Sitka Local Foods Network President Kerry MacLane, left, and Sprucecot Garden Owner Judy Johnstone pose in front of one of the high tunnels recently erected on Judy’s land on Peterson Street. (Photo Courtesy of KCAW-Raven Radio)
Longtime Sitka gardener Judy Johnstone will be able to extend the growing season at her Sprucecot Garden on Peterson Street after a crew erected two new high tunnels on her land.
The high tunnels, which basically are temporary greenhouses with a large frame holding a transparent plastic cover and without a built-in power supply, already have raised the temperatures inside by about 15-20 degrees over the low-50s we’ve had in Sitka so far this summer. They will enable Judy to start her plants earlier in the spring and keep producing food later into the fall.
The high tunnels were funded through a cost-sharing program run by the USDA National Resources Conservation Service, which is accepting applications for new high tunnel projects through June 15.
These are the first high tunnels to go up in Sitka, but there have been several built in other parts of the state (the lower Kenai Peninsula near Homer has about 90 of them). Since these are the first high tunnels in Sitka, they’ve received lots of coverage in the local media. The Daily Sitka Sentinel featured an article on Page 1 of its Friday, June 8, 2012, edition (password required), and KCAW-Raven Radio featured Judy and Sitka Local Foods Network President Kerry MacLane in its Monday, June 11, 2012, Morning Edition show interview and in a story on its Tuesday, June 12, 2012, newscasts.
(EDITOR’S NOTE: The following article first appeared on this site in April 2010. It is repeated because much of the information remains current and newsworthy.)
As you start to plan your garden for this spring and summer, don’t forget to Plant A Row For The Hungry. The Plant A Row For The Hungry program (also known as Plant A Row or PAR) is a national campaign by the Garden Writers Association of America that got its start in Alaska.
In the cold winter of 1994, Anchorage Daily News garden columnist and former Garden Writers Association of America President Jeff Lowenfels was returning to his hotel after a Washington, D.C., event when he was approached by a homeless person who asked for some money to buy food. Lowenfels said Washington, D.C., had signs saying, “Don’t give money to panhandlers,” so he shook his head and kept on walking. But the man’s reply, “I really am homeless and I really am hungry. You can come with me and watch me eat,” stayed with Lowenfels for the rest of his trip.
Jeff Lowenfels
The encounter continued to bother Lowenfels, even as he was flying back to Anchorage. During the flight, Lowenfels came up with an idea when he started writing his weekly garden column (the longest continuously running garden column in the country, with no missed weeks since it started on Nov. 13, 1976). He asked his readers to plant one extra row in their gardens to grow food to donate to Bean’s Café, an Anchorage soup kitchen. The idea took off.
When Anchorage hosted the Garden Writers Association of America convention in 1995, Lowenfels took the GWAA members to Bean’s Café to learn about the Plant A Row For Bean’s Café program. The Garden Writers Association of America liked the idea, and it became the national Plant A Row For The Hungry campaign (also known as Plant A Row or PAR). In 2002, the Garden Writers Association Foundation was created as a national 501(c)(3) nonprofit to manage the Plant A Row For The Hungry program.
“I am not surprised by the growth of PAR,” Lowenfels wrote in an e-mail to the Sitka Local Foods Network. “It is now in all 50 states and across Canada and there are thousands of variations of the original program — from prison gardens for the hungry to botanical gardens donating their produce from public display gardens. This is because gardeners always share information and extra food, so the idea was a natural.”
It took five years for the program to reach its first million pounds of donated food, but the second million only took two years and the next eight years saw a million pounds of donated food (or more) each year. Since 1995, more than 14 million pounds of food have been donated. Not only that, the program is getting ready to expand overseas to Australia, England and other countries with avid gardeners.
“We have supplied something in the vicinity of enough food for 50 million meals,” Lowenfels wrote in his e-mail. “Gardeners can solve this hunger problem without the government. And we don’t need a tea party to do it! Or chemicals, I might add, as author of a book on organic gardening (Teaming With Microbes, written with Wayne Lewis)!”
According to the U.S. Department of Agriculture, one out of every eight U.S. households experiences hunger or the risk of hunger. Many people skip meals or eat too little, sometimes going an entire day or more without food. About 33 million Americans, including 13 million children, have substandard diets or must resort to seeking emergency food because they can’t always afford to buy the food they need. In recent years the demand for hunger assistance has increased 70 percent, and research shows that hundreds of children and adults are turned away from food banks each year because of lack of resources.
