There is one thing I have noticed in my 15 years as a small family farmer:

the popularity of the local food movement usually lasts only 4-6 months a year.

Real, live Virginia farmer Joel Salatin.

In the spring, people flock to farmer’s markets leaving with bags overflowing with fresh produce, and the garden stores can barely keep their starter plants and compost in stock. But by October, most gardens are overgrown with weeds, and farm market traffic is at the lowest of the season.

What is it about the month of October that deters the eating of local veggies? Maybe after a long summer and a failed garden, many don’t want to be bothered planning and planting their fall garden. It could be the cooler temperatures somehow convince everyone that nothing is growing in the farmers’ field, or maybe schedules get busy with the kid’s school activities starting again. It could be everyone is tightening their budget in anticipation of an expensive holiday season.

Whatever the reason, eating local isn’t something that should only happen six months a year, and we locavores should work to increase our local food consumption year round. Much of the planning to eat local in the winter takes place during the peak harvesting months of July-September, with the old fashioned art of canning, freezing, and preserving. However, if you missed that train this year, you still have options to continue eating local in these cooler fall months!

Option One – Low Tunnel Gardening

The first option is to extend your garden’s growing season. Being from Ohio, I am amazed at how long the growing season lasts here in southeastern Virginia. My brother, the farmer who still lives in Ohio, gets jealous every time we talk and I rave that on October 26^th Hampton Roads saw temperatures in the 80s, and yet he has faced three frosts and lost all of his tomatoes, squash, peppers, eggplant, and okra.Hampton Roads residents don’t realize how lucky we are to still have tomatoes on the shelf at the Five Points Community Farm Market! Virginians are blessed to have such mild winters that with only a little extra work, you can GROW your own veggies through December.

The veggies are safe inside.

According to the Farmer’s Almanac, Norfolk’s first frost date is November 17^th. This means that in past years temperatures will dip below 32 degrees around this date. Those plants outside will most likely die during the first frost or at least cease produce production. That is, unless you take the time to protect your plants and construct greenhouse-like structures called  “Low Tunnels” or “Quick Hoops.” These quick and inexpensive, plastic covered tunnels can protect plants throughout winter and help you continue to eat local after the first frost! While you won’t be eating vine ripe tomatoes all winter, go ahead and prepare your winter garden with beets, broccoli, cabbage, Swiss chard, turnips, radishes, kale, carrots, lettuce, onions, peas, and spinach.

Once you have everything planted and temperatures are getting close to freezing, start building. Low tunnel construction is pretty straightforward. After trying to write and rewrite the instructions in this article, I realized the best way was to watch how it is done.

Still confused? Some of us learn better by doing. The Five Points Community Garden, located on the Norview United Methodist Church property on the corner of Norview and Hyde Avenues, will be giving a demonstration on low tunnel construction this Saturday, October 30^th from 2-4 pm. Come out and be a part of this exciting community garden while learning how to eat local longer.

Option Two – Enjoy Produce from Local Greenhouse Farmers

So maybe gardening isn’t your thing or you don’t have enough space. Your second option to eating local longer is to enjoy all the fresh local produce still available in your farmers market. In Norfolk, we are fortunate enough to have a farm market that is open year-round. In Ohio, my family could only sell their produce at the local farmers markets for 22-weeks a year, the typical market season. However, we often have produce for at least a month after the last market closes. That is why when I first moved to Norfolk, I wanted to get involved with the Five Points and their vision to provide local produce throughout the year.

Five Points in Norfolk.

One way the market is able to have local produce longer is by working with local farmers and the U.S. Department of Agriculture’s Natural Resources Conservation Service (NRCS). In 2010, the NRCS piloted a new project called “Know Your Farmer, Know Your Food.” Under this grant farmers are able to build high tunnels. Think of the low tunnels previously described, but bigger – 15’ high, 180’ long and 30’ wide. The NRCS’s goal is to help local farmers extend their growing season and increase the availability of local produce.

Just last week we met with two local grant recipients to discuss the types of produce our patrons want to see and how we can help them sell their produce. The grant program has been so successful three low tunnels were recently constructed on the White House lawn in Mrs. Obama’s garden. The USDA has committed to an additional year of funding, providing even more high tunnels to small farmers in southeastern VA and more fresh produce to us, the consumer!

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Eating local is a year-round commitment. Five Points community members have committed to building structures that will protect their veggies long after the first frost, and the Five Points has committed to working with our local farmers. We, in southeastern VA, are lucky that this region provides us with climate to continue to eat local long after most of America has frosted over.

What will you do to make sure eating local isn’t something that just happens 6 months a year?