local CSA farms

Here's a Boston Globe article on our local CSA (community supported agriculture) farms. I read about this on the Belmont CSA blog and wanted to link to it here too.

Gretta has a nice quote in the article: "I think people are getting a lot smarter about the importance of a strong regional food system and about healthy food. They're getting smarter about living in ways that are environmentally friendly and the positive consequences of that," said Anderson, who grows her vegetables on a 1-acre garden on Glenn Road.

About once a month I head over to Gretta's farm and take photos of her beautiful crops. Many of these photos end up on her blog. Its about time for me to head over there and see what she has growing now. We have a well needed rainfall today and I bet her crops (and mine!) are enjoying it.

Our Belmont Farmer's Market opens next week: June 12th.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

outsourcing vegetable gardening and CSAs

Here's a wild new idea.

Excerpts:

... MyFarm is an enterprise that puts vegetable gardens into people's backyards, then sends a gardener once a week to do upkeep and harvest, leaving fresh produce behind ... Trevor Paque calls his enterprise a "decentralized urban farm." ... aims to turn under-used, overgrown backyards into plots of green that will provide organically grown food .... what makes Paque's venture different is that he sees all the gardens as merely components of one large farm .... His plan is to take that land and use it to create a CSA (Community Supported Agriculture). ... The more extra produce a yard grows, over and above the owners' needs, the less they will pay for weekly upkeep.

Here's the link for MyFarm's website. They have great photos of their gardens.

What a concept! Can you imagine a vegetable garden in EVERY backyard ... or front yard. Not only the White House, but every house.

Why do this? I think I have a list somewhere back in my blog of a few reasons to grow vegetable gardens. Here it is. I think most of these apply. Of course Pollan has written well detailed reasons: NY Times article and Moyer interview.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)
White House veggie garden proposal

new CSA farm blog

A new blog! Its about the CSA farm around the corner from my garden: Belmont CSA News. Its very exciting to be able to read updates on what's happening down on the farm. And maybe I'll find some time to help Gretta out sometime. I can't imagine how much work it is to single-handedly run a CSA farm.

The CSA farm with its snow covered fields in the March twilight.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

winter CSA distribution

With no vegetables from my garden to photograph, I took pictures of my winter half-distribution from Belmont CSA. Beautiful roots, fluffy kale, gnarly celeriac, plump happy butternuts and ears of popcorn like iridescent pearls.

Gretta said most of these crops were stored a while in a root cellar. Only the kale is freshly picked.

These photos show my half of the December CSA distribution - I share with a neighbor. At $100 per half share, which included 3 distributions (Oct, Nov and Dec), its been a SUPER value. Quality, freshness and variety are exceptional.



The share included: butternut squash, turnips, sweet potatoes, carrots, yellow and red onions, shallots, parsnips, popcorn, celeriac, kale, potatoes, cabbage (not photographed) and beets.

It gives me ideas for my garden for next year:
grow a bigger fall crop of carrots
grow more and bigger varieties of potatoes
(can you do a fall planting of potatoes?)
grow more onions too (I think I'll buy seedlings next year)
keep trying to grow parsnips,
and try growing celeriac.

Another idea - its almost time to put together my planting schedule and seed order! I usually get time for this once the holiday's wind down. That will be soon.
CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

CSA farm tour

Many thanks to Gretta for the wonderful tour of her CSA farm this afternoon. Gretta farms an acre of land here in Belmont MA and produces the most delicious and beautiful vegetables you have seen. Her hoop house is full of seedlings now. She has a lot more information at her site: Belmont CSA News.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

my first CSA distribution

My first CSA share!

I picked up 50 lbs of fantastic vegetables from my local CSA (Gretta's Farm) this weekend. The farm is 1 mile from my house. Not only am I really excited to enjoy eating these, I'm also considering what I would like to grow in my own garden next fall. Gretta (and partner farms) grow all of this locally using sustainable organic methods.

The distribution included: oak leaf lettuce, broad leaved escarole, rainbow chard, hakurei turnips, spinach, parsley, green and red peppers, a couple jalapeno chiles, fennel, leeks, Napa cabbage, onions, beets, potatoes, carrots, sweet potatoes, Daikon radish, acorn and Delicata winter squash, a pie pumpkin and 10 lbs of apples.

