Whistling Train Farm

Firstly, 2024 CSA is starting next weekend, March 23-26. Saturday-Tuesday. If you are signed up, you will get an email soon, so check your inboxes and if you don’t see anything from me by Tuesday night, let me know.

There are 3 spaces left, so if spring snuck up on you and you forgot to sign up, the link is down below. ⬇️ (There are still Pantry Builder subscriptions and garden start kits available for preorder too!)

After last week’s frosty/briefly snowy spell, the weather has been truly gorgeous. Plant growth is exploding as fast as the increasing day length.

I truly can’t wait for the cut flower garden to start blooming (perennials will be flowering in May) and for the first sugarsnaps and juicy salad turnips and that gorgeous purple sprouting broccoli. And fresh herbs and lettuces! What are you most excited to eat?

Here we go! It’s going to be a great season!

Here is the link to the new online farm store, where you can register for 2024 CSA, the 8-installment Pantry Builder subscription, and last chance to order plant starts/garden kits.

And the contacts for the share-pools are below.

Whistling Train FarmStore Click this link to purchase 2024 CSA Shares and/or Pantry Builder Subscriptions

Contact for North Seattle/Greenwood CSA SharePool: Jonathan Betz-Zall at jbetzzall@yahoo.com

Contact for West Seattle CSA SharePool: Rose Ragan at rose.ragan@protonmail.com

If you would like the contact for the Burien SharePool, please email me.

With much gratitude,

Shelley

The 2023 farming season is winding down, the skies are getting darker and the days are getting colder. It’s a relief to be entering the season of rest. It is the time of roots and greens, and the cold makes them taste even better, even if it makes them more difficult to harvest. It’s my favorite time to eat vegetables, honestly. Not only are flavors more concentrated and the greens sweeter and less bitter, but I actually have the time to make FOOD, instead of the grazing days of summer.

It’s been a frosty, frozen week, and while the greens that can tolerate it are still alive and well, they can’t be harvested while frozen. You see, there is a constant ebb and flow of water and sap throughout the tissues of plants. When it is warm, sap and water flow upwards from the roots to the leaves, and when the air starts to freeze, the plants do their best to push much of that water down to the roots where it can’t cause as much damage. When the air freezes, the water inside cells turns into tiny icicles which can puncture the cell membranes, causing cell death. That’s why non-hardy plants look black and wilted, as if they are cooked (looking at you, Dahlias). But the more durable plants turn some of their starches into sugar that acts as antifreeze, so the cells don’t get punctured as easily by ice. However, if they are harvested while all their water is in the roots, they won’t recover and perk up, so it’s best to wait until the air temperature warms, and the plants are circulating liquids again.

That’s why, when we have a freezing stretch, there aren’t as many greens in the CSA harvest. More roots and storage crops make their way into boxes. But we’re warming up a bit in the next week, so greens will return. At least for the next few weeks; the final week of the CSA season is just before Christmas. And then I’ll begin strategizing for 2024.

On another note, the Trumpeter Swans have returned from the Arctic summer! We don’t get many in this valley, but it’s reassuring to have them back. I hear them tooting overhead while picking greens, their long, white bodies glide through the silvery fog, and all is well. At one time, prior to the invasion of agriculture and development, the Green/Duwamish River Valley was a major stop on the Pacific Flyway, one of the north-south bird migration corridors. A wildlife biologist who birds here somewhat regularly told me that this entire valley used to be a complex of braided streams and wetlands, and that huge flocks of ducks, geese, cranes, and swans, as well as songbirds passed through. Imagine the sounds! So when the clumps of swans and geese fly over, that’s what I try to imagine. Tens of thousands of birds in a raucous flock, gathering, circling, landing, talking, and eating.

I’m excited about the small and simple CSA of 2024. A smaller growing space will be much easier to manage, and hopefully I’ll be able to keep on top of the weeds in the cut flower garden. A more intimate CSA project awaits, and I am here for it. With fewer families to serve, I can plan for more u-pick opportunities for those who want that. Also, several people have asked about the Pantry-Builder Subscription, and I am considering offering it again in 2024. It’s not a lot more care or harvest time to plant more pickling cucumbers, green beans, and sauce tomatoes. And I’m already planning how I’ll reinforce the Sugarsnap Pea greenhouse to battle the bunnies.

