Category: 2010 Newsletters

Welcome back to the farm. It was great to see all of you last week. Your weekly farm visit completes the circle for us; we are gratified seeing you take fresh food home to prepare for your families.

Things are popping in the fields, including the weeds. We started picking zucchini this week and hopefully the plants will be in full production next week so that we can add some to your shares. Strawberries unfortunately drop off the list. The wet weather over the past two weekends destroyed major amounts of their fruit.  Carrots and scallions are coming along though and we should see kohlrabi soon too. Here’s a list of what to expect in your share this week:

Lettuce             Baby Bok Choi

Chard                        Broccoli

Kale                        Asian Greens

June is typically our “lightest” month for the CSA. Greens make up the bulk of your share for these first few weeks. Once we get into late June, heavier stuff arrives like zucchini, carrots and cabbage. For those of you new to CSA this year all these greens to start may be a bit daunting. Try looking on our website for recipes, ask the farmers for tips when you come to the farm and check out the CSA cookbook we have for sale.

Kale Chips: Some of you already make kale chips at home, but they are so good it is worth mentioning at this point in the season, to alleviate any feelings of having too much kale as the season progresses.  To make kale chips, just make sure the leaves are relatively dry.  You may tear them into smaller pieces or leave them as is.  Toss them in a bowl with olive oil, use your hands to make sure each leaf is coated in the oil, and sprinkle a little salt.  Lie flat on a cookie sheet – making sure not to overlap, and bake on 300 for 15-20 minutes.  They should be crispy – not chewy at all.  Put on a plate and watch them disappear.  You can also crumble the crispy “chips” onto salads, popcorn, rice, anything!  Our kids love these things. Let us know what you think.

Every summer is a process of working up to June, which is typically the busiest month on the farm. Relaxed seedings in the greenhouse in February while snowstorms whip about outside give way to the arrival of the apprentice crew in April and heavy transplanting in May. When June hits we always have a heavy load in the fields and then harvest starts. It’s exciting to cut wash and present to you all the food we’ve been raising up to this point but losing two field days each week to harvest really puts the pressure on. In the next week we have to till 4 acres, make up over 20 thousand feet of raised beds, transplant 10 thousand pumpkin and winter squash plants, stake 600 tomato plants, weed a couple thousand feet of various beds, and the list goes on. It’s lucky we eat well and have all of you for moral support.

For those that would like to go beyond moral support…Weeding Wednesday Tomorrow! Every Wednesday we’ll be ready to weed with your help.  Join us Wednesday mornings at the farmstead at 8:30 am and work with the farmers weeding in the fields.  Many hands make light work…the work is heavy for our few hands right now!

Field walk with Seth today  (Tuesday) 4:30! The third Tuesday of each month at 4:30 pm we will have field walks for CSA members who would like to see what we’re doing in the fields up close. This is a great time to see what kohlrabi looks like in it’s native habitat and ask all those questions about unknown bugs in your home gardens.

See you at the farm!

Summer begins this week with our first CSA pickup. What a year so far. I’m thinking we’re getting payback from the horror of last summer, but I don’t want to jinx it. Never have we had peas in flower and strawberries in full flush the first week of June.

What’s New?

We’ve added extended pick up hours, scheduled field walks with the farmers, regular volunteer days, scheduled cooking demos with local chefs, a pre-pay system for for-sale farm products, a local business board, and community supported fishery shares.

Gratitude

While we farmers work long hard hours, the farm would not be possible without you.  Thank you to all of our members who have been with us since our first year in 2004; thank you to all of you new members, taking a new adventure, and to all of you in between…we are excited to be feeding you this summer.

Pickup begins!

Come to the farm on Tuesday or Friday from 2 until 7 pm for our first harvest of the season. Here’s a list of what to expect in your share this week:

Lettuce             Baby Bok Choi

Chard                        Broccoli

Kale                        Chives

Asian Greens             Strawberries

BAGS

Please bring bags with you to the farm for your produce, both “produce style” and larger handle bags are helpful. If you forget, we have bags, but the fewer of these we can use the better it is for all of us.

