PCSWCD Tree & Plant Sale opens
DOVER-FOXCROFT — In the last few years, Piscataquis County Soil and Water Conservation District’s Tree & Plant Sale has evolved, quite significantly. The sale is now a new and improved system of supporting and showcasing local, organic farms and their products. The Tree & Plant Sale is one of our largest fundraisers, which helps keep PCSWCD’s general operations healthy as we aim to host more free and affordable conservation programs in the region.
The sale provides an opportunity to generate income, while giving back to our local farmers and highlight the availability of local organic plants and trees in our county. Buying locally not only helps our economy, but by planting natives, perennials and pollinator-friendly plants benefits our native wildlife and gardens. Bringing beneficial insects and pollinators to our gardens helps to increase our harvests of fruits, berries, flowers, vegetables and forests! It’s a win, win for everyone involved!
Before the COVID-19 global pandemic, customers would pick up their plant and tree orders at the USDA Service Center, where the Piscataquis County SWCD is co-located. The office would smell earthy and the plants were all laid out on a tarp, taking up much of the office floor, while we patiently waited for customers to pick up their orders throughout the week.
In 2020, we decided to partner with Piscataquis Regional Food Center to offer a “Soil Health for Gardeners,” day where other organizations would join us such as UMaine Extension Piscataquis County, Jackson Regenerational Farms, Natural Resources Conservation Services and the program “Garden in the Box” would be demonstrated by PRFC. Unfortunately, due to the disruption in the world at that time, this was canceled and we were forced to offer a safe curbside pick up option at the PRFC. Despite the change in plans, the fundraiser was still successful as many people wanted to support us and our partners highlighted in the sale. We saw the rise in people’s desire to garden and get outside in the spring and summer of 2020.
In 2021, much of everything was online ordering, Zoom meetings, events were remote and people were still socially distant and enjoying the outdoors more than ever before! The world remained upside down and people were continuing to figure out how to maneuver without changing the things they loved, making sacrifices to feel comfortable to live their lives. We knew we needed to shift our sale to online to keep up with the everchanging times. The change to online ordering also saved us a lot of paper, time and cost from not having to print out the beloved catalog (we know some of you still miss it!).
Although online ordering was a transition, we got through it, and in 2021 we were able to offer new products such as Haleys Inc landscaping material and blueberry sod from Sunkhaze farms. We continued our solid partnerships with North Branch Farms, Checkerberry Farms, and Ripley Farms for our organic perennial flowers, herbs, shrubs and fruit trees. Again, the sale was a hit — doubling the amount of customers from the previous year and tripling our income — and showed us how much interest people were gaining. The pick up was held at the Law Farm Nature Trails where PCSWCD staff and the NRCS soil scientist were available to answer questions regarding soil health tips for gardeners.
Last year we planned a ribbon-cutting ceremony for our newly-built education classroom at the Law Farm Nature Trails and we decided to pair the grand opening of the classroom with our Tree & Plant Sale pick up, along with a ‘Soil Health Day’ event that we had so longed for. The sale remained a huge success as customers were starting to seek us out for the quality plants grown by our reliable producers. The idea of having a fruit tree pre-sale that we launched in February, was spot on, since we sold out of all our trees, raised money for PCSWCD’s own educational apple orchard that is now planted and located at the Law Farm, and marked continued growth in our overall fundraising efforts.
At 2022’s Soil Health Day, we were joined by our partners NRCS Soil Scientists, Thompson Free Library, UMaine Extension Piscataquis, accompanied by Timberdoodle band, Piscataquis County Chamber of Commerce, and Cub Scout Pack 61. It was a day to remember!
This year, we have evolved once again and will be offering a new and improved online ordering system with our fruit tree pre-sale. We have a delicious variety of apple and pear trees available and in March we will be opening up our full tree & plant sale with our favorite farmers, Checkerberry Farms, Ripley Farms, and North Branch Farms. Not only will we be offering perennial plants and fruit trees, but expanding to offer local organic vegetable seedlings with a new producer that you may already know, Marr Pond Farm! To add to the excitement, we will be offering Frasier Fir tree seedlings from Halls Christmas Tree Farm as well! PCSWCD staff are beyond excited to keep our sale going strong in 2023 and are here to improve the ways we can keep this offering easy, affordable, interesting, and local.
Thank you to all that have supported us and our farmers in the past, we look forward to serving you again and hope to see new customers this year! You can find more information about our tree & plant sale online at www.piscataquisswcd.org and for those who still have their hearts set on ordering in person, we are located at 42 Engdahl Drive, Dover-Foxcroft ME to assist you with the process. Here’s to another year of our favorite tree & plant sale fundraiser!