Snow Drop |
The overwintered spinach with new growth! |
Look closely to see the new garlic sprout just above the label. |
Transplanting onions in 2017 |
We also have some overwintered parsnips, sunchokes and horseradish
that we need to harvest as soon as the fields dry out…and we have a crew to
harvest them! Our small winter crew has
been doing an awesome job taking care of, well everything. They’ve been washing vegetables still in
storage to fill a few winter orders, they’ve worked on repair and cleaning
projects, set up two greenhouses, harvested the willow, shoveled snow, helped
open up frozen drains and a whole lot of other random tasks! But we’re going to need more hands very
soon. Thankfully, our final approval for
our H2A visa application came through at the end of last week and we were able
to schedule the appointments for our field crew to go to the consulate in
Mexico where they’ll, hopefully, get their visas and make the long journey
north to Wisconsin. We hope to see the
first group of 19 people by the end of next week. Once they are here, we’ll start laying
plastic mulch so we can transplant onions, have fields to clean up and prepare
for planting, rocks to pick, seed potatoes to cut, animal fencing to fix, a
fleet of pickup trucks to service, wheel bearings to pack and a whole lot
more! Yes, we’re anxious to have them
back and hope all goes well with their travels.
It’s always bittersweet to see them.
Good for us because we enjoy working with them and they are an important
part of our farm, but when they’re here it means they aren’t with their
families. They seem to make the best of
it and we are grateful to their wives, children and other family members that
take care of business on the home front while they’re husbands, sons, brothers
are here.
Soon this house will be full! |
Our greenhouses are rocking and quickly turning multiple
shades of green! All of the onions,
shallots and leeks are planted and growing very nicely. We’ve had a lot of nice days with full
sunshine which means the plants are really able to suck up the energy and have
growth spurts literally overnight! When
I went into the greenhouse yesterday morning some of the onions had about an
inch of new growth that was not there when I walked through the house the night
before. By the end of the week we’ll
probably have to give them their first “hair cut” of the season so they don’t
start falling over. Last Friday and
Saturday Gerardo, Simon and Sarah finished planting all the celeriac and moved
on to fennel. Moises finished the fennel
planting on Monday and now we’ve moved on to the first plantings of parsley and
dandelion with plans to plant the first crops of broccoli, cauliflower, spring
cabbage, kale and kohlrabi before the end of the week.
Silky Wild Rye (above) and Crew Planting Pollinator Packs in 2016 |
Seed Cooler is stocked up and ready for spring too! |
Bau Sin (Osborne Seeds) |
Amethyst Beans (Johnny's Seeds) |
Danjo Cheong Yang Pepper (Osborne Seeds) |
As far as the rest of our valley goes, we hear and see signs of spring all around us. Richard’s ducks took a break from laying eggs over the winter, but resumed laying eggs a few weeks ago. Richard is trying to encourage the hens to set so we can have new ducklings later this spring. At night we can hear the owls hooting and the coyotes yipping in the distance, likely either defending their young or hunting for food to feed them. We’ve seen some flocks of geese migrating through our area and are anxious for the return of the blue birds.
We are planning to do some “Woods Walks with Farmer Richard” again this year, likely in May. We’re still putting together the details, so watch for more information in our April emails so you can make your reservation. Last year’s events were a lot of fun and we’re hoping to see more members take advantage of this experience again this year. Our woods are an interesting and kind of magical place in the spring!
We are processing your CSA orders and getting ready to put
together your Welcome Packets that will go out in April. Until we get all the orders entered, it’s
kind of hard to assess exactly where we are with number of shares sold this
year in comparison to previous years.
From a dollars perspective, it looks like we are down 5.5% in vegetable shares and down 9.5% for fruit shares. We do still have plenty of shares
available.
If you haven’t signed up yet, please do so very soon so you don’t miss out on anything! If you have a friend, co-worker, neighbor, etc that is interested in CSA, we’d appreciate it if you take a minute to share your first-hand CSA experience with them. You can also offer them our “New Member Coupon” which will give them some money off their first order and you’ll also earn a referral coupon! Our CSA season starts in just 6 weeks and we are looking forward to growing for you this year!
If you haven’t signed up yet, please do so very soon so you don’t miss out on anything! If you have a friend, co-worker, neighbor, etc that is interested in CSA, we’d appreciate it if you take a minute to share your first-hand CSA experience with them. You can also offer them our “New Member Coupon” which will give them some money off their first order and you’ll also earn a referral coupon! Our CSA season starts in just 6 weeks and we are looking forward to growing for you this year!
In The Kitchen with Chef Andrea!
Are your produce stores dwindling? Are you down to the last few onions? Does your refrigerator resemble this picture? We’re likely all experiencing a bit of spring fever and longing for fresh greens from the field. We aren’t quite there yet, so if you do still have some winter vegetables remaining lets find some good uses for them before spring vegetables start rolling in.
Here are a few of our favorite recipe suggestions that we’ve featured in previous newsletters. Perhaps you’ll find a few suggestions that will help you come into the home stretch and use up whatever is left in your refrigerator or pantry!
CARROTS:
BEETS:
CELERIAC:
ONIONS:
SWEET POTATOES:
See you next month!
Chef Andrea
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