Turkey Hill Newsletter - 2009-3

Turkey Hill CSA Newsletter - Week 3

Important Notes From the Farm

A bunch of little notes this week. First of all, I wanted to mention that we have our own farm eggs for sale at $3.75/dozen. Farm pickup members can just get these when they come (put money/check in the cash box), delivery customers - let me know ahead of time (email or call) if you want eggs and I will get them in your tote.  We have a limited supply, so its first come, first serve.

Varieties varieties varieties! 

Beets: This week we are getting into the full patch of beets and I wanted to mention the varieties. Most of last week's beets were called 'Pablo' - a specialty beet grown especially for baby sized picking (very dark red and succulent). We also picked a little bit of the Golden and new this year Yellow beets. We'll have lots more of both of these types this week, as well as the standard 'Red Ace' which is a scarlet red and is the classic beet and we will have Chiooggias - these look pink on the outside, but slices horizontally reveal candy cane stripe red/white circles. One caveat - these colors pretty much disappear when the beet boiled, so consider some thin slices fresh as a garnish or on a salad. Finally, we also grow 'Forno' a cylindrical shaped beet thats also dark red, and fun to cook with because of its shape.

Lettuce: last week we picked the 1st lettuce crop, a succulent crisp head called 'blonde de paris'. this week i'm moving into a new patch that includes green butter heads, red butter, green romaine, red lollo (frilly red) and a beautiful green romaine with red speckles. More varieties to come! We pick some of these very small so they won't get bitter and package them 2-3 to a sleeve. 

Chard: This year we have 6 or more individual colors planted, including yellow, golden, green, red, crimson, lipstick and orange. next week we will start mixing these into colorful bunches, for now the leaves are too small to bunch so we are bagging the chard.

Carrots: This week we are starting to pick the 4" long 'kinko' carrots, and some of the deep red 'cosmic purple' type. these make a great early carrot combo, and we have many other varieties to come.

More Notes:

Our very first planting of peas was  eaten by a flock of birds and we are just getting into the next patch. we should have peas for the boxes next week. we start with the edible pod sugar snap and snow peas, then go to shelling peas a bit later. Its getting HOT out and this means summer is here, but we still have a few more weeks of spring crops before the next wave of items comes in. Typically August and September are our most bountiful months, and its not even July yet! A note to marble/redstone customers: because your thursday delivery comes earlier in the week than the rest of the csa members, you may get a slightly different mix of items than the other areas.

This time of the year is a bit of a lull before the storm. A fun way to get an idea of what will be coming in over the next 3 or 6 weeks is to scan through the emails i sent out last year, which are organized by date on the blog. week three this year equates to week 1 last year (we started two weeks earlier than in any previous year this year) - 

Time for a salad

Make the most of all the succulent spring greens while we have them! The next few weeks will be a bit HEAVY on the lettuce, and part of a CSA is eating whats bountiful, so make the most of the season by eating salad regularly. Lettuce (but not the salad mix) will taper off later in the season, so enjoy it while its here!

Questions and Answers

 Please send me your questions, let me know what you want to know!

  

Send me your questions! Need a recipe? We have a recipe page on the website, or try  allrecipes.com. Want to know when a certain vegetable is coming in? confused about something in your box? email me!

This Week's Box

NEW: Carrots - baby sized - just a bit  full large/half small

Beets - more varieties - full large/half small

Chard - tender bagged rainbow colors - fill shares

Head Lettuce - green leaf, green butter, red butter - 

Kale  - everyone gets some. kale is very, very, very productive and our one planting will provide enough for every member to have one bunch a week and then some (unless we get an aphid infestation). i promise to give you a kale rbeak when other crops start filling the box, but for now we have lots of kale! get creative! one member reported making pesto with (cooked) kale! send me your recipes and i'll include them next week...
Salad Mix - we'll try to have this mix every week

Radish -  full large/half small

Spinach - bunches, still super sweet -  full large/half small - ends soon (unless our next planting comes in)

