Youth Farm

By: Dana Norder

Youth Farm is a FOOD For Lane County garden where they grow 100,000 pounds of produce. They have youth volunteers from preschool kids to college students. They love teaching kids about gardening and having fun doing it! The friendly staff and beautiful farm create a wonderful atmosphere for kids to learn.

Michaela Hammer, the Youth Farm Field Coordinator, concentrates as she calculates how many seeds need to be planted for the spring season. Because she can’t accept a world where sustainably and justly grown food is available to everyone she takes her job very seriously.

Michaela teaches University of Oregon student, Julia Yost, how to plant seeds correctly in seeding trays. This is a very tedious process where only one seed can go into each section of the tray. The student volunteers planted over 40 packages of seeds in their short time volunteering on the farm February 10th.

University of Oregon student volunteers help plant seeds for Youth Farm’s spring season. This FOOD For Lane County farm teaches kids about gardening and nutrition while giving them valuable work experience.

The graveyard of seed packages indicates the large amount of work in Youth Farm’s future harvest. The growing farm’s staff are very dedicated because they know the importance of bringing healthy food to people that otherwise wouldn’t have access to it.

Michaela is hard at work seeding red peppers in her tray. She enjoys seeding because she gets to teach the UO students about her passion for farming as well as getting a break from being in the rain.