This is the official opening week of our Upic field with strawberries as well as a few flowers. We are asking that you limit your berry picking to 1 pint this week to ensure that everyone can enjoy this crop. This does not include the berries you will eat along the way to sustain your picking! We will have pint boxes in the field. If you are new to the CSA and the upic field here’s how it works…
We prepare, plant, and weed this one acre plot just for you, the members of the farm. Growing there this season you will find peas, green beans, herbs, flowers, and most notably this week, strawberries. These are crops that are particularly rewarding to harvest and can add a lot of value to your share as they often are great accompaniments to the “field crops” we harvest and wash for you each week.
The important thing to understand about this field is that it belongs to everyone who has a share in the farm. There are 275 shares this year and we try very hard to plan each planting so that everyone will be able to enjoy every crop. The idea is that all of these crops are compliments to the field crops and not necessarily staples in and of themselves. While we would love to be able to plant enough Upic basil for everyone to make pesto for the winter or sow enough beans to share with your neighbors, it’s just not possible in the space we have to work with. Those of you that split shares, we ask that you be aware of your picking quantities.
With the exception of these first couple weeks we will not suggest amounts for you to take from the upic field. The idea is that we all take our share and consciously leave behind enough for everyone else. The upic field has always been our grand experiment in community spirit and we have never been disappointed.
What’s in the share…
Cabbage
Scallions
Beets
Lettuce
Chard
Asian Greens
Spinach
Kale
What’s in Upic…
Strawberries ( 1 pint)
Flowers
We have a really outstanding looking tomato crop this year thanks largely to Kristin and Corinne, our field and crew managers, who took on changing our system for planting and trellising this crop. Strong, stout plants and pumping out fruit and flowers ahead of years past and with a vigor we have not seen in a long time.
flavor, sweetness and creaminess. Give these a try sliced raw on a salad, splash them with a light vinegar (rice or apple cider) or just hoard them and eat them all before your family finds them.
What a difference a day makes. We had 2.65 inches of rain at the farm Sunday evening and both plants and farmers could be heard breathing out a long sigh of relief. The past month has been so unusually dry and until recently quite cold, that our crops in the field have been a bit stressed and not growing on schedule. That said we have a stellar lineup of produce for your first share. For the first time we are offering storage carrots in our starting share. We harvested this crop last fall for Wild Oats Cafe in Brunswick, who we supply with carrots year round (morning glory muffins are my favorite). It was a bumper crop and we had more than they could use this winter and spring so we are sharing them with all of you. They are remarkably sweet and are just a teaser for the fresh crop that we hope to start harvesting in July.
We will have great produce for you next week. The greens look astounding and everything is healthy and happy. Its amazing what a few days of warmth will do. The full crew is cranking along here working towards our first harvest.
Spring is into summer this year like the flick of a switch. We had 82 here Monday, five days ago was our last frost and five weeks ago it was snowing. All of this makes for some exciting times to bank on predictable growing rates for plants. That said things look great, just moving a bit slow. Many of the fields are still covered in row cover fabric for cold protection. These sheet give us 5 degrees extra at night and fifteen when the sun is shining.
What a wild ride so far this spring. If I could distill all of my big and small decisions from a farm season more and more I would find all I think about is weather. Its always been the great unknowable for any farmer but for the past few seasons, especially in the spring, mother nature has gone manic. So much of running a farm relies on general predictability. It takes a lettuce seed 5-7 days to germinate and another 3-4 weeks in the greenhouse before we can plant it out and another 45-50 days in the field before we can harvest it as a full head. If the lettuce stopped following these dates or stopped and started growing erratically we would have a very hard time keeping salad greens in your share week after week.
Spring has always been the most erratic season. The sun gets higher and the days get longer, slowly pushing the cold out of the ground and allowing the air above to stay warm even when the sun goes down. This process of warming the greatest insulator (the soil) is a battle and all of that warm and cold energy mixes into volatile expression of wind and air pressure, pulling in weather from Canada one day and Alabama the next. Our snowstorm this past week is a perfect example. The crew was in t-shirts on Monday and we all huddled in the greenhouse on Tuesday watching the snow pile on in disbelief.
We have been busy the past month partnering with many local food producers to bring a smorgasbord of possible farm share add-ons. In addition to organic eggs and Maine mushrooms we also have artisan bread 
from Standard Baking in Portland, organic yogurt from Wholesome Homestead in Winthrop, Maine. We are still working on a cheese share which we hope to have ready for sign-up next week. All of these Maine products are, in our opinion, outstanding and they pair up with our produce to make summer meals even more of a celebration. For more info on these add-on shares and to sign up 
Crystal Spring Farm Camp has a few spaces available for all sessions! If you know any interested families please send them our way!
Giving a farmer in New England an extra month of warm, snow free weather is overwhelming. We didn’t know what to do first or just how long the clear days would last. After we planted the garlic the second week of November we settled down and got organized. Kristin spent almost an entire week flail mowing pasture and hay land, knocking down dead growth that will keep next years hay clean and high
quality while I tore out the rotting wooden side boards and end wall of our seedling greenhouse and replaced them with new lumber. I also stained and prepped some beautiful pine to finally (after 12 years) finish out the inside of the CSA barn. Add to this a few days of barn clean out, massive potting soil delivery, some machinery repair and the month of December went by very quickly.
The Time to Jump in is Now…
We know you’ve been wondering what Tom, Gisele, and their kids eat. For those of you who missed this 
After eleven years we decided this fall to sell off our sheep flock. While we loved these animals and will miss them on a daily basis we came to the conclusion that we needed more time for family. This is especially true in the winter months when daily care and lambing during subzero temps and frequent blizzards could often take the entire day (and night). Like all changes on the farm it will take an entire season to make and understand but for now we are enjoying some extra time. More than half of our flock went to Kris Coleman’s farm in Yarmouth and we hope to be able to continue offer her lamb for sale starting this fall.
Incredible farmstead yogurt and an delectable line-up of cheeses that will rotate each week. This is the yogurt that we sold here at the end of last season to rave reviews. We are working out the details now and will let you know when sign-ups are available!