Cilantro - almost done

Fruit

NEW: cherries 'Brooke' cherries from First Fruits, Paonia CO

Coming Soon (1-3 weeks)

head lettuce, more varieties

rainbow swiss chard, bunched

kohlrabi

Upcoming

chives

peas - sugar snaps, shelling

scallions

Turkey Hill Newsletter - 2009-2

Turkey Hill CSA Newsletter - Week 2

Important Notes From the Farm

I'm very late getting this letter out this week, but Summer solstice is this saturday, and that means we are hitting the top of the farm workload bell curve. Soon I'll be able to catch up a bit, but for now everything is happening all at once on the farm. Baby plants need planting, seeding salad continues, weeding is a big task, irrigation is constant (even with all the overcast weather, we still need to water) and now harvest is taking more of our time. Everything is looking great, i'll post more pictures soon! 

Please note that the farm pickup time is 3-7pm on fridays. I neglected to mention that in the last newsletter and some people weren't sure about the time. If you need to pick up aearlier or later, just give me a call and we'll get your box ready separately. For those of you getting weekly deliveries, please don't forget your totes - we need those totes back each week to keep the delivery process working smoothly. A lot of members are just bringing canvas sacks or boxes to the pick up and transferring the produce immediately rather than taking the tote. If you do take your tote, just collapse it (two thumb buttons on each side) and give it to the delivery driver the following week.

This week we are starting to harvest the head lettuce crop. This week we have a delicious, crunchy bib type lettuce from seeds that were a present last year from the father of our French farm intern Valentin - its called 'Blonde de' Paris'. Next week we will move into green romaine and red butter lettuce. we grow a dozen types of lettuce every year, and you'll see a rotating mix in your boxes for the next few weeks. 

Questions and Answers

Q: Whats with all the bags?

A: When packing boxes for delivery we bag all the 'wet' produce - this helps keep the produce from wilting on the way over to deliver.

Q: My Kale/Lettuce/Chard/Etc. is wilting. 

A: Green leafy vegetables love to stay moist. If they wilt, try soaking in the sink with cold water for fifteen minutes or more. Another good technique is putting the veggies in a bag and shaking with a little water, then putting this in the fridge.

Q: I didn't get my beets/dill/chard this week!

A: when packing delivery boxes we sometimes don;t have enough of a particular crop for every box. in this case we will substitute a different crop, or give you the crop the following week. Also, the exact box may not always match what my email says! If you feel your box was mis-packed or something is missing, please let me know by email or call the farm.

Q: Why are there mud and bugs in my lettuce?!

A: We do our very best to wash all the produce, usually double or triple washing anything that looks dirty. Never the less, some mud clumps cling inside crevices and creases, and little bugs like ladybugs and slugs love to hide out deep inside the folds of veggies. For this reason, we suggest a final rinse for all produce. When you find a bug, take it as a sign that you are eating the freshest, most vibrant, chemical free food possible. 

  

Send me your questions! Need a recipe? We have a recipe page on the website, or try  allrecipes.com. Want to know when a certain vegetable is coming in? confused about something in your box? email me!

This Week's Box

NEW: Beets - full large/half small

NEW: Chard - tender bagged rainbow colors

NEW: Head Lettuce - green leaf

Kale  - full share only -  all four varieties coming in strongly now
Salad Mix - we'll try to have this mix every week

Bok Choi - last week

Radish - new varieties - full large/half small

Spinach - full large/half small - ends soon

Cilantro -full large/half small
Garlic - full two/half one

NEW: Dill - full share only 

Fruit

cherries start next week!

Coming Soon (1-3 weeks)

