“No garlic left behind!”

A common trend in the work at all three farms today was the garlic harvest.

As Miss Melissa at Charlestown told us, these are highly time intensive little plants, and so its especially important during harvest to ensure that all of them are picked, with none left behind. Garlic actually gets planted in October, and has one of the longest growing period of the crops on the farm. Working with that as our mantra, we weaved through some prickley thistle and highly compacted dirt to pull out the garlic plants, while other interns rubber banded them together for drying.

As we went along, Intern Daniel noticed a new technique – it’s not just about pulling the plants out with brute strength, but about gently wiggling the stalk to almost coax them out of the ground.

After a hard morning working in the blazing sun, we went down to French Creek to cool off. In the afternoon sessions, one group cooked up some frittatas while the business group learned about the economics behind community sustainable agriculture.