John Krueger of Starbrite Farm (on vacation)

Last Update, 2011

Note from Lenny: If you wonder why we have a CSA, please read John's update below. If you want to respond directly to him, his e-mail is kruegerjohn -at- earthlink.net.

Hello Everyone,

I hope you had a great Thanksgiving and that you were able to use many of the veggies in last week’s share in your feast. I suspect though, that many of you have families like mine, that don’t eat many vegetables!

The final share, much like the season, was not as great as I would have liked, but I know that most of you understand the challenges we faced this year. During the past several weeks I’ve had the chance to meet many of the members, at end-of-year parties and at the distribution sites. I’ve been impressed by how seriously you folks take your food and by your commitment to eating locally. I’ve had a chance to meet the children that you are raising on the food that we grow and seen how important it is for them to know where their food comes from. I have seen the community that springs from the CSA and the concern for the less fortunate in the larger community around us. I have been gratified by your praise and by your assertion that it was a good season in spite of my doubts.

It’s easy to get demoralized and just plain tired out in the midst of the rigors of a growing season. I sometimes wonder if there might not be an easier way to make a living! But the truth is that I love what I do and hope to continue farming and growing food for many years to come. The conversations I have had with the members in recent weeks have served to reaffirm for me the importance of what we do. I don’t think I could have gotten started farming or been half as successful without the CSA program. I am so grateful to the core group members and the site coordinators that work so hard to make it all happen and allow me to do what I love, and what I do best--grow food. It’s not easy being green or putting up with the whiny and the difficult among us! I am very grateful to all the members for their kind words (and deeds) and for putting your trust in me. I am truly honored and humbled to be part of an ever growing movement to reconnect with the earth and with each other. These are difficult times and they may get harder still, but they will be borne more easily as a community.

I know it’s sad when the season ends. I know it’s hard to say good bye (to your fresh veggies), but I must confess I’m ready for a rest! The 2012 seed catalogs have already begun arriving and they will accompany me on my winter travels. I will take a break from the physical tasks of farming, but I will be eyeing the new vegetable varieties and scheming of ways to make next season better than ever. I wish you all Happy Holidays and a safe and healthy winter. It will soon be spring again!

Take care, Farmer John

Nov. 9 Update

Hi Everyone,

Well, there just doesn’t seem to be any limit to the kind of crazy weather that Mother Nature can throw at us these days! We got about 14 inches of snow from the storm and experienced two nights of frigid temperatures; 19 degrees last Sunday night. The low temperatures did the most damage--the snow actually protected most of the shorter crops, insulating them from the extremely cold air.

We harvested everything we could that I thought would be damaged Friday, Saturday morning, and again on Sunday afternoon. We had to cut all the cauliflower that was beginning to head, even at a very small size. With cauliflower, the leafy part of the plant can withstand the cold, but the head freezes and is ruined. Broccoli is similar but the head can stand lower temperatures. We cut all of the larger broccoli but most were too small and I hoped they would make it; alas, they did not. We still have two more plantings of broccoli that had not begun to head and which should produce in the next few weeks. We also still have some yellow cauliflower that has yet to head.

Medium-size lettuce that was a week or two from harvest had the outside leaves plastered to the ground by the snow, exposing the inner heart to the cold--ruined. The chard and the beet tops were also decimated by the frigid air and will likely not recover. The bok choy that I was planning to distribute this week survived relatively unscathed as did the kale and the spinach.

We lost power on Saturday and did not have service restored until Friday, but were able to run the heat and the well pump on a generator I bought in the week after Irene. The shares will be a little bit light this week but should start to improve as we move into the last couple of weeks of the season. [Note: Our season ends this Wednesday, but John may offer a two-week extension to people who want to continue till Thanksgiving.]

The share for this week will be: Lettuce (small heads), acorn squash, sweet potatoes, garlic, bok choy, carrots, parsnips, and tatsoi or other mustard green.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Nov. 2 Update

Hi Everyone,

We recieved about 10 inches of snow at the farm and lost power Saturday evening. We harvested everything we though might have been lost prior to the storm. I expect the snow to melt fairly quickly and the greens beneath th snow to be in relatively good shape. We have a fair amount of stuff ready for delivery so the shares will arrive without interuption.

I am writing from a motel in PA where I needed to come to pick up some soil amendments for the garlic and cover-crop seed. I decided to head out on Sunday night and combine the trip with a hot shower! I will try to write a full update once power is restored and I can assess the state of the crops in the field.

The share for this week will be: Lettuce, Red skinned turnips, potatoes, onions, delicata or sweet dumpling squash, daikon, peppers, cauliflower. We will hopefully be able to harvest some herbs and arugula or tatsoi for greens once the snow melts.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Oct. 26 Update

Hi Everyone,

With the exception of some heavy rain on Thursday, the past week of weather was more or less beneficial. The temperatures remain balmy and the winds that followed the rain have helped to dry out the fields a bit. We still have some very soggy spots in the fields, making it a challenge to plant the winter cover crop. We are likely to have our first frost this next week with a hard freeze predicted as we head into November.

At this point, most of the crops that remain are cold hardy so except for the peppers, a few cold nights won’t affect us much. We will be harvesting and distributing the Vermont Cranberry beans this week. These are a shell bean, not a string bean, so please don’t try to eat the pods! I am told by one of my market customers that they are delicious with sausage or they can be used in soup. We will have celery root as our root vegetable this week (you know I have to throw you a curve ball once in a while!). It can be grated and eaten raw, boiled and pureed, or cubed and added to your soup. The celery-like stalks can be used to make stock (celery-stalk stock?).

We have a tremendous harvest of sweet potatoes so we will be sending more in your share for this week. This time, it will be a white variety, which is very sweet but a little drier than the orange type.

The share for this week will be: Red Romaine lettuce, celeriac, garlic, choice of spinach or Swiss chard, butternut squash, choice of red, green or Napa cabbage, Vermont Cranberry beans, tatsoi or other mustard green, and choice of an herb (dill, parsley, or cilantro. The fruit share will be Mutsu apples and Devoe pears.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Oct. 19 Update

Hi Folks,

It was another week of mild temperatures, and the rain that was predicted fortunately did not amount to much. The fields are still very soggy and I am a bit worried about how I will plant my cover crops and prepare the beds to plant next season’s garlic crop. There is not much rain forecast for the next ten days and the breezy conditions are helpful in drying out the ground, so hopefully there will be a window of opportunity soon.

We have finished harvesting the potato crop, which is a relief. We did lose a substantial amount to rot in the low-lying areas. We have enough to ship potatoes in the shares twice more for this year. We have begun digging the sweet potatoes and the harvest is a bit better than it appeared at first. While they are not as large as last season, the yields are good and the quality of most of the tubers is excellent. We do have some of the orange variety, which came out of low areas, that has some issues. We will be shipping these out first as they will not store well. Peel away the bad spots and eat them promptly.We are in the process of curing the rest of the crop which requires keeping them for 4-5 days at 95 degrees. This enables them to be stored and improves the eating quality. Expect to receive sweet potatoes 2 or 3 more times during the remainder of the season.

We have come to the end of the string bean season and we are still waiting for the Vermont Cranberry beans to mature. We may have enough green beans for one more round, but more likely we will have to include them as an “extra” this week. We have begun to harvest the fall carrot crop and they look very nice and should be fairly sweet. We have red cabbage, but due to flooding losses not enough for all members, so we will offer it as a choice with green or Napa cabbage. We also have affair amount of nice escarole, but again, not enough for all members (a consequence of deer damage). We will offer it as a choice with kale.

The share for this week will be Green lettuce, carrots, acorn squash, choice of tatsoi or other mustard green, sweet potatoes, choice of red, green or Napa cabbage, yellow onions, and choice of an herb. Due to unavailability of different apple varieties, we will wait one week for the final fruit share. No fruit this week.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Oct. 12 Update

Hello Everyone,

It’s been a glorious week of sunny weather and mild temperatures. Our fields are finally beginning to dry out, although there are still a few wet spots about. While daytime temps have been balmy, it is getting chilly at night and clear skies mean strong radiative cooling.

We came perilously close to a frost this past Friday morning. Frost warnings were issued for our area so we scrambled to harvest anything that might have been lost and covered the peppers to protect them. Alas, the frost did not come to pass, so our efforts were unnecessary, but as they say--better safe than sorry.

It now appears we should have nearly 2 weeks before cold nights are forecast. This should give the Cranberry beans a chance to mature and perhaps give us one more harvest of peppers. It also means a bit more time for the sweet potatoes to grow; at present they are rather smaller than I would like.

We picked the last of the string beans while still fairly small, so we don’t have large quantities. We also have small quantities of lima beans and edamame soybeans. The main crop of edamames I planted did not germinate well and had to be abandoned. We will offer the different beans as a choice for this week. We have been bringing in moderate quantities of broccoli and cauliflower and so we are in a rotation, shipping these out to different groups as availability allows.

The share for this week will be: Green leaf lettuce, red-skinned turnips, spinach or Swiss chard, choice of arugula, tatsoi, or other mustard greens, red onions, potatoes, choice of beans, peppers, pumpkins, and choice of an herb- dill, cilantro, or parsley. The fruit share will be Golden supreme apples and Bosc pears.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Oct. 5 Update

Hi Folks,

I guess I spoke too soon last week about dodging a bullet, as the scattered storms of the week brought us another 5 inches of rain. The creek did once again rise and form a lake in the field with the brassicas, drowning a few more plants on the edges of the previous inundation. While I enjoy bird watching, I am not happy to see ducks swimming and egrets wading in my fields. Many of the saying involving 3’s have been rattling around in my brain--bad things always come in threes, 3 strikes you’re out, and perhaps the most apropos, going down for the third time!

The truth is that not much additional damage was done to the brassicas, but many parts of all my fields are muddy messes--impassable by tractor and treacherous by foot. We had been trying to harvest as many potatoes as possible ahead of the showers, but tractor problems stymied these efforts. By the time the tractor tire was fixed and the leaky hydraulic line replaced, it was again too wet use the potato digger. I am rather worried that more tubers will begin to rot.