While many people credit Lowenfels for creating the Plant A Row For The Hungry program, Lowenfels says the real heroes are the gardeners growing the extra food and donating it to local soup kitchens, senior programs, schools, homeless shelters and neighbors. You can hear him pass along the credit to all gardeners at the end of this interview last year with an Oklahoma television station (video also embedded below).
“One row. That’s all it takes. No rules other than the food goes to the hungry. You pick the drop-off spot or just give it to a needy friend or neighbor. Nothing slips between the lip and the cup, I say,” Lowenfels wrote in his e-mail.
The Sitka Local Foods Network also takes donations of local produce to sell at the Sitka Farmers Markets, and all proceeds from the Sitka Farmers Markets are used to help pay for Sitka Local Foods Network projects geared toward helping more people in Sitka grow and harvest local food. For more information, contact Sitka Local Foods Network President Kerry MacLane (maclanekerry@yahoo.com), Sitka Local Foods Network Vice President Linda Wilson (lawilson87@hotmail.com) or Sitka Farmers Market Coordinator Johanna Willingham-Guevin (johanna.willingham@gmail.com).
Mark your calendars, because the 2012 “Let’s Grow Sitka” gardening education event opens at noon and runs until 3 p.m. on Sunday, March 11, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall on Katlian Street. Don’t forget to set your clocks to spring forward so you can get ready to grow.
This annual event brings together local garden supply stores, local gardeners, landscapers and anybody who is interested in learning how to grow food and/or flowers. Sitka Local Foods Network Vice President Linda Wilson, who is coordinating the event with SLFN Board Member Cathy Lieser, was interviewed during the Morning Edition show Thursday on KCAW-Raven Radio and she provided more details about this event (click the link to listen to the interview), which helps Sitka residents get excited about the upcoming garden season.
There will be a wide variety of individuals and businesses with booths for the event, with some booths providing gardening information geared toward and others selling gardening supplies. Lunch will be available for purchase. Here is a tentative list of some of those planning to host booths:
Linda Wilson, Sitka Farmers Market, Grow a Row for the Market
Cathy Lieser, Let’s Grow Sitka, Sitka Local Foods Network
Doug Osborne. Sitka Local Foods Network?
Johanna Willingham, Pacific H.S./Sitka Farmers Market backup.
Jud Kirkness, Sicka Waste compost project, Fruit tree map
Tom Hart, compost, NZ composter ?
Kerry MacLane. Pest management
Lisa Sadleir-Hart. St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm
Laura Schmidt, St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm/Seed swap & share
Maybelle Filler, ???
Stanley Schoening, Chickens, fig trees, UAF Cooperative Extension Service
Judy Johnstone, High Tunnel program
David Lendrum, Guest speaker 3:15, info on new/unusual varieties for Southeast Alaska
Jeren Schmidt, Sitka Spruce Catering, lunch for purchase
Robert Gorman, UAF Cooperative Extension Service, history of Experimental Station
Andrianna Natsoulas, Food Sovereignty
Tracy Gagnon, Sitka 4H Club
Eve Grutter, Chickens, produce
Adam Chinalski, Model greenhouse
Penny Brown, Garden Ventures – products for sale
Amanda Grearson, True Value – products for sale
Lowell Frank, Spenard Building Supply Garden Center ??
Rick Peterson, Gardening 101 – easiest to grow, need to amend soil, etc…
Lori Adams, Down-to-Earth U-Pick Garden – garden promotion and information
Mike Tackaberry/Robin Grewe, White’s Inc. – products for sale
Mandy Summers, Pacific High School
Kelly Smitherman, National Park Service – garden at Bishops House, etc…
Lisa Teas, Sitka Farmers Market art debut
Florence Welsh, Forget-Me-Not Gardens, local garden booklet, possible plant starts
Hope Merritt, Gimbal Botanicals herbal teas – info on wild herbs and herbs to grow
Right after the three-hour Let’s Grow Sitka event ends, guest speaker Dave Lendrum of Juneau will speak at 3:15 p.m. on “New Vegetable Varieties, Small Fruits, and Ornamentals for Southeast Alaska.” Lendrum is a landscape designer who just finished a two-year term as president of the Southeast Alaska Master Gardener Association and with his landscape architect wife, Margaret Tharp, owns Landscape Alaska.