Balances Due

If you have questions about your balance, payments, etc. you can talk to Maura or Seth at pickup or send us an email to info@crystalspringcsa.com.

We’re expecting a great summer this year and have another top-notch group of farm apprentices. Adrian, Emily, Jacinda and Bethany (back for and encore performance) are amazing people and we hope you will get a chance to chat with them this summer. They’ve been working unbelievably hard preparing and planting the past couple months and the fields look great. Hopefully you have noticed our new high tunnel greenhouses down in the fields. These are to ensure that we have tomatoes for you this year and so far the plants in them look great.

Want to get dirty?

Volunteer weeding days for the months of June and July. Show up at the farmstead Wednesday mornings at 8:30 am and work with the farmers weeding in the fields.  Many hands make light work…the work is heavy for our few hands right now!

Field walks with the farmers

The third Tuesday of the month at 4:30 pm we will have field walks for CSA members who would like to see what we’re doing in the fields up close. This is a great time to see what kohlrabi looks like in it’s native habitat and ask all those questions about unknown bugs in your home gardens.

Local business networking

The local economy is thriving here with so many local business owners being a part of this farm.  If you own a local business bring your card or brochure to pickup and add it to our local business board and webpage. Our hope is that  everyone who supports this farm will also support each other.

Crystal Spring Farm Camp & Junior Counselors!

We still have a few spaces available for 6-11 year olds for the week of August 9^th. We could also use a few more junior counselor volunteers throughout the summer. 12-15 year olds who are interested in gaining experience with farm work and young children can contact maura@crystalspringcsa.com.

Local Farm Products at Pickup

Look for outstanding products from other local farms at pickup this and every week. Milk, cheese, maple syrup, tempeh, sauerkraut and more items to come soon! Please let us know if you would like us to carry anything that your family really likes.

CSA shares still available

Please spread the word to friends, neighbors and co-workers. If you would like brochures let us know and we’ll mail them out to you. You can also direct prospective members to our website www.crystalspringcsa.com

Spring has come and feels like it’s almost gone here at the farm with the trees, flowers, peepers and farmers rushing to catch up. Never in twelve years of farming in the northeast have I even dreamt of seeding peas on the 12^th of March (or carrots, beets and parsnips on the 20^th). To be this far ahead of the calendar is exciting but also a bit unsettling. For now I’m sticking with optimism for the year to come.

Speaking of optimism, our new farm crew has been here for a week and they are jumping in to the daily operations with gusto. We are very lucky to have Bethany returning from last year, well rested from her travels to India and help with lambing over the winter. New this year we also have Adrian, Jacinda, and Emily. Adrian spent last summer working with Willow Pond Farm in Sabattus (they supply our fall apples) and is hoping to use his experience here, along with his MBA, to start his own farm in the coming years. Jacinda worked for a large CSA in New Jersey last year and hails from New York City, by way of rural Pennsylvania. Emily spent summers in Maine at summer camps (as camper and counselor) and most recently has been working for Chewonki and Ferry Beach Ecology School doing farm and ecology education. I see another great year ahead working with focused and talented people.

Some of the first fieldwork we hope to be doing together this week is transplanting broccoli, cabbage, and greens. While the exceptionally mild weather this month will allow us to get ahead we know that changing weather patterns will throw us a curve ball at some point. To try and keep things even and regular from your end, as members of the CSA, we spent the winter doing research and this summer will be putting up three field green greenhouses, known as high tunnels. These will protect our tomato crop in the summer and improve and prolong our greens crops in the fall, all with the hope of returning you more produce for your share.

