INTERNAL NEWSLETTER April 2021
Ghost & Snuggles meeting one of our new goat kids, Buster
IN THIS ISSUE Highlight on DEI Spring Cleanup Days Farm Camp Update Department Updates A Deeper Dig Kudos!
April Showers Bring... Happy spring, everyone, and what an amazing start we are having. I can see the grass getting greener every day. It is becoming increasingly clear that 2021 will be a very big and busy year for Wolfe’s Neck Center. April’s theme will be about getting ourselves ready: we’ve crafted great plans, the programs and campsites are all booked up, CSAs are sold out, seasonal staff are just about all hired, and go time is just around the corner. We just announced in yesterday’s email blast six volunteer workdays during this and next month. These will be good opportunities for all of us to rally some friends and neighbors to come out to the farm to lend a hand in helping us steward this land. Be on the lookout for more information and, in the meantime, enjoy these longer, warmer and brighter days.
Dave
Highlight on DEI By: Marissa Mastors Grants & Development Manager MOFGA’s SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education) PDP (Professional Development Program) project, Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Training for Agricultural Organizations and Individual Service Providers, was fully funded in March. Over the next three years, this project will provide training for agricultural service providers on topics such as racial justice, personal bias, land justice, and LGBTQ+ competency, in work towards supporting farmers in intersectional identities and experiences. Seven participating organizations, including Wolfe’s Neck Center, will engage in an internal facilitation process to help shift our organizational work and structure to a more equitable one. In March, WNC staff were able to participate in various DEI trainings. A past WNC farm educator,
Matea, lead a workshop focused on White Supremacy culture, Indigenous peoples in Maine, and gender equity (pictured below). At the end of the month, a handful of WNC staff members participated the first service provider training of MOFGA’s project with Cross Cultural Community Services on anti-bias and racial definition. We are exploring additional DEI staff training opportunities for the near future with organizations such as Wabanaki REACH. WNC’s DEI Committee continues to meet monthly to move this important work forward internally. We collectively finalized an Equity Statement and Land Acknowledge that now officially lives on our website, and a team is working to incorporate this language onto other relevant website pages, as well as on physical signage placed throughout the farm. We will focus upcoming sessions on incorporating DEI efforts into WNC programming and curriculum.
Spring Cleanup Days We would love to have you join us for one (or all!) of our Spring Cleanup Days at Wolfe’s Neck Center! It takes a lot of work to get this Wolfe’s Neck Center ready for the season, and it would never be possible without our incredible community of staff, friends, neighbors, and board of directors. Volunteers can join us for a half or full day of outside, socially distanced tasks, including raking, clipping and pruning trees and brush, moving downed branches and limbs, helping pull pesky weeds in gardens and pastures, and more. Please wear a mask! Half Day (9am-12pm or 1-4pm) • Full Day (9am-4pm) Friday, April 9 • Saturday, April 10 • Thursday, April 22 • Friday, April 23 • Friday, May 7 • Saturday, May 8
CLICK HERE TO SIGN UP FARM CAMP UPDATE
Michael Messina, Education Programs Assistant, and Molly Cyr, Farm Camps Manager Here are the current Farm Camp registration numbers: • Total individual campers not on the waitlist: 486 (2019 at this time = 404) • Total sessions enrolled: 776 (2019 at this time = 505 sessions) These numbers are up 20% and 54% from this point in 2019, respectively. (I’m using 2019 as our reference because we were in lockdown this time last year, making those numbers unreliable as benchmarks.) So far as I can tell, 776 is already the second most sessions we’ve ever had enrolled – the only summer that had more was 2018, which finished off at 797 sessions over the course of 10 weeks (we are only offering 9 this year). If we reach max capacity, which seems inevitable at this point, we will top out at 801 sessions. We’ll be offering an additional Peapod PM session each week and plan to fill those slots with the families currently on the waitlist. We will not be advertising this offering until we know how many of our waitlist families take us up on this offer. With this additional offer, we plan to bring in an extra $32,200.
April 2021 • Calendar of Events
Department Updates
FAMILY PROGRAMS
FARMER FOR THE MORNING Fridays at 9am & 10am: April 2, 9, 16, 30
$5 per child, one free adult per child. 45 minutes, recommended for ages 2+.
FARMYARD STORYTIME Tuesdays at 10am: April 6, 13, 27
Free! 30 minutes, recommended for ages 6 and under.
SALAMANDER MEANDER Monday at 10am: April 26
$5 per person. 60 minutes, all ages. Wear close-toed shoes!
Bring your young farmers to the barnyard for a morning of fun! We’ll start with a quick story before our little farmers help with farm chores and explore. We’ll also meet the animals and participate in activities with rotating themes.
Join us for a farm-themed story time! We’ll meet in our barn to read a few stories about our different farm animals. Sit back and bring a snack!
Meander through the woods with one of our educators in search of salamanders, snakes, and signs of other wildlife that inhabit the forests bordering our barnyard. Come prepared for a hike and exploration off of the beaten trail!