While I was picking kale and baby boy choi on this beautiful, sunny morning, I looked out into the field, filled with singing sparrows. Next year, most of the fields will be cover-cropped with species loved and needed by pollinators. I’m excited to see what changes come to my property if I don’t work it so hard. It’s already an Audubon birding hotspot… maybe even more species will visit. I’m looking forward to doing more in-depth surveys of insects here, expanding on what I’ve done in the last two years. Last year alone, I logged 156 species of moths. And my pollinator survey was haphazard, but will be more focused in 2024. Insect diversity is the key to a healthy ecosystem. If I can create a rich, diverse habitat on my 15 acres, how might that change, and possibly inspire, managers of other farms and open spaces.

This is my vision for 2024. 15 acres of healthy, healing ecosystem surrounding 1-2 acres of vegetables production. Let’s see what happens!

My 2024 Little CSA is filling up, but there are still a few spots available. Share pickup is on-farm only, but two Seattle groups have organized a “share-pool”, where members take turns picking up for everyone at a drop-site. Right now, these share-pools are happening in Greenwood/North Seattle and West Seattle, in addition to our long-time Burien share-pool. Pickup is still at the farm, Saturdays and Tuesdays, and everyone is welcome to cut flowers while in season and visit the pumpkin patch and sunflower field.

It’s been an interesting farm season, but it’s finishing up strong. I’d love to have you join me in 2024.

Here is the link to the new online farm store, where you can register for 2024 CSA. And the contacts for the share-pools are below.

Whistling Train FarmStore Click this link to purchase 2024 CSA Shares and/or Pantry Builder Subscriptions

Contact for North Seattle/Greenwood CSA SharePool: Jonathan Betz-Zall at jbetzzall@yahoo.com

Contact for West Seattle CSA SharePool: Rose Ragan at rose.ragan@protonmail.com

If you would like the contact for the Burien SharePool, please email me.

With much gratitude,

Shelley

It’s been an interesting summer, hasn’t it? We entered the season with record low soil moisture. That’s not something reported in mainstream weather reports, but it’s one of the most important considerations in agriculture. Irrigation is only successful if roots have access to the water being laid-down, and roots will only grow if the soil is wet where they are headed. That means that the soil below the roots must be moist enough to encourage active root growth. This summer, we started in May with active soil moisture down several feet. That means that several feet of irrigation have to happen before roots will penetrate to any meaningful depth. And that has been incredibly difficult this year.

Even though the air temperature has been cooler than in the last few years (haven’t hit 100° yet, knock on wood and fingers crossed!) but we also had much less precipitation in the winter. So, yay, no flooding, but boo, no residual soil moisture. Now, in August, we are finally starting to reach that soil moisture equilibrium in some parts of the farm, which is great for all the fall and winter planting happening in the next two weeks. But it also means that my July water bill is $2,000, something I don’t generally expect until September. So that was a shock, and my bank account is nearly empty. (Some farmers have mentioned water surcharges to help cover that unexpected expense…)

These concepts are important to understand, because that lack of root growth is why we haven’t had many greens, but the cucumbers and squash and (finally) the potatoes are happy. Leafy greens and herbs need a lot of water. But the beans are coming on, and I’ve managed to nurse along a late crop of sugarsnaps (to make up for the destruction by evil bunnies in the spring). Peppers and tomatoes are loaded with fruits and ripening. And hopefully the next big patch of lettuce and spinach will do better.

All of this wouldn’t be possible without a large underground plumbing project we installed in June to deliver more water to the fields (you may remember the trenches and backhoe). We might not have had anything to harvest if not for that $5,000 investment.

The fall and winter Brassicas are growing strong, lots of Broccoli and Cauliflower coming starting in October. Fall greens and roots are getting seeded today, as well as winter greenhouse greens. The days are getting shorter (thankfully!) which means the clock is ticking: we have just 2-3 weeks to get all of the seeding done for the rest of the year. Due to shorter days, plants don’t make significant growth after the end of September/early October, so we need to get everything as large as possible by that time.

August burnout is upon us, but we just have to push through and hope the new crew stick around to the end of it! The rest and calm of winter is coming.

And a heads-up: Della has been living here, doing an internship for summer, but is moving to Southern California to be with her new husband in early September. I’ll be going with her in my van, so will be away September 7-13. I don’t have anyone to do deliveries for me, so I need to figure out how we’ll handle that. I will likely split the missed week between the week before and after, but we’ll see how things look at the end of August. Just make a note that there will likely be no delivery/pick up that week.

