Heirloom Harvest

A letter from Concerned Grafton Residents

A letter from Concerned Grafton Residents

The Tufts Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine, in neighboring North Grafton has applied for, and received a $15 million dollar grant to build a bio-defense research facility in North Grafton from the National Institute of Infectious Diseases.

This facility will be what is called a BSL-3 (Bio Safety Level 3) Laboratory. There is only one level higher, BSL-4. In this lab, Tufts will perform bio-terrorism and bio-defense research with infectious and contagious pathogens. Tufts is currently registered to study: Ricin, Abrin, Tuleremia, and Botulinum.

These are what is known as Category A agents that pose a risk to national security because they:

• can be easily disseminated or transmitted person-to-person cause high mortality, with potential for major public health impact

• might cause public panic and social disruption

• require special action for public health preparedness

--NIAID Biodefense Research Agenda for CDC Category A Agents".)

Our concerned citizens group feels that this lab does not belong in North Grafton. Especially considering this facility is to be within a two-mile radius of North Grafton Elementary School, Grafton Middle School, and Westborough Mill Pond School. A population of 1664 students!

The Grafton Board of Selectmen and citizenship have voted through town meeting Article #45 opposing this facility. In case you didn't catch the April 6, 2006 Worcester Telegram and local television news, Tufts is presently engaged in this research, which was a surprise to our town officials:

"Five workers exposed to botulinum toxin at Tufts " -- Five employees of Cummings School of Veterinary Medicine at Tufts University were hospitalized yesterday afternoon after they were accidentally exposed to a toxin that causes botulism, according to school officials.

For more information e-mail mailto:info@nograftonbdlab.org

Or visit http://www.nograftonbdlab.org where there is a petition and contact information for local officials. Get involved! Find out more information, before it is too late.

Sincerely,

Grafton Residents for a Safe Community

Earth Day, Earth

Heirloom Harvest celebrated Earthday 2006 from 1 to 4 pm on Sunday, April 23. The rain forced a change in our plans to walk the farm and pick up trash. Instead, those present filled peat pots and seeded in the barn in between education events that included a discussion of Oxfam's campaign to reform farm policy in the US, and a demonstration of how pollution affects groundwater.

Volunteer Chris Wright and Oxfam representative Stephanie Demmons work to fill peat pots and plant summer squash seeds.

Barb Harrington (left) from the Crystal Spring Center for Earth Learning gives a demonstration of how pollution from various sources—including a golf course, a factory, a housing development, a clearcut hillside, and a conventional farm—affects ground water.

Audience members participated in the pollution demonstration by playing the roles of the various facility owners on the model. Here, the "factory owner" is pouring effluent into his factory which flows out into a stream, which leads to a river and eventually to a lake and the wetlands where the water changes color from the pollution.
[We are indebted to Mark Fisette for the next three photos.]

Act now!

We have closed the Tuesday pickup at the Westborough site. Due to heavy interest, it filled early. If you are planning to join the CSA, do so soon in order not to have your options reduced further or to be closed out of this season.

I say Tomahto

Around the farm--we are going full-tilt in the greenhouse right now. We have just finished the greenhouse transplanting of most of the pepper plants we will be growing this season. Soon we will begin the greenhouse transplanting of the tomato crop.

Also this week we will begin direct seeding and field transplanting of greenhouse transplants. We need volunteer and CSA member help.

Feel free to come in Sunday, Tuesday, or Thursday to help out.

Let's Call the Whole Thing Hot

Hopkinton resident and CSA member Kathy Mosher (left) came in with her daughter to help seed start Black Krim heirloom tomatoes, while Trish Stephanko transplants hot pepper seedlings at right.
Kathy is taking an organizational role in the effort in Hopkinton to establish a community farm on the 600 acres of Weston Nurseries land that is coming up for sale in that town. If you'd like more information about how to become involved in helping to preserve a significant portion of the 600 acre parcel for farming, contact Kathy at jkmosher@comcast.net.

Please note: Town water will not be turned on at the farmsite until around last frost in May, so please be sure to bring your own water bottles for drinking water, as the greenhouse can be as hot as 90-plus degrees even when it's only in the 50s outside.

Update on Travis

As many of you may already know (perhaps from last year's blog entry), the older son of Heirloom Harvest assistant manager Trish Stefanko is serving in Iraq right now.

Private First Class Travis Weiner (pictured here (middle) tying tomatoes at the farm last summer) is serving with the 101st Airborne with an Air-Assault Team near Baghdad. In recent action about two weeks ago Travis was hit in the neck by mortar shrapnel as his unit was leaving an area they had just cleared in a eight-humvee convoy. Travis was not nearly as badly injured as some other soldiers in his unit, and he assisted giving first aid to some very badly injured men.

Travis spent some time in recovery and has now returned to duty, though the doctors decided not to remove the shrapnel from his neck. Travis will be returning home in mid-April for a two week leave and has said he would love to attend a Red Sox game. His mother Trish has heard tickets are hard to get, and wanted me to post a request if anyone had tickets that they could donate or sell to her during the time Travis is in town, she would be grateful.

Her email is trish8588@verizon.net.