Gretchen is at the old Lowndes County Courthouse now, setting up for Valdosta Farm Days, 9AM to 1PM today.
By Colter Anstaetts reported from Okra Paradise Farms for WALB yesterday,
Lowndes County farmers ready for “Farm Days”,
Lowndes County farmers will be at the courthouse in downtown
Valdosta from 9 a.m.to 1 p.m. selling their crops. This is the
fourth year for the “Farm Days” program, and Lowndes County farmers
are looking forward to it.
“I’m definitely looking forward to Farm days,” said Gretchen
Quarterman, a farmer in Hahira. “It’s an excellent opportunity for
farmers, not only to sell but for local people to get local, fresh
food. And, when we buy from local farmers we support the local
economy.”
-jsq
Not wanting to miss a chance to pay tribute to my friend, the 103+ year old Dr. Elsie Quarterman, I’m sitting down to reflect on my remembrances of this wonderful woman who befriended me and many other botanical and conservation colleagues. It was the summer of 1976 when I moved to Nashville to join the young staff of the Tennessee Heritage Program as its first botanist. The program, now well established with the State Department of Environment and Conservation, benefited greatly from the prior work of Dr. Quarterman (Elsie) and many of her graduate students at Vanderbilt University who had done vegetation and rare plant studies in the Central Basin of Tennessee.
For help with understanding and conserving the best examples of cedar glades and their many endemic, nearly endemic, or otherwise rare Tennessee plant species, I and other colleagues frequently turned to Elsie and her Continue reading
