Latest Announcements
  • Call and book your spot at our local dinner coming up June 8th at 6:30 pm
  • The 2013 spring/summer CSA is currently full.  We have 620 members.  If you have interest in being on the waiting list should someone drop out, please click on the CSA tab and “apply for membership” this will automatically put you on the CSA waiting list.
  • Come check out our daily deli.  Try our panini’s, salads, soups and more.  The deli is open Tues-Sat, 11a-1p.
  • Visit us at the Santa Lucia festival downtown.  We will be here Sunday June 9th from 2-9pm.
  • Family yoga and smoothie class on June 13th from 6:30-8:00.  Call and reserve your place now!
This Week
  • Homemade ice cream is the latest addition to the many wonderful products available in our market.  It comes in both pints and individual servings and in many different flavors.
  • Plum Creek chicken is back!  Butchered on Mondays and Tuesdays and delivered unfrozen on Wednesdays.  You won’t taste any chicken more fresh and delicious!
  • Cookies from Nishna Valley Bakery make any celebration complete.
  • Organic Vanilla from Grain Place Foods is now available in store.
  • Want to add some pizzaz to your meal and cook a special dinner for that special someone?  Try any of the Artisan Pastas or Olive Oils from Dakota Earth.

 

Garden Fresh Thinks Outside the Soil

The true definition of hydroponics is “to grow without soil”. This means that plants can send their roots into any number of mediums that are not soil.

Hydroponics is often times misunderstood to mean “plants grown in water”. While this can be true, that type of irrigation is actually quite inefficient. The most widely accepted method involves drip irrigation into a medium called “Rockwool”.

Rockwool is produced by a process similar to making cotton candy. A particular mixture of sand and rock is melted at 1600 degrees Celsius and then turned into fibers by spinning the mixture to form a woven mat or cube. The tomato plants are planted directly into this growing medium.

As the irrigation water passes through the fibers of the Rockwool, nutrients are absorbed more efficiently than if they were simply allowed to stand in water or have water pass over the roots. This type of spoon feeding into this medium does several things that cannot be replicated in the soil by nature as Rockwool is very water absorbent, yet airy, not dusty and easy to use.

Why Hydroponics:

  • Uses the efficiency of commercial, conventional agriculture and combines it with the “natural process” growing of organic
  • Creates a sustainable and economically priced, great tasting product and
  • Yields more than 10 times the crop of conventional growing methods per acre with less inputs

 For more information about Garden Fresh Vegetables please visit www.gardenfreshvegetables.com