What is Farming?

By Dana Kilgarriff

Dana is one of the five students from Saul working with us this summer. She is employed through the Philadelphia Youth Network and is just wrapping up her 6 week internship at Henry Got Crops! Last year she also worked with us at the Weavers Way Farm at the Awbury Arboretum. She will be a Junior this fall at Saul.

What is farming? This could be explained as planting plants and harvesting them. If I didn’t know better that would be true, but as I entered W.B Saul H.S my ignorance was switched to knowledge. I thought it was easy and not much work. Boy was I wrong when Saul and Weavers Way farmers enlightened me.

I needed an agriculture job to place in my already busy schedule. My teacher / coach Naugle (now called McAtamney) and work-ready helped me get a job. Surprised a lot of people think I’m a plant girl? The truth is that maybe I am. The farmers taught me so much from preparing beds, harvesting, identification, and techniques.
I started my first week of a 6-week period spectacle to see if I would like it. As the week passed I started to settle in and enjoy myself. I even earned a self-proclaimed nickname, “a weeding machine.” On the serious side I will say that I truly learned what farming is first hand and personal.

This year I had a chance to work at an animal based job, but I asked Naugle to go back with Weavers Way again. I started this 6-week period confident and ready to farm the real way on fields of endless rows that need constant assistance.