And one more thing: I am not renewing my contract with Barn2Door, so you will be getting one last notification from them about that this week. I have all of your contact information saved , so in the future you’ll just get notifications from me directly. No more confusing crossed emails.

Cutflowers

The U-Pick Cutflower Garden is open to everyone on Tuesdays 2-7 and Saturdays all day. If you need to visit on another day, please let me know. Those are the CSA pickup days, and I’m already expecting lots of people wandering about. I need the other days for growing and working. There are pitchers and snips for you to use in the CSA shed. Just return them when you’re done!

With much gratitude,

Shelley

As we head into a week of hot weather, I find myself wondering if there is a “normal” spring anymore. 20 years ago, or even 10 years ago, there was usually a predictable pattern. Freezing and sunny February, followed by wet and cool March, occasional frosty nights, and that magical break in April when we could hustle some seed into the ground. Then we could count on gently warming up into summer. But in the last five years, spring has been the absence of any pattern. Either it stops raining mid-April and we dry up, or it doesn’t stop raining until mid-June and we can’t get anything planted, or there is a week in late March when we have to pull tricks to keep the transplants from freezing when temps drop into the teens.

It looks like we may have one of those sudden summers, as the daytime temps climb into the 80’s this weekend, after an abnormally dry winter (according to my soil explorations). The ground is going to dry up quick, and then it will be irrigation season already.

But, we’re going to do our best, as always, to roll with the punches. After some tractor futzing, we’re ready to get the potatoes planted this weekend. And a spot is ready for seeding greens and herbs. And setting out the early zucchini transplants. The sugarsnaps in the greenhouse are blooming, and the spring greens are doing well inside, but it may get just too hot in there. We may have another spring gap if everything bolts early, since until last week it was too wet to plant outside. Hopefully not!

So it goes. This is why I keep the Spring CSA small, because it is the most fickle of all seasons. But the good news is that it’s much easier to ride the wave of Summer, and there is plenty of room in the Summer CSA, and the Flower Bouquet and Pantry-Builder add-on subscriptions. And the truth is, we are in need of more subscribers to cover payroll for the next several weeks.

I could use your help! If you have friends or neighbors who might enjoy being a part of our farm community, please invite them to enroll! All the links are below!

Cutflowers: U-Pick and Pre-made Bouquets

The U-Pick Cutflower Garden is planted with the earliest varieties, and we’ll be putting more plants in this week. It’s looking like CSA members will have access to the garden the week after Della’s wedding, so I’ll open it up on the Summer Solstice… pretty perfect, I think! The Bouquet Subscriptions will start that week as well, since I want to make sure we have enough flowers for the wedding. Flower Bouquet Subscriptions: 16 bountiful, seasonal bouquets. Here’s the Flower Bouquet link

Bulk Pantry-Builder Boxes

Pantry-Builder will start with a hefty allotment of plump Sugarsnap Peas, then provide produce and herbs for making Pickles, Pesto, and Tomato Sauce for winter, and help you to stash a supply of Garlic, Onions, and Squashes for the dark months. These are available as a subscription now (at a discount), but I also hope to offer them individually during their seasonal windows. Pantry-Builder subscription: Bulk boxes of Sugarsnap Peas, Basil, Pickling Cucumbers, Garlic Braids, and more. Here’s the Pantry Builder link

A Reminder about Farm Finances…

The nature of the CSA model is that I depend on CSA enrollments in order to purchase farm supplies in the winter, as well as to pay the farm mortgage and utilities, and to buy groceries. If you haven’t yet enrolled for 2023, and are able to, please don’t wait. Please share widely, it will take 200 CSA families to cover myself, expenses, and two staff. (That’s about 40 more families than last year.) Thank you so much!

Summer CSA will start June 17… that’s just 5 weeks away!

2023 CSA Enrollment is open to everyone, and there are plenty of Summer and Winter Shares available. Here’s the store link

2023 is going to be a great season!

With much gratitude,

Shelley

The days are getting longer, and the prop house is filling up! The garlic is growing tall outside, and the earliest weeds, our native cover crop, are blooming and ready to provide for the earliest pollinators. Up to now, I’ve only seen the honeybees out foraging, but the earliest queen bumblebees will emerge soon, and the willows will be ready to feed their bee children with protein-rich pollen.

