of the world’s leading advocates of farming and food relocalization. Featured in Michael Pollan’s book, Omnivore’s Dilemma, and in the films FRESH and FOOD, Inc., Joel Salatin and Polyface Farms exemplify successful grass farming and the farming and food relocalization movement. Joel is the author of six books including Family Friendly Farming, Salad Bar Beef, and his latest, Everything I Want To Do is Illegal.

In this course, Joel will challenge participants to design pathways to relocalization based on his own very successful model at Polyface Farms in Swoope, Virginia, and will also include techniques and directions from the emerging relocalization movement.

Relocalization is a strategy to build societies based on the local production of food, energy and goods, and the local development of currency, governance and culture. The main goals of Relocalization are to increase community energy security, to strengthen local economies, and to dramatically improve environmental conditions and social equity. The Relocalization strategy developed in response to the environmental, social, political and economic impacts of global over-reliance on cheap energy. Our dependence on cheap non-renewable fossil fuel energy has produced climate change, the erosion of community, agricultural lands, wars for oil-rich land and the instability of the global economic system.

Carbon Economy Courses

Labels: Environmental, farmers, Farms, Omnivore’s Dilemma, Organic, Santa Barbara

Stanford Hospital & Clinics is launching a new daily menu for inpatients featuring organic, locally grown, sustainable ingredients. Chef Jesse Cool's creative approach to developing a new menu option reflects a basic principle - simple is best. - Stanford's "Farm Fresh" program

While the country roils in debate over health care reform, Stanford Hospital and Clinics is reforming the in-patient experience one meal at a time through its new Farm Fresh project. Launched in a pilot phase last month, the program brings organic, locally grown and sustainable food to a setting better known for serving up Salisbury steak and Jell-O.

It's available to any patient whose doctor approves it, and does not cost a penny more than traditional fare. Other area hospitals have experimented with varied food options - Kaiser Permanente offers Northern California patients local, sustainably grown fruit, hormone-free milk and zero trans fat menus.

But Stanford Hospital administrators believe Farm Fresh is the first program of its kind, with a larger selection of organic, locally produced food for all meals and a focus on nutrition education designed to be used beyond the bedside. - SFGate

Labels: farmers, Farms, Food, hospitals, Organic

The Bay Area’s well-known, much-loved Soul Food Farm was devastated by a fire...

...It would be a terrible shame if the future of Soul Food Farm went up in smoke along with the beautiful grassy pastures in which these birds have pecked and foraged for worms for several years. I say this not only as Alexis’s and Eric’s friend and supporter of several years, but because they are a truly vital part of the still-nascent food chain for local, sustainably raised meat in the Bay Area. Even here, where people get up at dawn for the chance to pay $6 per pound for pastured chicken at the Ferry Plaza Farmers Market before Marin Sun Farms sells out of them, getting a pastured chicken to your plate is a tricky business.

...To help get Soul Food Farm access to cash, whether for rebuilding the chicken houses and ordering enough replacement birds to meet their obligations to their existing customers or frankly whatever, with her reluctant permission I’ve set up a PayPal donation account in Alexis’s name, under the new email account firefund@soulfoodfarm.com. Please consider donating whatever you can spare via the PayPal button. You can also go to Paypal.com and send a donation directly via the preceding email address. [Update: Don't be alarmed if PayPal says the account is not yet verified; I need to get Alexis to fill in some details. Also, please note that those who dislike PayPal can also mail a check made out to Soul Food Farm to 6046 Pleasants Valley Rd., Vacaville, CA 95688.]

Labels: Bay Area, chicken, Donating, farming, Farms, Fires

Since its adoption 44 years ago, the California Land Conservation Act, popularly known as the Williamson Act, has grown into the state's most important farmland protection program. The Williamson Act has served California very well, but it is facing its most significant challenge due to the ongoing state budget crisis.

In addition to protecting one of our state's most valuable resources—our agricultural land—other significant benefits of the act must also be recognized and appreciated for their contribution to our quality of life: the protection of our precious watersheds; the availability of and access to a local, safe and affordable food supply; wildlife habitat; and the beautiful landscapes that are so important to all of our citizens.

...In addition to its significant impacts on the state and local economies, the Williamson Act is widely appreciated by those in the environmental, agricultural and business communities, as well as by state and local government officials, as one of the most important environmental laws ever adopted in California. It has encouraged good land use planning and prevented leapfrog developments that can be devastating to agricultural and natural resources.- California Farm Bureau Federation

Program benefiting farms and ranches gutted.

...Under the Williamson Act, landowners sign 10-year contracts with the county that allow ranchers and farmers to pay property taxes based on what they produce on their land, instead of charging them the same taxes residential landowners pay.

The state then reimburses the counties the difference.

As a result, county governments - not farmers - will initially see the effect from the funding cuts, said Assemblyman Jim Nielsen, R-Gerber.

..."That's discretionary dollars," Lees said, meaning the money can be used for just about anything.

Bundy said most ranches and farms under Williamson Act protection might be temporarily safe from drastic tax increases because of the 10-year contracts. But he was quick to add that he didn't know for sure.- Redding.com

...Farmland preserved by the Williamson Act takes more of the world’s primary greenhouse gas — carbon dioxide — out of the air than any other program now contemplated. More than the proposed tailpipe emission changes and carbon-trading programs proposed as ways to carry out the landmark 2006 AB32, the most aggressive anti-climate change bill ever passed anywhere. More than scrubbing every smokestack in California. More than all proposals to clean up ship- and truck-caused emissions from all California’s ports put together. - Ventura County Star

Now, more than ever, we need to support our farmers...our farmland...our open spaces our environment... because they are endangered more than ever.

Labels: Agriculture, budget, California Agriculture, farmers, farming, Farms, Governator

Labels: farmers, farming, Farms, YouTube

Labels: Farmer's Markets, Farms, Santa Barbara