What did we eat first?

Well, the apples were first. They're going fast. Very crisp and sweet.

Second was the oak leaf lettuce. Excellent! I will definitely add this to my crops next year.

And third was the carrots and red peppers. Nice in salads. Sweet colorful spears in martinis. I tried to grow red peppers this year without success and will try again next year.

Tonight I made a delicious cabbage risotto with the Napa cabbage (also using carrot, onion and parsley). I'll consider cabbage growing myself (Napa, savoy or other). It's an attractive and very hardy fall vegetable.

I'm looking forward to eating my giant sweet potato. I'll probably make sweet potato fries (deep fry) half for one meal and then bake the other half. Yummy! I don't know much about growing these. A gardener I know at the BVG grew a crop this year and was very happy with them. I'll have to look into this.

No, we're not eating all these veggies ourselves. We shared half with another family (David and Jennifer) and will bring some of our half to my parents. I still have greens, radish, beets, carrots, potatoes and onions from my garden. (If we don't look out, we'll turn into rabbits with all these veggies!)




CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

dreary December

Its such a dark and dreary time. The sun sets at 4:15 now. And with the thick cloud cover it is truly gloomy. Many parts of Massachusetts had a serious ice storm last night and will be without power for days. But just rain here - buckets and buckets full of rain.

I haven't been in a garden in many days, but took some time this morning to go out and photograph in the mud. I took photos of my community plot, my home garden and Gretta's farm.

My community plot:



I tried to edit these photos to brighten and enliven them. But the gardens just aren't bright and they aren't lively. The only thing apparently alive in my plot is the rye and clover cover crop. My wheel barrow is overturned in the middle and I've left a few tools here and there.

There is some wild life around the dreary gardens: the birds gather in flocks and chatter with each other. They scatter as I walk through. And Skippy and I find evidence of coyotes (piles of scat) at the periphery of the gardens. That means there must be rabbits and voles around too. But most of the color in the gardens is the cheap green plastic fences and the bright orange bittersweet we are trying hard to eliminate.

Gretta's CSA farm:



Gretta still has crops in her fields. Rows of curly blue-green and purple kales, big leaved collards and rows of leeks. Her cabbages still look fine to me. But then Gretta farms for whole sale and has much higher standards than me. She says these are frost burned. She has nice cover crop rows of green rye sprouts and golden spring oats. I love the golds, blues and browns of her fields.

As always, she gives me ideas for my garden. Challenges. I tasted collards for the first time from her winter distribution and will definitely add this tender and hardy green to my crop list for next year. I'm not so big on eating cabbages, but the big round heads sure look beautiful.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

Belmont CSA mid-winter veggies

Its getting pretty cold for northern vegetable gardens. But, even under several inches of snow, there are veggies growing. Skippy and I took a walk over to the Belmont CSA garden, a mile from our house and grown by Gretta Anderson.

I wish I had such beautiful vegetables. She has very nice heads of broccoli - probably her second harvest of this row. I planted mine too late this year and will remember that next year. This broccoli hardly seems to notice the snow.

I'm not sure what's under the row covers. Any guesses? Escarole? Along with several long rows of broccolis and the covered mystery crop, Gretta also has a several nice long rows of a purple kale (winterbor, the hardiest variety). When I took this photo, she had just harvested this crop for a winter share distribution.



A gaggle of Canada geese were out in the front garden, where a cover crop was growing in a corn field. They saw Skippy from a distance and, with much commotion, took to wing. Skippy's reputation precedes him among the local water fowl. I guess they didn't notice I had him on a short leash.


It was a lovely, warm winter day today. A clear blue sky. Its unusual for us to have snow so early in December. It makes it feel festive - like an early Christmas.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

radish taste test

I have three types of radish in my fridge now, so we did a side-by-side taste test. From left: my home-grown salad radish (var. Easter egg mix), Daikon radish (CSA grown) and the pink is also CSA grown - a winter radish called Misato rose. The lower photos are both the winter rose radish.

Winter radish are larger and slower growing than the standard salad varieties. And they keep longer.

Our taste test results: they all taste like .... well, radish.

The salad radish has the sharpest flavor, Daikon a bit milder and Misato rose the mildest. Misato rose is also the most crisp, Daikon a bit less so and salad radish the least crisp. (Of course, the salad radish here is an end-of-the-year, two-week-in-the-fridge one. I bet a freshly pulled spring radish would compare better.)