95% of my seeds for 2023’s crops have arrived, but I haven’t been able to purchase fertilizer yet, or irrigation supplies. The farm bank account is nearly empty, and I’m getting nervous about securing all of the necessary supplies since there have been supply chain shortages the last few years. The farm needs folks to enroll in the CSA. There is still room for 100 families for the summer season, and room in the supplemental Flower Bouquet and Pantry-Builder subscriptions. If you have friends or neighbors who might enjoy being a part of our farm community, please invite them to enroll! Also, we’ve added a free pick-up location at Shadow Lake Preserve in Renton. All the links are below!

I’m very excited to welcome Kyle Putnam as an intern this season! She is working on an online Horticulture degree at OSU. She’s getting married in March, but will be starting work here in April/May as things get busier in the field.

I’m Still Looking for a Farm Operator/Manager Trainee

I have been frustrated and disappointed by my attempts at finding a successor up to now, so this time I am working with the Farm to Farmer organization, formerly Washington FarmLink. I have created a listing there, and they have advisors to help with all the aspects of transitioning. I’ll be working to refine my listing in the coming weeks, but I’m hoping to bring this new person(s) on board this spring to start the learning/weaning process. Please share this link with anyone you think may be interested: https://farmtofarmer.org/node/655

Cutflowers: U-Pick and Pre-made Bouquets

The U-Pick Cutflower Garden is ready to start planting the earliest varieties in just a few weeks, as soon as they outgrow their greenhouse trays. I’ll be opening up the Cutflower Garden to the public, for a fee, this year because some folks are happy to pay a lot more money for flowers than they are for food. As far as I know, there are no other U-Pick Flowers in this area, so I’m hopeful that this will become a profitable income stream as well. DON’T WORRY THOUGH: All CSA members will always have free access to the U-Pick garden for their weekly bouquets!

Bulk Pantry-Builder Boxes

I’m excited to offer these bulk produce options every 3-4 weeks this summer. Pantry-Builder will start with a hefty allotment of plump Sugarsnap Peas, then provide for making Pickles, Pesto, and Tomato Sauce for winter, and help you to stash a supply of Garlic, Onions, and Squashes for the dark months. These are available as a subscription now (at a discount), but I also hope to offer them individually during their seasonal windows.

A Reminder about Farm Finances…

The nature of the CSA model is that I depend on CSA enrollments in order to purchase farm supplies in the winter, as well as to pay the farm mortgage and utilities, and to buy groceries. If you haven’t yet enrolled for 2023, and are able to, please don’t wait. It’s a few months until we will have surplus produce available to market outside of the CSA. Here are all the purchasing links. Please share widely, it will take 200 CSA families to cover myself and another farmer. (That’s about 40 more families than last year.) Thank you so much!

2023 CSA Enrollment

2023 CSA Enrollment is open to everyone, and there are plenty of Summer and Winter Shares available. Here’s the store link

Flower Bouquet Subscription: 16 bountiful, seasonal bouquets. Here’s the Flower Bouquet link

Pantry-Builder subscription: Bulk boxes of Sugarsnap Peas, Basil, Pickling Cucumbers, Garlic Braids, and more. Here’s the Pantry Builder link

2023 is going to be a great season!

With much gratitude,

Shelley

The 2022 Season is finally complete. What a ride this year was. My target was to finish up the season right before Christmas; it’s a good marker for most people and there’s not a lot left to harvest after the Solstice. But the late Spring start threw a wrench in that plan, and after forcing the cancellation of several Spring Season weeks, we started Summer Season two weeks late. I know that this resulted in confusion, especially because I couldn’t make changes to the reminders from Barn2Door. But here we are: we survived. A few folks even told me it was the best year yet, which is reassuring because I definitely felt like the CSA was in survival mode for a long stretch. However, aside from those few sparse weeks in June, I do feel like the farm produced a lot of food after July, and I feel good about that. Thank you for being patient and understanding and supportive!

The thing about farming is that there is always more to learn, and, more than any other year prior, 2022 taught me to be prepared for any weather scenario. I am feeling pretty cautious about starting 2023, hedging my planting bets in all manner of ways. Rearranging the early greenhouse plantings so that there’s food available even if it doesn’t stop raining until late June. Starting more crops as transplants that can be set outside even if it’s too wet to work soil properly and impossible to run a seeder. 2023 will be good.

