Falling temperatures bring rising spirits... and sprouts!
As the temperatures in the Valley finally start to drop below triple digits, the Rob and Melani Walton Urban Farm at St. Vincent de Paul is excitedly harvesting the last of its summer crop and starting to see the fall and winter plants sprout, including some beautiful squash, pumpkins, and cauliflower (pictured above).
Harrison Surprise, the Urban Farm program coordinator, is excited to tackle the challenge of organizing and planning what the Rob and Melani Walton Urban Farm at SVdP's main campus is going to take on, especially since this is his first fall working the farm here at SVdP's main campus. The Urban Farm program has two other farms in operation alongside its Phoenix and Mesa dining rooms.
"I'm looking forward to finally doing all the planning myself," he said. "I've never really had the space to practice companion planting, which is basically planting different plants together to symbiotically help each one where each one lacks."
This year, Harrison and the farm staff and volunteers plan on planting more pumpkins, Swiss chard, lettuce, chives, red onions, cauliflower and purple cauliflower, and they're branching out by including some medicinal plants including mugwort, mullein, and hibiscus.
Harrison is really excited for the fall and winter growing season, but his favorite part of the work is knowing where the food goes after it's out of the ground.
"The most rewarding part of the job is that none of this is going to profit. All of it's going to help people in need," he said. "And that's honestly, the biggest drive that you could give to me. We're just dealing with making as much as produce as we can for people in need, and keeping it that simple. Honestly, it inspires me a lot."