On a happier note, we have abundant greens for this week and for many to come. There is some broccoli raab and lots of arugula. The spinach looks gorgeous and should be abundant during the month ahead. We are digging the last of the spring-planted carrots, but the fall crop will be ready in another couple of weeks. The fall crop of beets is also looking good and I expect them to be ready in about 2 weeks. We also have parsnips and celery root to look forward to in the near future.

For this week you will have to be content with everyone’s favorites (not), radishes. We have a Japanese variety called Shunkyo semi-long which are generally a little milder. Keep in mind that radishes can be cooked and are good in soups or stir fries. We will be sending spaghetti squash this week and I must again warn against holding on to it for too long--use it or lose it! We are still picking beans, although in the wet field this means sinking up to our ankles in mud. We are waiting on Vermont cranberry beans, more lima beans, and perhaps a few edamames.

The next round of lettuce is still a bit small, so we will have to skip it for this week. I planted sufficient quantities of both green and Napa cabbage for one each for all the members, but unfortunately these were among the flood casualties; so we can only offer a choice between the two.

The share for this week will be: Carrots, potatoes, garlic, spinach, radishes, arugula or broccoli raab, spaghetti squash, green or Napa cabbage, and choice of dill or cilantro. The fruit share will be Macoun apples and hardy kiwi berries.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Sept. 28 Update

Hello Everyone,

We seem to have dodged a bullet this weekend as the heavy rains predicted did not materialize. We received only about a half an inch of precipitation as opposed to the 3-5 inches forecast as possible. We’re not completely out of the woods yet, as there are still a few days of scattered storms and showers ahead. Nevertheless we are grateful for the reprieve. The fields are still quite soggy, but I was able to plant another batch of mustard greens, spinach, turnips and radishes just ahead of the rain. I am hopeful we will be able to resume digging potatoes with the machine soon as we have been harvesting them by hand these past weeks; an arduous task.

We are back in the bean business again as the late planting begins to mature. While we don’t have super-abundant quantities, the quality looks very good. The peppers are full of small fruit, so hopefully we will have a few ready for next week’s shares. We will have more greens in the shares now each week as we progress through the back end of the season. The arugula is still a bit small, so we will wait another week on that, but we have tatsoi, mizuna, and some broccoli raab. We also have the baby white salad turnips for this week which also have lovely greens for steaming or braising.

We have been busy harvesting the pumpkin and winter squash crop and it looks fairly good in spite of being planted a bit late. I am worried about how well it will keep due to the wet conditions; many of the pumpkins are already beginning to go bad. We will be shipping butternut squash this week, selecting those which have a skin condition that will preclude extended storage. It does not affect the quality of the meat but do not hold on to them--eat them or cook them and freeze the pulp. We will have herbs in the shares again next week, as the dill and cilantro is almost tall enough to cut.

The share for this week will be: Romaine lettuce, string beans, salad turnips, mustard greens, potatoes, shallots or cippolini onions, and butternut squash. The fruit share will be nectarines and Cortland apples as well as a pint of Hardy Kiwi berries as an "extra" to try to make up for some of the less than stellar fruit selections earlier in the year.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Sept. 21 Update

Hi Folks,

We continue to feel the effects of the back to back inundations delivered by Irene and Lee. Some brassicas that were not flooded are wilting and dying from root diseases brought on by continuously saturated soil. We are still unable to machine-dig potatoes and some of the crop that was in low pockets has almost certainly rotted.

I have been chomping at the bit to try and finish my planting for the season. There is only another week or so to plant one final round of spinach, mustard greens, turnips and radishes. While most of my fields drain and dry out quickly, in almost every field one edge is lower and remains too soft and muddy to drive a tractor through. I nearly got the big John Deere stuck several times during the past week, but was able to escape each time. On Sunday however, my luck ran out and I sank one wheel deep in the muck. Today we will attempt to pull it out with the other tractor.

The weather forecasters continue to tease us with promises of a week of sunshine and no rain and then quickly change the prediction to a week of showers and scattered thunderstorms! We are also being affected by the sudden cool-down, which along with shorter days, means everything grows slower.

The tomato crop is essentially done for the season and production in the peppers and eggplant has greatly slowed. Both of the latter are flowering prolifically, however, so I am hopeful we will begin to harvest some fruit in a week or two. Bean production is also slow as we wait for the late planting of bush beans to mature. We do have lettuce again and should have sufficient quantities for delivery through the rest of the season. The mustard greens are still a bit small but we will try to harvest some small bunches of tatsoi and other Asian mustards for this week. Arugula should be ready by next week and broccoli raab soon thereafter.

This week will be one of the leanest of the season, but I expect gradual improvement in the size of the shares in the coming weeks. I will list only those items which I am fairly certain we will have; we will add other items to the shares as availability allows.

The share for this week will be: Green leaf lettuce, carrots, onions, potatoes, and mustard greens. The fruit share will be Bartlett pears and Gala apples.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Sept. 14 Update

Hi Everyone,

It’s been a difficult couple of weeks on the farm as I’m sure you can imagine. The rain from the remnants of Hurricane Lee dropped another 5 inches of rain on already saturated ground and swollen streams. The lake that formed in my lower field during Irene returned and swallowed even more of the fall brassicas than before. I estimate that we have lost nearly 10,000 plants.

The prolonged wet and overcast conditions have also taken their toll on other crops, accelerating the demise of the tomatoes, slowing the production of the peppers, and promoting fungal diseases in a late planting of zucchini and cucumbers. Harvesting has been difficult as my workers sink in the muddy furrows in between the beds and we are unable to machine-dig potatoes. I have been delayed in continuing my fall planting of direct seeded crops such as spinach, mustards, and turnips.

While it’s heartbreaking to lose so many crops, I still feel fortunate to be farming on sandy, well drained soils. And while this news may seem dire for you, the members, we still have many crops unharmed by the bad weather. We are just a few weeks away from beginning to harvest spinach, arugula and other mustard greens. The Rattlesnake pole beans are producing heavily and the late planting of bush string beans and cranberry beans is flowering profusely.

There will not be lettuce in this week’s share because of the losses we incurred in lettuce that we had in storage, due to loss of power and hence refrigeration. The next round of lettuce should be ready by next week and I expect a steady supply for the rest of the season. We have replanted thousands of broccoli, kohlrabi, and kale plants and the spring-planted kale is beginning to grow nicely again.

The weather for the week ahead looks to be relatively dry and sunny, albeit a bit on the cool side. While the shares for the next week or two may be a little lean, I expect we will be back on track for a good fall season soon. We will try to include as many “extras” in the shares as we can during the next 2 weeks to attempt to offset the somewhat meeker regular shares.

I know that many of you are interested in lending a hand on the farm. I did not ask for volunteers during the past 2 weeks because of the uncertain weather. We will host volunteer work days on the next four Sundays to help with bean picking and with the winter squash harvest. These will begin at 10 am at 141 Brighton Rd. Andover. The dates are: 9/18, 9/25, 10/2 and 10/ 9. Your assistance will be greatly appreciated.

The share for this week will be: Leeks, radishes, garlic, beans, potatoes, tomatoes, eggplant and broccoli, or Swiss chard. The fruit share will be Asian pears and nectarines.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Sept. 7 Update

Hi Folks,

I know you are all anxious to know how the farm fared with Hurricane Irene. I have not been able to write until now because we were without power until Saturday. While we sustained some damage, it could have been much worse, and indeed it was worse for many farms in NJ and especially for New England farmers. We had almost no damage from wind as I had expected.

The field where almost all of the fall brassicas are planted is low-lying and adjacent to a creek. The creek overflowed its banks and formed a lake in a portion of this field, which took several days to subside. I was hopeful immediately after the water receded because the plants seemed okay, but a day or two later those which had been under water wilted and died.We lost several thousand plants including broccoli, cauliflower, red cabbage, kale and kohlrabi. We still have thousands of brassicas in good condition and we have been trying to replant to replace our losses to the extent that we can given the late date.

This update will serve as a makeup for last week’s missed one and I will try to write another soon to apprise you more completely of the state of the farm. I am short on time at present as I have plans for a much needed afternoon off. We were busy this morning trying to harvest potatoes and other items for this week’s share ahead of the 3 days and 3 inches of rain that is forecast. Egads! It could be time to start building an ark.

The share for this week will be: Romaine lettuce, carrots, beans, tomatoes, white onions, potatoes, peppers, eggplant and ground cherries.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

August 24 Update

Hi Folks,

The rainy week is behind us and fortunately it was not as bad as it looked on the weather sites. We received another inch and a half of rain during the week in addition to the 3 inches mentioned in the last update. Last night’s storms, which were predicted to possibly bring hail and damaging winds, brought neither and only a quarter of an inch of precipitation. The week ahead looks good with sunshine and mild temperatures, as we keep a wary eye on Hurricane Irene.

I managed to find a few windows of opportunity to get some seeds in the ground and I expect good germination as a result of the moist conditions. I have planted nearly 10,000 row feet of spinach as well as a mile or two of radishes, turnips arugula and other mustards. I was also able to get in another planting of cilantro, dill and chervil. My ankles are sore from pounding on the seeder with my feet to insure the seeds are flowing, but I am relieved to have completed a big chunk of my fall planting.

The fall plantings of beets and carrots have come up nicely and now the challenge is to get them weeded, since the weeds grow much faster than the crops. The beans are coming in heavily now, despite a re-infestation by the dreaded leafhoppers. We are having difficulty keeping up with the picking along with all the other harvesting on our plates (and soon to be on yours). We will be hosting a volunteer work day this Sunday, 10 AM, at the farm in Andover for anyone who is willing and able to come out and lend a hand.

This week’s share will be essentially the same as in the last few weeks, the only new addition being celery. The celery is best used for cooking in soups or stir fries; only a few of the inner blanched stalks are likely to be mild and tender enough for use in salads. We are also beginning to see a few ground cherries, so we will begin shipping them to different groups in rotation over the next few weeks.

We almost did not have these unusual members of the tomato family this season because the seeds that I purchased turned out to be tomatillos, their close cousin. It was already too late in the season when I discovered the problem to replant, but thanks to another local farmer/friend I was able to get some stunted, overcrowded plants which we transplanted and nursed back to health before setting them out in the field. They are late getting started and it will probably be a short harvest season, but at least we will have some.

