Farm Update
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| Fred has been deconstructing two secondhand coldframes, and will put them up at our farm as soon as the ground thaws. |
What's New for 2017?
Each winter, we get a chance to sit down and reflect on the previous season and decide what needs to be tweaked for the following year, and this year is no different. There are a few changes we'll be making this year to save money, make the farm run more smoothly, and get us closer to that ever elusive ideal of work-life balance. So here are some of the new things we'll be doing for the 2017 season!
Moving the Midland drop-off to Thursday: This is the foremost change that will likely affect you, our CSA members. In previous years, we've delivered to Midland on Wednesdays and Lansing on Thursdays, and starting in 2017, we're going to be switching those drop-off days to Lansing on Wednesdays and Midland on Thursdays. We found that this switch would allow us to better meet the scheduling needs of many of our customers.
Moving the Lansing drop-off location: Those of you in the Lansing area may have heard that the East Lansing Food Co-Op, where we have previously had our CSA drop-off, is closing soon after 40 years of operation. While we're not 100% sure about the new drop-off location, it is extremely likely to be at the Allen Neighborhood Center on the corner of Allen and Kalamazoo Streets in Lansing. While we will be delivering the shares there late Wednesday afternoon, they have their indoor farmer's market occurring at that time, so it is likely that CSA members will actually pick up their shares anytime on Thursday instead. We'll let you know for sure when we have confirmation on this, but that is what we'll likely be doing for the Lansing drop-off this year.
More veggies earlier in the year: Because of the two new coldframes we're putting up this year, we'll have over 4000 square feet of additional season-extension opportunities. We're planning on doing an early summer variety of tomatoes, as well as growing earlier peppers, cucumbers, zucchini, and probably one or two other veggies to round out the early-season shares.
Starting our own onion and shallot transplants: In previous years, we've ordered organic onion and shallot transplants from out east because we haven't had access to enough greenhouse space to start our own from seed, but that was always a pretty expensive way to go. This year, we're partnering with a local Amish organic farmer who has agreed to let us keep our flats of onions in his large greenhouse until they're ready to put in the ground. Once we seed the flats, we'll take them to his greenhouse, and he'll water them for us for about two months until we put them in the ground. We'll also be transplanting them into beds covered with plastic (which is how we grow several other things, like our lettuce). Onions don't compete well with weeds, so this will help them to not become a weedy mess.
Overhead irrigating: This year we'll be getting a small system that will allow us to overhead irrigate a few veggie beds at a time. In previous years, we've only had our drip irrigation system, where we would run strips of perforated plastic right along the base of the plant, thus saving water and helping cut down on weed pressure. But with as dry as last June and July were, that just wasn't enough, and the crops really suffered because they got too hot and too dry. So this year we're putting in a system that resembles a glorified rotating lawn sprinkler that can be moved around to different areas of the field. This will be especially good for our summer lettuce production, and will help keep us in more lettuce for more of the year.
Keeping the deer out: We've always had a fair amount of deer pressure, but last year was ridiculous. So this year, we're putting in a deer fence to surround pretty much our whole production area. We estimate that this simple change will allow us to grow about 10% more veggies in any given year (and more in high-pressure years like last year). It will also mean that we can put each crop in the area of the field where it would grow best, without having to consider the movement patterns of the deer. Our estimate is that it will pay for itself in about two years through increased production, and it will also keep Fred from having to go stomp around the fields in the middle of the night every night to scare the deer (one more strike for work-life balance!)
So it's going to be a year of change at the farm, which in a way, is business as usual. :-)
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| The coldframe deconstruction project. |
Moving the Lansing drop-off location: Those of you in the Lansing area may have heard that the East Lansing Food Co-Op, where we have previously had our CSA drop-off, is closing soon after 40 years of operation. While we're not 100% sure about the new drop-off location, it is extremely likely to be at the Allen Neighborhood Center on the corner of Allen and Kalamazoo Streets in Lansing. While we will be delivering the shares there late Wednesday afternoon, they have their indoor farmer's market occurring at that time, so it is likely that CSA members will actually pick up their shares anytime on Thursday instead. We'll let you know for sure when we have confirmation on this, but that is what we'll likely be doing for the Lansing drop-off this year.
More veggies earlier in the year: Because of the two new coldframes we're putting up this year, we'll have over 4000 square feet of additional season-extension opportunities. We're planning on doing an early summer variety of tomatoes, as well as growing earlier peppers, cucumbers, zucchini, and probably one or two other veggies to round out the early-season shares.
Starting our own onion and shallot transplants: In previous years, we've ordered organic onion and shallot transplants from out east because we haven't had access to enough greenhouse space to start our own from seed, but that was always a pretty expensive way to go. This year, we're partnering with a local Amish organic farmer who has agreed to let us keep our flats of onions in his large greenhouse until they're ready to put in the ground. Once we seed the flats, we'll take them to his greenhouse, and he'll water them for us for about two months until we put them in the ground. We'll also be transplanting them into beds covered with plastic (which is how we grow several other things, like our lettuce). Onions don't compete well with weeds, so this will help them to not become a weedy mess.
Overhead irrigating: This year we'll be getting a small system that will allow us to overhead irrigate a few veggie beds at a time. In previous years, we've only had our drip irrigation system, where we would run strips of perforated plastic right along the base of the plant, thus saving water and helping cut down on weed pressure. But with as dry as last June and July were, that just wasn't enough, and the crops really suffered because they got too hot and too dry. So this year we're putting in a system that resembles a glorified rotating lawn sprinkler that can be moved around to different areas of the field. This will be especially good for our summer lettuce production, and will help keep us in more lettuce for more of the year.
Keeping the deer out: We've always had a fair amount of deer pressure, but last year was ridiculous. So this year, we're putting in a deer fence to surround pretty much our whole production area. We estimate that this simple change will allow us to grow about 10% more veggies in any given year (and more in high-pressure years like last year). It will also mean that we can put each crop in the area of the field where it would grow best, without having to consider the movement patterns of the deer. Our estimate is that it will pay for itself in about two years through increased production, and it will also keep Fred from having to go stomp around the fields in the middle of the night every night to scare the deer (one more strike for work-life balance!)
So it's going to be a year of change at the farm, which in a way, is business as usual. :-)
Recipes