Dave’s life has evolved in partnership with the natural world. He grew up in California on an organic u-pick vegetable farm, learning horticulture from his parents and the 4H club. He did nursery work and continued his post-college adventure in Ecuador by starting a fresh market produce business. After being a city horticulturist at the Eugene (Ore.) Parks Department, Dave started his first nursery, Western Oregon Perennials. A few years later, he found himself in a high-temperature photosynthesis lab at Stanford. In the Pacific Northwest, Dave restored old estate gardens. When he heard Alaska’s call, he moved north to Elfin Cove. Dave and his wife started Landscape Alaska in Juneau 28 years ago. They design and build landscapes on every scale and have won numerous awards both locally and nationally. In addition, Dave is the landscape superintendent for the University of Alaska Southeast and the Southeast representative on the statewide invasive species organization (SNIPM).
For more information about Let’s Grow Sitka, contact Linda Wilson at 747-3096 (evenings, weekends) or lawilson87@hotmail.com, or Cathy Lieser at 978-2572. The two event fliers for this event are posted below as Adobe Acrobat files (PDF files).
"Hook, Line and Dinner" TV show host Ben Sargent, of the Cooking Channel, showed up in costume to participate in the Sitka Local Foods Network's Running of the Boots fundraiser on Sept. 24, 2011.
Sitka residents who missed the “Hook, Line and Dinner” show’s episode about Sitka are invited to watch the Cooking Channel show in a free public screening at 5:30 p.m. on Tuesday, March 6, at Kettleson Memorial Library.
The show, which originally aired nationally Feb. 23 and 26 on the Cooking Channel, recounted a September trip to Sitka by host Ben Sargent. Unfortunately, the Cooking Channel is not available on any of the GCI Cable TV packages, so many Sitka residents missed seeing the episode.
The show features a fishing trip with Alaska Longline Fishermen’s Association Executive Director Linda Behnken and her family, cooking with Chef Colette Nelson of Ludvig’s Bistro, a visit to the Alaska Raptor Center, and then Ben participates in the Running of the Boots fundraiser for the Sitka Local Foods Network and eats some black cod tips cooked by Sitka Local Foods Network President Kerry MacLane.
The 2011-12 Sitka Local Foods Network Board of Directors at its winter board retreat on Dec. 3, 2011. From left are Lisa Sadleir-Hart, Doug Osborne, Maybelle Filler, Cathy Lieser, Robin Grewe, Linda Wilson and Kerry MacLane. Not pictured are Johanna Willingham-Guevin and Tom Crane.
The Sitka Local Foods Network board of directors will hold its monthly meeting from 6:30-8 p.m. on Monday, Feb. 6, at the Sitka Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Building, 408 Marine St. (parking lot is off Spruce Street).
Key topics for the meeting include planning for the Let’s Grow Sitka on March 11, a recap of the Jan. 21 Sitka Local Foods Network annual meeting and potluck, an update on the Sitka Community Greenhouse and Education Center, an update on the Sitka Food Co-op, an update on recent work by the Alaska Food Policy Council, an update on the Sitka Composting Project (Sick-a-Waste), our new logo and t-shirts, planning for spring planting at St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm and other community gardens, planning for upcoming events such as the Sitka Farmers Markets on alternating Saturdays from July 7-Sept. 15, and more.
Board meetings are free and open to the general public, usually once a month (except summer). We always welcome new volunteers interested in helping out with our various projects. For more information, contact Kerry MacLane at 752-0654 or 747-7888.
Please join the Sitka Local Foods Network for its annual meeting and potluck dinner at 6 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 21, at the Sitka Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall (408 Marine St., parking lot is off Spruce Street).
Join us as we honor our four years of existence and prepare for our fifth year. During this time, the Sitka Local Foods Network has worked on several initiatives — creating the Sitka Farmers Market, building St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm, hosting the Let’s Grow Sitka! garden education event, and more. We supported projects to plant more fruit trees around Sitka, get more local fish served in school lunches and increase Sitka’s ability to compost, and we are working toward starting the Sitka Community Greenhouse and Education Center. We also received a 501(c)(3) non-profit status from the IRS, so people can make tax-deductible gifts to help fund our work.
Our annual meeting and potluck is open to the public, and all Sitka residents are welcome to attend. We will feature local and slow foods, but we really value your attendance. This is our opportunity to say thank you to those who have helped us grow, and it is your chance to learn more about what we’re doing and how you can help.
As we enter 2012, Sitka and the rest of Alaska face some serious food security issues. According to a recent survey by the University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service, the weekly cost for food for a family of four in Sitka has gone up 44 percent over the past five years. With rising fuel prices, this trend does not figure to change in the near future. Sitka still imports about 90-95 percent of its food from the Lower 48 or other countries, which means transportation is a big part of our food cost. The Sitka Local Foods Network is looking for input from Sitka residents about how we can work to improve Sitka’s food security. We also are working with the Alaska Food Policy Council, which is a statewide organization working on food security issues.