The share for this week will be: Green leaf lettuce, carrots, celery, cucumbers, summer squash, beans, yellow onions, white potatoes, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, melons or watermelon, and choice of an herb. The fruit share will be Tydeman apples and peaches.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

August 17 Update

Hi Everyone,

It was a week of glorious weather; plenty of sunshine and moderate temperatures. Now it seems we have slipped back into the rainy weather pattern that prevailed in the spring. The rains that began on Saturday evening have dropped 3 inches on us thus far, with more forecast for Monday and Tuesday. While the fall brassica crops are benefiting from all the moisture, for most other crops this much rain is not helpful. Plant diseases spread rapidly during prolonged period of rain and overcast skies. The tomatoes are perhaps the most susceptible, but the beans as well as the cucurits (cukes, melons, and squash) also suffer. The primary culprits are fungal diseases, such as early blight in tomatoes and powdery and downy mildew in the squash family.

We have a few weapons in our tool box of organic spray materials, such as a hydrogen dioxide formulation called Oxidate, an essential oil product called Sporan, and a biological product known as Serenade. The problem is that they are not so effective if they are washed off immediately after application. Nevertheless, for me this week’s primary task will be trying to keep the fungus among us at bay.

The other downside to so much precipitation is the effect on our ability to harvest the crops. We pick in the rain when it’s necessary, but we try not to touch the beans or the squash family crops when they are wet, as not to spread diseases from one plant to the next. I am also held up with my planting schedule, because the seeder won’t function properly in saturated soil and because I cannot prepare more planting beds while the ground is too wet.. Keep your fingers crossed that the ten day forecast is not as bad as it looks at present.

The share for this week will be: Red or green Romaine lettuce, string beans, tomatoes , peppers, eggplant, squash, cukes, red potatoes, white onions, savoy or green cabbage, beets and melons or watermelons.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

August 10 Update

Hi Everyone,

It was another good weather week here on the farm. We received an inch and a quarter of rain on Saturday night. We are looking at a lot of chances for more rain from scattered and isolated thunderstorms during the week ahead. The rain has been very helpful for both germination of the many direct seeded crops I have been planting as well as for rooting of the thousands of brassica family crops we have been transplanting. Hopefully, these storms won’t drop too much more precipitation as the ground is quite saturated now, and persistent wet conditions can exacerbate disease problems in the tomatoes and other crops.

We are still low on greens; the kale has been decimated by flea beetles and the chard was overcut and suffering from the dry conditions. We are working on renovating the spring chard, planting now that the ground is moist, with a good cultivation and a top dressing of fertilizer. We should be able to start cutting again in a week or two. I have also planted more chard for fall production.

We are also low on herbs, having overcut the basil and the parsley and with other herbs flowering heavily. The next planting of lettuce is ready just in time, so we will be able to continue our unbroken streak of having lettuce in the shares every week. Herbs and cooking greens notwithstanding, the word for this week is abbondanza. Tomatoes and melons are ripening prolifically and the second planting of squash is coming in heavy. We have a large assortment of different types of melons; one is a long yellow fruit with white stripes that looks like a delicata squash. It is not--it is a Korean melon. Please don’t cook the melons!

We have lots of cucumbers, peppers and eggplant as well. We are still a bit short on string beans but that should change by next week. We are harvesting small quantities of some "experimental" crops such as okra and artichokes. Watch for these as extras in the coming weeks along with tomatillos if you are a fan of salsa verde.

The share for this week will be: Boston or oak leaf lettuce, carrots, summer squash, cucumbers, eggplant, peppers, tomatoes, melons or watermelons, white potatoes, garlic, string beans and yellow onions.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

August 3 Update

Hi Folks,

We’ve had two wonderful rains here on the farm during the past week; each dropping a little over an inch of precipitation. The first was a beautiful slow steady rain that fell over a period of 8 hours or so, which allowed the very parched ground to soak it up. The second came as more of a deluge, delivering an inch in about two hours, but since the ground was already moist it was ready to absorb the water with little or no runoff. Just what the plant doctor ordered!

Now that we have some soil moisture, I can begin to sow a new round of crops for the fall harvest. It’s a long list, from arugula to spinach and more zucchini. I have already planted more string beans and edamame soybeans and they are beginning to sprout. I need to plant another batch of carrots and beets as well as other root crops such as radishes and salad turnips.

I know you are all anxious to see greens in the shares, so now you know that they have been planted and are on their way in another few weeks. Although summer officially began 5 weeks ago, it begins unofficially here on the farm with the arrival of the tomatoes, and they are beginning to ripen prolifically. Along with green beans and melons, these are the harbingers of the beginning of the summer bounty.

The first picking of beans has not been as bountiful nor as high quality as it is normally. This is due to a leafhopper infestation as well as the hot dry conditions in attendance while the beans where developing. Now that the bugs are under control and the plants have had a drink, they are looking much better and starting to flower profusely. Better bean days are ahead, but in the meantime, there will be smaller quantities in the shares.

We delivered a few melons last week, mostly to the smaller groups. As they become more abundant, we will ship them to other groups as supply allows. We have lots of different types of melons planted, honeydews, galia, canary, cantaloupes as well as red and yellow watermelons. There should be sufficient quantities that all groups will receive different types in rotation over the next 4-5 weeks.

At present, we are almost out of lettuce until the next planting is ready in another week or two. We will send a mixture of types from what we have left in storage for this week. The second planting of summer squash has begun producing and the deer have not discovered them yet. Perhaps I should thank my neighbor for planting soybeans, one of their favorites, which for now is keeping them well fed. Peak production won’t begin for another week or two, so for now we will be distributing what we have to groups that may not have had them as much. We are drowning in cucumbers at the moment, so there will be a lot in the share and probably some as extras as well. It seems that homemade pickles are all the rage at the moment, so now might be your chance.

The share for this week will be: Lettuce, red skinned potatoes, white onions, beets, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, red cabbage, cucumbers, string beans, basil, maybe melons, and maybe squash.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

July 27 Update

Hi Folks,

Holy heat and humidity Batman! The record breaking heat wave has been stressing my crops and taking a toll on my workers and myself. We have been moving the sprinklers around trying to maintain some soil moisture on those crops not set up with drip irrigation.

The extreme temps have also led to the second onion catastrophe in as many weeks. It is standard procedure to pull the onions and leave them on the ground for a day or two so the tops to begin to dry down. My crew was a little overzealous and pulled more than they were able to gather in one day. On Thursday, I sent the workers home early due to the heat and the red onions were left in the field for a second day. When we began to gather them on Friday, we found that the heat had scalded many of them and made the outer layers soft. The insides of the onions are still fine but they will not store in this condition. This is a truly heart-breaking disaster because they were beautiful, large onions which I expected to have for distribution and sale at market for the next few months. I cannot bear to throw so many onions on the compost heap, so we will be trying to salvage what we can by peeling off the damaged layers. If you receive peeled onions in your share, you will understand the reason, and that it’s not that we’re trying to help you with your kitchen chores.

The beans have begun! Thanks to some volunteers who braved the heat to help pick, we have about 200 lbs. in the cooler and the workers will be picking the remainder of this first harvest today. We have regular green beans, wax beans, and haricot verts, those wonderfully thin French filet beans. We will begin a rotation so that all groups will receive each type over the next several weeks. I expect to have a steady supply of beans for a least the next 4 or 5 weeks, as long as the marauding bandits known as deer don’t decide to ravage them. Fortunately there are soybeans planted in a neighbor’s field, which they seem to prefer to string beans, so hopefully they will leave our food alone.

We have been harvesting beautiful eggplant and some groups received it last week. If you did not, you should get it in this week’s share. We are also beginning to pick green peppers and some groups may find a few in their share this week. And what about the tomatoes you ask? Soon, very soon! There may be a few in next week’s delivery and after that I expect the flood gates to open and we will be drowning in tomato heaven.

We are also very close to having ripe melons and watermelons to sweeten thing up for you folks. The share for this week will be: Romaine lettuce, carrots, string beans, cucumbers, Yukon gold potatoes, red onions, eggplant, and choice of an herb. Swiss chard for those who did not receive last week.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

July 20 Update

Hi Folks,

It was another week of hot and dry weather here at the farm. We really need some rain! It looks as though we may get some Monday afternoon from thunderstorms, hopefully sans hail and damaging winds.

We are beginning to transplant the fall brassica crop out into the field and a little moisture would certainly help the plants to take root. I also have a number of other crops to seed; a second planting of carrots, beans and beets and a third planting of cucumbers and summer squash. It seems that we may have finally excluded the deer from the squash patch, so we may start to bring in a bit more zucchini. This planting is already in decline, though, so the best hope for larger quantities of squash is the second planting, which should begin to produce in about 2 weeks.

We are harvesting lots of cukes at the moment and they are really nice. The peas are just about done, a late planting of English peas having succumbed to mildew. Normally, we have beans at this point to take over in the legume slot but due to the wet spring they were planted late and are just beginning to flower.

We have sweet onions in the share this week; 2 mild types called Ailsa Craig and Walla Walla. These are not really any sweeter than a regular onion only less pungent and as a result do not keep well. In fact, they were already beginning to rot in the field and we have had to take extraordinary steps to try to save them and still lost hundreds of pounds. They begin to rot at the stem and this passes to the center of the onion. Most should be okay but some may have bad centers. They are really good and mostly quite large so remove the bad center, if necessary, and use them quickly. There are lots more, better keeping onions on the way!

We have small heads of green cabbage and still some Napa cabbage in storage, so we will offer these as a choice. We also have beets this week--a regular purple type and an Italian heirloom variety called Chioggia, aka candy cane, because of their white with red rings interior. We also have very nice fennel, but since some has rotted we may not have enough for everyone, so we will offer this as a choice with a large bunch of basil.There will be a second herb choice of parsley, sweet marjoram, or summer savory.

About the only green we have at this point is Swiss chard. In order not to over-cut the patch, we will begin a rotation over the next 2 weeks, with some groups getting chard this week and some next week. We are also harvesting a fair bit of eggplant, so it may be in the share too, as supply allows. And as promised, we have some lovely red skinned new potatoes for you!

