Edible Austin Selects Urban Roots as a “Local Hero”

Thank you to Edible Austin and their readers for selecting Urban Roots as a 2022 Local Heroes award recipient, and for featuring us with glowing words in the March and April edition of their magazine. The article discusses our growth from Urban Roots being “just 15 teenagers in a field” and how far Urban Roots has come since then. If you’d like to read the article, go to page 31 here.

Photo Credit: Edible Austin

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We’d like to thank one of our amazing partners, Ghisallo Cycling Initiative, for lending us shipping containers for the South Austin farm! These allow us to store farm essentials like our tools and equipment, instead of transporting them back and forth between farms on a daily basis. This will allow us to better operate both farms simultaneously and more flexibly. As our Farm Operations Manager Jacob Grob put it, “More storage, more tools and more people equals more food to share with our community.”

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Urban Roots welcomes all types of new growth and a clean start to our season! We’ve been forging ahead in preparation to continue growing and maintaining our 75% donation rate we achieved last year! While we wait for spring to come, we’re working and planning to make this year even more successful than the last. Keep reading to learn more.

New & Notable at the Farm

Urban Roots wrapped up the majority of our winter harvest earlier this January, and despite the rain and cold slowing our progress, our team has been hard at work spring cleaning and spring seeding. We seeded broccoli, cabbage, eggplant, kale, lettuce, peppers, tomatoes and rainbow chard at the East Austin farm for this season, which we’re excited to be able to share by mid-March!

At the South Austin farm, we are in the process of planting potatoes, carrots, onions, and replacing fruit trees for the orchard. We’re preparing to welcome two shipping containers to the South Austin location to help with storage constraints, and to support the South Austin farm’s steady expansion.

Committed to Nourishing Our Community

To prepare for the cold temperatures and freezing weather this past month, we focused our efforts on harvesting our remaining carrots and cabbage from the South Austin farm for storing and distribution. We were able to send out almost 1,000 lbs of food in January in preparation for the upcoming weather limitations. We’re currently working with our wonderful food access partners to review the past season and map our growth for the future. We can’t wait to continue our hunger relief efforts in March, and look forward to sharing this coming season’s growth and bounty with our community!

Come Join Our Community Crew!

Urban Roots invites you to join our wonderful group of dedicated volunteers who help make our mission possible – the Community Crew! The Community Crew work on the farm from 8 a.m. – 12 p.m. Tuesday through Friday. We are also seeking volunteer drivers, who work Wednesday through Friday to help us get our produce to our food access partners. Click here to sign up and learn more! (p.s. Crew members earn free veggies!)

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Join the Urban Roots Community Crew Today!

Calling all volunteers! Help support Urban Roots’ mission to empower youth and nourish our community by joining us on the farm! We’re seeking new Community Crew members, a dedicated group of volunteers who support farm operations. We’re looking for YOU if you’re interested in sustainable agriculture, enjoy the outdoors, and want to support our mission to INSPIRE, ENGAGE, and NOURISH our community. Bonus: crew members earn free veggies! Take a look at what’s it’s like to be on the farm and a Community Crew member in the video above. 

The Community Crew work days are Tuesday – Friday from 8 a.m. – 12 p.m. Plus, we’re also looking for committed volunteer drivers to help us deliver every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday to Austin-area food access partners. Crew members will do tasks independently and practice social distancing and following COVID safety precautions. Our farm team will work with the community crew to help distribute to food pantries around Austin. Click here to sign up and/or learn more! For questions or comments, please don’t hesitate to contact the Urban Roots team.  

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Video Credit: Alexander McGinnis

Urban Roots Executive Director Frances Deviney recently joined Taylor Ellison of We Are Austin to share about our mission and organization. A huge thanks to Taylor and the show for featuring Urban Roots and ways to get involved! Watch the full interview here!

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New & Notable at the Farm

We kicked off the year by wrapping up our end of season harvest and making preparations for the spring and summer seasons ahead. We secured our seeds for the next season, and we are now in the process of resetting beds, seeding, and more. We will spend the next several weeks seeding flats of broccoli, cabbage, kale, peppers, onions, and tomatoes, which we will transplant later in the season. We anticipate having produce available again in mid-March and look forward to keeping you updated on our progress along the way!

