Southern SAWG

Each year for the last fifteen or twenty years, a brochure from the Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group (SSAWG) arrives at our house. I could not have told you how our name got on their mailing list, but each time I read through the brochure announcing their annual convention and the descriptions of sessions related to organic gardening, I always wished that I could call in sick for a week and head out to wherever the farmers were meeting that year. This year, I got to do just that. Now that I am retired, there just wasn’t any excuse good enough to make me stay away from the convention, especially since it was being held in a city I love—Chattanooga, Tennessee.

My one worry about attending this convention was that I would have nothing in common with farmers that grow on such a grand scale as to be able to make a living from it. My efforts are totally geared toward feeding my family. I feel successful if I’ve managed to pick a few handfuls of green beans to garnish a plate of lettuce—how would I fit in with people who grow miles of green beans. I was afraid my efforts with a trowel and hand rake might be considered puny by those whose hands were calloused by years of work with tractors and harvesters and real farmer implements.

I should not have worried.

The first pre-conference session began at 8:00 a.m.—late, I suppose, for most farmers—and ended at 5:30 p.m. I could tell right away that this was not a conference for gadflies.  There were no buses for taking spouses to shopping malls, no after hours “hospitality” rooms for free drinks and hors d’oeuvres.  If you are at a SAWG conference, you are there to learn!

Daniel Parson and Cathy Jones were the instructors for ‘Beginning Organic Vegetable Production.’ (This session actually ran for a day and a half.) I cannot begin to tell you all of the useful information these two individuals provided, but I do want to tell you about Daniel and Cathy—yes, by the end of the conference we were on first-name bases.

Daniel has two acres under cultivation. With the crops he grows on these two acres, he feeds 48 families through CSA subscriptions. He hopes to increase his cultivation to three acres this year, and his goal is to have a 75 member CSA. What a guy! (He could surely feed 20 families with my four garden rows.) Cathy has approximately four acres in cultivation and grows enough vegetables and flowers to be a main draw at three farmer’s markets each week. Both of these people became my instant heroes!

On the afternoon of the second day, after we had finished our intense learning session with Daniel and Cathy, we toured the Sequatchie Cove Farm. It is a beautiful a place located in the shadow of Lookout Mountain, with forest and pastureland, a swift-flowing clear-streamed creek, and homes for the three generations of farmers who work there nestled among the trees climbing the hillside. Grazing animals, native plants, artisan cheese, and a strong ecological connection drive the work at Sequatchie Cove Farm. Be sure to visit their website.

All of the sessions we attended during the remainder of our time at SSAWG were so informative. We were like sponges soaking up water, trying to hold on to every bit of information. We learned about soil science from guru Joel Gruver and became more determined than ever to grow mushrooms after hearing Tradd Cotter from Mushroom Mountain.

But enough of all that we learned, now I am going to tell you one of the most astounding discoveries we made during our trip.

On the second day of the conference, Harvey stepped out of the meeting room to quickly get both of us a cup of coffee. He seemed to be gone for quite a while, but Harvey does sometimes get side-tracked if something grabs his interest. In this case, he was walking near the registration tables on his way back to the meeting room when he noticed a laminated page from a newspaper on one of the tables. He stopped to take a quick look, but then had to take a second look. On the table was the front page of the Daily Iberian, our hometown newspaper. Prominent on the page was a photograph of about thirty people, Harvey being one of them, who were in attendance at the first Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group. Yes, it was held right here in New Iberia; and no, I don’t know why Harvey attended without me!

   

The conference in Chattanooga was the twentieth gathering of small farmers, and the size of the gathering has grown to 1200 participants. I don’t know what kind of synchronicity is involved when things like this happen, but to put the icing on the cake, Harvey was invited to participate in the culminating video presentation that was shown at the closing banquet.

I think we were meant to be in Chattanooga for the 20^th SSAWG. We really did fit right in. 

Helen Vinton (far right) organized the first
SSAWG conference in New Iberia.

1200 participants in 2011!