SCHEDULE & DETAILS
PETALUMA FAIRGROUNDS
175 Fairgrounds Dr, Petaluma, CA FARMERS MARKET!
Stop by our Farmers Market for a variety of fresh, locally-grown fruits, vegetables, meats and more. FOOD TRUCKS & VENDORS! Organic flavors with pasture-based meat and vegetarian options. |
NOON - 6PM
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AND MUCH, MUCH MORE.... (ongoing activity details below)
LIVE MUSIC BY
THE HUBBUB CLUB 12pm
ODDJOB ENSEMBLE 1:30pm
MISS MOONSHINE 3pm
BUCK THRIFTY! 4:30pm
THE HUBBUB CLUB 12pm
ODDJOB ENSEMBLE 1:30pm
MISS MOONSHINE 3pm
BUCK THRIFTY! 4:30pm
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To get involved in this year's big games, learn more, or to host a game on behalf of your farm, business or organization, get in touch.
ONGOING GAMES & ACTIVITIES
BUTTER CHURNING
With fresh, organic cream from a local dairy, a single mason jar and a whole lotta shakin', you can make delicious butter all on your own! But can you do it faster than everyone else? Find out at the butter churning contest with Straus Family Creamery!
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WHEELBARROW RELAY
Get the carbon cycle moving with North Coast Brewing in this down-and-dirty relay for soil-loving speed demons of all ages. And find out how this brewery partners with a farm, turning spent grains into a gardeners' black gold! Adults, try the relay with a beer in hand... Just don't spill the compost!
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HAY BALE TOSS
Farming ain't easy. Neither is tossing a hay bale. But contenders in this game of barnyard brawn will be rolling up their sleeves and hurling bales as far as they can. Do you have what it takes?
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HONEY BEE HUSTLE
Back by popular demand! Join the Sonoma County Beekeepers Association in racing to fill your Honey Comb with Nectar! Participants race with eyedroppers to liquid-filled test tube flowers, then return to deposit their “nectar” in a honeycomb. Whoever collects the most “nectar” wins. Participants receive a delicious “Honey Stix”.
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WATERMELON SEED SPITTING
Put those seedless watermelons away, and join us to celebrate the ancient art of seed spitting. Compete against world famous Dina Izzo of the Ecological Farming Association to mark your place in agrarian history. Gold goes to both the greatest spitter as well as to the farmer who grew the winning seed! Brace yourself for Agricultural aerodynamics!
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SQUASH BOWLINGPerfect your aim for this harvest-time favorite with our friends from Farmster who believe that from the big actions to the small everyday acts, everyone has a role in creating a resilient, local food system, with happy healthy people.
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HARVEST TIME GRAPE TOSSHarvest is a bountiful time here in the North Bay, with plenty of extra grapes to gobble up! Grab a partner, grab a grape, and take aim with this can't miss game hosted by the Napa Farmers Guild.
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T-POST POUNDINGGather 'round to watch one of the most exciting olympic events of the year, the t-post pounding competition! In this game of brute strength, farmers and ranchers race to drive these ubiquitous fence posts into the ground. As always, this one's sure to keep you on the edge of your seat.
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APPLE PRESSING
Join Slow Food for an interactive apple pressing demo! We'll be gathering up apples, including our own local gem, Sonoma County's prized Gravenstein, and pressing juice--offering some sweet hydration for all our agrarian athletes.
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OYSTER SHUCK'N'CHUCK
Farmers of the sea? Yes! Join Hog Island Oyster Company to learn about our agrarian comrades beyond the land, masters of sustainable aquaculture. And try your hand at the Shuck'N'Chuck: after slurping down a tasty, freshly-shucked oyster, take aim with that shell into one of several buckets in this test of epicurean and aquatic precision.
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Always a favorite, sack up for this classic, all-ages game. Let the hay and hair fly and we'll see you at the finish line!
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SOIL ZONEIt all starts with soil! Stop by for games and activities about the building blocks of healthy food with the Sonoma & Gold Ridge Resource Conservation Districts together with the Natural Resources Conservation Service!
