This Saturday Feb. 8 from 9 a.m.-1 p.m. the Mill Spring Ag Center is hosting an Indoor Farm Market and Seed Exchange.

There will be seed catalogs from various non-GMO seed companies, seeds for exchange, raffle opportunities and advice on how to save seed in the coming season.

The day will also include an indoor farmers market day and poultry swap. It will be an exciting day and I hope to see you there!

As a special treat for visitors, this market features the Bee My Local Honey event, which includes education, tastings and more. Visitors to this market will be able to swap seeds with their neighbors.

The seed swap works on a simple principle that each gardener and farmer in our area can and should save seeds. Bring a little of your favorite seed and swap with your neighbor a bit of your carrot seed for a bit of their lettuce seed. Growing our local seed saving promotes resilience for our food safety, our local economy and for our diversity. Seed catalogs will also be available for free.

The day also features a chicken swap, working quite like the seed swap, chicken owners can bring one chicken to swap for another. Farmers will also be selling chicks and chickens at the market too.

Lastly, while the market is going on one of the farm series classes will be occurring. Hugelkultur: Ultimate Raised Beds, taught by Patrick McLendon. will run from 9 a.m. to noon.

Hugelkultur (pronounced “hoogle culture”) is making raised garden beds filled with rotten wood. This makes for raised garden beds loaded with organic material, nutrients, air pockets for the roots of what you plant, etc.

As the years pass, the deep soil of your raised garden bed becomes incredibly rich and loaded with soil life. As the wood shrinks, it makes more tiny air pockets – so your Hugelkultur becomes sort of self-tilling.

The first few years, the composting process will slightly warm your soil, giving you a slightly longer growing season. The woody matter helps to keep nutrient excess from passing into the ground water – and then re-feeding that to your garden plants later.

Plus, by holding so much water, Hugelkultur could be part of a system for growing garden crops in the desert with no irrigation.

Farmers market vendors are welcome and should call the ag center to register ahead of time. The ag center is located at 156 School Road in Mill Spring.