Here’s to a New Year

As we turn the page on 2021 and enter a new year, our team wishes you and those you love a Happy 2022! Like so many others, our hope is for a conclusion to the pandemic and for emerging opportunities to gather again in ways that sustain each of us. We have an exciting year ahead and hope you will join us on this journey. Thank you for the myriad ways you support Common Roots Farm. We can't wait to see how the year unfolds and look forward to sharing our story with you as we enter our fifth production season. We have grown so much, but the best is yet to come! Happy New Year from all of us.

Volunteer with us! A note from Geoff

by Geoff Palla, Engagement Manager

I wanted to take this opportunity to introduce myself — my name is Geoff Palla and I’m the newest member of the Common Roots Farm team! Hired last summer, I am the farm’s new Engagement Manager and will be your point of contact going forward for any and all volunteer opportunities. We’re having lots of rainy day conversations these days discussing how we can design the most engaging volunteer program possible. We’re expanding the program for the 2022 season and look forward to working with you here on the farm.

Volunteering at Common Roots Farm is a great way to get your hands in the soil and make a meaningful impact in our efforts to create a farm that engages people with and without disabilities. Volunteers are able to get involved in a variety of ways including bed prep, weeding, harvest, hedgerow maintenance, animal husbandry, plant propagation, and much more.

Apply here to begin your volunteer experience at Common Roots Farm or visit www.commonrootsfarm.org/volunteer for more information.

The volunteer program is currently on “winter break,” so look for us to resume with volunteers near the spring equinox. Until then, Happy Winter and have fun looking through those seed catalogs! (Doesn’t everybody do that?!)

Strawberries: Making the magic happen

by Heidi Cartan, Executive Director

If you’ve tried our strawberries, you will believe me when I say many people tell us ours are the tastiest they’ve ever had! Having experimented with less satisfactory varieties, we grow Albion strawberries exclusively now. Our growing conditions, combined with frequent attention throughout the season, means our most popular crop is a mainstay on our farm.

What you may not know is how much work is needed to grow this delicacy. Over six months before we will see our first ripe berry, our crew of staff and volunteers breaks ground on 6 raised beds. Each 100 foot long bed is raised at least 8 to 12 inches to ensure the plants’ roots don’t get too wet and that the labor of harvesting is made a bit easier. Then drip tape is rolled out and pinned to the bed tops to provide irrigation directly to the plants’ root zone, thereby maximizing water conservation.

This November we had two crews out to assist us with forming the beds. A big “thank you” to Larry Palla of Meder St. Farm for loaning us his toolbar so we could take the first pass at bed formation using our tractor. Pictured here, members of the Catholic Community at Stanford then did lots of shovel work by hand to crisply define the beds and furrows. Next, the Jang family’s volunteers evened out the bed tops and smoothed the furrows further to be sure our harvest carts can roll freely between beds.

Finally, our crew was joined by George, our volunteer from UCSC, who is seen here rolling out the plastic tightly over each bed, reducing weed pressure and helping the soil stay warmer.

Farmer Noah’s job was to separate the bare root plants and place them into trays to be handed off to Annabelle, Nina, and Geoff, our farm crew, who then planted out 1200 plants.

The Ta-Da moment is pictured here!

Strawberries are a living reminder that many hands make lighter work, and that good things are worth waiting for! If you didn’t get a chance to try our berries fresh during the season, please grab a taste from our assortment of jams, shrubs, syrup and margarita mixes available on our website. We will proudly present our customers with fresh berries again in springtime.