What a delightfully mild winter we’ve been having. Our post-season/winter share has been abundant this year. We still have fresh spinach under cover out in the field. We’ve had plenty of Brussels sprouts and pak choi, and only now in the middle of January are we beginning to dip into our napa/Asian cabbage supplies. It is always nice in a post-season/winter share situation to have something green to go with all the root crops and storage vegetables. And even though the apple crop was shy this year, we still have tasty Golden Delicious and Blushing Golden apples to “fruitify” the long winter’s night. Seed catalogs pile up. Somehow I’m getting on other lists and am getting new catalogs from small seed growers I’ve never heard of. Seed inventory is almost complete, so I know how many of what I need to order and how much I can allow myself to spend on new things that always promise to solve all the world’s problems and allow us to somehow reach a heavenly plane of existence we never thought possible. Maybe the seed catalogues don’t exactly come out and say it that way, but one easily gets the feeling that…….. We’ve actually been able to keep working out at the garden until very recently. It was often muddy, but not impossibly cold. We caught up on a few of the myriad of to-dos and junk piles we’ve accumulated over the years. We were able to get several loads of wood chips and were able to mulch new raspberry plantings as well as old black currant plantings to help solve some of the problems that lie ahead of us for this coming summer season. We enclosed our blackberry plantings with plastic snow fencing to keep the bunnies from nibbling off the bark from the canes again this winter, only to discover that bunnies have no qualms about nibbling holes through the plastic so they can get at the goodies. We’ll probably have to upgrade to metal fencing, even though it will cost twice as much. Just one more cost to add to the list, one more time-consuming operation each season. Only about a month to go before we start planting for the summer. Onions and leeks, tomatoes and peppers, lettuce………..They’ll all get their start about mid February. Last year, despite the severe drought, we had plenty of goodies, especially in the fall. This year rhubarb will come back on line after a 4-year absence due to previous flood years. Strawberries will also be back up to enjoyable levels. Other fruits might lag a little behind due to last year’s drought, but one never knows. That is the farmer’s motto/mantra : one never knows! But I’m sure we’ll be out there again trying to find out. So, if you’re up for the adventure of eating fresh, tasty, nutritious vegetables and fruit this coming season, please feel free to sign up for the upcoming season of Brackett-CSA. We’re waiting to hear from you. Operators are standing by……….. Print our 2012 brochure for a summary of our offerings and rates and payment schedule, and if you decide to join us, please print out our 2012 contract and mail it to us. Thanks! Do check out our slideshow of the honest-to-goodness-real Brackett Farm and our Spring 2010 farm pictures, too. Don't miss our week-by-week photos of a typical Brackett CSA share of fruits and veggies, arranged by month (part of May through end of October). Take a look! |
| How did the CSA concept start? | Goals of a CSA |
| Sharing the risk with the farmer | What do I grow? |
| How many people will a share feed? | What? Where? When? and how? |