For two months, members of our team have been teaching students at Seattle's William Grose Center to develop a local microgreens production facility. One of the exercises was to produce a crop in a small container. The adjacent image shows Keyshawn's results.

The seeds were sown and kept in darkness for three days before exposure to sunlight. The result after seven days total was as shown.

Other students with other varieties but under the same regimen had different results. A report on those results and how they can be the basis of a bit of surreptitious STEM learning will be published here soon.

William Grose Center

In cooperation with SIXR, a Seattle firm that develops video visualizations of engineering projects, Evertarden is conducting a joint-venture training program in association with William Grose Center, which is building a variety of youth-oriented programs for its local community. We will be updating this article as the project proceeds. Also watch the member updates for personal comments.

On February 22 and 23, a team comprised of Michael Twiggs, Kade Eckert and Rees Clark presented a preliminary schema for an indoor garden to about a dozen young adults. The program exposed the participants to basic concepts of indoor gardening, including study of the food deserts, nutrition, crops suitable for indoor growing, alternative growing methods and aspects of the economics of individual gardens and urban development.

Organizing the program was Budi Mulyo of SIXR, a local firm that creates video and virtual reality conceptualizations of architectural projects. In this case, the youths will design and supervise implementation and production of microgreens at a new indoor garden to be built at the WG Center during the spring of 2023. The meeting was sponsored by Ty Griffin and Evan Poncelet of the Grose Center, which is part of Africatown Community Land Trust, a local development organization.

According to an article from the Dept. of Agriculture, "Starting decades ago as fashionable, high-value gourmet greens, today microgreens have gained popularity among consumers for their nutritional profile and high content of antioxidant compounds. Now, a new study suggests that the tiny plants have the potential to help provide global nutrition security.

As part of a project titled, "Food Resilience in the Face of Catastrophic Global Events," an international team of researchers has found these vegetables can be grown in a variety of soilless production systems in small spaces indoors, with or without artificial lighting. The findings are especially relevant amid a pandemic that has disrupted food supply chains.

“The current COVID-19 pandemic revealed the vulnerability of our food system and the need to address malnutrition issues and nutrition-security inequality, which could be exacerbated by potential future emergencies or catastrophes,” said Penn State University Assistant Professor, team leader Francesco Di Gioia. “Nutrient-dense microgreens have great potential as an efficient food-resilience resource.”

Open Philanthropy and USDA’s National Institute of Food and Agriculture supported this research."

Our Seattle Central Area Urban Garden will begin production in May, with a first harvest expected in June or July. Completion of funding via a major grant from the City of Seattle is pending. (Cue elevator music.)

Participating sponsors are the city's Dept. of Neighborhoods, Black Dollar Days Task Force, Northwest Harvest and the people of zip code 98122. Evergarden Networks has arranged for space, equipment, staffing and training.

Training is coordinated by Maxine Mimms Academy and Bates Technical College, both of Tacoma, in which students will learn hydroponic gardening, distribution and marketing.

Evergarden Team members Kade Eckert (left) and Michael Twiggs and erstwhile photographer Rees Clark recently participated in Burien's Solar Punk Festival. The group presented its plan for creating a consortium of microgreen growers in the Puget Sound region to the local community. Watch the News for more information as the project develops. This first and hopefully annual solar festival was held in Burien, WA, August 27. Other groups presented introductions to solar equipment manufacturers, consultants and installers.

SAN FRANCISCO (CN) — September 22, 2022— Hydroponically grown crops can be considered organic, a Ninth Circuit panel ruled Thursday, upholding a federal judge’s refusal to bar hydroponic growers from using the label.

The Organic Foods Production Act, on the books since 1990, specifies that farmers must submit an organic plan showing that their practices foster “soil fertility” through techniques like proper tillage, crop rotation and manuring.

Along with the Center for Food Safety, some of the nation’s oldest organic farms sued the U.S. Department of Agriculture after the agency denied their petition requesting a rule that would make hydroponic crops ineligible for organic certification in 2020.

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