Stories and photos by Danielle Wallingsford Kirkland
The Jackson County Farmers Market is now open and offering locally grown produce. Leroy Higginbotham manages the operation and said this year’s weather gave local growers a bit of a slow start.
“We open in the first week of June, unless it’s real hot,” Higginbotham said. “This business is controlled by produce. When it gets hot and we get ripe produce, we are open. If it is real cold, like this time, we waited up until June.”
Higginbotham, who on Saturday was selling yellow squash, collards and green tomatoes, explained that the weather has been cold and wet, so things are ripening a little later than growers and buyers alike had hoped for.
“You see these red tomatoes?” Higginbotham said, laughing and pointing to his baskets of green tomatoes. “They are supposed to be red. I was picking yesterday afternoon, and I said ‘okay here is red one’, but it just mushed in my hand.”
He said it will probably be another week or two for ripe red tomatoes, as well as watermelons, if that’s what you’re visiting the market for.
As the growing season continues, Higginbotham said he will have different kinds of squash, cucumbers, red and green tomatoes, green beans, watermelon, cantaloupe and okra. He hopes to offer corn, but says the rain may have affected it too.
“The silver queen corn is high. They’re tufting at the top, but I don’t see any ears. I’m afraid it may be a bad year for corn. That’s just the way it is sometimes,” Higginbotham said, adding that with the weather, it’s always either not enough water or too much. “The only time it’s just right is when your’e irrigating.”
Higginbotham was selling alongside four or five other local growers, some with squash, others potatoes. James Craft, was enjoying his day at the market, selling green beans and cucumbers. Craft has been at the market as long as Higginbotham, which he recalls is 10 or 12 years.
“Somewhere along, maybe more,” Craft said.
Craft has always grown his own food, and though he can’t recall quite why he started growing enough to sell he said he just enjoys it.
“Meeting people. That’s my favorite part,” Craft said. “That’s one reason why I keep doing it.”
Craft said he would encourage people to shop at the farmers market.
“You get better produce come to the farmers market,” Craft said. “ It’s homegrown. You go to the grocery store and you don’t know where it’s coming from or how it’s grown.”
Higginbotham agreed with that sentiment when asked why he would encourage shoppers to stop by the farmers market.
“Home grown and a thousand miles. That’s the difference in the farmers market and the grocery store,” Higginbotham said.
For that reason, the farmers market only allows sellers who grow their own produce and have a growers permit.
“No one can sell here unless you have a growers permit,” Higginbotham said, explaining that getting one is as simple as visiting the county agents office and filling out a form. “It don’t cost nothing and that way we can look at it and know what you’re growing.”
The Jackson County Farmers Market is located at 218 Bob Jones Road in Scottsboro. It is open Tuesday. Thursdays and Saturday through October from 6 a.m. until 12 p.m.
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