Local Fish. In addition to your vegetable share you will also be able to buy and pickup at the farm a fish share this year. Crystal Spring and Port Clyde Fresh Catch (Maine’s first Community Supported Fishery) have teamed up to offer the first CSA/CSF connection in Maine. Like CSAs, CSFs provide fisherman prepayment for their seafood at a set price, allowing them some financial security in a changing seafood market. We are really excited about this relationship and hope that you will be as well. How does it work? You can order a share week to week or for several consecutive weeks and each Tuesday your seafood will be delivered here to Crystal Spring, where you can pick it up with your vegetables. The cost is $20 per week and the seafood you will find in the share over the summer will include: Sole, Haddock, Pollack, Monkfish, Cod, Hake, Redfish, Lobster, Crab, squid and more. For more details and a sign-up form go to www.portclydefreshcatch.com

Expanded pick-up times for the CSA. This year, due to popular demand we will be expanding the pick-up times for the CSA on both Tuesdays and Fridays. You will now be able to come to the farm from 2-7 pm for CSA pick-up.

CSA shares still available. Please spread the word to friends, neighbors and co-workers. If you would like brochures let us know and we’ll mail them out to you. You can also direct prospective members to our website www.crystalspringcsa.com

Thanks to all of you who have made payments towards your shares. This is the grease that keeps the wheels turning!

Crystal Spring Farm Day Camp seeking middle school participants. We have an afternoon program (1:30-4:30) for kids entering grades 6-8 to experience farm life that runs June 28-July 2. We also have a girls only week for girls entering grades 6-8 August 9-13^th, 9am-3pm. Ther is some space still available in our day camp for 6-11 year olds July 12-17. For all the details and registration info see our website. http://crystalspringcsa.com/farm-camp or email maura@crystalspringcsa.com

Great to see all of you at our lamb open houses in March and April!

Spring has arrived, bright and beautiful. This appears to be the earliest spring we have seen in our six spring at Crystal Spring Farm.  While it feels odd, we hope to be out in the field this week, preparing ground and planting our first field crops of the year.

In the barns we have further proof of spring with 115 new lambs born over the past three weeks. This large number of lambs, born over such a short period, is a new experience for us. Usually we have this number of lambs over a six-week period. But this year, in the interest of keeping farmers well rested before the farm season we decided to shorten the lambing period.  We made this decision way back in late July when we put our teaser ram (a vasectomized ram) in with the ewe flock.  As advertised, this ram got the ewes all excited and brought their estrus cycles into sync.  At the same time we put this flock on the best pasture we have on the farm.  Having top nutrition encourages the ewes’ bodies to release more than one egg at a time.  So after six weeks with the teaser ram and an ample supply of top quality pasture, the ewes were all in great condition coming into heat in early September.  This is when we pull out the teaser ram and replace him with two viable rams who spent three weeks doing their jobs.  150 days later we have lambs.

So far we farmers really like the shortened lambing season.  The lambs appear to be enjoying it as well as they form big gangs in the barn, running in circles, jumping over hay bales and teasing their mothers with selective hearing (sound familiar to any parents out there?).

Maisy the world’s best farm dog We have sad news for all of you that knew and loved our farm dog Maisy. Maisy passed away in December. She was a great dog and for the past couple seasons had been on the payroll as our official CSA pickup greeter. We loved her very much and miss her sweet even presence around the farm and in the house.

CSA Lamb Open House. Mark your calendars for Sunday March 21^st from 1-2:30pm. We will open the barns for our CSA members to come and enjoy an afternoon visiting with our new lamb flock.  Farmers will be on hand to help young and old touch and handle our new lambs.  This event is just for CSA members. There will be another open house for the general public coming in early April.

Crystal Spring Farm Eggs are Coming! In addition to new lambs we also have a new flock of laying hens that have been on the farm for the past few weeks.  These birds arrived as chicks and with care will go out onto pasture in late April and start laying amazing pastured eggs for sale at CSA pick ups by mid-July.

Seedlings…We started this past week in the greenhouse with our first seedings for the coming vegetable season.  Leeks, onions, shallots and several flower varieties were started this first week with many more to come.