The share for this week will be: Red leaf lettuce, beets, cucumbers, sweet onions, red potatoes, fennel or basil, green or Napa cabbage, and choice of an herb. In the “maybe” category, we have Swiss chard, eggplant, squash, and broccoli.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

July 13 Update

Hello Everyone,

It was another good weather week here on the farm; plenty of sunshine but not terribly hot. We had a torrential downpour accompanied by some strong winds on Friday evening but it didn’t last long and caused no damage.

Our greatest challenge in recent weeks has been the critters, both the 4 legged and 6 legged kinds. The deer, having developed a taste for summer squash, have been overcoming our attempts to keep them out of the squash patch and have eaten or destroyed (half eaten) hundreds of pounds of the fruit. The worst part is that the plants were at the peak of their productivity and will now begin to decline, especially because now that they are fenced in, I cannot easily spray to control the fungal diseases to which they are susceptible. I much prefer giving the members veggies rather than excuses, but there may not be a lot of zucchini until the next planting comes into production in a few weeks.

The main six-legged enemy at present is a sucking insect called a leafhopper. These are a perennial problem on the potatoes but this season have spread onto many other crops which are not normally attacked, such as the beets, chard and the beans. I am in the process of spraying to control the populations but it’s not easy because I can’t spray all affected crops at one time. Since organic spray materials are short-lived in their effectiveness, these flying insects can re-infest an area that has been treated from one that has not yet been sprayed. The good news is that we are harvesting lots of cucumbers. These have some cosmetic damage due to another bane of my existence--the cucumber beetle; however, they are really nice cukes.

Last week’s share was quite large. I suspect that many of you are still trying to eat your way through it! This week may seem rather small by comparison. One of the many things I have no control over is when the crops mature. I normally don’t send more than one or two members of the brassica (cabbage) family per week, but last week some of you received four. We were in danger of losing the Napa cabbage if it was not harvested and when the broccoli and cauliflower is ready, it has to be cut. If you have not yet had cauliflower, you should see some this week or next.

We are still cutting broccoli but the main crop is done, so this will probably be the last week for it until the fall crop begins. We are at the point in the season when we are transitioning from spring, cool-weather crops to the summer crops like peppers, eggplant, tomatoes, and beans. Due to the wet spring and subsequent late planting, the latter are still a few weeks away. Greens (other than lettuce) are also scarce and will remain so until late August. We will begin having potatoes and onions next week.

The share for this week will be: Romaine lettuce, some kind of peas, cucumbers or summer squash, broccoli, cauliflower or kale, carrots, and basil. We will try to send a variety of items as extras such as turnips, radishes, dandelion greens, etc.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

July 6 Update

Hi Folks, Happy Independence Day!

It was a week of glorious weather; plenty of sunshine but not too hot and no rain. That was until Saturday night when the thunderstorms returned and dropped another inch and a half of precipitation on us. It was getting a bit dry and we needed some rain, but this was a little more than we bargained for. I have been trying to get the winter squash crop planted and it is getting late, since most varieties need more than 3 months to mature. It will now be several days before the fields dry and I can begin seeding again. Here’s hoping for a warm September and a late October first frost!

We are cutting lots of broccoli at the moment, and it is some of the best quality that I have seen from a summer crop, one of the good consequences of all the wet weather. It does, however, seem to be turning yellow very quickly, so I recommend using it promptly. We have also begun to see a fair amount of cauliflower and we will include this in the shares as availability allows over the next several weeks. Some may be a yellow variety called Cheddar.

We have been harvesting summer squash now for about 10 days; unfortunately, the deer have developed a taste for it and have been inflicting substantial damage. We have put up a temporary fence around it but they still manage to find their way inside. If you have not yet received any, we will try to send you some this week. We are still waiting for the carrots and beets to size up; the wet spring meant a late planting for these crops. In the meantime, you will have to endure another week of turnips or radishes as the root vegetable.

In the allium category, we have Elephant garlic, a mild flavored cousin of real garlic, more closely related to leeks than to true garlic. A favorite use for this bulb is roasting whole and making a paste to be used as a spread on bread or crackers. We still have a lot of dill and cilantro but it is at the point of bolting and must be cut. Once it is done, it will be a while until we have it again as I have not been able to get a second planting in yet. There will be basil and other herbs in next week’s share.

Speaking of bolting, I have been asked to explain what the term means. Essentially, it is the beginning of the flowering process of a plant. Many plants like lettuce and escarole grow in what is called a rosette form, a compact low growing plant. When the plants reach a certain age or when stressed by heat or dry condition, they begin to stretch out and send a flower stalk up through the middle of the plant. This process causes biochemical changes in the plant, leading the leaf to become very bitter even before the stalk has fully emerged. We try to be vigilant and watch for the early signs of this process, but time and storage space sometimes preclude a timely harvest. At this point in the season, we have lost hundreds of heads of lettuce and now have thousands of heads in refrigerated storage.

The share for this week will be: Green-leaf lettuce, broccoli, daikon or red skinned turnips, peas, Napa Cabbage, kale, radicchio, Elephant garlic, and choice of an herb.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

June 29 Update

Hello Dear Friends,

Welcome to another addition of the farm update. First the obligatory weather report. It was another wet week with 3” of rain, most of which fell in a 2-hour period on Thursday, causing considerable flooding. We once again count ourselves lucky, as parts only 5 miles from the farm experienced hail and damaging winds, which we were spared.

I have been trying to get the pumpkins and winter squash planted, as it’s getting late. The beds were all prepared and ready to go on Wednesday and I was about to begin seeding when our delivery truck had a front tire blow out on Rt. 80. I had to leave the farm to deal with the crisis and get the deliveries made and the following day, the rains came and made the fields too wet to plant. The ground has dried out sufficiently now, but the beds will all have to be tilled again before seeding. The week ahead looks good, relatively dry with only a few isolated storms in the forecast, so hopefully I can get caught up on my planting.

It seems like everything on the farm is in flower at the moment--from arugula and tatsoi (things we don’t want to flower) through tomatoes, peppers, and eggplant. For the former, this means the harvest is over; for the latter, it means we will have fruits to harvest in 3-4 weeks. We have been cutting loads of lettuces and escarole to keep ahead of their tendency to bolt and become bitter.

Much of the potato field is in flower too, a beautiful sight. Once the plants finish with their feeble attempts to reproduce by seed they can get down to the business of producing a much more dependable means of reproduction--the tuber. This week’s share will be rather similar to last. I like to keep things changing and varied, but sometimes it doesn’t work out that way and we have to ship what we have in abundance and that which may not hold quality for another week.

We have lots of the white salad turnips and in another week they will become large and stronger flavored. We still have loads of endive and escarole that has to be cut, and the cooler is jammed full of crates of lettuce. The spinach is almost gone and the only mustard green left is broccoli raab. We will offer these as a choice with Swiss chard and kale (a 4-way choice that site coordinators hate; sorry!). Broccoli and sugar-snap peas are maturing in abundance now, so if you haven’t received these previously you can expect them this week.

Summer squash is beginning to come in, so you may see a couple in your share, but no promises. The share for this week will be 2 lettuces, a red romaine and a leaf lettuce, choice of escarole or endive (frissee), salad turnips, scallions, peas, broccoli or kohlrabi, choice of spinach, chard, broccoli raab, or kale, Bok Choy and choice of an herb.

Enjoy! —Farmer John

June 22 Update

Hi Folks,

We are still dealing with very wet conditions here at the farm. The storms that passed through Thursday night dropped 2½ inches of rain on us and spoiled my plans for transplanting melons and ground cherries on Friday. Fortunately, we were spared the strong storms that visited the northeastern part of the state and that I understand were accompanied by hail.

We are also fortunate to be experiencing relatively mild temperatures, which are a boon to the cool season crops such as broccoli, peas and lettuce. These same crops are also benefiting from the abundant moisture. We are beginning to see a lot of broccoli starting to head up. I expect that some groups will receive broccoli in their share this week in place of kohlrabi, which they will then receive next week.We will proceed with this rotation for the next couple of weeks until all groups have gotten broccoli (and kohlrabi).

We have a pretty purple variety called Kolibri (hummingbird in Spanish but not spelled that way). Kohlrabi can be cooked or eaten raw--grated and mixed into salads or made into a slaw (kohl slaw). The arugula has all bolted to flower but we still have broccoli raab (which we want to flower!) and tatsoi. We also still have a fair amount of spinach and it is looking gorgeous; a beautiful dark green. The escarole has begun to bolt so we have begun to harvest it, some not as big as I would have liked, but it’s use it or lose it. We will offer it as a choice with endive (frissee), another slightly bitter member of the lettuce family.

Escarole is typically eaten braised or in soup, while frissee more commonly eaten raw. We have been harvesting snow peas these last few days as well as more sugarsnap and English peas. Most groups ended up getting English peas last week, contrary to my prediction. One of the reasons for this is that the English peas turn starchy very quickly and must be picked at the right time and then eaten promptly. Whichever type you received last week, you will get a different type this week; if it’s English use them right away.

The Bok Choy is looking good but I think it can stand another week without bolting and since we can only harvest so much and you can only eat so much, I mention it as a coming attraction. The featured lettuce this week will be a red Boston, a tough decision because we have several varieties and thousands of heads of lettuce that will have to be cut soon. There will likely be 2 lettuces in next week’s share.

In the root vegetable category, we have Hakurei salad turnips, which can be sliced or grated into salads, or cooked and do not need to be peeled. In the spring, these develop a bit of radish-like spiciness, which cooking will mitigate. The fall crop will be much milder and the edible greens mild enough to put in salad.

The share for this week will be: Red Boston lettuce, salad turnips, kohlrabi, spinach, choice of escarole or endive, some type of pea, choice of broccoli raab or tatsoi or a generic mustard green, and choice of dill or cilantro

Enjoy! —Farmer John

June 15 Update

Hi Folks,

The week you have been waiting for has arrived—the first delivery of the season. This is the week that my crew and I have been working and preparing for since March. It’s also the week that I have been worrying and fretting over for about the last month; would there be anything to deliver? Crops were growing very slowly during the gray rainy spring and windows of opportunity for sowing seeds out in the field were rather limited.

