Four Seasons Winter Farmers Market Brings Summer to Winter

2/18/2021

Locally grown tomatoes in winter? Fresh-picked lettuce, arugula, kale in February? Yes, you can find them at the Four Seasons Winter Farmers Market every Saturday.

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Locally grown, ripe tomatoes in Winter?

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Fresh lettuce, arugula,

and kale in February?

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You'll find them at the Four

Seasons Winter Farmers Market

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every Saturday through mid-March.

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You're watching the Local

News Network brought to you by

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CMIT Solutions and The

Overlook at Edgemont Highlands.

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I'm Wendy Graham Settle.

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Are you craving the ripe summer time taste

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of fresh tomatoes in your salads?

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Get to the Four Seasons

Greenhouse and Nursery

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right at 10:00 AM on Saturdays

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when the nursery's Winter

Farmers Market opens.

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Early bird shoppers deplete

the weeks supply quickly.

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Gail and Vic Vanik have owned and operated

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the Four Seasons Greenhouse and Nursery

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for more than 22 years.

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Located of Colorado State

Highway 145, North of Cortez.

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The 40 acre complex of greenhouses,

nurseries, and tree farm

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attract local gardeners

from Southwest Colorado

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and gardeners from as far way as Phoenix,

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Salt Lake City, and Grand Junction.

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In the Spring and Summer,

the place is bursting

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with blooms, vegetable

starts, succulent plants,

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trees, and every

gardening tool imaginable.

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It wasn't until 8 years ago when owner,

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Vic Vanik learned he had dangerously

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high cholesterol and

high blood pressure that

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the Winter Farmers Market was born.

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Yeah I had some high cholesterol issues,

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and I started, we started growing a lot

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of our own stuff in the greenhouse

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and people were coming in and saying,

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"we want to buy that," and we were saying

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"you can't have that, that's our dinner."

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You know? So, one thing led to another

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and I went "Ah maybe we

should start growing some

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extra stuff" and so we started growing it,

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and people were still coming in.

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And then just kind of

like "why don't we do it,

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there's nobody around here who had

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a winter farmers market.

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And so like we have

greenhouses and we don't have

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anything to do with them

in December, January,

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February, and early March.

They're pretty much empty.

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So, I know another, once again

another light bulb went off

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and thought maybe we should start one,

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and it did start of pretty slowly.

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We had some people that were

ya know we had some of them

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we have some, some charter members here

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like Mick and Joy and

just a couple other ones,

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but it started off fairly slow.

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But it's been building

and getting traction

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more and more and more and

now the last couple of years

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it's just been, ya know,

pretty busy as you can see.

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Like many of farmers markets in Summer,

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The Four Seasons Market features

artists, arts and crafts,

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and artisanal foods like

salsas, homemade cinnamon rolls

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and even freshly made, warm donuts.

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We grow all the produce that we have here.

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So we have a variety from

lettuce and peas and tomatoes.

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In the fall, we have broccoli

and cabbage and kohlrabi.

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That's amazing

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And it's amazing so that's

what we like to have

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a place for the community

to come and get fresh food

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and that's what, ya know, our goal is.

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But folks like to see arts and crafts too,

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so we have some vendors that have earrings

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and some blown glass and

we have cooking spices.

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A vendor that sells goat

cheese, jams, jellies,

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just pretty much a variety of everything

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you could think of, but

it's all locally made

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or locally grown.

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The Winter Farmers Market

starts the Saturday

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after the Summer Farmers

Market in Cortez ends

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its season in early November.

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It will run through

mid-March when the Vanik's

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need the market space to get ready

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for the spring planting season.

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Hours are 10:00 AM to

1:00 PM on Saturdays.

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Masks are required and social

distancing is encouraged.

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For more information and for directions,

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visit fourseasonsgreenhouse.com

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Thanks for watching this edition of

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the Local News Network,

I'm Wendy Graham Settle.

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