Happy Friday!

Saturday, May 30
8th Annual Pollinator Day Celebration
Lawn next to the Chatham Mills Farmers’ Market
Pittsboro, NC
9am-1pm
Kid Friendly

• Presentations on beginning beekeeper
• Watch someone work a hive (while you watch safely from the other side of a wire “bee cage”
• Learn  what to plant to attract butterflies, bees and other pollinators
• Tour Cooperative Extension’s demonstration Pollinator Paradise Garden at Chatham Mills and get a close look at visiting pollinators
• Try honey wine (mead) from co-sponsors Starrlight Mead—Visitors can also visit their meadery on the property!
• Kids’ tent: scavenger hunt, plant-a-pollinator-plant, beeswax candle making, face painting, pollinator games and balloons, and more
• Native plant giveaways and gift certificates from local nurseries throughout the day, thanks to generous support from Niche Gardens, Mellow Marsh Farm, Cure Nursery, and Big Bloomers Flower Farm.

For photos and a program schedule visit the Growing Small Farms website at http://go.ncsu.edu/2015-pollinator-day

Friday to Sunday, June 5-7
Farm to Fork Picnic
Various venues in the Triangle

The annual Farm to Fork Picnic, which Bon Appétit magazine called the “country’s best all-you-can-eat-feast,” is expanding to a delicious weekend full of local food events June 5-7, 2015. This year’s Farm to Fork events will have a special focus on seafood, a critical but often overlooked component of our state’s local food system.

Paul Greenberg, The New York Times best-selling author of Four Fish: The Future of the Last Wild Food and American Catch: The Fight for Our Local Seafood, will be the weekend’s distinguished guest.  Four Fish won the James Beard Award in 2011 and was the basis for a Time Magazine cover story.

Thursday, June 11
2015 Small Farm Field Day
NC A&T State University Research Farm
Greensboro, NC

Demonstrations:

• High Tunnel Reboot: Solar Energy and Rain Catchment System
• Summer Cover Crops for Organic and Conventional Vegetables
• Alternative Farming for Urban Areas
• Pastured Pork and Swine Genetics
• Truffle Farming: Unearthing a New Niche

Poster Presentations:

• Animal Production and Human Health
• Forest Farming with Medicinal Plants
• Grapes: The Value Added Promise of Pomace
• Keeping the Peas: Using Vegetable Oil to Deter Beetles

Please Note: Lunch will be guaranteed to first 250 registrants. Pre-Registration is recommended. Please contact Alexis Gaines at: ajgaines@ncat.edu or336.285.4661

And if you have an upcoming event, let us know (just comment below).

If you know of a place consolidating food or farm info, please let me know! Until then, I’ll provide periodic updates of the happenings in the Piedmont Triad.