Meeting to Explore Growing and Marketing Pumpkins and Related Crops

Farmers and gardeners who want to learn more about pumpkins, squash, melons, and cucumbers are invited to attend the 2006 Oklahoma Cucurbit Meeting, Friday, December 15, from 9 to 3 at the Grady County Fairgrounds in Chickasha.

The meeting is free and includes lunch.

OSU researchers will talk about the production and marketing of these popular crops.

The information will be of interest to all growers, says Dr. Jim Shrefler of OSU, whether they sell at farmers' markets, produce stands or ship out of state.

Dr. Francis Mangan of the Department of Plant and Soil Sciences at the University of Massachusetts will be guest speaker.

He will discuss growing and marketing exotic, tropical pumpkins for the growing ethnic markets in the U.S. Dr. Mangan has extensive knowledge of the many exotic cucurbit crops used by various ethnic groups.

Other speakers will present information on the 2006 Oklahoma specialty melon trials, developments and opportunities with the Oklahoma Farm-to-School Program, and cucurbit vegetable pest management.

Research into organic production and Oklahoma Mesonet weather products that help with irrigation scheduling will also be covered. Additional topics are still being developed.

For more information or to be added to the meeting mailing list to receive a flyer, contact Dr. Shrefler at 580.889.7343 or jim.shrefler@okstate.edu.

More information on Mangan's work is available at www.worldcrops.org.

"Practical Tools and Solutions for Sustaining Family Farms" Conference Set for January 25-28

The popular annual conference of the Sustainable Agriculture Working Group (SAWG) Southern region, will be held in Louisville, Kentucky, Jan. 25-28. Organizers expect 900 Òforward-thinking farmers and sustainable food advocates' from around the South to attend.

SSAWG conference is known for its high quality sessions, interesting field trips and in-depth mini courses and short courses. Farmers who are making sustainable agriculture work on their farms share their expertise with conference-goers, as do university researchers and experts from non-profit organizations.

The conference will offer fifty practical sessions on a wide range of topics: sustainable and organic livestock and horticulture production, direct marketing, community food systems, agriculture policies and more.

In addition to the regular program, there are optional educational programs available. These include six sustainable farming field trips, eight sustainable farming short courses, three community food systems mini-courses and an 'on-farm exchange' with an experienced organic vegetable farmer.

One pre-conference mini course on Friday, Jan. 26, from 9-noon, will feature the Kerr Center (see sidebar) and Closer to Home: Healthier Food, Farms and Families in Oklahoma, the just completed assessment of the food system in Oklahoma from farm to table. (See p. 3 and p. 14 for excerpts from the report.)

For complete conference information, or to pre-register (lowest rates before Dec. 22) go to www.ssawg.org/conference.html or call 678.494.0696.

"Creating Useful Community Food Assessments: Way Beyond the Numbers"

will help community food activists understand the usefulness of community food assessments and how they can support organizational work.

Using the recent experiences of the Community Farm Alliance in Louisville and the Kerr Center for Sustainable Agriculture in Oklahoma, instructors will discuss how to design an assessment, how to make the information gathered come alive, and how to use the process and resulting report to advocate for policy changes and programs.

This mini course will give attendees a wealth of ideas on how to gather information about the food and
agricultural system in their areas, (even if without much funding), and how to use that information to further community food systems work. Trainers will be Joe Schroeder & Ivor Chodkowski, Community Farm Alliance (KY); and Maura McDermott, Wylie Harris & Doug Walton, Kerr Center for Sustainable Agriculture (OK).
This minicourse will be offered at the 2007 "Practical Tools and Solutions for Sustaining Family Farms" conference in Louisville, Jan 25-28. See story, above.

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