Visit to Juniper Jungle Permaculture Farm

Zion (grade K) hangin' with the pigs and sporting a
mustache in honor of Mr. B's birthday

By Inanna (grade 6)

On Wednesday April 27, Black Butte School visited Juniper Jungle Permaculture Farm just east of Bend. Juniper Jungle is an organic, permaculture, biodiverse farm. They grow heirloom plants and raise heirloom animals. Heirloom food is grown from seeds or animals that have been passed down from generation to generation. The farm is a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) farm, meaning they sell to families and at farmers markets. By now you might wonder how they got their name, well, they are growing a jungle in the junipers, since they used permaculture principals in growing food. Sometimes permaculture principals mean that the farm could look messy like a jungle.

Jessica showing us the "jungle" in their greenhouse

Our tour guide, Jessica, did an amazing job showing us around. Jessica showed us their beautiful, giant pigs. Next, she showed us the cows. They have two milking cows. After we checked out the cows, we headed over to the greenhouses. Their greenhouses are wild and crazy. They don’t do anything to contain the wildness of the plants, they just let them do what they want and produce their seeds. This returns needed nutrients back to the soil. We all ate our fair share of dill before walking outside for some rock chucking. No, we did not actually CHUCK the rocks, we carried them. Our task was to clear the field of rocks. There were a few giant monster rocks buried several feet underground. We all dug and dug until we couldn’t dig anymore. Sheesh were we tired.

Students helping remove large rocks and
weeds from a field

After chucking rocks, we went and checked out the canal. Juniper Jungle pulls the water, in a canal, from the Deschutes River. Soon after, we had lunch and wrote in our journals. All in all, our Juniper Jungle Farm visit was amazing and fun. Hopefully we will be able to go back soon! If you want to learn more about their farm check out their website: http://juniperjunglefarm.com