Countryside Farmers' Market

$25 for 25 Raffle 

See details here.

Administrative Coordinator

The Countryside Conservancy is now seeking applications for a key staff position: Administrative Coordinator.  Applications are due not later than Friday, May 6, 2011.  A preferred start date of Monday, June 6 will allow four weeks orientation and training by the current Administrative Coordinator. 

The Administrative Coordinator reports directly to the Executive Director, and has primary responsibility for managing several critical Conservancy support functions: Office operations, IT/computer services, financial records, and personnel records. 

The signs of spring have been abundant at the Countryside Winter Farmers' Markets since March, and now we are all anxiously awaiting our return to the great outdoors!  Opening day at Howe Meadow is May 14, and we plan to launch our 'Waste Not' project on opening day.  We will be providing information to our customers and vendors on how we can all contribute less waste to landfills - and consequently, more land to farming for local markets like ours - by separating waste generated at our markets.  We will be adding a regular section in our market e-news to share ideas on how you can reduce waste at home, and we'd love to hear what ways all of you manage to divert waste from landfills- whether it's by bringing your own totes to the market, or if it's through using mason jars for lunch packing.

Our weekday market is undergoing a transformation in 2011, and we are very excited!  Not only are we moving to a new location (Highland Square!) but we are also changing the day of the week to Wednesday.  Countryside Farmers' Market at Highland Square will be open every Wednesday beginning June 1 through September 28 from 4-7pm at the corner of Conger Avenue and Market Street. Here's a link to the new location. We can't wait to see you there! 

Thanks to the generous support of the United States Department of Agriculture, the Countryside Conservancy in concert with The Ohio  Ecological Food and Farm Association, just completed a series of three webinars geared toward taking specialty crop block farmers to the next level in their business.

The first webinar "Improving Efficiencies on Your Organic Farm"

held January 31^st was given by Jon Cherniss of Blue Moon Farm

in Illinois and Jim Crawford of New Morning Farm in Pennsylvania. These two successful organic farmers have over 30 years of experience.  They shared their insights on managing labor, evaluating and investing in capital improvements and organizing your farm business utilizing

Excel spreadsheets.

The second webinar in February titled "Building Mutually Profitable Relationships with Independent Chefs and Restaurateurs" was hosted by Chef Douglas Katz, owner

of Fire Food and Drink in Shaker Heights, Ohio.  Chef Katz discussed the entire process by which chefs make their purchasing decisions and gave practical information to growers on how to most effectively communicate and engage chefs to increase sales.  Additionally he shared his personal experience with how to manage ongoing relationships after the initial sale.

The final webinar held at the end of March, "Effective Weed Management Strategies for Your Organic Farm" was presented by Matthew Liebman, Henry A. Wallace Chair for Sustainable Agriculture and Professor of Agronomy at Iowa State University.

Weeds remain one of the top constraints for organic crop production. In this session Matt discussed successful weed management without herbicides through better cultivation methods and equipment.  He gave an in depth look at multiple physical, biological, and cultural tactics woven together with basic ecological processes that can lead to more effective, lower cost strategies for weed suppression. Liebman illustrated this approach with examples from agronomic and horticultural cropping systems.

All three sessions are available to view free of charge at www.cvcountryside.org and www.oeffa.org. 

Spring Cleaning

Sage Culley, Farmers' Market Intern