I know you are a going to love this interview I did with RockStar Millennial Nick Lubecki as much as I did because I listened to it today as I drove to work. So the shownotes are completely raw from the day we actually spoke. I didn’t have time to fix them but they are great! I have 20 episodes in the bank I can’t wait to share. In an ideal world, I would share them all right away! But in reality it’s all I can usually do to produce one a week. I will try though to get them caught up so they are current! In the meantime I hope you enjoy as much as I do. I’ve been having some sound problems too it seems in Andony’s podcast last week I thought I was too loud, this one I feel like I am can’t always hear everything I say? I’m as frustrated as you are that way, as I just copy and save everything, the settings don’t really change? I feel like ever since January 2018 I’ve been struggling with my sound? But I think you will love the content as much as I enjoyed recording it! Happy Spring Everyone!
Tuesday February 5th, 2019
Today we have a rockstar millennial Nick Lubecki from Grow Pittsburgh who is giving a presentation on Learning Circle: Weed Management in Intensive Veggie Production.
Right now I am the Farm Manager
which is a project of Grow Pittsburgh
Currently I manage the Braddock farm about an acre or so
borough of Braddock
town just outside Pittsburgh
last remaining steel mill in the next door
It reminds me of the Brooklyn Grange on your website with the urban mill and the farm together.
Yeah! It’s a great photo shot for sure!
my first memory visiting grandparents in northern PA
They had a huge garden
as a kid I was really excited about that!
at our home, my grandmother helped put together our first big garden, Imust have been 5-6 years old.
Do you have brothers and sisters?
Yeah, we were all involved at first, eventually became me and my brother and we’re still growing together today!
we are about an hour about north of the city! I’ve been gardening for a while!
Tell us about that. How does a millennial come to be growing as an adult.
grow
subsistence crops
corn
I had that as a background
as a child the thing I liked to do with my free time was hangout out in the garden and in the backyard
gardens a couple of years then got a couple of urban community gardens growing
At some point, I remember working at a grocery store
not being very satisfied with my life.
I’ve always been into homesteading and wanted to grow all your own food and preserve it
decided to try to work on a farm so I quit my job and got a job on a farm in central PA
been doing that every sense
what I wanted to do
love watching the plants grow and being able to take it back and cook with it
worked on farms
start my first farm in 2012
had an urban farm with a couple of friends in the city and did that for a year
some one had an urban farm hadn’t been used in a bit. They weren’t using
Got a start out there
after that season I was sold on it.
Later started a bigger farm
equipment
great way to get a taste of doing our own thing
after that season sold
did that for a couple of years
I know my listeners are wondering, our goal is to grow enough food for us to eat to supplement our produce at least. do you have any tips for going through that curve.
I found it really valuable to work for somebody else already doing it
so many things you don’t even think of
farmer has already thought of them
Weather working or work trade for a farmer
What’s a good example of one thing you learned?
logistics
of having produce for market
having knowing when to harvest before your market
depending day of week
do I do it that morning or the day before? Depending on the time of market
how to wash everything in an efficient way
presentable at a a market stand
bunches of herbs like cilantro and then at the market stand they just wilt into hour
put in a plastic bag
most significant things
beyond our capacity
How do you sell your produce? CSA or Market or
I’ve done all three in the past
Braddock
biggest goal is to grow produce for the town of Braddock
no grocery store
That’s the main goal for vegetable farm
We also
use our space to fundraise for our efforts of providing produce for the neighborhood
We also sell to restaurants
2 outlets
We’re members of a farmers coop called Penn’s Corner here in western PA
They handle the ordering and the logistics of that. We just drop everything off at the warehouse, it’s worth it for us!
Do you get a smaller profit then?
yeah. That’s definitely true
it can be nice
depends on how you do it
planning for a market stand vs planning for wholesale
different
took me a while
thin margins
handful of crops for wholesale
grow things like salad
we’re not
weather here is all over the place usually
last week we had couple of days of highs in the single digits
today highs in the 50s
yesterday in the 60s
30s and 40s for highs
maple sugaring
well my grandparents had a big compost pile
thought it was a magical process
scraps turned into what looked like dirt
mom had a copy of the rodale envy
read that when I was a kid
before the internet
resource for gardening info
then
also I didn’t really know what I was going just reading ab look
trying to figure it out on my own
working on a farm
helped me learn the practical application of a lot of those things
when to do something about a problem
Ok! I’ve been trying to figure out for a couple of years celery
pretty wet here, get a lot of fungal disease
tried a couple of different varieties
really good celery for the first time
one people buy
don’t often see at the farm stand
we also had
did red, yellow, orange bell peppers
started
different colors
that really turned our farmstead into a rainbow
looked really nice
I also, tried out transplanting green beans
did that last
it worked really well
that kind of
plant green beans every couple of weeks to have them all season
buys us extra weeks by transplanting them
planted them at the time at the direct sow
pretty excited
more space
on an acre
trying to cycle through crops
one or two more crops
first crop
double triples
faster too
I like trying things out every year
something trying right now
overwinter strawberries
plant in the fall
for us was sept
cover with row cover
supposed to produce first June with good yields
have them in the ground see if it works
along those lines
try to have as many crops as we can as early as possible
more things in June
our last frost date
middle of may
couple of high tunnels
June is like the least exciting farm stand
green things radishes
as much as we can add to that
better anyway
good luck
getting
zucchini and cucumbers earlier
red yellow
orange
some green
ready in June
weren’t picking them waiting to turn colors
customers more fruit
planted some blackberries and red raspberries
should produce for this season
red raspberries in high tunnel
should have a longer picking season
rains a lot
off of the berries
rot right when you pick it
red raspberries
grown outside
fruit flies
pick
look forward
ever bearing ones
i have tried those before
bigger farm
my experience you get a little bit at a time
backyard garden too
snacking thing
Every couple of years I try to do some broccoli as long as I can
had a couple of weeks of good broccoli
people
got too hot
hotter weather ones
broccoli didn’t do so well
I think I sold about a handful of units
not gonna grow it
sales weren’t there
did really well at first
early okra
did great
got about 2 feet tall
stopped growing
used to okra getting 7 feet tall
do some transplanting
some transplant and some direct
get 2 rounds
apart from each other
direct seed root system can get bigger
yeah, yields suffered
it was still ok
able to bring it to market every week till the season was over
lot of demand for okra
could have had more
half the plants just stopped growing
struggled
some plants have tap roots
okra has a tap root
damage the root
I was thinking along those lines
stopped a certain point
doing it 2-3 rounds
separated by a couple of weeks could be good
spread out the damage
whenever gets to that point
great cucumber...