Join us for the ICF Annual Meeting and Celebration Potluck! We’ll begin with the potluck portion at 5 pm; the meeting begins at 6 pm at the Integrated Arts Academy/H.O. Wheeler Elementary School 6 Archibald St, Burlington.
Click here for details on the annual meeting agenda and potluck. We hope to see you there!
The community support for all farmers affected by tropical storm Irene is astounding. Farm member Andrea Todd is hosting a dinner series of Farmer Dinner Fundraisers
in Burlington; the next two dinners are on September 25 and October 19 and all proceeds go to the many Intervale Farms who suffered losses. Champlain Orchards in Shoream is also hosting benefit concerts for Vermont farmers on September 24 and 25. Click here for details.
For more information on how to directly help out ICF or support other farms affected by Irene, please contact Andy Jones (andy at intervalecommunityfarm.com) or Becky Maden (becky at intervalecommunityfarm.com).
Sadly, this will be our final week of Summer share 2011 pickups. Come get your veggies, bread, cheese, eggs, and City Chicks organic chicken, if you ordered ahead. We’ve truly appreciated your support and understanding during this challenging year. We are already looking forward to 2012 and have exciting new things in store, as well as our old standby: delicious, excellent produce.
In the midst of this very long, surreal week, support from the community has buoyed our spirits. As each emotional day has curved by since the rise and fall of the river, my own sprits have risen and fallen many times. They rise when I try to make my way through City Market and person after person grabs me for a hug; they fall as I wander through our fields, discovering trenches gouged by the river and crops flattened by mud and debris. They rise as I snack on a piece of banana bread from a woman I’ve never even met, and fall again as I scrape mud from the floor of our office, crushing lavender in my hands to combat the stench carried by the thick Winooski. They rise again as I walk into our storage room where there are pallets of tomatoes and mounds of onions, harvested by the hands of friends and volunteers, and fall when I tearfully tell another member that we’re not sure we’ll have crops to complete the Summer Share.
In the midst of our community are some gifted writers and photographers documenting the flooding. We’ll try to keep links to the media updated on our “news and events” page. Several fundraisers for farm recovery are in the works as well, so please keep checking in for updates. In the meantime, check out ICF Board Member Meg Klepack’s blog post for City Market; Natalie Stultz’s photos; and farm member Melissa Pasanen’s article in Sunday’s Free Press. There are also some powerful photos of ICF during the flood in Seven Days and the Burlington Free Press. Also, check out this AMAZING time lapse video of our neighboring farm, Diggers’ Mirth.
Donations to assist with farm recovery for Intervale Farms can be made through the Intervale Center’s Farmer Recovery Fund.
We are cutting short our 2011 Summer Share and expect to cancel our 2011-2012 Winter Share. Please read the details in our letter: ICF Hurricane Irene Update
Due to flooding from Hurricane Irene, we are canceling our Thursday, 9/1/11 pickup. Pickup will resume next week Tuesday (on account of Labor Day) 9/6 and Thursday 9/8. We need a few more days for Intervale Road, our parking area and barns to dry out before we can handle the vehicle traffic.
Thank you to all who helped us bring in the harvest ahead of the flooding. We appreciate all of your concern and best wishes and will keep you posted on opportunities for involvement later on.
It’s an uncomfortably familiar pattern: widespread heavy rainfall brings Winooski River flooding, resulting in crop losses and letters of explanation.
ICF Main Gate, Monday 8/29/11, 4pm
Irene, alas, repeated the pattern. ICF suffered the worst flood in our 22-year history yesterday, with all fields inundated and the river flowing through our buildings. The full impact of the flooding won’t be known until we’ve had a chance to assess the farm at lower river levels we hope we expect to see today or tomorrow. Suffice it to say that Irene caused a huge disruption in our already challenging season.
Bright spots are hard to find right now, but we are heartened by the enthusiastic and dedicated energies of members and friends that joined in our efforts to salvage as much of the harvest as possible on Friday, Saturday, and Monday. Likewise, ICF is much more fortunate than many upriver and elsewhere throughout the state.
Intervale Road, Monday 8/29/11, 4:30pm
For now, we will continue our regular pickups until we’ve exhausted the food we rescued before the flooding. We’ll update you with information regarding the season and CSA pickups on a regular basis, as we are able to make sense of the landscape. Thank you all for your understanding and support during this challenging season.