Learn to Identify Soil Types by Texture Testing: Learn all about different soil types and how to tell them apart! Plant Lasso: You are a plant, and you’re hungry. To get what you need, you’ll have to pull them in to your body. How? With a lasso, of course! And you may not be the only plant in the garden. Try to lasso sunlight, oxygen, nitrogen, CO2, water and nutrients within 5 minutes—the first plant to do so is the winner! Soil Organism Toss “Teeming with Life”: Soil is teeming with life! What and where are these organisms living in the soil? Test your aim with this soil ecosystem toss game. Compost Relay Race: You and a friend race to create a compost pile in just 2 minutes! Piles will be judged on their contents – green matter, brown matter, food scraps and trash. |
THE PIPE ROLL
Irrigation on the farm is all about balance, especially here in drought-prone California. And in this game, balance is key. Teams compete across a wide open field, passing a small ball through a series of long, heavy, unwieldy irrigation pipes. Drop the ball? Start over! First team to get to the opposite side of the field wins! Thanks to New Family Farm!
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Crooked carrots? Speckled apples? Lopsided pumpkin? We see the true beauty in all of them. Whether you harvested those gems from your own field or garden or if you chanced upon that one-of-a-kind specimen at your local farmers market, bring them to the Agrarian Games and enter to win this pageant of alternative and edible aesthetics, brought to you by Preserve Farm Kitchens!
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CHICKEN POOP BINGOYou read that right. Place your bets on a chicken run bingo board. We'll unleashes the chickens and the crowd waits for them to do its business on a number. If you've got the winning number, you get the glory.
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TOMATO TASTING"Knowledge is knowing that a tomato is a fruit.
Wisdom is knowing not to put it in a fruit salad." 
The most refined palates in the land will gather for this blind tomato tasting, searching for terroir and sweet undertones, hints of barnyard and a smooth finish. Bring your homegrown and enter to win bragging rights as the tip top tomato.
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CABRACCINO:
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TRACTOR RACEBig or small, come pedal your way to agricultural glory in this game of clod-hopping speed...
Just play nice and don't get too boastful, as evidenced in the video of this year's tractor race training sessions. Thanks to the Sonoma County Farm Bureau's Young Farmer & Rancher club for lending us these speed demons for a day! |
GIANT ZUCCHINI COMPETITION
Size does matter in this contest of colossal cucurbiteae! Bring us the biggest summer squash from your farm or garden and see how it sizes up against the competition. All naturally-grown varietals eligible. Winner based on overall length.
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SOIL YOUR UNDIESHealthy soil means hungry soil. With proper management, the ground beneath your crops will teem with millions of tiny lifeforms, all busy transferring carbon and nutrients, eating and decomposing organic matter in a process that helps plants grow organically. So how do you measure the biological activity of your soil? Enter the "Soil My Undies" test. Simply bury a pair of white, 100% cotton undies beneath your soil, come back two months later and dig them up. Sterile, lifeless soil will keep your tighty-whities clean and intact whereas busy, organically thriving soil will eat away at your briefs, processing them through the carbon cycle, leaving nothing but an elastic strap!
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AN AGRARIAN VOCABULARY FOR THE 21ST CENTURYAn interactive artwork that collaborates with farmers and the greater public to create new words to express the changes we are experiencing as our world rapidly changes due to climate change and other manmade events.
Brought you by The Bureau of Linguistical Reality |
EXTREME PEICE RATE
A game of skill and speed, contestants compete to toss as many balls into a 5 gallon bucket as possible within one minute, and must take care to only toss the correct color ball they have been assigned into their bucket. The contestant who fills their bucket first in each round wins a "golden ticket" representing the $5 they would earn for their bucket as a farm laborer. However, points are then taken off for every wrong color ball in their bucket, and these points represent the dollars that would have earned per bucket. This game explores the realities faced by farmworkers who work for "piece rate", instead of hourly like most professions.
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AND MANY, MANY MORE...
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All proceeds from this event support our 501c3 non-profit work building sustainable food and farming systems through policy advocacy and on- the-ground programs that create more resilient family farms, communities and ecosystems.
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