Dilmun Hill Student Farm

After their year-long rest, we’re finally producing shiitakes from the 100 logs we inoculated on Hill Day 2024! We soak them for 24 hours, wait 7-10 days, then harvest the mature mushrooms. This summer, we are selling them during our CSA pick-ups on Wednesdays from 4-7 pm at the farm and on campus at our Thursday markets. In the fall, look out for them at Anabel’s Grocery, Cornell’s student-run grocery store.

We also inoculated 30 more logs with your help this past semester during Hill Day 2025, so that we can reap an even more abundant harvest next year! 

Have you ever heard of honeyberries? Also called haskaps, these supersized (~1 inch long) raisin-shaped fruits in the honeysuckle family have a mixed-berry flavor that depends on the variety. While uncommon in the US, they are popular in China, Japan, and Slavic cultures, and are well-suited to Dilmun’s environment.

This past Hill Day 2025, we planted 42 individual bushes of 6 cultivars- Boreal Beast, Boreal Beauty, Boreal Blizzard, Indigo Gem, Indigo Treat, and Tundra- arranged to promote pollination and extend our harvest season. While they won’t be ready to eat this summer, look forward to seeing these in future CSA shares and markets!

This May, we were joined by pawpaw expert and Cornell alum Bob Meadows to learn how to graft pawpaws – a tropical-tasting fruit native to North America. Grafting involves attaching the rootstock of trees with unknown/less desirable characteristics to the budding branches of cultivars with more desirable characteristics. In June the seedlings began to leaf out, and in July we fertilized and repotted them. We’ll plant these this coming winter so that future students can enjoy the fruits of even more abundant trees!

Last year we harvested over 150 lbs. from the pawpaw trees planted at Dilmun in 1999. Since we don’t know their cultivars, we are documenting characteristics like fruit size and canopy cover, and mapping the orchard to determine where the best spots for our grafts will be.

Indigenous communities are some of the most food insecure populations in the USA and are often geographically separated from their traditional foods. This project uses container-based gardening and freely available fertilizers, such as human waste, fish effluent, and black soldier fly frass, to grow culturally relevant foods and ceremonial tobacco. Seeds are returned to members of the Haudenosaunee through the American Indian & Indigenous Studies Program.

One of the high tunnels is dedicated to a research project that seeks to recycle nutrients from human and agricultural waste into fertilizer. Connecting sanitation and agriculture in this way can add valuable nutrients to the soil where they are needed.

• Grow as you go: 'Peecycling' helps plants & compost thrive
• Recycling human waste for a more prosperous planet

From planning which crops to grow and tending them throughout the season, to harvesting – growing food is our passion. We love to experiment with novel crops and methods, and to share our abundant harvest with the Cornell community. 

Look for our produce at Anabel's Grocery, visit our market stand on campus, or check out our CSA and u-pick options.