Over the Skyway and through the woods to Geraldson Farm we go.
by Arielle Stevenson“You want to try the best tomato you’ve ever had in your life?” asks Christa Leonard of Bradenton’s Geraldson Community Farm.
She beckons me toward a line of tall green bushes dotted with yellow spheres and, with a gentle twist and snap off the vine, hands me a gold cherry-sized tomato. Unlike the flavorless grocery-store varieties, Geraldson’s “sungolds” burst with flavor, no marinade required.
“That’s what we’re known for,” she says. “They’re like little cherry tomatoes filled with sunshine and happiness. People go crazy for them.”
With a staff of just seven, along with numerous volunteers, Geraldson spreads the sunshine to customers in four counties, including Sarasota, Manatee, Pinellas and Hillsborough. A 20-acre organic CSA (community supported agriculture) farm located three miles east of Anna Maria Island, practically hugging the Gulf of Mexico, Geraldson feeds some 200 members of the CSA and supplies farmers’ markets, local restaurants and buying clubs through the Central Florida-based distributor Local Roots. Growing season began the second week of November and runs through May. Right now the fields are brimming with greens, tomatoes, squash and more.
Pointing to a row of deep magenta shoots, Leonard exclaims, “Those are beets. That’s my happiness right there.” The CSA’s community outreach coordinator, Leonard takes pride in the farm’s four kinds of beets: golden, candy stripe, and Cylindra beets are grown in addition to the traditional variety.
The farm is known for its heirloom vegetables.
“Heirloom means it’s true to its seed and hasn’t been crossed with anything else,” says farm manager Claudie Babineaux. “It’s not a hybrid. It’s been the same variety over a certain amount of years.”
That means you can find multiple hard-to-find vegetables — some of which, like beets and carrots, need to be directly planted by hand into the soil. And to reach the desired yield, you have to plant a lot of them. “There are probably 5,000 beets and 5,000 carrots in there,” says Leonard.
She recalls the equipment used for automatic direct seeding when she worked one summer on a farm in Minnesota.
“Things didn’t look as good or go as well as here,” she says. “It made me think of something Claudie told me. She said there’s something beautiful about planting a seed and sowing it by hand. There’s an exchange of energy that goes into it.”
Members of the CSA pay an annual fee for a full or half-share, and can either pick up their produce at the farm or at three other sites, one in each of the counties served. Anyone who can’t afford his or her share can work it off on the farm (two hours for half-share, four for a full).
Leonard began working at the farm as a volunteer two years ago. Once a month turned into once a week, and eventually she came on full-time. Every vegetable presents a different challenge.
Unlike the beets and carrots, the sungold tomatoes are planted into reflective plastic “to keep aphids and white flies away so we won’t have to spray,” says Leonard. The material also cuts down on the amount of nutsedge that crops up; the pesky weed is hard to beat because of its sturdy nutlike root system. “We come through and pull them out.”
Beyond pests, farm manager Babineaux says Florida’s weather is another formidable foe.
“Being so close to the water here, when storms happen they’re usually pretty intense because it’s coming right off the Gulf,” Babineaux explains. “Getting things in the ground between August and September is difficult because of flooding.”
Leonard recalls Babineaux digging trenches this past season until 3 a.m. in the rain, just to drain the fields.
Babineaux started out as an apprentice at Geraldson four seasons ago. Before that, she worked professionally as a park ranger and firefighter. Now she spends 60-80 hours a week, “sun up to sun down,” on the farm, then heads home to do copious quantities of record-keeping.
“Farming combines my interest in preserving the environment and allows me to be involved in the community,” she says. “It’s a perfect fit for me. This is what I’ll do for the rest of my life.”
Consumers’ lack of knowledge about local produce can be frustrating.
“A lot of people don’t know what we can grow down here and what our seasons are,” Babineaux says. “People wonder why we don’t have lettuce throughout the year and why our lettuce is more bitter. It’s because we don’t get the frost other places do.” Educating the community about food pathways is a core mission of the farm, and a big part of that is involving nearby schools.
Leonard points to a field of luscious greens.
“That’s kale, broccoli, kohlrabi, collards, and cabbage,” Leonard explains. “We have St. Stephen’s Catholic School come out and help us plant six times a year. We have 4-year-olds from the Children’s Academy. Kids are so desensitized about where their food comes from. It’s cool to see them planting, hands-on, and connected to the food source.”
The end goal isn’t to be the biggest, baddest farm in the biz. CSAs aren’t really meant for that kind of growth.
“We’re not trying to produce 10,000 pounds of squash,” Babineaux says. “We’re trying to produce enough for the CSA and markets, and still have a squash that tastes better.”
Geraldson Community Farm, 1401 99th St. N.W., Bradenton. Farmers’ market on Sundays 11 a.m.-3 p.m. 941-792-0985, geraldsoncommunityfarm.org