TOURS & WORKSHOPS SMALL GROUP GOAT HIKES 1pm: April 6-8, 13-15, 27-29
$40 per group of up to 5. Only two groups total to ensure social distancing. Wear close-toed shoes!
COWS FIGHTING CLIMATE CHANGE Saturday from 2-4pm: April 24
Suggested donation of $5. Recommended for adults & HS students. 1-2 miles of walking. Masks required.
FRUIT TREE PRUNING & GRAFTING Saturday from 10am-12pm: April 24
$30 per person includes your own Black Oxford apple to bring home & plant. Participation capped at 15.
WINGS OVER WOLFE’S NECK Wednesdays at 7:30am : April 7 & 28
$10 per person. 1-2 miles of walking. Please bring your own binoculars!
Join us for a special adventure with goats! One of our educators will lead your small group on a hike with our goats. We’ll head out onto the trails and pastures with a few of our dairy goats to explore and learn about the farm!
Join our research & education teams to learn about our involvement in the Bovine Burp Busters (B3) project. This collaborative research project is testing the benefits of feeding sustainable seaweed to our dairy herd to reduce methane output.
An overview of orchard care for your own backyard! We’ll begin with a lesson in fruit tree grafting & pruning: care, watering, basics of grafting, & long-term tree support. Then we’ll head outside for a lesson on pruning apple trees while demonstrating proper grafting.
Learn about the diversity of wild birds we have at Wolfe’s Neck Center and their roles within the ecosystem, practice your identification skills, visit our chickens, and enjoy an early morning walk on our beautiful property.
SPECIAL EVENT OUT LIKE A LAMB Wednesday from 10-11am: April 28
This members-only event is the highlight of our spring season. The event is an insiders’ look at our new friends live on Zoom! We read a sheep-themed story, meet our newest farm animals, and do a fun sheep craft that participants are able to make at home.
To become a member: www.wolfesneck.org/give/membership/
For more information & to register, please visit:
www.wolfesneck.org/calendar/
Department Updates Advancement
Visitor Services
This month, we are excited to launch the Host Committee for the Farm-to-Table series and are working to solidify key event dates with our restaurant partners. The Host Committee for these events is one of our most important fundraising efforts of the year and we are looking forward to some smaller-scale gatherings this year. In 2021, we will continue to include effort to support food insecurity work in our community, with a special focus on Freeport Community Services and Cooking for Community. We also are also planning for the the annual print newsletter, which will highlight many communities of which WNC is a part of and makes an impact. Lia led design process for the new batch of way finding and interpretive signs and it will be great to get them printed and up around the property sometime in April or early May. Marissa, along with others on the Ag Team did a great job with the BFRDP grant proposal for mid-level farmer training program. we should know about that grant in July. We have also been focusing on building up our 2021 list of business sponsors; be sure to thank Bow Street Market, Royal River Natural Foods, and Wicked Joe for their generous support! Our popular members-only Out Like a Lamb event is set for Wednesday, April 28 at 10am. This family favorite will be held over Zoom again this year and will feature a story, craft, and tour of the barn to meet our new lambs.
April priorities: • Clean out all campsites and common areas for a bumper crop of May campers. • Build out a 30’ x 40’ platform for our new equal-sized tent that will serve as our Farm/ Camp Store and Information Center. • Paint and prepare the Farm Café to open for the first time on May 1. We are changing how guests line up at the service window and and safely expanding opportunities to eat on-site. • Welcome returning and new staff, and train new staff for a busy May. Last month, we: • Completed the hiring process for 2021 staff. • Finished the Farm/Camp Store and Information Center layout and list of products we will carry. With great enthusiasm, Rebecca and Kristen have returned to Freeport for the summer season. They are jumping in with both feet to lead staff to get the Farm Café and Campground ready for guests on May 1. We will begin opening Campground roads by April 15.
Community & Visitor Programs Programs are back! We will be running a small slate of weekday programs in April. These will be taught mostly by Andrew and occasionally by Michael. We’ll also be getting our May calendar together and open it up to booking – lots of campers already asking! Please help guests if they look confused – all programs meet in front of the Haze Hut.
We got new goats! Tobias (Toby) and Buster (BB). They’ll be drinking milk for April and then weened off in May. Once weened, they can join the rest of the herd. We have finished our hiring and will have our two educators starting in May!
Department Updates Farm Camp & Discovery Programs Education is continuing to get ready for Farm Camp School Programs and a full season of Community & Visitor Programs. We are continuing to run FDS. We kicked off the program last week and plan to run it through June 4. We will be taking a break from FDS during the week of April 19, and plan to offer a three-day April Vacation Camp on Tuesday, Wednesday, and Thursday of that week; registration opened yesterday, April 1. We are also in the beginning stages of interviewing Farm Camp staff and Junior Counselors. We hope to bring on 14-16 new staff for the summer season! In March, we onboarded a stellar FDS team. If you’re around the farm, say ‘hello!’ to our FDS students and educators. They are having a blast being on the farm this spring season!
Agriculture is getting ready for pasture season! Lambs coming in a couple weeks!