So mark your calendar to attend our annual meeting and potluck dinner at 6 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 21, at the Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall, 408 Marine St. For more information, contact Kerry MacLane at 752-0654.
The 2011-12 Sitka Local Foods Network Board of Directors at its winter board retreat on Dec. 3, 2011. From left are Lisa Sadleir-Hart, Doug Osborne, Maybelle Filler, Cathy Lieser, Robin Grewe, Linda Wilson and Kerry MacLane. Not pictured is Tom Crane.
The Sitka Local Foods Network board of directors will hold its monthly meeting from 6:30-8 p.m. on Monday, Jan. 9, at the Sitka Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Building, 408 Marine St. (parking lot is off Spruce Street).
Key topics for the meeting include planning for the Jan. 21 Sitka Local Foods Network annual meeting, a recap of the recent SLFN board retreat, an update on the Sitka Community Greenhouse and Education Center, an update on the Sitka Food Co-op, an update on recent work by the Alaska Food Policy Council, an update on the Sitka Composting Project, our new logo and t-shirts, planning for upcoming educational events such as Let’s Grow Sitka on March 11 and the Sitka Farmers Markets on alternating Saturdays from July 7-Sept. 15, and more.
Board meetings are free and open to the general public, usually once a month (except summer). We always welcome new volunteers interested in helping out with our various projects. For more information, contact Kerry MacLane at 752-0654 or 747-3475.
Each year, the Sitka Local Foods Network hosts a variety of events to promote the use of local foods in Sitka. Here are the dates and (if known) times for some of the events we will host in 2012.
The Sitka Local Foods Network annual meeting and potluck takes place at 6 p.m. on Saturday, Jan. 21, at the Sitka Unitarian Universalist Fellowship Hall located at 408 Marine St. (the parking lot is off Spruce Street). For more details about this event, contact Kerry MacLane at 752-0654.
The Let’s Grow Sitka! gardening and local food production education event is from noon to 3 p.m. on Sunday, March 11, at the Alaska Native Brotherhood Hall (ANB Hall), 235 Katlian St. If you would like to be a vendor, do a demonstration or display, host an informational table, or participate in some other way, please contact Linda Wilson by phone 747-3096 (evenings/weekends) or via e-mail at lawilson87@hotmail.com.
The Sitka Farmers Markets this year will be from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. every other Saturday, from July 7 through Sept. 15, at ANB Hall, 235 Katlian St. The exact dates are July 7, July 21, Aug. 4, Aug. 18, Sept. 1 and Sept. 15.
While it’s not an official Sitka Local Foods Network event, we do support the Sitka Seafood Festival because it promotes the use of local seafood. This year’s Sitka Seafood Festival takes place on Friday and Saturday, Aug. 10-11, at Harrigan Centennial Hall and the Crescent Harbor shelter. For more information about this event, contact Alicia Olson at (928) 607-4845 or sitkaseafoodfestival@gmail.com.
(NOTE: The following letter to the editor appeared in the Friday, Dec. 9, 2011, edition of the Daily Sitka Sentinel.)
Dear Editor,
Many in Sitka are feeling squeezed not only by rising fuel costs, but also by escalating food costs. The September 2011 Alaska Food Cost Survey, conducted by University of Alaska Fairbanks Cooperative Extension Service, calculated Sitka’s weekly food cost for a family of four as $198.41. This is a 44-percent increase since 2006, when the same market basket cost was $138.14. Sitka’s food costs are 57 percent higher than in Portland, Ore., 37 percent more than in Anchorage and 30 percent more than in Juneau.
Feeding America 2011 statistics report that 11.7 percent of Sitka’s borough is “food insecure.” This translates to 1,030 Sitkans and other Baranof Islanders who sometimes are completely without a source of food on a regular basis.
Kids Count Alaska 2009-2010 reports that 46 percent of Sitka’s school age children and youth live in families receiving some form of public assistance i.e., Denali KidCare, food stamps, or Alaska Temporary Assistance. This is a 10-percent increase since 2007.
Alaska behavioral risk factor data from 2009 show that only 23 percent of Alaskans consume the recommended five fruits and vegetables each day and only 17 percent of adolescents eat five daily servings of fruits and vegetables. One of the primary reasons for this low intake is inadequate access to affordable, quality produce.
These combined statistics paint a picture of increasing vulnerability when it comes to securing nutritious food on a regular basis. In the nutrition and public health world, this tenuous access to healthy food is known as food insecurity. So, how can Sitka, collectively and creatively, respond to food insecurity? Sitka can respond by INCREASING ACCESS TO AFFORDABLE LOCAL FOOD.
