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Kelle Carter,
Garden Manager
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Our gardens provide community businesses and families high quality, local, beyond-certified, organic produce.
Farmers at La Boca demonstrate and cultivate sustainable land stewardship through growing not just healthy crops, but a healthy soil.
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Keith Bruno, Garden Manager
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The market gardens at La Boca supplies an abundance of food for staff and interns, as well as our regional food system. The educational farm and garden are being developed to provide a working site to train prospective farmers interested in limited day, high-altitude annual and perennial fruit and vegetable production and marketing techniques. We not only work with the local ecology of the 180 acre ranch, but also work collaboratively with all other aspects of La Boca Center for Sustainability in order to make the whole site a practical demonstration of integrated sustainable agriculture, from building techniques to growing food, animals, and resources for local communities.
Emphasizing a healthy, organic ecosystem in the garden promotes strong immune systems of plants and animals, capable of defense against pests and pathogens. As with any organic setting, we have our share of weeds. Weeding on our farm happens either by hand or by animal. Fortunately, the pigs, goats and chickens make garden "waste" virtually nonexistant, as they consume every discarded piece of plant material available to them. In return, we receive rich compost and nutritious meat, milk and eggs.
What agricultural techniques are applied in the Garden?
Animal Integration
*Pigerated Compost System
*Chicken, Turkey Tractors
*Horse-drawn Cultivation
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Specialized Irrigation
We model three different types of irrigation in our crop production at La Boca including:
*Drip System
*Overhead sprinklers
*Flood using gated pipe
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Season Extension
*Green House for cold sensitive crops
*Green House for transplant propogation
*Remay, Row Covers
*High Tunnels
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Chemical-free Fertilization
*Compost Tea Application
*Chicken-pecked, pigearated compost
*Cover crops
*Crop rotation
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Ecosystem Biodiversity
*Bee hives
*Flower abundance (wild and non-wild)
*Wildlife habitat
*Crop diversity
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| At La Boca, our vision is to provide training and education to all who are interested in learning these techniques including other farmers, apprentices and community members. |
Garden Products
The 2009 growing season has yielded a large, healthy variety of crops including over 40 different varieties of fruits and vegetables.
La Boca currently has three to four acres under production utilizing a combination of agroecological principles and season-extension techniques.
Markets
Community Supported Agrilculture
La Boca has started a CSA program in 2009 which is offered Spring through Fall each year.. To learn more about community supported agriculture at La Boca please visit our CSA 2009 webpage.
Fresh veggies are currently available through a variety of local markets in Durango and Ignacio, Colorado. For the 2009 growing season, our produce was sold at the following farmer's markets, stores, and restaurants:
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Farmer's Markets
Natural Food Stores
Restaurants
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