I’ve often thought that worrying is an inescapable aspect of farming. There are so many factors beyond one’s control that being proactive has to be replaced with reactive and adaptive, and lots of worrying! Sowing seeds directly in the field is an especially anxiety-producing task; are the seeds falling thickly enough? Are they deep enough? Are they too deep? Will it rain enough or too much and wash out the seeds?

Usually everything comes out (and up) fine, but this spring Murphy’s Law was in full effect and many of the things that could go wrong did. Nevertheless, while the first delivery may not be as bountiful as last year’s, it is a reasonable start to the season.

There is nice spinach; some a red type and some the traditional green. We have lots of mustard greens—arugula, tatsoi, mizuna, and broccoli raab. The leaves of the mustards have some lacing caused by a particularly pesky pest called the flea beetle. We have tried out best to control them with an organic pyrethrum spray but it is nearly impossible to eliminate them completely. The active ingredient breaks down quickly in sunlight, which is why it is safe and allowed in organic production, but that also means it has no residual effectiveness.

The arugula is very peppery as it always is this time of year. The broccoli raab will have some flower buds though probably not that many. Tatsoi, also known as spoon mustard, is the mildest of the bunch as well as the darkest green and is my favorite mustard.

The lettuce patch is gorgeous and colorful and is crying out to be photographed before we begin to part them from their roots. There are thousands that have almost filled out and after last week’s heat wave are probably thinking about bolting (the same effect the heat has on me!) and will have to be cut. If not this week, then next there will be 2 lettuces in the share.

Are you ready to eat the BIG salad? The most likely candidate for lettuce of the week is Forellenschlus, an heirloom romaine called trout back in German because of its red mottling. We also will have plenty of peas, provided we can pick them promptly. It will likely be mostly sugar snaps (edible pod) this week, though some groups may get English (shell) peas. The radishes, like the arugula, will be spicy, but don’t forget that they can be cooked and will lose most of their heat.

And the first delivery would not be complete without garlic scapes. These are the flower buds of the garlic; flowers that don’t produce seed, but rather bulbils. Garlic is a strange plant. They can be chopped finely and sautéed, grilled, pickled, or blended to make a kind of pesto. They also store for weeks in the refrigerator, so don’t feel you need to use them up quickly.

The share for this week will be: Romaine lettuce, spinach, radishes, garlic scapes, sugar snap or English peas, arugula, and choice of tatsoi, broccoli raab, or other mustard greens

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Second 2011 Update

Hello Everyone,

I see that it’s been over 3 weeks since my first update; time flies when there’s too much to do! At that time we were in the middle of a dry spell, the first of the season, and we were trying hard to get caught up on the planting schedule. We almost did get caught up and then the rain started again and it rained, or was overcast for a week.

I was scrambling to plant as many seeds I could that week, ahead of the predicted rains. I got quite a bit in, but unfortunately, too much rain can be almost as bad for germination as too little; heavy rain can wash the seeds out or bury them too deep. It also compacts the soil and when the sun returns, it bakes the soil surface, producing a crust that is difficult for tiny seeds to break through.

Perhaps the worst crop in this regard is spinach, which simply will not germinate when conditions are too wet. With my third planting of spinach, only one out of the three varieties I sowed came up well.

In other bad news, we lost nearly 1,000 cauliflower plants to buttoning--forming a tiny head before the plant has grown large enough--nd hundreds of broccoli plants succumbed to root disease because of the sustained wet conditions. The fava beans are an almost complete crop failure, due to cold wet conditions in the early spring, which caused many of the seeds to rot. Those that did emerge seemed stunted and now many have been destroyed by the deer, which had never shown an interest in them previously. So that’s the bad news.

Now for some good news. The lettuce crop looks beautiful and the peas are flowering heavily. The potato crop looks great so far and we have beds already waiting for the sweet potato plants to arrive. We have planted thousands of peppers, eggplant, and tomatoes with a few thousand heirloom tomatoes left to be set out. We are beginning to plant the melons this week, with a second planting to follow in a week or two. Zucchini and other summer squash should begin to produce in another 2 or 3 weeks.

While we lost some broccoli, we still have thousands that will be heading in the next month. We have also already begun to seed the fall brassica crops in an attempt to get crops ready for harvest in September and October.

The bottom line is that while it’s hard not to get discouraged by the ravages of pests, diseases and adverse weather, we don’t give up. There will always be losses and crop failures, but we forge ahead, replant when possible or look for another crop to replace a lost one. I and my crew are working hard to insure a bountiful season. Thanks to those who came out to help cover the high tunnel greenhouse over Memorial Day weekend. Many hands makes light work, as the Amish say, and things went very smoothly.

I hope to see many of you at the farm visit this Saturday and have a chance to show off the results of all our work. Keep your fingers crossed it’s not too rainy! —Farmer John

First 2011 Update

Hello Everyone,

It was a long hard winter and then, when spring came, it didn’t! March was one on the coldest I can remember and April was one of the wettest. So here we are at the first update of the season and I’m already complaining about the weather.

In farming, almost everything we do is dictated or affected by the weather. We need rain but not too much, we need heat but not too much, and hurricanes and hail we hope to do without. Moderation in all things, but in these days of extreme weather we rarely get the ideal balance.

Every year is different, but it’s amazing how different this spring has been from the spring of 2010, which was warm and relatively dry. We have been busy since early March planting in the greenhouse. Normally we begin seeding certain crops and transplanting onions in the field in early April. This year, due to the wet conditions, we were delayed until Mid- April and even then only because we have sandy soil at the farm in Andover and I was able to find a few windows of opportunity in between the bouts of rain when the ground was dry enough to work and plant.

I was forced to change my plans and plant the onion crop in Andover rather than at the original Starbrite Farm location near Blairstown. The soils there are a heavy clay and do not dry out quickly; an advantage in a wet year but a problem during a wet one. It’s unfortunate because the onions have always grown well there and since they are not grazed on by the critters and are harvested at one time, it was a good fit.

Needless to say, we are a bit behind in our planting, but my crew and I are working hard to get caught up. It’s hard though, when May is already a busy planting month and you’re still planting crops that should have gone in in April. It brings to mind a favorite line from a Dylan song: “odds and ends, lost time is not found again”

Ironically, now that the weather has started to moderate and I have been able to sow numerous types of tiny seeds, we have had to put the sprinklers out, after a week without rain. The smaller the seed, the more shallowly it must be sown, and the top layer of the soil dries out quickly in the sun and the wind. The beets and the chard are already coming up, but the carrots and the parsnips take 2 to 3 weeks to emerge and must be kept moist during that time.

I have just finished planting nearly an acre of peas, most of which have already come up and been growing for several weeks. We have nearly finished planting the potatoes and onions, and there are thousands of lettuces and Cole crops in the ground and growing well. The greenhouse is full of tomato, pepper, squash and other plants ready to be transplanted in the next several weeks.

We are working hard to ensure a bountiful season, but the first couple of deliveries will not be as large as they were last year. We hope to compensate for this as we go through the season. I hope to see and meet many of you during the coming weeks at one of the farm events.

Enjoy the spring! —Farmer John

Update for Nov. 3

Hello Everyone,

It’s been a very warm fall up to now, but now it would seem we are quickly entering winter. We have had lows in the upper 20’s these  past few nights and now they are predicting lows in the lower 20’s for Tuesday night. We are scrambling to harvest or cover anything that might be damaged by these frigid nights.

Most of what is left in the fields is very hardy and can survive quite cold temperatures, but in some cases the edible part of the plant can be damaged. This is the case with cauliflower--the plant will survive, but if the head has started to form, it can freeze and be ruined.  Similarly, root crops like radishes and turnips have leaves that can withstand the cold but if the roots project too far above the surface they can freeze and, after thawing, become spongy. 

Today, Monday, we harvested about 800 lbs. of daikon which had pushed itself several inches out of the ground. We also began raking soil over the roots of turnips and radishes to protect them. Tomorrow we will be continuing this task as well as covering some crops with a white ag-fabric that affords several degrees of frost protection. Hopefully, once we get through the next couple of nights, we will have a couple of weeks of more moderate lows.

Last week, we began cutting quite a bit of cauliflower, some of which ended up in the shares for the Thursday groups. This week we will have cauliflower for all other groups and broccoli for those who pick up on Thursday. Next week we should have broccoli for everyone. We will be sending the daikon with leaves attached as they are quite palatable--good in soups or stir fries. We will have sweet potatoes again this week, this time a variety known as Japanese, which have bright red skin and a yellowish flesh. They are quite delicious but were not as productive as the other varieties, so there will be a slightly smaller quantity to disperse. We are out of herbs for the time being, having overcut the parsley. We are waiting for a planting of cilantro, chervil, and dill to be large enough to harvest.

Update for Oct. 27

Things are beginning to wind down a bit here on the farm. We are done seeding and transplanting crops for harvest this season. We have finished digging the sweet potatoes and most of the white potatoes as well.  Besides the daily harvesting of greens and root crops for the shares and the markets, we are focused on clean-up. My crew has been dismantling the trellis for the tomatoes, removing hundreds of posts and stakes, and pulling the plastic mulch. I have been busy broadcasting cover crop seed--winter rye and hairy vetch, which will protect the fields from wind erosion during the winter months. These cover crops also improve the soil by adding organic matter and nitrogen which is “fixed” by the vetch. Members of the legume family like vetch take nitrogen from the atmosphere and store it in nodules which form on their roots.

We are also preparing ground to plant the garlic and shallots for next year’s crop. Garlic is grown from the individual cloves, each of which will produce a new bulb next July. Planted now, the cloves will begin to grow roots, so they will emerge and begin to grow rapidly as soon as the ground thaws in early spring. I plan to put in about 600 lbs. of seed garlic, 50% more than last year, as we never seem to have enough of the popular stuff.

We are still waiting on the broccoli heads to size up, a process that is painfully slow during the fall, with shorter days and cold nights. The good news is that the quality is generally high when they are ready, and many different varieties are beginning to mature. Once we can begin harvesting, we should have it consistently during the final weeks of the season. In the meantime we have kale as the brassica of the week.