I would like to try to grow a few winter radish next year in my garden. I tried a round black winter radish from the super market last year. Very nice. I was not successful in getting any seeds of this variety to sprout, but will try again. I'll try Misato rose and black round winter radish. Just a few of each for salads and martinis.

The Daikon is very nice, but its a bit scary to have so much radish in one place. Too big. I'll skip this one.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

radish (Raphanus sativus)

late blight continues to kill tomatoes

On yesterday's visit to my community plot I found late blight on all of my remaining tomato plants. My next chore will be to remove them all. Bag and dispose in the trash. I was hoping a few of my plants would have survived, but all have succumbed. 16 plants - 11 varieties that I babied since March.

I also had a sad note from the New Hampshire Farm that I distribute CSA shares for. Its a long but very interesting note so I'm posting most of it here. Very sad to think of all the lost crops for local farmers.

I'm nervously watching my little patch of 8 tomato plants tucked in next to my house. But, with fingers crossed, they look fine so far. I make sure not to go near it after being at the community garden. Looks like another day or two til the big tomatoes ripen.

Late Blight appeared on our farm last week. Thursday, in the cherry tomatoes, enough small lesions that we took out the entire planting immediately, with the hope of preventing spread to our main tomato and potato fields. With several advisors from UHN Agricultural Extension, we examined our main season tomatoes and potatoes, and found no sign of Late Blight on Thursday. But by this morning, I found blight lesions in various places in the tomato field, including on one ripening tomato.

The quick summary for you again: Late Blight is a fungus endemic to the southern U.S. that, in wet years, makes its way north to New England. This is usually in September or later, and affects a few potato and tomato fields after the main harvest is concluded. It is not harmful to humans, except in terms of crop loss. It's not normally (never before this season) a big deal for most NE farms. This year, it seems that a single nursery from the south distributed infected tomato seedlings to Wal Mart and Home Depot, among others, who sold those plants to home gardeners across the Northeast. Once these plants were planted outside, the fungus began spreading across our region, some three months ahead of the typical schedule and in time to do serious damage to the harvest of both gardeners and farmers alike. Weather conditions suited the Blight perfectly - cool and wet - and we haven't yet seen the long stretch of hot and dry that might put the Late Blight in check. This week may be the dry and warm we've all been hoping for, though it's probably too late for the tomatoes on our farm.

There is no organic control for this fungus once it appears, and conventional sprays have limited effectiveness as well. The organic copper fungicides that we have used over the past 6 weeks may have some preventative effect, but because they are washed off in every rain, this has been a challenge. With the blight on our farm, the only options are to burn, bury, or discard affected plants to try to slow the spread through our farm and to other growers.

So right now, we are facing limited choices and a mountain of work. The sunny weather will be on our side as we proceed. In the tomatoes, the cherries are already untrellised and tilled in. Because the main season crop looks beautiful and is just beginning to ripen, we're going to try pulling out infected plants one by one, as well as using our hand-held flame weeder to burn infected leaves. Honestly, we're not hopeful, particularly because other farmers who are further along with the blight aren't reporting great success with these "pruning" strategies. We'll try this approach for a few days. Of course, we have a whole farm to care for, so cannot let everything else go for a potential fool's errand in one crop (even one of the favorites).

Potatoes, we are thanking our lucky stars that we already have a reasonable crop underground - blight notwithstanding, it's been a great potato growing season. However, the Late Blight spores can quickly travel through the vines and rot the potatoes underground. We've decided to kill the potato vines, and enjoy the harvest that is already sized up. Up and down our valley, farmers are doing the same. Conventional farmers use an herbicide for vine kill, and it is certainly disconcerting to see dead potato fields all over in early August. As organic growers, we have a harder road to hoe, as we attempt to mechanically kill all of the vines without damaging the potato hills underneath. First, we've been mowing the field. Later today we'll go through with weedwackers (yes, that's 8 miles of weedwacking!). When that's all done, we'll sweep through with the crew and loppers, knocking back the last remaining living stubs. We're learning that there's no such thing as "overkill" when it come to late blight. We'll see a smaller yield, as some spuds would have continued to size up over the rest of the summer. And we're uncertain if we'll lose some storability with such early vine kill - the potatoes have to store underground for at least two weeks after the vines are dead, to set the skins for storage. We'll see. But plenty of mashed potatoes remain in our future this season!

