Farm Happenings
The new Free choice shareholders had orientations this week and are out enjoying the fields already. There’s a few summer shares that have wrapped up for the season.
A note on peppers: This hasn’t been the easiest pepper year for us. As summer shares will recall, we lost most of our plants to late frost in the spring. We replanted with replacement plants that we scrounged from various greenhouses. Most of the hot pepper plants did fairly well, so you’ll see ancho poblano, Hungarian Hot Wax and cayenne in the share room. There’s some jalapeno, but not as abundant. The sweet pepper plants didn’t fare as well. We will be able to distribute them one week or possibly a bit more this month, but overall the yield is lower and the fruits are modest in size.
How to get your eggs if you signed up for Fall Share
- Visit the farm anytime during the week, the eggs are stocked on Sundays
- Find the eggs labeled with your name in the fridge.
- Leave name label in quart container on door of fridge.
- Mark by your name in the appropriate week column on egg sheet on outside of shareholder fridge.
It pays to read your local newspaper. While browsing through the North Country This Week, we saw the events schedule for the 30th Annual Old Fashioned Harvest Days, a festival hosted by the St. Lawrence Power and Equipment Museum in Madrid. It was the Women’s Skillet Throw event that caught our eye. So the whole farm crew rolled over there this weekend. Dottie and Flip gave it their mightiest and won their age categories. Future invitation: all the ladies of the farm, join us there in 2022!
Fresh batch of red radishes available this week. In the patch, find the ripe globes (around golf ball sized) and pull entire plant. The greens are edible too.
BONUS: We have grapes along the fence line at entrance of the farm, the upper side of front range field. This is the first harvest of these three year old plants and they are available first, come- first served up to three bunches per share. Use clippers (provided in barn) to cut the bunches off the vines.
Tips for Success
- Don’t be intimidated by the edamame. We ate our first last night, in the simplest way, just boiling the whole pods in salted water, draining and eating as an appetizer by popping the beans into our mouths. A fun pastime and also great protein source. The pods are not edible, it’s just the chewy fresh beans you want.
- Aim to be thorough when picking the green beans by harvesting all medium and large beans from each plant before moving down the row. Shift the plant around to look at it from all sides. Often there’s pods in the middle of the bed that are easy to overlook. These get oversized and inedible.
- The groundcherries (aka husk tomatoes) are available for harvest. They are in the Dutchess field, which is a 1 minute walk from the barn. To get there, walk along upper side of Front Range field, cross the Taylor Park Road and enter into the fence on opposite side of park road.
The winter squash and pie pumpkins matured earlier than usual. This week there is the opportunity to select either a butternut (on left) or spaghetti squash (on right). The squash and pie pumpkins are in the center part of the barn.
Crops Available
This list and availability are subject to change, check the share whiteboard at the start of every visit. If you are unsure about how to harvest: ask us! In person, via text or email.
Cell phone numbers, Flip: 315-854-5399 and Bob 315-854-5395.
*New this week
- Arugula
- Beets
- Cabbage
- Celery stalks
- Cutting flowers
- Edamame, green soybeans*
- Groundcherries*, in the Dutchess field across Taylor Park road, see 2020 harvest video here
- Head lettuce
- Hot peppers, ancho, Hungarian hot wax and cayenne
- Kale, curly or dinosaur
- Mixed lettuce greens
- Mixed salad greens
- Onions
- Pie Pumpkins*
- Rainbow chard
- Red radishes*
- Russet potatoes
- Scallions
- Tomatoes, multiple varieties
- Winter squash: butternut or spaghetti*
Culinary and Medicinal Herbs
- Basil
- Cilantro
- Dill
- Fennel seeds
- Lemon balm
- Lemon verbena
- Lime basil
- Mint
- Oregano
- Rosemary
- Sage
- Thyme
- Tulsi holy basil
- Winter savory
Stay tuned for the 2nd annual pumpkin contest!
Win the pumpkins by being the closest to guessing their weights.
Thanks to the soil that nourishes us,
-Flip & Bob