The red potatoes we are sending with the shares this week are a bit ugly, with a lot of russeting of the skin. You will probably want to peel them. Fortunately, they are fairly large so this won’t be a terribly difficult task. We will be shipping some pumpkins this week as a choice with a large gray kabocha type squash called Sweet Mama. All pumpkins are edible, but some are better eating than the ornamental types. These are excellent for baking as well as for soups and in any recipe which calls for pumpkin. The root of the week will be salad turnips. Don’t forget that the greens are edible and very nutritious.

The share for this week will be: Red potatoes, leeks, salad turnips, choice of romaine or a red romaine–like variety, arugula, kale, choice of ornamental pumpkin or kabocha squash and choice of an herb (mostly parsley).    Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for Oct. 20

Hi Folks:

I hope you are all enjoying the beautiful fall weather. There is no rain in the forecast this week, at least for the moment. This is good news, since the ground is quite saturated. In general, this is not much of a problem, but I do have one field that stays wet, and part of it is planted with turnips, radishes, and various mustards. We have tried to cultivate these crops several times during the past 2 weeks, but the tractor bogs down and sinks into the mud. All we can do is lift the implements and race for the edge, so we don’t get stuck in the mud! We also still have about a half an acre of potatoes to dig, which will be much easier if the ground has a chance to dry a bit.

I have finished sowing seed for crops for this season, but there are many acres of field that need to be planted in a cover crop. We sow winter rye and hairy vetch to improve the soils and protect them from erosion. The vetch is a legume which fixes nitrogen and improves the soil fertility.

We are still waiting for the next broccoli crop to do its thing, but we have begun cutting cauliflower. There won’t be enough for all groups this week, so some of you will get kale and should see the cauliflower next week.

We will be sending sweet potatoes again this week, this time a white variety called a Jersey sweet. This type is a bit drier than the orange variety but quite delicious; I sampled them last night for dinner. We are in the process of trying to cure the sweet potato crop so that they will store better. This requires keeping them at a temperature between 85 and 90 degrees for about a week. I have never been able to accomplish this in the past, but this year we have turned a recently constructed cooler into a hot box using some electric heaters. We have a tremendous crop of these scrumptious and nutritious tubers; now the trick will be to store them for distribution during the remainder of the season.

We have also begun digging the parsnips, so they will make their first appearance in the root category in this week’s shares.

Update for Oct. 13

Hi Folks,

We had our first frost this past Saturday night. As warm as it has been, I was hoping we would get a couple more weeks from the warm weather crops. The old saying “you can’t always get what you want” is especially true in farming. I was, as frequently happens, taken by surprise by it, as it wasn’t forecast until Saturday. I might have tried to cover a few crops, but by the time I learned of its imminence, the workers had already gone home.

Gone are the beans and the basil, the peppers and eggplant, and the zucchini. The cold also blackened the leaves of the sweet potatoes, but that’s good news, because now we have begun to dig them, and hopefully, soon so will you! So far the harvest looks great, with good size and quality and overall yield. I pulled a few out of the ground last night and baked them for dinner; they were quite yummy.

We are still waiting for the next round of broccoli to head up, which should happen in the next week or two.  In the meantime, we have some Napa or Chinese cabbage and some bok choi to offer in this week’s share. Some groups will get the cabbage this week and others the bok choi, next week the contrary. Both white and yellow cauliflowers are beginning to head as well, so look for these in the shares soon.

We will give the spinach a rest this week and allow it to get a little bigger, ditto for the chard and the kale. We had been thinning out the rows of spinach as we harvest; pulling the largest plants and leaving the smaller ones with more space to grow. I planted the spinach at the back of one of my fields, because in my experience it was not eaten by ground hogs or deer. Unfortunately, with fewer of their favorites available to them, the deer seem to have acquired a taste for it. They did a fair amount of damage before we were able to get it fenced in. We have now had to put a fence around a second planting, which I thought was still too small for them to bother with; wrong again!

The lettuce for this week will be an old variety called Forellensclus, which means something like trout back in German. It is a romaine type with red speckling, hence the name. I mention it mostly because to the un-initiated it can appear to be going bad, but it is a very nice lettuce with a dense head, full of many tender leaves.

The squash of the week will be spaghetti. I was planning on sending acorn, but it appears that the spaghetti squash is not keeping very well. This is not typical for winter squash as most keep for months. I recommend that you use it promptly, or at least keep an eye on it, so that it doesn’t spoil before you get to it. We also have a choice of edamame soybeans or flageolet beans in this week’s share. The latter are the traditional ingredient in the French dish cassoulet. They are shell beans and can be used in any dish calling for lima beans or added to soups. They look just like green beans, but you will be very disappointed if you try to prepare them as such.

Don’t forget about the farm visit this Sunday at Circle Brook Farm, 141 Brighton Rd., Andover, NJ, 07821, 11 AM to 4PM. This will be a simple event, an opportunity  for those who have wanted to visit the farm and haven’t had the chance, to see how their food grows.  The weather forecast looks good!

Update for Oct. 6

Hello Everyone,

The dry spell has officially ended!  I knew all along, as I complained about the lack of rain, that at some point it would begin to fall again and likely in excessive amounts. Be careful what you wish for, as they say!  I guess it’s too much to ask, to have a balance between the sunshine and the rain and we have to accept the feast or famine pattern that has become the norm. Fortunately the fields here in Andover are very well drained and have been able to absorb the 7” of water that fell last week with no flooding.

Perhaps the greatest challenge during long rainy stretches is getting the harvesting done. We have been in the process of bringing in the winter squash crop, a project that now becomes more urgent as it will begin to rot in these wet conditions. We normally clean it and pack it into boxes in the field. Under these circumstance, we have been quickly gathering as much as we can during the interludes between downpours and bringing into the barn to clean and pack. This double handling is not very efficient but is the only way we can forge ahead.

Unfortunately this strategy doesn’t work with the greens and the root vegetables, which must be pulled and bunched in the field, so my workers must endure working in the light rain and run for cover during the downpours. We are looking at another rainy period ahead and with cooler temperatures, so it will be another challenging week. The downside for you, the consumers, of all this wet weather is dirty vegetables. The rain splashes soil all over the leaves of the plant and there is only so much that can be removed by washing after it is bunched. I guess we all have our crosses to bear!

While fall is typically associated with apples and pumpkins, it is also the season of the Mustard family.This large and diverse group of plants thrive in the cool, wet conditions common to autumn. The family includes the brassicas such as cabbage, cauliflower, kale and of course, broccoli, as well as root crops like radishes and turnips. The list of varieties of  mustards with tender leaves is extensive and includes Italian favorites, such as arugula (not a lettuce as some seem to think) and broccoli raab as well as a plethora of Asian greens like tatsoi, bok choi, hon tsai tai  and several types which make small flower buds, similar to broccoli raab.

These vegetables will make up a sizeable portion of the shares during the final third of the season. We began cutting broccoli raab last week and I forgot to mention it in the update. It is one of the trickier crops to grow, as it should be cut with a flower bud, which turns rapidly into a yellow flower, even after being cut and in storage. We will be offering it as a choice along with other tender mustards over the next couple of weeks, so watch out for it if it is a favorite.

After much deliberation, we have decided to host a fall farm visit on Sunday, October 17 from 11 a.m. till 4 p.m.  I know there are many folks who would like to visit the farm but were unable to make it in the spring. This will be similar to the spring event with a potluck lunch and a farm tour. This will be a rain or shine event, unless torrential rain is predicted, in which case we will postpone until October 24. We will have pumpkins available for kids to paint or for carving. I apologize for the short notice and hope that many of you will be able to attend.  I will send out a flyer with more details shortly.

The share for this week will be: Red Boston lettuce, kale(broccoli if you got kale last week) choice of arugula, raab, or other mustard green, cippolini onions, radishes, string beans, summer squash, peppers, choice of spinach or Swiss chard, butternut squash and choice of an herb. Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for Sept. 29

Howdy Folks,

Summer has officially ended and with it go the warm weather crops. The tomatoes are definitely over for the season; the peppers should continue producing for a few more weeks. The eggplants are full of small fruit but they are sizing up very slowly. We will give them a rest this week in hopes of getting one more large harvest of medium size fruit for next week.

The late summer squash planting peaked last week and production will begin to decline rapidly. Many of the plants already have powdery mildew issues and with wet weather coming will probably fade quickly. We still have a good supply for the shares this week.  We have a good winter squash crop that we are in the process of harvesting. Next week we will begin the rotation of the various varieties of winter squash, from acorn to spaghetti, which will take us to the end of the season.

The first large broccoli planting is heading up nicely and we should have sufficient quantities for everyone this week. If we run short we will substitute kale and ship broccoli to those groups next week. We have put in nearly 10,000 plants so expect broccoli frequently during the remainder of the season. There are also thousands of cauliflower and cabbage plants that will begin to mature during October. I expect to have lettuce in the shares again by next week. We have some spinach which is large enough to pick, principally a red stemmed variety. We need to harvest this type first because it is more prone to bolting and also because the deer have decided that they like it!

I just returned from the Garlic Festival in Saugerties, NY, where I went in search of seed garlic for next year’s crop. Garlic is grown from individual cloves that we plant in late October. It will begin to grow some roots and then emerge in early spring as soon as the ground thaws.

Seed garlic is rather scarce at present and prices are high, due to both increased demand for the richly flavored stiffneck varieties as well as a recently discovered nematode problem in NY State. Nematodes are microscopic worm-like creatures that attack the roots of the plant and are spread on infected bulbs. One bulb can contain as many as 50,000 organisms! This is a serious problem which also affects onion crops, so those who have the problem have had their crops quarantined. For many others, testing is necessary to insure the absence of these critters and prevent the spread of the plague.

Since I never seem to have as much garlic as I would like (or as you would like!) to put in the shares, I was anxious to obtain a substantial quantity for next season. I came back with my Subaru loaded down with nearly 600 lbs. of several varieties that I am fairly confident do not harbor the pest. I spent $4000 on this haul. Farming is like that, we are always reinvesting the profits in the next crop or the next season. I look on it as money in the bank, only a bank without FDIC insurance and that is subject to frequent robberies.