My small house project is finally moving along, and I’m truly hoping to be moved in by March, before everything gets crazy. Della and Chris’ wedding is happening in June, Cosmo will be graduating with his Auto Tech degree this quarter, and I’ll be in school one more year, finishing my AAS in spring of 2024. I am doubling-down in the hunt for a younger person or team to help me operate the farm. I’m not getting any younger, and for a variety of reasons that require a separate essay, I need to transition. Many of those reasons are financial. But this CSA community that we have all built together is very important to me, and I want to do everything in my power to keep it going. Likewise this 15-acre wildlife oasis that I have had the good fortune to occupy and encourage. (I’m working on another essay about land ownership and occupation.)

I’m Looking for a Farm Operator/Manager

I have been frustrated and disappointed by my attempts at finding a successor up to now, so this time I am working with the Farm to Farmer organization, formerly Washington FarmLink. I have created a listing there, and they have advisors to help with all the aspects of transitioning. I’ll be working to refine my listing in the coming weeks, but I’m hoping to bring this new person(s) on board this spring to start the learning/weaning process. Please share this link with anyone you think may be interested: https://farmtofarmer.org/node/655

With so many changes in the works in my life and family, I feel the need to simplify some operations and work harder to make the farm more profitable. (“Profitable” has been a dirty word in the small farm world for too long, and it’s an odd thing. “Sustainable” used to be the big buzz word, and now it’s “regenerative”, but a farm really can’t be “Sustainable” if it isn’t financially sustainable, or it won’t be a farm for very long. I’m working on yet another essay about this subject.) But the reality is that when a mortgage needs paying, and farm families need to be able to set aside funds for college and retirement, the farm needs to be profitable. I scraped by for far too long, and I want to ensure that the next farmer(s) here don’t have to carry that stress.

Cutflowers: U-Pick and Pre-made Bouquets

I have become hugely interested in Wildflowers, and that prompted an expansion into growing Cutflowers. Last year’s Cutflower Bouquet subscription was an experiment, but Rebekah will be on board again this summer and we’re going to expand this project. I’m really excited about it! The U-Pick Cutflower Garden is going to be bigger, and we prepped it in the fall so it’s ready to start planting the earliest varieties in just a few weeks. I’ll be opening up the Cutflower Garden to the public, for a fee. Because some folks are happy to pay a lot more money for flowers than they are for food. As far as I know, there is no other U-Pick Flowers in this area, so I’m hopeful that this will become a profitable income stream as well. DON’T WORRY THOUGH: CSA members will always have free access to the U-Pick garden for their weekly bouquets! I may need to give you all a badge or something, but we’ll figure that out.

Bulk Pantry-Builder Boxes Instead of Mystery Boxes

I am simplifying the food crops that we grow here. When I was going to farmers markets (and was super stressed-out), it made sense to grow a lot of unusual crops, because that was my niche and I could justify their production needs with high prices. But the CSA-only model is most profitable and manageable with a shorter list of crops to maintain because it is easy to scale up, and easier to mechanize. Hand labor is very expensive, so all the investments made last year in machinery and mechanical cultivation are going to start to shine in 2023. This will (should) result in more food, and more people being fed, as well as more individual product that can be packaged and sold in bulk above and beyond what is needed to satisfy the CSA. Instead of our Mystery Boxes, I will instead be offering Pantry Builder Boxes. These are available as a subscription now (at a discount), but I will also be offering them individually during their seasonal windows. I hope to also offer them through one or more local Food Hubs.

A Reminder about Farm Finances…

The nature of the CSA model is that I depend on CSA enrollments in order to purchase farm supplies in the winter, as well as to pay the farm mortgage and utilities, and to buy groceries. If you haven’t yet enrolled for 2023, and are able to, please don’t wait. It’s a few months until we will have surplus produce available to market outside of the CSA. Here are all the purchasing links. Please share widely, it will take 200 CSA families to cover myself and another farmer. (That’s about 40 more families than last year.) Thank you so much!

2023 CSA Enrollment

2023 CSA Enrollment is open to everyone, and there are plenty of Summer and Winter Shares available. Here’s the store link

Flower Bouquet Subscription: 16 bountiful, seasonal bouquets. Here’s the Flower Bouquet link

Pantry-Builder subscription: Bulk boxes of Sugarsnap Peas, Basil, Pickling Cucumbers, Garlic Braids, and more. Here’s the Pantry Builder link

Next week, I start planting in the greenhouse! Let’s have a fantastic 2023 Season!

