ECO-Vrindaban Board Meeting Minutes 08/18/2019
ECO-Vrindaban Board Meeting Minutes 08/18/2019
Mission Statement: ECO-Vrindaban promotes cow protection, local agriculture, and above all, loving Krishna, as envisioned by Srila Prabhupada, ISKCON New Vrindaban’s Founder-Acharya.
Participating Directors: Anuttama, Chaitanya Mangala (chair), Jamuna Jivani (board secretary), Olivia, Ranaka, and Vraja.
Participating Advisors: Kripamaya (partial attendance)
1. Cow Fest Recap
Olivia reported some highlights from the Happy Cow Festival, held March 29, 2019:
- 100-150 guests, many of which were locals
- Demonstrations, including incense making
- Devananda played live music
- Some of the cows were decorated for the event
- Nityodita and Anandavidya told stories about the cows
- Kids’ activities
This was a positive first experience in planning and hosting this festival which the organizers can build on in future years.
Here’s a link to a Wheeling Intelligencer new article about the festival.
2. Ranaka’s Monthly Report:
Lalita Gopi (Temple Barn):
- There are eight cows being milked: Subhadra, Surabhi, Cintamani, Parijata, Sita, Vamsika, Jaya Radhe, and Usha
- 22 gal of milk are produced daily.
- 20 gal of yogurt and 30 lb of butter are produced weekly.
- There are five calves: Prahlada, Satyabhama, Puspavati, Narada, and Dhruva.
- Lakshmi was dried off and moved to the Valley Barn to be bred by Dharma.
- Anjali was dried off, retired, and moved to Bahulaban.
- Joshua Rama is helping with the milking
Ray (General Farm Hand):
- Hauled four dump trailer loads of aged manure from Nandagram to the Valley high tunnel site for a total of eight loads.
- Cut, baled, and stacked 243 bales in the barns. He was assisted by Joshua Rama, Daniel, and Caitanya Bhagavat. Total hay baled and stored in the Valley and Nandagram Barns is now 681 800-lb round bales.
- Brush-hogged various pastures.
- Removed and piled a build-up of manure from outside the Temple Barn into a staging area to be moved to a composting area at a later date.
- Made repairs to tractor and hay wagon tires along with repair work on the hay baler stringing system.
Caitanya Bhagavat (Cow Care):
- Daily cow care at Nandagram and Bahulaban, included:
- monitored the herd numbers
- health checks
- arranged and facilitated veterinarian visits
- checked and maintained fence lines
- mowed and weed-whacked at Nandagram and the Valley Barn
- Put up a new, high tensile fence at the milking barn pasture with assistance from Daniel.
- Cleared the vegetation circling the electric fence around the Nandagram bullpen.
Suchandra (Gardens):
Community Garden:
- cleared area for next planting of green beans
- trimmed tomatoes and sprayed with organic disease repellent
- harvested tomatoes, green beans, green/hot peppers, cucumbers, zinnias and marigolds.
- secured fencing to keep the deer out
- mowed and weed-whacked with help from others
Teaching Garden:
- Mowed and weeded every week.
- Planted last crop of marigolds.
- Laid the last of the mulch in rows and beds.
- Deadheaded marigolds and lilies
- Harvested green beans, tomatoes, gladiolas, and small marigolds.
- Harvested blueberries at Bahulaban for the second time. 5 lb were sold at Ratha Yatra.
- Harvested and delivered to the temple during July 2019:
- Zinnias – 52
- Lilies – 200
- Small marigolds – 1,700
- Large marigold – 828
- Gladiolas – 70
- Green pepper – 2
- Tomato – 20
- Hot pepper – 16
- Green beans – 66 lb
Vidya (Vidya’s Garden):
- Angie worked on the high tunnel
- 300-500 flowers were picked, three days per week
- Tomatoes were picked daily.
- Kale was used from the garden for smoothies at the promotion in Pittsburgh
Vidya’s Garden harvest totals for July 2019:
- Large marigolds – 525
- Small marigold – 7182
- Gladiolas – 95
- Lillies – 1291
- Kale – 107 bunches
- Lettuce – 8 heads
- Green beans – 73.5 pounds
- Red cabbage – 2 Heads
- Roma tomatoes – 102 pounds
- Big tomatoes – 236 pounds
- Cherry tomatoes – 37 pounds
- Peppers – 18 pounds
- Bitter melon – 38 pounds
Lila (Nandagram Garden):
- Harvested and delivered to the temple kitchen (all quantities reported in pounds):
- Zucchini – 147.5
- Summer squash-4.75
- Sweet peas – 9
- Beets – 8.75
- Green beans – 46.75
- Cherry tomatoes – 13.5
- Cucumber – 30.25
- Hot pepper – 1.75
- Roma tomatoes – 9
- Large tomatoes – 40.5
- Carrots – 2.5
Ranaka (General Manager):
- worked with Gintras and John Blackmore in regard to bringing water and electric to the two high tunnels in the Valley and the one at Vidya’s. All three high tunnels now have water and electric, and the automatic side curtains are set up and working properly.
- With no changes, the herd count remains at 66.
3. Next ECO-V Board & Staff Meeting
The next ECO-V board/staff meeting will be on September 27 at 10:00 AM.
Here’s a link to the ECO-Vrindaban website.
For regular updates, please visit, like and follow the ECO-V Facebook page.
