Certified Organic Vegetables, Fruit, Flowers & Wool Since 1985
What’s the news of the past week?
Well… like all first weeks back, it was busy: lots of new CSA members, lots of excited customers placing orders, and lots to harvest and weed. And as you can imagine, after taking a few weeks off, it takes us a second to get back up to full speed. Plus there’s always some sort of technology issue to fix (printer problems, email issues, time clock tumult). All things considered, it was a pretty normal week and it was nice to see everyone again.
It’s the first farming week of the year! Welcome back to returning CSA members, and welcome to the many new folks joining our Community! We’re excited for you to get your first boxes.
After four weeks off, we’re ready to start picking, washing, packing, weeding, seeding, and all the other tasks that are needed to get our produce to your tables. The bright, sunny, dry days are quite a change from the rainy, grey, muddy conditions as we started our break. Cover crops have germinated and most fields are covered with some amount of green.
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Somehow it’s December and we find ourselves almost at the end of another year. Time flies when you’re having fun. And/or when you’re really busy farming. We’ve got this week, next week, and then a four-week break (until the week of January 13).
The weather and surroundings make it clear that seasons are changing. The sun is noticeably weaker, and it gets dark so early. The trees have been turning colors and losing their leaves. The hills haven’t yet turned green, and the fields of cover crops have yet to germinate, so things are looking a little brown. We know that things will look very different very soon, but it takes time.
Now that things are drying out, we can do more transplanting (lots of starts in the greenhouse!), planting (plenty of summer crop fields that need cover crop seed!), and taking down summer fields (mowing, pulling drip tape, etc.). There’s plenty to do when it comes to getting the farm ready to take a break, and last week was too short and too wet to get anything done. So it’s a good thing we had a few days off for Thanksgiving to rest up before the final sprint over the finish line.
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A telltale sign that we’re about to get our first big fall rain is every tractor in use and everyone operating at a slightly frenetic, faster than usual pace.
Last Monday and Tuesday, every tractor on the farm was accounted for: mowing fall crops, turning over beds, spreading compost, planting cover crop seed (until long after dark – that’s why tractors have headlights!), transplanting, and planting tulips. We even squeezed an all-hands-on-deck hand transplanting effort in the rain on Wednesday before the soil got too saturated. Did we get everything done before the rain arrived? No – the list of tasks is too long. But we still got quite a lot done, and then got quite a lot of rain, 8.5 inches between Wednesday morning and Saturday morning.
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I wanted to share a letter we got a week ago from a CSA member:
[Read more…]On Wednesday, we picked up our CSA box. As my husband was prepping the corn, he found a little corn worm. Our kids (5 and almost 3) love caterpillar friends, so as we have done many times, we put the little guy in a mason jar with some food and placed him in our kitchen for the kids to enjoy. He was promptly named Caterpilly. We also got to talk about how other animals and insects we share our world with enjoy the same food we do and how great that is. We love our CSA box, and I wanted to share this story because it is so much more than food that comes in those green boxes.
Keep doing what you are doing.
Thanks, Meghan
What’d we do last week? Here’s just a few things (a complete list would go on forever) with photos – thanks to Andrew, Becca, Dru, and Mizu for sharing their pictures!
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This week’s Beet – a short video showing how the many bunches of beautiful, delicious chard last week got from the field to your CSA boxes. Those of you who didn’t get a box missed out!
This time of year, we’re harvesting and curing winter squash. When the squash look ready, we stop watering, then we cut the squash from the plants, line them into rows, then after a few days in the field (the exact number depends on the temperature) we pick them up and store them in bins until they’re needed. The few days in the field is called curing. While curing, extra moisture evaporates, hardening the squash skin and concentrating sugars in the squash. It also slows down the respiration rate of the squash, which is essential for long term storage. Curing also helps heal cuts and scratches and seals the stem. The hardened skin creates a protective layer that will help preserve the squash. Some squash need additional ripening time in storage for the best eating quality.
[Read more…]Scenes from the past week:
The transition from fresh flowers to dried. The 2024 CSA flower season has come to an end. Thanks to all those who got a bouquet! There are still some fresh flowers out in the field, but this week, the flower team will need to spend some time with the dried flowers to make sure we have wreaths ready for the Hoes Down on Saturday. After that, we can turn our focus to making wreaths and mixed bouquets for CSA members, farmers markets, and stores!
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Whew – another week in the summer sprint done!
Some notable moments from last week included:
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Farming requires being very aware of the current conditions (weather, crops ready for harvest, etc.) all while thinking about the next day, week, month, season, and year. In August, we start pivoting to fall. We’re undeniably still in summer, even with cooler temperatures over the weekend and continuing into this week, but autumnal elements are starting to creep in. Here’re a few examples from the past week:
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July is always a very busy month, when seemingly everything is ready to harvest. Plus there’s the heat. Last week and the week before have included many long, hot days.
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I think there’s only one word to describe last week: HOT. The coolest high temperature was Monday when it still got above 100, and it only got hotter as the week went on. Being outside when it’s 110 or above feels similar to the blast of hot, dry air you get when you open the door of an oven. Except that you can’t close the oven door, and you still have to work and get things done at home (including cooking), and for us, our work is outside. 100 is a standard summer temperature for us, and it’s also fairly normal that we’ll have heat waves for a week or two (here’s a chronicle of a few past heat waves), but that doesn’t mean that it’s comfortable or easy.
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The solstice was last Thursday so now it’s officially summer. But even without looking at a calendar, we knew it – it tastes, looks, feels, and sounds, and smells like summer.
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Farming is more than a full-time job, but somehow between a busy schedule of planting, weeding, harvesting, and farmers market schedules, we host folks at the farm to enjoy the fruits (and vegetables) of our labor and to take in the sites and sounds of the season.
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