With much gratitude,

Shelley

The short days and flirtatious snow let us know that winter is truly here. Thanksgiving brought us over a week of below-freezing temperatures, which made harvesting a challenge but sweetened up the roots and greens perfectly. At long last, we can eat all of the hardy greens! The kale and Brussels sprouts, and beets and carrots, as long as they stay in the ground while the air freezes, will convert their starches to sugars… an antifreeze of sorts… which benefits everyone who eats them.

New Home Update:

My little house project begins in earnest next week! I’m quite excited, and very grateful to those who stepped forward with short-term loans to help me out with expenses. Huge thanks to Terry and Marianne, Jonathan and Rosy, Elizabeth, and Maureen! The first step will be to swap out the French door in the little house for a single-wide exterior door, remove the picture window, and reframe the wall. The French door will be moved to the double-door end of the shipping container, and become the entrance to my new office space and the big window will become my office view onto the perennial cut flower garden. Once the little house wall is re-framed, the little bathroom can be framed, and then the kitchen. Then it will be habitable. At the same time, I’ll order the insulation kit for the shipping container, and buy Cosmo a plasma cutter so he can start cutting out the window holes in the shipping container and weld the steel frames. Updates will be posted as they happen!

Almost Time to Start Planting!

I’ve ordered the earliest seeds to start, but the rest need to be purchased very soon. Also, greenhouse supplies and fertilizer need to be ordered. Work begins in the propagation house in January… Sugarsnap Peas need starting first on the heat mats (so they’re ready to plant into the ground in hoop houses in early March), and then the tomatoes, peppers, onions, and celery. And then the seedling train just keeps rolling until June.

Michael is patching together a transplanter, so I won’t have to do all the planting bent over. My body doesn’t enjoy that job anymore. The goal is to plant more plant babies in straighter rows that will be mechanically cultivated. Less work all around. With any luck, the first plants will go out into the field in early May instead of late June this year. And hopefully I’ll have extra help this season! Always hoping the magic works!

The nature of the CSA model is that I depend on CSA enrollments in order to purchase farm supplies in the winter, as well as to pay the farm mortgage and utilities, and to buy groceries. If you haven’t yet enrolled for 2023, and are able to, please don’t wait. It’s quite a few months until we will have surplus produce available to market outside of the CSA. Thank you so much!

2023 CSA Enrollment

2023 CSA Enrollment is open to everyone, and there are plenty of Summer and Winter Shares available. Here’s the store link

Also, the new and improved Flower Bouquet subscription is live. 16 bountiful bouquets, from fancy, flouncy tulips in early June to Sunflowers in September, and an Everlasting bouquet to brighten your winter. Here’s the Flower Bouquet link

I have decided that I need to simplify my crop plan. Sadly, that means discontinuing the Mystery Boxes. It’s just too much to keep track of without a solid farm co-manager. Instead, I’m offering a Pantry-Builder subscription! Bulk boxes of items that will stock your freezer and/or pantry. Bulk boxes of Sugarsnap Peas, Basil, Pickles, Garlic Braids, and more. Here’s the Pantry Builder link

AND, I figured out how to offer the purchase of Gift Credits through the Barn2Door store. Like a digital gift card, you can purchase credits in increments of $25 and gift them to friends and family. Then they can use the credits toward any items in our Barn2Door store, including subscriptions. Here’s the link for Purchasing Store Credits

Wishing you the happiest of holidays, and most restful winter season.

Hard to believe that I’ll be starting the earliest crops for 2023 in just a few weeks!

With much gratitude,

Shelley

After a smoky, very warm Fall, we finally got our normal weather. It snuck up on us though, after that long dry spell. It wasn’t much fun, but I’m grateful for every extra sunny day that we had, because otherwise most of our late fall and winter crops wouldn’t have finished. I was seriously worried about the winter squashes, and the fall greens and brassicas.

The eventual rain came as a relief to the soil and to my bank account. Usually our last big water bill is in September, but because I had to keep irrigating through October, is was one more huge bill. The first rainfall also meant that I could start planting garlic and cover crops, and I nearly finished before the sudden freeze planning got underway. But tonight, I’ve harvested all of the crops that can’t handle freezing and they are tucked safely in the walk-in. Cauliflower for weeks, and the last of the tomatoes and cucumbers. Those will go to CSA next week, since we’ve already started the week.