Update for Sept. 22

From Lenny: The fruit share for this week will be Bartlett pears and Kiwi berries. The kiwi is called Hardy or Siberian kiwi. It is a relative of the familiar fuzzy kiwi that grows in northern climates, being native to China. It is organically grown in PA. It has a smooth green skin and is eaten whole like grapes. It has a bit of fuzz at the bottom of the berry that can be removed before eating. The berries are sweetest when fully ripe, at which point the skin will darken and become wrinkly. It is very nutritous, high in potassium, and vitamins C and E. They are also quite acidic, so don't eat to many at one time. They will keep in the refrigerator for a couple of weeks and ripen at room temperature in a few days.

Hello Everyone,

We received a bit more rain this past week from the storm that passed through on Thursday. It wasn’t much, perhaps a quarter of an inch, nothing like the downpour experienced in the eastern part of the state and NYC. Fortunately we were also spared the high winds and hail that accompanied the storm in these areas.

We are still a little on the dry side, but the fall crops look great and the most recent planting are germinating nicely. The final summer squash patch is producing abundantly, so expect lots of zucchini and summer squash for the next few weeks. The beans too, are beginning to bear prolifically, although they are a bit slower to size up now, as the days get shorter and the nights cooler. There weren’t enough to go around last week, so some groups did not receive them. Those who did got only a half pound. We will try to compensate for the inequity this week, by sending larger quantities to those who were skipped last week. Eggplant production remains slow, so we are still in an every-other-week rotation. The tomato harvest has slowed to a trickle; we will try to include a few in the shares, but I can’t make any promises.

We have the wonderful Hakurei salad turnips available once again. Remember that the tops are a good cooking green or can even be added raw to salads. The turnips can be cooked or eaten raw. Both the greens and the roots are of better quality in the fall than those of the early summer harvest.

The Swiss chard is absolutely gorgeous right now and we will have spinach in the next week or two. The first large planting of fall broccoli should be starting to head up soon, so it should be in the shares within 2 weeks. The first of the fall lettuce crop is also still about 2 weeks away from being ready.  Since it’s been so many weeks without lettuce, I decided to buy some from another local organic grower. Besides the corn, this will likely be the only veggie not grown on the farm to be included in the share.

Update for Sept. 15

Hello Folks,

We had some light rain and drizzle here at the farm this past Sunday. I don’t think it amounted to even a ¼ inch of precipitation. It will help to germinate some of the recently planted seeds and will also help the lettuce and some other newly transplanted broccoli and kohlrabi starts. It really only wet the top 3 or 4 inches of soil and was a lot less than what I had hoped for and what we really need. I guess we’ll be moving the sprinklers around a lot in the days to come, since currently there is no rain in the forecast for the next 10 days.

We will be sending celery in the shares this week. This has once again been a disappointing crop for us--growing slowly and never really achieving good size. I have dreams  of someday soon gaining access to some of the black dirt or muck soils that we have nearby; I am told that celery grows beautifully in this ground as do many crops. It is rather unfortunate that these fields are used largely for sod production and an inch or two of this rich soil is removed with each harvest. The celery will be stronger in flavor that what you are used to from the grocers, with only a few of the inner stalks being mild and tender enough to be used in salads. The outer stalks are best used cooked in soups or stir fries.

The tomato production has slowed way down, with mostly plum tomatoes and heirlooms left with green fruit and a healthy plant. Despite the dry weather and my efforts to control the blight, disease has once again taken a heavy toll on the crop. We should still have some tomatoes in the shares for the next few weeks, just not the large quantities you have seen over the past 3 weeks. 

The third planting of summer squash is coming on strong despite grazing damage from the deer. I expect sufficient quantities for all groups this week and larger amounts per share next week. We are back in the bean business as well, with green and wax beans in small quantities this week and larger amounts over the next several weeks. We also have another planting of edamame and some cassoulet beans that will be ready in about 3 weeks. The lettuce is beginning to grow nicely in the cooler temperatures and we should see it in the shares again soon.

Update for Sept. 8

Hi Everyone, 

I hope you had a pleasant Labor Day weekend. There’s no 3-day weekend here at the farm, of course, we’ve got to harvest your food!  For my workers and me, today was just another day of labor.

Besides harvesting, the major project for Monday was to finish erecting a temporary fence around 4 acres of field to keep the deer from destroying the pumpkin and winter squash crop. The vines are beginning to die back and there are only a few more weeks before the harvest, but the deer have already done a lot of damage.  We need to protect it until it matures and we have a chance to bring it in out of the field. 

We are back in the greens business again—this week we have arugula or other mustard greens, next week there will be tatsoi. A second planting of chard is coming on and the first planting has been renovated and is beginning to grow nicely again. We should have spinach and kale in 2 or 3 weeks.  

Unfortunately lettuce is still a few weeks away, but once it begins again we should have a steady supply until the end of the season. I haven’t griped about the weather yet; a mandatory part of these updates, but I’ll keep it brief. It’s been beautiful of course, but very dry; we really need some rain and there’s none in sight. 

Beans are a bit scarce at the moment, as we wait for the next planting to start producing, which should be next week as they are flowering heavily. The Rattlesnake beans have been almost completely defoliated by the bean beetle, despite the release of thousand of parasitic wasps. The guys from the state insect lab have been making frequent visits to scout and release the wasps to try to at least reduce the population that will overwinter.  In the meantime I have to tolerate the devastation.  

Zucchini and summer squash will be making their reprise soon, possibly by next week. I’m sorry to say that the melons are done, but at least we had a fairly good run. Eggplant production is still slow, so it’s a maybe for this week; if you got it last week, probably not. 

The share for this week will be: Tomatoes, peppers, eggplant (maybe), red potatoes, yellow onions, carrots, string beans or edamames, ground cherries or cherry tomatoes, arugula or mustard greens and choice of an herb. Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for Sept. 1

Hi Folks,

As predicted, we received some much needed rain this past week, a total of a little more than an inch, that fell mostly as drizzle and light rain over four days. Such a protracted period of precipitation makes the harvest more challenging, especially for the potatoes, which had to be dug by hand without the help of the potato digging machine. I’m not complaining, though—after such a dry summer, we’ll take whatever we can get, and be grateful for it. Now it seems we’re engulfed in another heat wave, but it should break by Friday and we get another chance for rain as the high pressure moves in.

We are still picking melons and watermelons, although the peak production is past. What we have at the moment are mostly smaller watermelons. We were unable to harvest many edamame soybeans last week, so some groups did not get any as promised. If you were one of those members who did not get soybeans, you will this week. The same is true for eggplant. We are bringing in loads of tomatillos at the moment, so start searching for recipes…. These green (sometimes purple) paper-husk-covered members of the tomato family are the main ingredient in salsa verde, the Mexican condiment. They are not picante as many people assume, since the heat comes from the chili peppers that are added to the salsa. Salsa verde is very simple to make—just boil them until soft, pour off the water, and put them in a blender with an onion, hot peppers (or not), and salt to taste.

The share for this week will be tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, beets, green beans or edamame, garlic, sweet corn (conventional), melon or watermelon, choice of cherry tomatoes or ground cherries, tomatillos, red onions, and choice of an herb. Enjoy! —Farmer John

Hello Everyone,  

It's been a dry summer and we ve been waiting and hoping for some rain. Many of the scattered storms that have been about have missed us and we finally had to hand water most of the recently transplanted lettuces last week or risk losing many of them. Now it seems we're headed into a rainy stretch for the first half of this week.

Rain is, of course, critical for the crops, but it can be a mixed blessing.  Long periods of damp and overcast conditions accelerates the spread of diseases in the tomatoes and in other crops as well. These conditions also make the harvesting more of a challenge.  The flood of tomatoes we've seen over the past 2 weeks is beginning to ebb, as most of the early varieties have produced their crop and succumbed to disease. We are bringing in a lot more plum tomatoes now, there are still heirlooms that will continue to produce and we are still picking lots of the cherries.

The melon bonanza is also starting to slow, but we will still have them in the shares for the next couple of weeks. Eggplant production continues to be slow, so we will probably be in the every other week rotation for a while. The first planting of edamame soybeans is ready, so we will be harvesting the 60 or 70% that the groundhogs have not destroyed as weather permits this week. We will likely offer them as a choice with the string beans.

We have been busy transplanting lots of broccoli, cabbage and cauliflower over the past couple of weeks. I have also seeded many other fall crops, such as spinach, turnips, broccoli raab, arugula, and other mustard greens. I will be continuing to make successive planting of these crops over the next month, until about the third week in September, in order to provide you with ample quantities of greens during the second half of the season.

he share for this week will be: Potatoes, white onions, tomatoes, string beans or edamames, peppers, savoy cabbage, carrots, melons or watermelons, choice of ground cherries or cherry tomatoes, and choice of an herb. Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for August 18

Hi Folks,

This will be a brief update, since I am late in writing it. My computer died last week and after determining that it was not worth fixing, today I purchased a new one. Between setting it up, learning my way around a different operating system and getting the farm work done, it’s been a hectic day.  

Greens continue to be scarce and we have run out of lettuce as well. We’ve been planting more and should have some again in about a month. Spinach and arugula are up and growing and should be ready about the same time—in mid-September. Meanwhile, tomatoes and melons are ripening rapidly and ground cherries are falling to the ground profusely.

For those of you new to the CSA, ground cherries are an odd fruit in the solanaceous (tomato) family closely related to tomatillos, having the same paper husk around the fruit. They are the size of cherries and they fall off the plant when ripe so we gather them off the ground, hence the name. They are very sweet and have a unique nutty pineapple flavor. They are one of those items that people either love or hate, so we will send them as a choice with cherry tomatoes.

We had a couple of days of drizzle this past week, which, while it was enough to help some of my recently planted seeds to come up, didn’t do much for the overall soil moisture levels. We have a couple of more chances for rain this week, so hopefully we will receive some more substantial precipitation.