The Sitka Local Foods Network is working towards improving access to nutritious, local foods through five interconnected strategies. Together, these five strategies can move Sitka toward a more food-secure future. They are:
Promoting traditional and customary food gathering and preservation.
Developing the Let’s Grow Sitka gardening campaign to assist Sitkans in learning to grow some of their own food.
Growing the number of community gardens to augment the garden behind Blatchley Middle School. The 4-year-old St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm is a recent example.
Coordinating regular Sitka Farmers Markets during the summer growing and gathering seasons.
Creating a community greenhouse and promoting commercial greenhouses to increase year-round access to local fruits and vegetables.
If you are interested in supporting this effort, please commit to one of the following actions:
Attend the Let’s Grow Sitka extravaganza as part of Artigras from noon-3pm on March 11, 2012, at the ANB Hall to learn how to grow your own food
Volunteer to work at St. Peter’s Fellowship Farm this spring or the Sitka Farmers Market this summer
Support the Sitka Farmers Market which begins July 7, 2012, and runs every other Saturday morning through Sept. 15, 2012.
Mail a tax-deductible, year-end contribution to the Sitka Local Food Network at 408-D Marine Street, Sitka, AK 99835.
Together, we can make food security a reality in Sitka.
Sincerely,
Sitka Local Foods Network Board and Friends
(Lisa Sadleir-Hart, Charles Bingham, Kerry MacLane, Doug Osborne, Ellen Frankenstein, Maybelle Filler, Robin Grewe)
It’s time to dig your XtraTufs out of the closet and gussy them up. The 17th annual Running of the Boots takes place at 11 a.m. on Saturday, Sept. 24, at the Crescent Harbor shelter. And this year people who “Bike to the Boots” can receive a free bike safety check before the race.
So what is the Running of the Boots? It’s Southeast Alaska’s answer to Spain’s “Running of the Bulls.” Sitkans wear zany costumes and XtraTufs — Southeast Alaska’s distinctive rubber boots (aka, Sitka Sneakers). The Running of the Boots raises funds for the Sitka Local Foods Network, a non-profit group that hosts the Sitka Farmers Market and advocates for community gardens, a community greenhouse, sustainable uses of traditional subsistence foods and education for Sitka gardeners.
Participants line up behind the Running of the Boots banner before the start of the race
The Running of the Boots is a short race for fun and not for speed, even though one of the many prize categories is for the fastest boots. Other prize categories include best-dressed boots, zaniest costume, best couple, best kids group and more. The course involves a run from Crescent Harbor to the corner of Katlian and Lincoln streets and back, with a short course for kids looping around St. Michael’s Cathedral. The entry fee for the Running of the Boots is $5 per person and $20 per family, and people can register for the race starting at 10 a.m. Costume judging starts about 10:30 a.m. There is a lip synch contest after the race, which costs $10 to enter. Local merchants have donated bushels of prizes for the costume and lip synch contests, including a new pair of XtraTufs. The Sitka Local Foods Network will host a Sitka Farmers Market booth with fresh veggies for sale. Grilled black cod and crépes also will be available.
The “Bike to the Boots” event was added this year as part of the national 350.org “Moving Planet: A Day to Move Beyond Fossil Fuels” event on Sept. 24 promoting community sustainability. A bike station will be set up at 10 a.m. at Crescent Harbor Shelter, and people can pump air into their tires, oil their chains, get a safety check, receive info about bicycle safety rules and more. There also will be booths about Sitka environmental issues, the importance of local food and how to reduce our use of fossil fuels.
Runners hit the trail during the 14th Annual Running of the Boots race on Sept. 27, 2008, in Sitka.
“This is a really fun way to advance the Sitka Farmers Market and our other Sitka Local Foods Network projects,” Sitka Local Foods Network Board President Kerry MacLane said. “The ‘Bike to the Boots’ event will add a fun new twist to the Running of the Boots, while helping remind people about how much fossil fuel is used to bring food to Sitka from thousands of miles away.”
To learn more about the Running of the Boots, contact Kerry MacLane at 752-0654 or by e-mail at maclanekerry@yahoo.com. Historical information about the race (through 2005) can be found online at http://www.runningoftheboots.org/, and info about the Sitka Local Foods Network and more recent Running of the Boots events (2008-10) is online at http://www.sitkalocalfoodsnetwork.org/.
Sitka Local Foods Network 
You must be logged in to post a comment.