Mixon Farms

Today we are celebrating the passing of the key of Mix and Fruit Farms to Manatee County. Starting the day with a ceremony, then volunteer planting, and then fun community activities. It feels so amazing for the community to come together and just really celebrate the preservation of this really special space. Today we celebrate the strong contributions Mix and Farms has provided for more than 84 years. Five plus generations of Mix and Family and friends have grown, packed, and shipped some of Florida's finest citrus where we stand today. We're going to preserve that legacy of agricultural heritage and really the things that people have always loved about Mix and Fruit. The wonderful events that we're going to be able to have, we're going to preserve a little piece of citrus grove so that people can walk through and kind of remember that history and enjoy it. We are also planning to have a library on the site which is amazingly exciting. It will be such a community resource for this area. One of the biggest potentials for this property is to provide space for kids to get their hands in the dirt, learn about agriculture, and really train that next generation of farmers. So not only are we preserving that agricultural heritage, but we're bringing it into the future in Manatee County. Volunteers were briefed and they're starting to be guided by FNGLA, by the Property Management Department, and the Master Gardeners on where to plant and how to plant a Florida friendly landscape, which you'll see here and starting to bloom. We had somebody that sent us the picture of the sign, the Mix and Farms, and it's One of the things that we're able to get started almost immediately is a weekend farmers market here. And that'something that has definitely been missing in this area. There aren't any grocery stores near here. People have a little bit of a lack of fresh, healthy, local food, and so we'really excited to fill that gap. We're trying to gauge interest in a friend's group, so if anyone's interested in that, we do have a couple dates coming up that they can attend though. They believe it's November 20th and December 8th. Those will actually be held here. It's not specific to helping Mix and Farms, but any friends of parks that would be, if that'something somebody's interested in, they could come to them. The Mix and Family had the opportunity to sell to developers, but decided to sell to Manatee County instead to preserve their legacy within the community. Watch the full video of the ceremony on our YouTube channel at Manatee Educational TV. Music