During the weekend of October 3 and 4, 2009, the Okanis Garden was one of 19 local farms featured on the Kaw Valley Farm Tour. Farm Tour hosts included the Kansas State Research & Extension, Lawrence Convention & Visitors Bureau, the Community Mercantile, the Community Mercantile Educational Foundation, and Live Well Lawrence. An estimated 250 farm tourists visited the Okanis Garden and a Prairie Moon Waldorf School open house. Visitors were shown the water-conserving drip irrigation system, heavy mulching practices, rain barrel system, soils display, and worm bin. The University of Kansas Center for Sustainability recruited students interested in local foods to help escort garden visitors: Hope and Katy (not pictured), Margaret and Cindy, Zuozhou, Nancy, and Caleb. On evaluation forms, farm tour visitors scored the Okanis Garden an average of 4.7 on a scale of 5, with 4 being “good” and 5 being “excellent.”
The farm tour was reviewed in Farm Talk: Regional Weekly Agricultural Newspaper. In an October 13, 2009, article: “Area agriculture highlighted on Kaw Valley Farm Tour,” Nora Cleland wrote, “One of the most unusual tour stops was at the Prairie Moon Waldorf School Market Garden, north of Lawrence. The 50 pupils in the private school, pre-school through fifth grade, have a large vegetable and flower garden which serves as an outdoor classroom. Volunteers oversee the teaching project which is financed through grants. The children sell the produce and flowers locally to the organic foods market, independent natural foods restaurants and the Farmers’ Market in Lawrence. Irrigation is from rain water collected off the roof of the school.”
