Harvesting Commences This Week!

For our early season subscribers Rosemattel's begins the harvesting for 2010 shares today! This CSA is closed for any new subscribers for regular season. Please stay in touch if you may be interested in the Fall/Winter offerings. We will have a better idea of this option the closer we gets to mid summer.
Depending on when subscribers signed up determined if they were starting this week or the following if they chose a half share which is a full share picked up every other week. We have to spread out the half shares so that we are not overharvesting one week and then find ourselves with a void in the following week's harvest. It helps balance the crop production out evenly.

Remember: The Barberton Grange is Mondays 430-530, farm on Tuesdays after 1pm and the BG Farmers Market on Saturdays 9-3.

22 Week Subscriptions:
We had to delay the 22 week subscriptions due to the crazy weather til this week and will begin today.

Corporate Subscribers:
Our shared corporate CSA customers begin this Wednesday as we work with Hunters Greens to eagerly meet their veggie needs.

17 week Subscriptions:
17 week subscribers begin pick up

15 week Subscriptions:
In two more weeks!

Remember-
Depending on when subscribers signed up determined if they were starting this week or the following if they chose a half share which is a full share picked up every other week. We have to spread out the half shares so that we are not overharvesting one week and then find ourselves with a void in the following week's harvest. It helps balance the crop production out evenly.

Please call my cel at 241-1278 if you have any questions!! I have sent out emails over the last week to remind 22 week and 17 week subscribers of when they begin their pick up. I will email the 15 week subscribers by the beginning of next week.

Please remember that if you have missed your pick up, the veggies cannot be re-harvested. We will donate it to the local Share House Women's shelter if you do not pick up your veggies. We do not have a way to store your share for another day or time so please if you cannot make it at least send a friend to pick up for you!

Normally I do not do weekly newsletters as we get in to the busy season of harvesting but will update this blog as we go along at least monthly if not more often :)

Till then,
See you soon!
The Clark County Farmerette

Milk In Glass Bottles-Yum!

Lori, one of our farm produce subscribers is getting a milk share arrangement and is looking for like minded individuals to go in a share of it with.

Here is her email-
I'm getting milk delivered from Noris dairy (www.norisdairy.com) but they require a weekly subscription with a minimum of $18 for delivery. Unfortunately I don't need quite that much dairy. I'm hoping you might know someone else who subscribes that I can piggyback my order with (preferably on the west side of Vancouver) or who might be interested in going in with me. They're a bit spendy but I love the glass bottles and how fresh everything is (the milk is typically "good" for only about a week). Any ideas?

I don't want to post her contact info online, so please email me at battlegroundfma@yahoo.com and I will forward your inquiry!

Great Two Days of Growing Weather!

Great Two Days of Growing Weather!

Spent the last two days intensively taking advantage of the pristine weather opportunities at the farm. The baby lettuce is starting to catch up with the scheduled timing of size. The strawberries have officially been reclaimed from the weeds that flourished during the weeks of rain and are flowering nicely with green berries. The apple trees have received their first spraying of a kaolin based protectant to help deter the "not so welcomed" pests. Though the tomatilloes( still in the cold frame) are not ready to take the strength of night temps at this farm-they are already flowering, yay! Spinach, chard and kale varieties had to be reseeded in the ground as the mice were real hungry and found a drive by veggie start pit stop. I had done these twice before in seed trays and finally gave up. I would see the seedlings appear and then the next day or two later, they were getting nibbled down. With the hopes of coming back I brought them to the outdoors and covered them with plastic and another barrier but they were too far eaten down to make any sense of them. The other direct seeded chard, spinach, beets that were done 2 months ago are just as big as what I direct seeded again a month later. The gourmet salad mix is a slow gower as well. Some of the pre-grown onion starts I had added to the regular onion starts that were planted a while back, to my surprise, are going to seed already???? When the temps go from high to low back and forth sometimes the plant is tricked in to making seeds. Luckily most of them are not doing this, just some. The peas should begin flowering now and just are not.....they will be ready later rather than sooner.
To sum this up things are delayed by at least a week of target harvest on account of the weather. I will touch base with you all in another week or so to see if we need to delay the 22 week subscriptions pick up. The subscribers who are starting later in the harvest season, things will be alot more predictable as far as greens are concerned. Let's all be happy for the sun and pray for more!!!
Til later :)
Clark County Farmerette

Posted by Battle Ground Farmers Market at 6:26 PM

The rain game.......

We have had record rainfall this spring....
Easy to work with when putting seedlings in to the ground during the luck of dry days and neatly tossing the direct seeded crops in short windows of opportunities to do so.
Peas are now about a foot long and the chard and lettuce starts are slowly coming around. The potatoes are revealing their green tops which means it is time to hill and straw them up for baby potatoes first and larger ones later. The tomatoes, peppers, tomatilloes and basil in the greenhouse are screaming to come out and play ! Unfortunately the questionable night temps and soil warmth is something that has to be more predictable during a safe time to take the chance of being on their own out there in the fields.
Yes on a small scale of warm season veggie production one could set them out and use various covers of frost protection but when it is a field of them, it would not be cost effective for us to do so as we work with mother nature and what she gives us for growing in. Seasonal growing and eating is part of what CSA is about. For some folks, the understanding of what goes on behind the scenes in this type of growing arrangement can be quite educational indeed.
The strawberries are showing the buds of blooms but not quite opening up yet. The blooming succession of apple trees is definitely one challenge to get to this year as the non-petro spray we will be applying can only be done in dry weather to make it effective. It is like a dance we do to have apples with pretty faces in the summer and fall.
Pending a corporate contract tied in with the CSA farmers I am sharing land with, it looks like this farm could be full. We are waiting for a few details that need to be firmed up from them to get a better idea of where the subscription status stands. This means I am taking folk's info through my website to be placed on a waitlist for the regular growing season. Fall and winter shares availability will be decided on at a later date in the Summer so there may be an opportunity there-will keep you posted!
Adieu!
The Clark County Farmerette!