New Home Project:

In addition to field cleanup and pulling irrigation and putting away water lines and timers, my new Small Home project has begun. Those of you who have been with the farm for a decade or more may remember when we had our used double-wide brought to the farm, before I got the mortgage for the property. It was affordable, and made sense for the short-term; I planned on it being a temporary house for our family. It served its purpose perfectly, and now I no longer need that much house. It’s falling apart, my nest is nearly empty, and rather than spend a chunk of money rehabilitating the mobile, I decided to go small with a modified shipping container. So far, I’ve spent about $12,000 on the container, but also on running new water, electrical, and septic lines. I’m a bit nervous about how I’ll find another $10,000 to finish the project this winter before the mobile disintegrates. I had planned on roughly $20,000 total, but I didn’t anticipate this weird growing season and diminished non-CSA, summer income. I am hoping for some short-term financial help… so that I don’t need to dip into next season’s payroll and other farm funds. If you can help with a short-term loan, please let me know!

I’m not sure what will happen at this point, but I’m proceeding with ordering seeds and fertilizer, and planning crop extensions for next spring, just in case we have a super soggy spring again and can’t plant until June. The one sure thing is that we don’t seem to have reliable seasons lately, so I am planning for the worst scenario and have some tricks up my sleeve. I’ve learned a few things in the 20+ years I’ve been farming.

Thanksgiving Turkeys:

Thanksgiving is coming up, and I have 10 turkeys still available. Their butcher date is Monday, the 21st, so they’ll be available for fresh pick up either Tuesday or Wednesday before the big day. $10 per pound, and I expect most to be 9-15 pounds, with one big boy that will be much larger. A $50 deposit will hold your bird, and will be subtracted from the total balance at pickup. (You may remember that I hatched the turkeys in an incubator in my office in early spring, and the eggs were laid by my own breeding stock. It was very exciting!)

2023 CSA Enrollment

To close, I’m including the link to the Barn2Door store here. 2023 CSA shares are open to all (Spring is sold out, but plenty of Summer and Winter Shares are available).

Hard to believe that I’ll be starting the earliest crops for 2023 in just a month or so!

Have a great week, and happy rain!

Shelley

The Equinox. That time when we really notice that the days are getting shorter, and can no longer deny it. It’s my favorite time of year, aside from the excitement of starting the first seeds in January, or eating the first Sugarsnap of the year. I love cool, rainy fall weather, sweaters and swirling leaves, and splashing in puddles. But this year, because we got started six weeks late in spring, I’m grateful for every extra sunny day and non-freezing night. Every warm afternoon pushes all the crops to grow and ripen just a little bit faster than they would on a cloudy day. Every heat unit of each day counts now. Frost could happen at any time.

Fall crops are coming on as the tomatoes wind down. This year’s tomato crop was mind-blowing, though! I’ve never had that kind of production, and I’ll definitely be using the same new tricks I used this year in 2023! The peppers will continue to ripen for several more weeks… there was one year that I kept picking peppers until Thanksgiving! Zucchini and cucumbers will soon be making way for their cousins, the hard squashes, including Honey Bear and Delicata and Spaghetti. Hopefully the rest will ripen up in these last warm days!

The cut-flower garden is finished for the year, and bouquet subscriptions will finish up this week. That’s six weeks earlier than planned, but we also got started six weeks later. Credits will be coming to those who purchased bouquet subscriptions to make up for the shortfall. We’ve learned an awful lot, and will be expanding and focusing more on the flower block of the farm.

Fall migration season has begun, and as the Osprey and Warblers depart for the south and Golden Crowned Sparrows and Coopers Hawks return for winter, so will the Vultures of the Pumpkin Patch begin to appear. Keep your binoculars handy, they’ll be here any day! There are a lot of pumpkins out there, and hopefully they’ll get the chance to turn orange! But I’ve carved my share of green pumpkins; they can be just as spooky.

We finished planting two weeks ago, and now we do maintenance; the final cultivations, a little irrigation, and a lot of harvesting. We’re getting as much cleaned up as possible in preparation for next year, and cover crops will be sown as soon as we get our first rain. We’ve made adjustments and are planning ahead so that we can get the higher parts of the farm planted early next year, even if it’s as wet as this spring was.

To close, I’m including the link to the Barn2Door store here. 2023 CSA shares are open to all (not many Spring shares left, but plenty of Summer and Winter). I’ve also extended the deadline to use the 10% off discount through September 30. (Originally it was the Equinox, but I forgot to remind everyone, so I added a grace period!) The discount is only for current CSA Members please: Use CSAEARLYBIRD at checkout.

Have a great week, and Happy Fall!

Shelley