Department Updates Dairy & Livestock
Research
We are preparing for the start of the spring grazing season by monitoring forage growth and soil conditions. We picked up our first batch of beef and pork from Herring Bros. Meats and the hot dogs are awesome! The dairy team received a Pasture Map orientation from Leah. Pasture Map is an online and appbased platform that is now part of OpenTEAM, and we are excited to use this technology to streamline our grazing planning and forage monitoring. Lambing is scheduled to begin on April in the Livestock Education Barn.
Highlights from the month of March: 1. B3 trials were ongoing this month! 2. The Ag Data Wallet concept is coming to life through the simultaneous work around a collaborative social platform, ag data use agreements, field boundary clearinghouse and other items. This month, we are planning our upcoming In-Focus Meeting Series that support convergence of working group activities into more focused conversations (e.g. biodiversity monitoring, remote sensing science, remote sensing implementation for hubs, soil probe usage, USDA technical work, etc). We are launching the Soil Health Network Cohort this month! We are also interviewing for the research internship position and the communications/membership manager position at OpenTEAM. In April, there will be ongoing OpenTEAM working group meetings and co-work sessions.
In Case You Missed It...
Yesterday, we introduced a new monthly series in our marketing emails entitled, A Deeper Dig. The series aims to provide a closer look at terms such as: regenerative agriculture, soil health, OpenTEAM, etc. in reader-friendly language. The topics will all eventually live on our website and be repurposed for social media content. Check out our first highlight below!
You have likely heard the term regenerative agriculture and while it may seem new like a new buzzword, regenerative farming practices have been around for thousands of years. In many ways, it is a return to the way farming used to be, and is focused on restoring soils that have been degraded by the industrial agricultural system. Its methods promote healthier ecosystems by rebuilding soil organic matter.
In short, regenerative agriculture lets nature do the work. Some principles of regenerative agriculture include: • Managed Grazing: As animals move, they break up the soil, allowing nutrients and sunlight to reach new plants — essentially speeding up the building of soil organic matter. Their manure adds nutrients to the ground, further improving water retention. • Cover Crops: Keeping the soil covered at all times protects it from wind and water erosion, lowers its temperature, and feeds the microorganisms within it. • No-Till: One teaspoon of healthy soil has more living organisms than there are people on Earth – vitally important for building structure and overall soil health. Limiting the disturbance of the soil maintains the soil structure and prevents erosion. • Crop Diversity: Diverse ecosystems, whether it’s through plant or animal species, mean healthier and more resilient soil. Why is regenerative agriculture so important now? Finding solutions to the growing climate crisis relies on both limiting greenhouse gas emissions AND capturing carbon in the soil. The world’s soils store several times the amount carbon as does the atmosphere, acting as a natural “carbon sink.” Healthy soil captures more carbon. By building soil health through regenerative practices, we can farm in a way that solves the problems we face now and makes our farmland more resilient for the future of food and our planet.
Farming can and must play a role in the fight against climate change. At Wolfe’s Neck Center, we promote regenerative agriculture in three main ways: 1. Research programs right here on the farm in collaboration with local, regional, and global partners including Bigelow Labs 2. Farmer training programs for both dairy and fruit/vegetable apprentices where trainees learn regenerative practices 3. Demonstration of year-round farming practices Climate change threatens the health of our planet and jeopardizes our ability to grow food. At Wolfe’s Neck Center, we are committed to creating solutions to these problems to build a healthier planet for our future generations. A Deeper Dig aims to highlight terminology, practices, and ideas, both in our backyard and globally, through monthly topics.
KUDOS Kudos to Leah for bringing the Soil Health Network Cohort to life, in coordination with Maine Farmland Trust! Kudos to the Dairy Team for all of their help with B3 work! Special shoutout to Steph for her blood-sampling wisdom! –Laura Congratulations to Corinne on her graduation from DGA. Corinne is spending the last weeks of her apprenticeship by assisting another farm in Vermont who had a team member out due to surgery. We already miss Corinne’s presence here, but are excited for her as she gains new experience and moves to the next chapter. –Ben Kudos to Jeannie for getting me a great group of volunteer goat feeders! –Andrew Huge shoutout to Kaiti, Michael, and Andrew for supporting FDS with staff training and jumping into program to cover staff absences. Huge kudos to ALL FDS staff! They are doing a fantastic job bringing farm-based outdoor education to the RSU5 community and we are so thrilled to have such a talented group of folks leading the way! –Molly Kudos to Marissa for the her incredible work on the BFRDP and SARE grants! And also to Lia for pulling together a beautiful, informative and cohesive set of signs that will help our visitors learn about our work and know how find things! –Jeannie I would like to give a big shout out to our Education staff – Molly, Andrew, Michael, and Kaiti – for amazing team work and multi-tasking ability. The Ed department is humming! And to Tom for stepping into his new role BIG time and showing leadership on all fronts, but especially with meat sales, freezer inventory, and connecting with our ag community in support of the BFRDP grant. –Joe Three cheers to Tom who lead the team to develop a new WNC hot dog that will be featured in the Farm Café, Farm Store, and CSA offerings. It’s very tasty. We may need to reconsider Tomato Tom’s nickname! –Jim