Furniture auction to benefit MidCoast Hunger Prevention. Brunswick Furniture designer Michael Perkins will be auctioning off over thirty original pieces to benefit the Midcoast Hunger Prevention Project on Saturday April 3 from 7-9pm. Michael is a friend of the farm and a skilled craftsman. This will be a great event. For more info about Michael’s work go to his website http://www.vintageperkins.com/

Crystal Spring Farm Day Camp sign-up open. Maura has added several new options and programs for kids ages 3-16 during the summer vacation to experience a real working farm. Coming off our wildly successful first year we are really excited about this year’s expanded programs.  For all the details and registration info see our website. http://crystalspringcsa.com/farm-camp

Five Years at Crystal Spring Farm. Farmer Seth will be giving a slide presentation at Curtis Memorial Library on March 24 at 7:00 p.m. chronicling the first five years he and his family have spent living and farming at Crystal Spring Farm.  This is one event of many to celebrate the Brunswick-Topsham Land Trust’s 25^th Anniversary.

Winter is a great time on the farm. This may seem a bit counter intuitive to most you as the natural world appears to be frozen solid, but to farmers this time is when we dream up the year to come. Maura and I have been busy at work crunching numbers, looking at seed catalogs and ordering endless varieties and quantities of things like six foot oak stakes and rubberized work gloves. It is truly amazing all the little bits and pieces that go into making a season on the farm happen. I often wonder what is the truer view of the farm; what I see looking out over the fields in July or what I see sprawled out across my desk in January. I know which one I prefer looking at!

CSA membership is on track compared with years past and we have high hopes for the quality of the coming growing season. There are lots of shares left for those of you who have yet to sign up. If you have neighbors, friends or co-workers who you think who enjoy a share please pass on our information or let us know a street or email address for them and we’ll send out our latest brochure. Just a reminder to those of you on the winter payment plan, the February 1^st payment of $138.33 is coming up.

Our next big task after the planning and ordering is done will be lambing. Starting the first week for February we expect our 83 ewes to begin a three to four week process of birthing 130-150 lambs. This should be an average of 5.6 lambs a day (I’ve never looked at it this way)! For the shepherd, lambing is an intense time (not as intense as for the ewes!) as we keep a close watch over the process. One of the most important things in choosing ewes for our flock is their ease and skill at mothering. How well does a ewe deliver lambs (most are twins)? Optimally she does everything without any help from us. After delivery, how eager is she to clean them and encourage them to nurse? New lambs when encouraged by the ewe, can walk and find their mothers nipple within minutes. These traits in ewes, just like fleece color and size, are highly heritable and we think have a major impact on the long term health and vigor of the lambs. If all goes well we check the flock four to five times a day, recording new lambs information like weight, sex and to which ewe they were born. This alone is tiring, but when things go wrong, like breech births and lambs that are rejected by their mothers at two in the morning, the process can wear us down. All in all it is an incredible time and when most of Maine is beginning to doubt whether spring will ever come, we are given the gift of seeing new life springing forth.

2010 has already proved to be a bumper crop for us in regards to apprentices. We have hired three of the four we are looking for and all of them are top notch. Bethany, a superstar from this past season will be returning soon for another year, after a month long trip to India. Adrian apprenticed last year for Willow Pond Farm in Sabattus (remember their cider we had in the fall) and Emily has worked for both Chewonki and Ferry Beach Ecology School. We hope to hire the fourth apprentice soon and will be ready to hit the ground running with them the first week of April.

Winter at the Farm: Half-day education programs for kids coming up February 16-18th. This year we will be offering half-day programs at the farm during the February school break. Kids will work with Maura and Seth as we feed, water and care for our new lambs and chicks. We’ll also warm up in the greenhouse sowing seeds and having a hot drink and healthy snack. There are four slots to choose from for 5-10 year olds: programs on Tuesday or Thursday (16th and 18th) are from 9-11am or 1-3pm. Preschoolers can come with a parent on Wednesday (17th) from 9-11am. Each session is $20 ($15 for a sibling) and will be limited to a small group. Please call or email Maura for more info or to register.

Crystal Spring Farm Day Camp sign-up begins this week. Maura has added several new options and programs for kids of all ages during the summer vacation to experience a real working farm. For all the details and registration info see our website. http://crystalspringcsa.com/farm-camp