Strong start for Farmers Market

The county’s Farmers Market opened its season in the parking lot of Greene’s Technical Education Center Saturday.
“We’re off to a wonderful start,“ beamed Bob Burkholder of Ruckersville, who helped organize the market.
He was referring to the approximate 17 vendors who showed up to peddle their produce on this year’s first day. Seventeen, he said, “was the high number last year.“
And what’s more, shoppers “started out really strong about 8:15 a.m.,“ said Stanardsville’s Herb Heroy, who brought fresh-laid eggs to sell.
“Yahoo!“ commented Earl Moyers of Stanardsville. He and his wife Peggy were there to sell their early crop of beets, potatoes and onions.
Others brought cabbage, berries, vegetable and herb plants; and even Asian pear trees
That’s only the beginning. As the season progresses, according to the vendors, folks will be able to buy locally-grown tomatoes, peppers, cucumbers, yellow squash, zucchini, beans, herbs, flowers and more.
Kevin Elliott of Ruckersville and his wife and Leah, for example, showed up Saturday with tomato and pepper plants and beets. But they will have “basil, beans, squash, cucumbers maybe even sunflowers and zinnias,“ he says.
The market, says Burkholder, is “oriented toward locally grown foods (and) we encourage some crafts but no yard sales or flea markets.“
Burkholder’s wife Joanne, along with Edna Estes of Ruckersville, was selling Farmers’ Care bags on the steps of a shed built by Tech Center building trade students. “The bags are like Go Green bags in that they are environmentally proper,“ said Joanne Burkholder.
Profits from the sale of the bags will go to benefit the children of Deputy Chad Carr, who was killed when his car swerved into the path of an oncoming tractor-trailer on Route 230 last month. Some profits will also go to the Sheriff’s Office’s Project Lifesaver. That program furnishes those with Alzheimer’s and some other disabilities with bracelets with tracking devices built into them.
The shed built by the students is for sale, and there were other non-edible products for sale as well.
Jamie K. Reaser of Stanardsville was selling Asian pear trees, frozen wine berries, mint and honey tea and eggs, but she was also selling books she had written and photographs she had taken.
In addition to cabbage, onions, potatoes, and plants, Joyce Powell of Stanardsville brought tea towels, baked goods and pickles to market.
Tom Silliman of Sweet Dog Farm in Stanardsville was selling eggs, coffee, donut holes and chickens he had raised and slaughtered himself.
Burkholder says that there are regulations regarding the sale of such items as baked goods, pickled products and poultry. Those who would like to know what they are can visit the Virginia Department of Agriculture website at http://www.vdacs.virginia.gov. 
It would seem that Greene’s farmers’ market is expanding, and at the same time, getting more organized.
The county’s Ruritans had run the market in years past, but this year, “Greene County Farm Bureau is partnering with the Ruritans,“ says Burkholder. And, “a committee has been established to rejuvenate it.“
The market will run at least through the third Saturday in September or “until the gardens are gone,“ Burkholder concludes.