Long known as “The Grower Who Grows Growers,” organic farmer and educator Lynn Pugh was awarded the 2013 Georgia Organics Land Steward of the Year Award at the organization’s 16^th annual conference on Feb. 23, 2013.

As Broad River Pastures’ Cathy Payne said in her introduction, “for over 30 years, Lynn has been a living example of the heart and soul of organic agriculture.” Pugh studied science, and ecology in college, and went on to teach at the high school and college levels, gardening all the while. In 2001, she founded her own growing operation in Forsyth County. Cane Creek Farm is a four-acre Certified Naturally Grown farm that features a wide variety of fruits, vegetables, and flowers.

Pugh never quite shook her desire to educate — for over 13 seasons, her hands-on, intensive farming and gardening class has trained 155 people in the fundamentals of organic growing, and many graduates have gone on to start their own operations. Pugh’s generosity of spirit is spurred by a genuine love of the land and desire to act as a good steward. “The way we live with the environment and the world is important,” she said during a tour of her farm in December 2012. “It’s important to value it, to work with the world we’re given.”

The Land Steward of the Year Award was created by Georgia Organics to honor an individual or individuals who have contributed greatly towards the organic agriculture movement in Georgia. The award has traditionally been given to a farmer, agricultural professional, or researcher who has demonstrated a commitment to the tenets of organic agriculture— soil fertility, biodiversity, on-farm recycling, and water quality— and also the larger community through leadership, education, and outreach.

With more than 1,300 attendees, the 16^th Annual Georgia Organics Conference and Expo united the two communities most responsible for the health of Georgians—growers who farm organically and healthcare practitioners. The conference’s theme, “Farm Rx: A Prescription for Better Health,” was a banner under which these two groups united over two days at the Georgia International Convention Center in Atlanta.

The good food movement in the South has unprecedented momentum, and from Feb. 22-23 conference attendees visited local farms, sat in on panel discussions, and made connections with farmers, medical professionals, school nutrition staff, gardeners, teachers, and community groups. They attended workshops on topics ranging from mushroom cultivation to young farmer advocacy.

The conference culminated with a keynote from CNN’s Dr. Sanjay Gupta, who recognized the important unity of good food and good farms: “We’ve eaten our way into a problem, we can eat our way out of it.”

The Barbara Petit Pollinator Award was given to Helen Dubose, the first female African American in the nation to graduate with an agriculture degree. She went on to get two Master’s degrees as well. For the last 32 years, she has lived on her 12 acre blueberry farm in McDonough,  known as Healing Acres, which has more than 250 blueberry bushes and is for many  an epicenter of African American agriculture.

The Barbara Petit Pollinator Award honors an individual or organization for outstanding community leadership in Georgia’s sustainable farming and food movement. The award acknowledges exceptional success in advancing Georgia Organics’ mission by spreading—pollinating—the movement throughout community life, such as the food industry, faith communities, public agencies, schools, and institutions. The award is named after Barbara Petit, a committed leader, culinary professional, and organizer who served as President of Georgia Organics from 2003-2009. During her term as president, the organization evolved from a non-staffed, member, and program-driven nonprofit to a professional group with expanded outreach, programs, and communications.

More Georgians then ever are choosing to eat local produce. The number of farmer’s markets across the state increased 588 percent between 2003 and 2008. There’s also been an explosion of interest in Community Supported Agriculture, which are grass-roots groups that directly link consumers to local farmers. There are 35 such groups in Georgia now, a 600 percent increase since 2003.

via Cumming Patch

The hardest lesson that you inevitably learn while farming is to try not to put off until tomorrow what can be done today. This can often be difficult, especially when knowing the extensive list of work that needs to be done immediately. However, as tempting as it might be to consign what looks to be a small task to tomorrow, DON’T DO IT! Weeds that look small today can be enormous tomorrow, and much harder to deal with. The amount of work it would take to pull them out when they are young may feel like a lot when added to the general to-do list, but as the weeds grow, they become their own project that requires much more labor. Similarly, if you cast a cover crop immediately after you mow a field, you can actually prevent weeds from growing there as you , thus accomplishing two tasks at once. And don’t be discouraged if you don’t see immediate results from your actions. Take compost for an example. An untended compost heap will be just a pile of smelly vegetables, but add a bit of mulch, and spend 15 minutes here and there turning it, and voila!- you will magically have a beautiful pile of dark, rich soil, full of happy earthworms.

Coming to a farm in Georgia was a learning experience in itself. Having spent a season on an organic farm in California, I knew I had the practical knowledge to farm anywhere, but I didn’t realize that California has it real easy when it comes to organic farming. Its mild and semi-dry climate prevents a whole host of fungal diseases from thriving. Georgia, on the other hand, had the hot humidity that fungi love, and as a result, you have to be really smart about what you plant, and how to you tend it. Choosing vegetable varietals that originate from hot, humid climates, or that have been bred to thrive in them is vital to your success here. Probably the crop that has done the best this summer is one that I had never even heard of before I came here: Malabar spinach.

Training the Malabar Spinach

Malabar spinach is not related to the spinach we all know and love: it is actually a vine that is commonly grown in south and southeast Asia. It loves the heat and seems to grow overnight. We trained it on a wire fence where it formed a trellis so thick, you can barely see through it. It is one of  the only greens that can not only survive, but flourish in a Georgia summer. Our tomatoes on the other hand, were not so lucky. They picked up not one, but three types of fungi: a fusarium wilt, early blight, and late blight. We were actually stymied as to what was going on at first, since not even Lynn had seen tomatoes with late blight before. (Incidentally, late blight is the same fungus that wiped out all the potato crops in Ireland, leading to the Irish Potato Famine.) We had to call in an expert from the UGA agricultural extension service. Dr. Garton came to our rescue by identifying these fungi and offering suggestions to deal with them organically. Using a combination of neem oil and compost tea with protective fungal inoculations, we were able to get a worthwhile tomato harvest.

After several months working at Cane Creek Farm, I have definitely learned a lot. From new farming techniques like the Florida Weave (a method of stringing up tomatoes), to new vegetable varieties, and, especially, a new understanding of my abilities to work in difficult conditions (like 100 degree heat, you know) I can confidently say this summer has opened my eyes to a lot of new aspects of farming. More importantly, however, is the knowledge that farming is a neverending learning process, and every new piece of information I pick up drives that home. There will always be new challenges and surprises ahead, and you always have to be on your toes to deal with them. Every season, every piece of land, every plant is different, so there is always something new to learn, and that is what keeps farming fun.

- Andrea Ness

In 2010 we became stewards to seven head of Dexter cattle. Like the sheep, the cows enjoy our green pastures and we welcome several calves each year. The native home of the Dexter is in southern Ireland, where they were bred by small land holders and roamed about in an almost wild state of nature. In recent years there has been a worldwide surge of interest in Dexter cattle because they thrive in hot as well as cold climates and do well outdoors year round.

Our animals live a natural life–eating naturally and behaving naturally. They graze on green pasture, and are fed no hormones or antibiotics. Meat from grass-fed animals is lower in fat and lowers LDL cholesterol (bad cholesterol). Additionally, there is 2-4 times the amount of Omega-3s in meat from grass-fed animals compared to those fed primarily grain. Omegas-3’s play a vital role in every system in the human body. Learn more about the benefits of grass-fed meat at eatwild.com.

When you purchase meat from us you are buying beef and lamb that is locally raised and processed humanely. Your purchase makes a difference!