Dear 2024 CSA members!
The greenhouse is bursting with seedlings; the first garden beds are being shaped for planting; the strawberries are bursting into flower; and the barn is abuzz with projects…
Spring is upon us!
We wanted to send you a quick update of what’s been happening on the farm and to look into the crystal ball to inquire as to start of harvest season!
Propagation Manager Asa Black and the rest of the crew have been busy filling the greenhouse with the seedlings that will become this harvest season!
WHEN WILL THE CSA START?
After another wet winter and spring, our main fields are just starting to think about drying down. Despite this, we are aiming for an earlier start date that last year. Unexpected spring storms aside, we hope to start the CSA on either Saturday, June 8th or Saturday June 15th. The six months thereafter will be, as usual, and avalanche of deliciousness.
We will nail down the official start date soon and send an email letting you know in May.
A few days before the CSA starts we will send an email with all the logistics like how to find us, what to bring, and orientation times for new members.
Note! All of our important CSA communications are sent to your inbox via this email and are simultaneously posted on the Newsletters page of our website.
CSA SHARES STILL AVAILABLE!
We still have about 10 slots remaining in our 2024 CSA program! If you know anyone who might be interested in signing-up, please encourage them to join!
Because as you know, there is really nothing better than spending a Sunday in a garden of flowers nibbling sun-ripened strawberries with your besties.
Since the equinox, the perennial section of the garden has been springing to life.
FARMER’S LOG
AT HARBOR
The period from January through mid-April is a very important time on the farm.
It is like the liminal time before a long sailing voyage when the boat is at harbor and the next journey is plotted in cozy, smoky cabins; when the ship is moored, scraped, and every corner is cleaned; when the sails are mended, new masts set, and the carpenters work overtime; when the crew is hired, the provisions calculated, and the ship loaded.
This year’s planning and project time on the farm has been incredibly productive — with Tristan, Asa, and Aisling all working over the winter — and the recent additions of Ava Jablonski and Char Curtin to the crew.
The amount we’ve been able to tackle with this many great farmers on board has been inspiring.
To name a few…
The greenhouse has been greatly upgraded with overhead hoses, new tables, landscape fabric, and sliding doors! Asa Black, who is now managing our propagation, has poured a lot of love into that space — it is now a greenhome rather than a greenhouse —and it is showing in the happy seedlings. Even Goose the greenhouse cat is smitten with the new digs and seems to have finally embraced the domestic bliss of sleeping inside at night.
Asa has also greatly expanded our fleet of herb barrels — adding 13 new barrels for exciting new mints, pineapple sage, and other herbal goodies for your mixological and culinary adventures this summer and fall.
Tristan led the remodel of the inside of our big cob cooler, which used to be an obstacle course of ancient shelves. It is now like the empty, cavernous hull of, yes, a great sailing ship. The shelf-free space will make the daily loading and unloading of vegetables approximately one thousand times easier this harvest season.
Tristan is also currently leading the charge on the expansion of our parking lot and the construction of a proper play structure for kids next to the swing set!
From L to R: Baby Alice, Aisling, Nuthenroy the Gnome, and new crew members Char and Ava next to their new Gnome Home!
Ava has been hard at work improving the barn pickup area (think beautiful new plant trellis and improved signage). She also just today helped Char build the trellis of a new Gnome Home…
Yes, you read that right. After two years of farming without a home for Nuthenroy the Farm Gnome, we finally said enough-is-enough. His new estate now features prominently next to the herb barrels. Nuthenroy looks forward to when he can once again count his jewels and stolen car keys from within a magical tent of Scarlet Runner Beans and Mexican Sour Gerkins.
Aisling has been quietly making it all possible by often watching a growing and crawling baby Alice, while Kayta and I plot, plan, budget, and do whatever it is we do in the smoky cabin.
Speaking of which: What is the plan? Because, as the expression goes, “A ship at harbor is safe but that is not what ships are built for.”
2024 is shaping up to be an epic harvest season.
We will be planting about 8 acres of rich loam for 230 shares / households — a slight expansion from last year.
Because so many of you really fell in love with the ritual of picking big flower bouquets last year (much to our delight) we’ve nearly doubled the size of the flower garden.
We have a new, blossoming, quite large strawberry patch that we hope, Farm Gods willing, will match or exceed the glory of last year’s strawberries.
And in the vegetable fields, we are set for year that will include all of our most favorite varieties, as well as exciting new experiments and flavors, and the return of the beloved Floriani Red Flint corn.
We can’t wait for you to meet the new crew members, to get lost in the new garden zones, and to sink into this beautiful place and the flavors of the approaching harvest season.
Anchors aweigh!
See you in the fields,
David & Kayta