Nourishing our Community

We wrapped up last season’s hunger relief efforts earlier this month by harvesting all of our remaining root crops and greens from both farms and sharing them with our food access partners, including Street Youth Ministry of Austin, Farmshare, Keep Austin Fed, Manos de Cristo, North Austin Muslim Community Center, and Vivent Health. In all, we were able to distribute over 11,000 lbs of food to our local communities via our food access partnerships this past season! We will resume our hunger relief efforts in March, and look forward to sharing next season’s bounty with our community!

Join the Community Crew Today

Looking for a way to get involved at the farm? You’re invited to join the Community Crew, a group of dedicated volunteers who support farm operations. Community Crew work days are Tuesday – Friday from 8 a.m. – 12 p.m. Plus, we’re also looking for committed volunteer drivers to help us deliver every Wednesday, Thursday, and Friday to Austin-area food access partners. Click here to sign up and/or learn more! Bonus: Crew members earn free veggies!

Stay up to date with Urban Roots by subscribing to our newsletter. Follow us on social media @UrbanRootsATX on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.  

Featured Image Photo Credit: Lloyd Deviney

New & Notable at the Farm

Urban Roots is rounding out our bulk harvest season with our first round of beets, broccoli, and carrots currently being harvested! Every tomato has been harvested before officially pulling the cages and plants for the season. Over the next few weeks, we’ll be focused on prepping for the spring season.

At our South Austin Farm, onions and leeks are going into the ground, plus the seeding for the greenhouse will begin soon! The seeds will be nurtured over the holidays with the hopes of transplanting in early 2022.

Dedicated to Nourishing our Community

We are so thankful that we’ve been able to donate approximately 10,000 lbs of produce to local food access partners since August 1, 2021! We finished the year strong with our Go Austin! Vamos Austin¡ partnership and other food access efforts. Thanks to a heavy year-end harvest, we’re able to provide beautiful, fresh veggies to our food access partners, including, Street Youth Ministry of Austin, Farmshare, Keep Austin Fed, Manos de Cristo, North Austin Muslim Community Center, and Vivent Health.

Join the Community Crew Today

Looking for a way to give back to your community and spend time outdoors? Sign up for our Community Crew, a group of dedicated volunteers who support farm operations! Plus, members earn free veggies! Email volunteer@urbanrootsatx.org to sign up and/or learn more!

Stay up to date with Urban Roots by subscribing to our newsletter. Follow us on social media @UrbanRootsATX on Instagram, Facebook, Twitter, and LinkedIn.  

Featured Image Photo Credit: Alison Klein

Click here to sign up for a Community Crew orientation session

 

Urban Roots is seeing a rising need for fresh vegetables in food pantries around Austin. As part of our commitment to the community we’re working hard to provide pantries with organic and locally grown vegetables this fall.

However, with the surge in covid cases, it is unlikely that we will be able to go back to having the large groups of volunteers we had before the pandemic. Instead, we’ll continue to rely on the help of a few committed individuals in order to reduce the risk of exposure at the farm.

We’re looking for YOU if you’re interested in sustainable agriculture, enjoy the outdoors, and want to support our mission to INSPIRE, ENGAGE, and NOURISH our community. All Community Crew members will earn a share of 5 to 10 pounds of fresh vegetables, distributed when they become available.

Urban Roots is following all of Austin Public Health’s recommendations to stay safe during the COVID-19 pandemic and will require all visitors to do the same. You must be fully vaccinated to visit the farm and able to wear a face covering while at the farm. You must be able to lift 50 lbs and sustain physical work outdoors in all weather. You must be over the age of 18.

We need helpers who are available to volunteer a minimum of 4 days in one month. Work blocks are from 8 a.m. to 12 p.m. on weekdays. Crew members will do tasks independently and practice social distancing while on our farms in East and South Austin.

Our farm team will work with the community crew to help distribute to food pantries around Austin.  To learn more about the community crew, please sign up here to attend an orientation. Orientation sessions will be held weekly through December 21, 2021, and will pick up again in the new year.

For questions or comments, please don’t hesitate to contact anyone on the Urban Roots team.

 

Urban Roots is seeking new members for our Community Crew! While our farm is still closed to public volunteer groups due to the pandemic, Urban Roots formed a small, yet, mighty Community Crew to help us continue our farm operations. If you are interested in sustainable agriculture, enjoy the outdoors, and want to support our mission to INSPIRE, ENGAGE, and NOURISH our community, please apply here! Crew members are volunteers who will do tasks independently and practice social distancing.

For questions or comments, please don’t hesitate to contact anyone on the Urban Roots team. Follow us on social media @UrbanRootsATX on Instagram and Facebook.

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