head lettuce, varieties

rainbow swiss chard, bunched

dill, more

Upcoming

chives

peas - sugar snaps, shelling

scallions

Turkey Hill Newsletter - 2009-1

Turkey Hill CSA Newsletter - Week 1

From the Farm

The farm season is in full swing. Everything, or nearly everything is planted or seeded, and the weeds are growing like - you guessed it - weeds! Harvest has begun to take up nearly all our time, but we still have flats to plant and of course, lots of weeding! If you are a work-trade member, now is a Great time to come down to the farm and put in some time pulling weeds! Nearly everything is planted, and the fields look beautiful. These days we are busy irrigating all the newly seeded and transplanted beds, which means lots of irrigation work - setting up and moving irrigation sets and drip tape. Another big activity is mowing - the tall grass provides an unwelcome habitat for lots of grasshoppers which can be a real menace to vegetables! Mowing and clearing the beds of weeds reduces that habitat and the grasshoppers migrate to the nearby fields which are un-mowed. Mowing a bit of a challenge between the trees in the orchard (one day i'll get a fancy side mower, but for now, its lots of zig-zags), but the effect is rewarding. I've also mowed the cover crops down before they went to seed (we call the mower clippings / organic matter which i leave lying on the top of the soil 'green manure'). The potatoes got a great hilling and look amazing, and the hoop house is covered and nearly full.

Questions and Answers

Q: Who is delivering my produce?
A:  Our harvest crew (and me) take turns delivering each week. This week Lara will be delivering your boxes - Lara has worked at the farm for many years and has become our salad maestro for harvest season. When you see her, remember to thank her for growing your produce! 

  

Send me your questions! Need a recipe? We have a recipe page on the website, or try  allrecipes.com. Want to know when a certain vegetable is coming in? confused about something in your box? email me!

This Week's Box

Kale  - great for you, at their tender best this time of year
Salad Mix - we'll try to have this mix every week

Bok Choi - a crunchy asian vegetable perfect for stir fry. we'll have these for two weeks and thats it!

Radish - for a few weeks, spicy & crunchy.

Spinach - at its tender best 

Cilantro - a spring crop we will have for a few more weeks
Garlic - immature, with a slightly milder garlic flavor. chop up the whole thing, you can even use the green stem of the plant. just a bit to get you started, we'll have lots of garlic this season!

Plenty of room in those totes, just wait until mid season and they will fill up! Don't forget to bring your tote back next week, or just give it back to the driver when you pick up.

Full Share

Marjoram

More spinach, more cilantro, more radishes bunch, more garlic

 

Fruit

No fruit yet. A week to three weeks before we'll have the 1st cherries of the season.

Coming Soon (1-3 weeks)

head lettuce, varieties

rainbow swiss chard

baby beets

dill

Upcoming

chives

peas - sugar snaps, shelling

scallions

Spring 2009 - harvest starts soon!

From The Farm

Everything is bursting with spring on the farm. The last few days have brought overcast weather and some good soaking rains. Here are some recent pictures from the field



Click here to view the slide show in a larger size...

What to Expect!

Harvest starts soon, so I thought I would try to give you an idea of what to expect for the first 4-6 weeks of harvest. Its important to understand that despite our very early start this season in the field, the crops we harvest in June and July are limited! Overall, the fields are looking fantastic and I am expecting a bountiful harvest, but don't expect too much at first - we are starting extra early this year which means a slightly longer wait until the veggies of summer hit - so enjoy all the greens of spring while we tend the corn, cucumbers, squash, tomatoes, peppers and other summer crops.

Below I have listed all the veggies I can think of that we will be harvesting in the next six weeks. As for fruit, cherries usually start by the end of June, we will have fruit nearly every week after that until the end of the season.

Early Harvests
Here is what we plan to harvest for the first few harvests (spring starts green!):

Salad Mix - we strive to have salad nearly every week of the season by planting salad greens regularly.
Braising Mix - we only have this in the spring, one or two times. a bag of spicy greens for cooking - baby kale, tatsoi, chard, mizuna.
Bagged Spinach - the first few weeks we'll bag the spinach, which is at its best in the cooler spring weather. We'll switch to bunched spinach in July and have spinach regularly until the heat of summer arrives.
Green Garlic - We'll dig up the growing garlic plants - these will mature into garlic bulbs by August, but for now try these for a delicious mild garlic flavor.
Radishes - we will have a variety of radishes for the first few weeks
Kale - we have beautiful kale coming in now. This year we have green frilly and purple frilly kale, plus red russian kale and tuscano or lancinato kale. The kale is really at its very best in the spring, but we usually have kale all season long. Email your favorite kale recipes and I will share them with the group! We will vary the type each week and may bag the baby leaves until they are large enough to bunch.
Chois - we will have beautiful baby chois for the first couple of weeks - these have been covered under floating row covers, but may show some small pert damage (flea beatles). This will probably be some of the only chois of the season, so enjoy their crunchy stems and mustardy flavor.
Head Lettuce - we'll have romaine, green & red butter, summer crisp and some beautiful frilly, colorful & unusual types. Head lettuce lasts the spring, then fades away in the heat of summer.
Herbs: Early season herbs include cilantro, chives, marjoram, sage and dill. Later in the season we will have thyme, oregano, and lots of basil!