Of course, we're disappointed about (likely) losing the tomatoes, as we know you are as well (why couldn't it be the turnip blight?!). The epidemic proportions beyond our farm, as well as the connections to large-scale, industrial agriculture, make the blow a bit harder to swallow (or not swallow, as the case will be). We are so deeply sad for many other farmers who are seeing serious financial losses due to the blight. We hope you understand that there is abolutely nothing that we can do to have this crop for you this season. I really, really, really wish we did (can you hear me stomping my feet now?). Of course, everyone knows, not just farmers, that hard work doesn't always lead linearly to good results. We are affirmed in our commitment to growing for you, through Community Supported Agriculture. We are grateful for your support and understanding.

Jenny and Bruce, Picadilly Farm LLC, Winchester, NH

And another quote added Wednesday, August 5. This from a CSA farmer in White River Junction VT, after blight landed on his farm last week:

"All this reminds me that while climate change is the big cloud hanging over the land, it's actually transportation that has done the serious damage to our ecosystems so far. (Both problems being manifestations of fossil fuel use.) We humans love to travel, and we love to move stuff all over the place for fun or profit or by necessity. This brings new species into contact with one another, often to the detriment of one or both. Most of the damage in VT/NH has been to our forests so far - chestnut, elm, butternut, and beech essentially gone, with ash, hemlock, and possible sugar maple in imminent peril. Agriculture is in less danger, primarily because everything we grow is not native to here anyway. Hopefully in this case, a nice cold winter will wipe out the blight and bring us a fresh start next year."

Gretta's farm

Check out the photos I took of Gretta's farm (Belmont CSA blog). Her fields are as beautiful as a piece of art.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

juicy sweet watermelon

This melon was grown by Belmont CSA. A beautiful dark green round fruit that I bought last week at the Farmer's Market. It tastes as good as it looks. Sweet and juicy. I didn't ask the variety, but it looks like an heirloom Sugar Baby Watermelon. I saved all of the seeds and am looking forward to a nice patch of these in my garden next year!

Watermelon (Citrullus lanatus (Thunb.) Matsum & Nakai, family Cucurbitaceae)

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

Gretta's planting list

I found this great list that Gretta (the farmer at our local CSA farm) posted of the crops she will be planting this year! An awesome list to peruse - maybe for bedtime reading...

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

Gretta's distribution

I went over to Gretta's CSA farm this morning and took some photos of her distribution. It has a number of new items that will need identification for her customers. I'll be posting a photo labeled with mouse-overs on her blog later today.

I spread all the vegetables on a bench in her hoop house, along with a box of each of the five apple varieties (each distribution includes just one bag of apples). Lots of roots, squashes and greens. Skippy seemed to like hanging out here. He seems to have taken to the task of guarding vegetables - just like he does at my garden.

I have signed up to get half a distribution myself. Mine starts next weekend. I'm looking forward to trying all of these veggies myself!

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)

farmers market day

Another beautiful day at the local farmers market. But HOT!! I always like to see what the local real farmers are harvesting - and see how far behind my garden is :(

Today they had lots of tomatoes, peppers, squash and eggplants. Also blueberries, raspberries, corn, broccoli, garlic, onions, beets and potatoes. Cut flowers. Since I've been complaining about what a bad year it is for tomatoes, I asked the farmer from Belmont Farm CSA what she thought. Well, she said its an awesome year. She got her tomatoes in early sine the weather was so good (May 10) and has been harvesting for 3 weeks now! She had lots of New Girl's at the stand. That's one of her beautiful Kaliope eggplants (the large one).

The lettuce is in short supply, as I am finding in my garden. The Belmont farmer had to box her lettuce since it had wilted (looked great to me!). She said the farmers are only growing a type of heat resistant lettuce called Summer Crisp or Batavia now (seeds from Johnny's). Any other type she says will bolt. I'll put this variety on my list for next year!

The garlic I bought looks about like the head I dug from my garden earlier this week. I'm going to wait a few more weeks and see if it will get a bit bigger.

CSA (Community Supported Agriculture)