Growing Growers apprentices have gone on to contribute to local food in many ways.

Here are a few and what they are up to now.

Stephanie Thomas '05

Apprenticed at Kansas City Community Farm ... and is now a host farmer!

     Stephanie started Spring Creek Farm in Baldwin, Kansas in 2005 and is heading into her fourth full year of production. Spring Creek produces 90+ varieties of naturally grown vegetables, specializing in heirloom tomatoes, melons and sweet potatoes. The farm also has around 50 laying hens. Stephanie sells her produce at the Lawrence Farmers Market and to area restaurants and grocery stores. She also has a twenty-five member CSA.

Anna Weaverdyck '08

Apprenticed at Spring Creek Farm with host farmer Stephanie Thomas (above) .

     Anna is headed to Alaska to visit friends and investigate reports of giant vegetables. She has been reading Ruth Stout, and watching the documentary One Man, One Cow, One Planet which is about Peter Proctor implementing biodynamics in India. 

Steven Maitland '08

Apprenticed at Bear Creek Farm

      Steven is off to a quick start - he has relocated to family land in Colorado and will be growing vegetables commercially in 2009.  Congrats, Steve - but we wish you were here in KC!

Jessi Asmussen '06

Apprenticed at Sandheron Farm

      Now growing with partner, Kevin Prather, as Mellow Fields Urban Farm in Lawrence, KS.

      We grow on a few different areas, including my yard, a neighbors yard and a small amount of land I am renting south of Lawrence.  I am focusing on improving the soil  structure of my yard plots and experimenting with no-till techniques.  In 2008 I started selling to a restaurant and also through a small 5 member CSA. This year I am partnering with a couple other urban and  
rural growers to increase the CSA subscriptions to 15, and will  continue selling to local restaurants.  Besides growing food for myself and selling it to others, I have been working with a new volunteer group: Support for Local Urban Gardeners (SLUG), which was started in the Fall of 2008 as an outreach of the Lawrence Sustainability Network. We have been organizing this winter and are starting to assist new gardeners in our area by offering advice, support and minimal labor. Our goal is to encourage and help urbanites to begin learning how to grow their own food.

Jeff Hunter '08

Apprenticed at Fair Share Farm

     Jeff and his wife, Stacy, are growing vegetables at Fairview Gardens in Gladstone, MO. 

     Sales of their vegetables benefit youth programs at their church.  Fairview Gardens will be on the 2009 Kansas City Urban Farms and Gardens Tour.

Julie Koppen '05

Apprenticed at Prairie Birthday Farm

     Julie apprenticed on Prairie Birthday Farm in Kearney, MO. Instead of growing food for market, she decided to support local farmers by telling their stories and the many benefits of eating local and organic. She is the founder and publisher of Greenability, a magazine that covers all
facets of green living in the Kansas City area. She grows veggies, herbs and fruit in her urban yard for her family.  

Joseph Puglisi '06

Apprenticed at Kansas City Community Farm

     After completing his apprenticeship and moonlighting at the KSU Extension, Joey spent a short, 2-year stint in Thailand.  As soon as he returned to the US, he again started looking for ways to get involved with local growing. He is currently the Assistant Manager at Dea-Dia Organics at the Prairie Crossing Incubator Farm in Illinois.  Early in 2009 he volunteered at the Renaissance Collaborative, a non-profit training homeless individuals to garden and landscape on the south side of Chicago.  His hope is to take all he is learning back to KC one day to start his own urban, market garden.

Laura Christensen '05 and '06

Apprenticed at Kansas City Community Farm

     Laura began Blue Door Farm in Kansas City, Kansas in 2007.  Blue Door produces organic vegetables, selling at at the Farmers Community Market at Brookside and through a small CSA.  Her most valuable lesson learned from her apprenticeship is the difference in scale and workflow between gardening and farming for market.  Her favorite skill learned?  Napping in wheelbarrows.  Least valuable skill learned? The fine art of rotten tomato flinging. Having survived fellow apprentices Stephanie Thomas and Joey Puglisi (who threw a mean rotten tomato himself), Laura decided she could probably handle just about any apprentice, and is now the Program Manager for Growing Growers.

Are you a current or former apprentice? Willing to share a story or photo?  Email Laura at growers@ksu.edu.