Coming Soon - week 3 plus
After the first few weeks more of the early harvest crops will begin to mature
Carrots - we will have baby carrots from time to time then later we will switch to full size carrots. Several types and plantings extend the carrot harvest over many weeks
Beets - we will start with baby beets, then switch to full sized beets for a few more weeks before beets are done. these are mainly a spring crop, but we sometimes have a few weeks in the fall as well.
Peas - peas are a spring treat that come and go pretty quickly. Our first planting was eaten almost entirely by what I guess was a flock of birds shortly after they came up, but the second planting looks beautiful and should produce at least a few weeks of sugar snaps, snow peas and shelling peas.
Rainbow Chard - we have a large planting with some wild color variations this year, so you can expect a regular supply of chard. we will try not to overwhelm you with chard!
Scallions - we usually have these just a couple of times in the season.

Frequently Asked Questions

Q: What am I supposed to do with all these GREENS!?
A: Some people love cooked greens and can eat them every day, others can't figure out how to eat all the chard, kale, spinach, lettuce and salad that the early CSA boxes contain! If you fall into the latter group, here are a few suggestions: check out our website for recipies, use a cookbook and try something new, or add the greens to something old, like a lasagna with spinach. Finally, see if you can find a friend or neighbor who might want them rather than just letting them go to waste! As we enter the summer season boxes fill out with other vegetables, we will lighten up on the greens, and offer these in the "extras" area.

Q: Why didn't I get radishes (or kale, or spinach or something) in my box?
A: Each week I type out an email for members, and I make a best guess at what will be available for the box harvest later in the week. Sometimes what we actually harvest might be a little different than my list, or there might be a shortage of one crop and an abundance of another. As we pack the boxes each week, we try to ensure everyone gets the exact same box, but sometimes (usually as a particular crop is just beginning to ripen and we don;t have that much) there isn't enough for everyone. In this case, we substitute another crop, so if you didn't get carrots you got beets, or if you didn't get braising mix you got extra baby chard. We also watch the overall dollar value of the box each week to insure you get a great deal for your box fee. The first weeks of the season are always slim, later season big boxes are more abundant!

Turkey Hill CSA Newsletter - May 2009

Welcome to spring!

Its May again on the farm and the bees are buzzing! Our new early water proved to be incredibly valuable, allowing us to plant a small very early section of crops including spinach, beets, carrots, kale and lettuce. The new system  took some work to get the kinks out, but eventually worked perfectly, keeping our pond filled for the few weeks in April before Fire Mountain water comes on.  This main season water (Fire Mountain Canal) is now of and going full tilt. Early water means early harvest and we are on track for starting harvest the first or second week in June! There is still time to sign up before the harvest begins.

I've posted some pictures so you can see the early crops progressing.

the field beyond the old apple orchard	packed greenhouse
garlic and baby lettuce	beds ready to plant

I also posted these pictures and more as a full slide show with captions, click here to view the slide show.

Also, here is a video of me running our Celli Spader . The video doesn't quite capture the very slow creeper speed the tractor is in, moving slowly forward while the spades slice down and kick back, chopping, loosening and pulverizing the soil to over a foot.

With a little under an acre planted so far, spading is a big activity at the the moment. I spend more time on the tractor in the spring than any other time of year, and now is crunch time, trying to get all the beds I need for the year ready. The recent rain has helped a lot - without it, I have to irrigate before I can spade - or the soil is too dry and hard. After a day of solid rain, the fields are perfect for tilling this week.

In addition to the field crops, we have been working to get the hoop house planted. This big field house gets the first planting of tomatoes, cucumbers, squash and other heat loving crops. We rebuilt the house this spring in a new location and we are now getting the soil prepared for planting, we should start filling it up next week. 

