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Will restaurants and breweries open again? What about schools? The export market? While farmers are still grappling with big questions triggered by the COVID-19 pandemic and lockdown, “we have to get farming,” says Eddie Gordon of Gordon Skagit Farms. “The growing season is here.” That means moving ahead on plans made last winter – or coming up with a creative workaround. Also important to consider: soil health and crop rotation. Here is what some La Conner-area farmers are getting...
You can work from home, shop from home, and call friends from home. But you can’t farm from home. That’s why La Conner area farmers and farmworkers are adopting new habits as they comply with new rules from the Washington State Department of Labor and Industries. To protect workers from the COVID-19 virus, agricultural employers must implement an effective social distancing plan, ensure frequent and adequate handwashing by employees, and increase cleaning and sanitation of commonly touched surfaces. Sick workers must stay home or be iso...
Legislative District 10 Democrats from Island, Snohomish and Skagit counties came to La Conner’s Pioneer Park Saturday, holding a salmon lunch fundraiser to buy metaphorical political bricks to elect Democrats, strengthening a blue wall they have been building since 2017. State Democratic Party Chair Tina Podlodowski told the 75 party activists she had a two word job description: “Elect Democrats.” The 14 elected officials and candidates for office speaking to the crowd highlighted their accom...
Almost on cue, farmer Harley Soltes brought his van of blueberry products to the Puget Sound Food Hub Cooperative on Best Road Thursday afternoon. Soltes knows the value of cooperation and made time to recount the origins of this Co-op. In 2013 Soltes offered his Bow Hill Blueberries cold storage facility to area farmers for aggregating, storing and wholesaling their crops. Over three years that effort grew to 22 farms, becoming a hub linking King, Snohomish, Whatcom and Skagit County farmers wi...
In what became a perfect weather day Saturday, 28 people combined the best of the Skagit Valley, riding their bikes to three organic farms that provide produce to the Skagit Valley Food Co-op for the co-op’s eighth annual Bike to Farm Tour. The bikers meandered just over two miles from their Edgewater Park gathering site to Skagit Flats, Andy Ross’ farm on Kamb Road. Ross was peppered with questions as he stood out standing in his two-acre field of various lettuces, facing the dismounted bik...
April, weather wise, left the western Skagit Valley as it sometimes does: overcast, cool, rain overnight Sunday and dripping into Monday morning. Monday, was in fact perfectly average: the morning temperature started at 50 degrees F at WSU’s Mount Vernon weather station. My phone app says temperatures hit 60 degrees F around 5 p.m. This April it rained 20 days, including the last three. In 2017 it also rained about 20 days, though total rainfall was about three inches against the nearly five inches this year. This April was cooler, though h...
This lush, alluvial plain we call home, the Skagit Valley, is the site of the 19th Festival of Family Farms this weekend. A dozen farms are participating. Cows, blueberries, shellfish, pumpkins, apples, alpacas, cheese, gardening demonstrations, and flowers – it couldn’t be more diverse. But they have one thing in common: they are farms; farms run by families. Each year, rain or shine, more and more people line up for hayrides, harvesting, music, food, animal exhibits, and more. They a...
Young Archie Patino chomps into an ear of corn at Hedlin Family Farm in La Conner during the Skagit Valley Festival of Family Farms held over the weekend. – Photo by Don CoyoteYoung Archie Patino chomps into an ear of corn at Hedlin Family Farm in La Conner during the Skagit Valley Festival of Family Farms held over the weekend. – Photo by Don Coyote...
OK, these farm vehicles aren’t really known for speed. On a hay bale next to a real farm vehicle sat a collection of kid-constructed veggie racers. Racing zucchinis were among the entrants in the speedy vegetable contest at Hedlin’s Farm during the Festival of Farms last weekend. – Photo by Don Coyote...
Congressman Rick Larsen visited La Conner and Fir Island on Friday, touring Hedlin Farms and the Fir Island Estuary Restoration Project. “I always tell people you can meet in my office for 15 minutes, or I can come take a field trip and meet you for an hour,” said Larsen. Larsen, D-Everett, who represents Washington’s 2nd Congressional District, which includes La Conner, will head to Washington D.C. next week, when Congress will reconvene after summer recess. At the Fir Island Estuary Resto...
Faster than a rolling parsnip! More powerful than mashed potatoes! The Turnip Racer was one of the entries in the annual vegie racing contest held at Hedlin’s Family Farm in La Conner as part of the county-wide Festival of Family Farms held last weekend. – Photo by Don Coyote...
It was a hot time at Hedlin Farms in La Conner on Saturday morning, though not by design. A tractor caught afire when flame weeding just east of town went awry. Hedlin’s employee David Rodriguez was on the hot seat only briefly, able to safely dismount the burning John Deere 7210 model as La Conner and District 13 firefighters arrived on scene. Locals say they were alerted to the incident by billowing smoke and what sounded like tractor tires exploding. Organic farms, like Hedlin’s, use fla...