We are also busy working in the heated greenhouse - we are transplanting the tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, flowers and other long season crops into jumbo six packs. These will go out into the field in late May or early June. We are also planting the last of the spring head lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, chard and kale crops as well as large seeded annual flowers and some veggies like our early cukes and squash. 

 

We had a flurry of signups for the CSA before the discount deadline, but we also still have plenty of room for new members. Our first harvest is just five or six weeks away, so if you or anyone you know has been thinking about signing up - now is the time to act! Thanks for your support!

Turkey Hill April 2009 Update

Turkey Hill April 2009 Update

Time to plant!

After a very warm Feb/early march, the last two weeks have been intermittently cold, snowy, windy or rainy. All the moisture is great, but the cold is delaying the melt that feeds our early water and keeping us out of the field from planting (which is probably good since its been extremely cold at night). 

This week the storms have finally broken and the first seeding and field planting are finally happening. I'll be seeding salad mix, spinach, peas, scallions & pearl onions, carrots, cilantro, radishes and more, plus we'll finally be transplanting out the greenhouse plants that have been waiting for weeks: kale, chard, broccoli, lettuce, cauliflower, cabbage and more.

Its still very early in the season to be planting: I usually don't start until the last week in April. I'm a little nervous about the lingering cold and the deer, which can take down a swath of crop pretty quickly. Much of or early plantings will get covered in floating row cover - the thin, breathable spun polyethylene fabric. This will add a few degrees of additional frost protection to these already hardy crops, and also insure they aren't chomped by the deer.  

Here are some recent photos: 

The fresh beds await an early planting of crops.
Soon to be sprouting or transplanted: peas, spinach, lettuce, chard,
kale, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage and more...

The humidity of the greenhouse is hard to
communicate in a picture! This is just the early crops, at the peak
every square inch of space is crammed with plants.

The chickens are moving down to the farm this year, this is the new chicken coop!

The garlic is up and slowly coming to life.

Turkey Hill Newsletter, March 2009

Spring is a lovely time on the farm! The air is crisp and cool, and the days are warm. Spring winds have been whipping up, and today a new storm is bringing snow to the mountains.

In the field work progresses preparing for the season. The moisture was good, so I was able to disc the entire field. I planted a variety of cover crops on around four acres - mustards, vetch & other green manure mixes. Some of these will get tilled in late spring for planting, others will stay in cover crop all season, getting mowed so they won't go to seed. We'll till these in next spring. Cover crops help build soil, adding organic matter and sometimes fixing nitrogen. In our climate, its a bit difficult to get a cover crop in because the season is quick! fortunately our field is expansive enough that we can devote a part of the field to cover crop while the veggies get planted in other sections.

This week we nearly completed the hoop house setup project. Our 200' x 20' hoop house has been in use for six years, but last year we took it apart to relocate it and never managed to finish putting it back together. This year we got an early start and the hoop house is nearly ready for planting. It will still be a few weeks before we can really get crops planted in there, but its great to have it ready to go! The hoop house adds night time heat that brings crops in weeks ahead of outdoor planting. This means a wider variety of crops early in the season.

We've already begun our early plantings in the greenhouse. I'm frequently asked about why we start certain crops in the greenhouse and some directly in the field. There are a variety of reasons, here are a few. Earliness - many crops need a jump start on the season to reach maturity in one summer in our climate - Tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, and some herbs and flowers. Taproots - root crops don't transplant well and do best when grown from seed in the field: carrots, beets, radish. Expense - some seeds we use are very expensive (for example orange cauliflower 'cheddar' costs around five cents per seed! planting in the field requires that we drill a line of plants, then thin to the proper spacing, wasting lots of seeds along the way. Starting seeds in the greenhouse insures that nearly every seed winds up reaching maturity.

Spring is a great time to visit the farm! We love having visitors, especially CSA members. Plan a visit this spring to see what's going on up here. We'll walk the fields, tour the greenhouse and  answer any questions. Just call ahead to let us know you are coming. If you would like to come the farm for a few hours of work, plan on later in the spring when we need more help weeding - usually after mid may.

Until next time...