The share for this week will be:  Tomatoes, beets, potatoes, leeks, tomatoes, melons and /or watermelons, beans, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant (maybe), choice of cherry tomatoes or ground cherries, choice of an herb and more tomatoes. Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for August 11

Hello Everyone,

It’s been getting rather dry again here on the farm. It’s been nearly 2 weeks without a substantial rainfall, and while there is still some moisture deeper in the ground, the surface is essentially dust. This makes it a bit challenging to get good germination on the many crops which we are currently seeding, such as carrots, turnips, and mustard greens. These crops have fairly tiny seeds and thus must be sown quite shallowly. We have set up the sprinklers on the fall carrot planting, because they are slow germinators and need to be maintained constantly damp to ensure good emergence. The fall brassicas that we transplanted recently have taken root well, but are being devoured by the voracious flea beetle. We have sprayed them twice during the past week, and while the populations have been substantially reduced, they are still a problem. These pests generally disappear about the end of August, going underground to over-winter. Until then they are a serious plaque, capable of completely defoliating plants; anything I can do to reduce their numbers will also mitigate the severity of the infestation when they emerge next spring.

The tomato deluge has begun, with fruit ripening abundantly in all of the early varieties. There are a number of “maybes” in this weeks share; the one thing that is certain is that you will get lots of tomatoes. The heirloom tomatoes are also beginning to mature substantial amounts of fruit, although many of these have been cracking. Be sure to use the heirlooms quickly as they have a very short shelf life. Melons have begun to ripen as well. The variety that we have the most of at the moment, is a Korean melon called Sun Jewel. These are small, yellow, oblong fruits with a crisp texture like a pear, and very sweet. There are also some white honeydews and some canary melons. Soon we will have cantaloupes and watermelons. We may not have enough at present for all groups. The eggplant is flowering abundantly but there is still not enough large fruit to harvest for all groups. Some folks received eggplant last week; if you didn’t, it should be in your share this week.

The share for this week will be: Swiss chard, multi colored carrots, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, melons, red onions, beans, red cabbage, sweet corn (conventionally grown) and choice of an herb. Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for August 4

Hello Folks,

We’ve arrived at August, having survived a scorching July, and happy for the more moderate temperatures we’ve enjoyed over the past week. A few passing storms have brought us just enough rain to keep the crops happy and to help germinate the many seeds I’ve sown during the week. I’ve planted more beans, cucumbers and summer squash for a late September harvest as well as beets and carrots for October. We have also begun transplanting the brassica crops for the fall as well.

We’ve been busy in the greenhouse seeding escarole, radicchio and lettuces to be transplanted out into the field in 2 or 3 weeks. We have to work in the greenhouse on overcast days or during the early morning hours before the heat becomes unbearable. We also have to trick the lettuces into germinating by placing them on a cool concrete floor in the barn for several days until they begin to emerge. Lettuce seed has a trait known as heat dormancy by which, if exposed to high temperatures and moisture, it will refuse to germinate under any circumstances for about a month. We have to watch them carefully because they will quickly get too leggy if not moved into the light as soon as they begin to emerge.

It’s not easy being (a) green, especially during a hot summer in New Jersey. The spinach and mustard greens are long gone and the kale is laced with holes courtesy of 2 pests—the flea beetle and the tarnished plant bug. I have sprayed it twice to try to control them but they continue to migrate in from the broccoli and cabbage plants which are finished and waiting to be plowed under. The Swiss chard has been over-cut and needs time and cooler weather to recover. About the only greens we have in abundance are the dandelion kind; not a big favorite (the insects don’t seem to like it much either). We will continue to send it as an extra for those who like it bitter.

I am planting spinach, arugula, and other mustard greens this week, so we should start to have greens in the share again in September. In the meantime, we will have to make do, with the summer crops—peppers will begin this week, and eggplant the next. Tomatoes will become more abundant with each passing week. The melon crop is looking good and some fruit should begin to ripen in the next 2 weeks.

We are still experiencing a dearth of beans, but the pole beans have begun to flower and the beleaguered bush beans are trying to produce a second crop, so we should  be back in the bean business soon.

The share for this week will be: Lettuce, tomatoes, peppers, summer squash, white onions, carrots, red gold potatoes, and choice of an herb. Enjoy! —Farmer John

Note from Lenny: The fruit share will be peaches and nectarines.

Update for July 28

Hi Everyone:

It looks as though the tomato season has arrived. We began picking a sizeable amount of fruit last Friday, and a lot more have ripened over the weekend.

It’s a week or two earlier than normal, one of the better consequences of this sunny, hot, and accelerated season. There will probably only be enough for 1 or 2 fruits per member this week, with more appreciable quantities arriving in the coming weeks. We should have some peppers and possibly eggplant for next week.  The bean plants have begun to flower again now that they have been re-hydrated. Hopefully they will produce a second picking of better quality than the first batch. The pole beans have begun climbing their trellis and will begin to flower soon, so the delicious, heirloom Rattlesnake beans should start in another 2 weeks.

Another consequence of the hot summer is that the onion crop has matured earlier than anticipated. The tops have died back on almost all varieties. Once this happens, we must quickly get them out of the field to be dried or they will begin to rot. My workers spent most of Friday and all of Saturday pulling, gathering, and spreading them out in the greenhouse to dry. The volunteer work day to help with the onion harvest scheduled for August 8th is cancelled, since we could not wait until then. The crop looks excellent with lots of large bulbs of good quality that should store well.

We received some good precipitation on Sunday, which began as a sudden downpour and continued for another 2 hours as a steady light rain. It caught me in the middle of sowing a late crop of beans and soaked both me and my bags of seed before I could flee the field. I often joke that the best way to bring rain is for me to get on the tractor I use for seeding and head out to plant. I consider this to be a corollary of Murphy’s Law as it relates to farming. I was in the middle of a row and had to try to finish as the soil quickly turned to mud and stuck to the wheels of the seeder. What a mess!

The share for this week will be: Lettuce, tomatoes, summer squash, green cabbage, beets, Yukon gold potatoes, garlic, daikon radish, a small quantity of either beans or snow peas and choice of an herb. Look for dandelion greens as an extra, if you like them (most people don’t). Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for July 21

Hello Everyone:

The fruit share will be peaches and plums this week.

We had a great start to the season, with plenty of beautiful greens, and unusually bountiful shares. As we head into mid-summer greens generally become more scarce, and in this accelerated season we have arrived at this point a little sooner than normal. All of the various mustards have bolted to seed and the kale is looking quite sad due to the heat and dry weather. At this point only the Swiss chard remains viable and we have been cutting it quite heavily during the past 2 weeks. I believe we can harvest sufficient quantities for distribution this week, but then we will need to let it rest and regenerate for a bit. I have been preparing ground to plant more spinach and mustard greens and I will be seeding these crops as soon as the weather allows. These greens should become available again in early September.

Up to this point we have provided you with chiefly “normal” vegetables with which most members are familiar and know how to use. This week may be the week that we cause some members to search their cookbooks and the internet for ways to use some less common vegetables; specifically radicchio and fennel. Even though I planted over a thousand radicchio plants many have bolted and quite a few have been destroyed by the groundhogs.  We may need to offer dandelion greens as a choice with the radicchio. This time last year we were swimming in green beans; this season however both the abundance and quality of the crop has been reduced by the heat and dryness. The plants are looking better now that they have gotten some rain and I hope that they will begin to flower again and produce a second picking.  We also have an heirloom pole bean called the rattlesnake bean that looks good and should start producing in about 3 weeks. I am in the process of planting more bush beans for September harvest.

The tomato crop is looking good so far, and we may have sufficient quantities to ship out by next week, if not, certainly in 2 weeks. Eggplant and peppers should also become available in the next couple of weeks. We will be beginning to harvest potatoes this week, even though the earliest varieties have not completely died back. This means that they are “new” potatoes and as such have thin skins that are easily damaged in harvesting and washing. It will be best to use them fairly quickly, as they probably won’t keep well.

The share for this week will be lettuce (various types), red potatoes, cauliflower, summer squash, carrots, red torpedo onions, fennel, radicchio or dandelion greens, Swiss chard, string beans (either green or wax), and choice of an herb. 

Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for July 14

Hi Folks,

I am happy to report that the farm received nearly 2 inches of rain this past Friday night into Saturday morning. This was much more than expected and a bit more than was needed, but nevertheless a huge relief, both to my worried mind and my drought stressed plants. We were occupying too much time moving the sprinklers around and I was unable to begin preparing ground for the fall planting which will begin soon.

When the ground gets dry, it shrinks and tightens, making plowing difficult and dusty.

I will have to wait a day or two for the soil to dry a bit, but soon I will be able to get some seeds in the ground.

I picked and ate the first few tomatoes over the weekend. The first few always end up on my plate, since there aren’t enough to distribute or even to take to market. And what a delight they are—acidic and sweet, unlike anything available from far away places, out of season. The tomato crop looks good so far and I anticipate having sufficient quantities to begin distributing in 2-3 weeks.  Peppers and eggplant are on the horizon as well. 

The pea harvest is essentially done but we are still picking a few shell peas and some snow peas that were planted late. Their replacement in the legume category—the string beans are just beginning to fill out. The plants have been looking quite sad this past week or two, a result of the dry conditions and also the damage caused by the bean beetle. It is necessary to tolerate some defoliation as we wait for the parasitic wasp to do its job.

While we are on the subject, 2 weeks ago in my update I discussed the Mexican bean beetle and the biologic control program run by the NJDA. I like to try to inject some humor into my writings and I jokingly referred to these insects as “undocumented aliens.”

I received a message from one of the members saying that she found this offensive. I apologize if anyone else did not find this amusing. I did not mean to compare undocumented immigrant to bugs, but since in recent days some politicians have done just that. I suppose that my remark could have been easily misunderstood. I have tremendous respect for the hard work done by the immigrant population, in agriculture and in other areas. I have seen the poverty that exists in Central America and I have sympathy for the risks that are taken and the sacrifices made by these folks in order to provide a better life for their families. The United Farmworkers Union is currently promoting a program they call “Take our Jobs,” encouraging average Americans to spend a day doing farm work, in an attempt to promulgate greater respect for these workers and the arduous tasks they perform. I guess in some way we are unofficially participating in this program with the volunteer work days we have been hosting. I wish to thank those members who came out this past Sunday to help with the garlic harvest. We were able to bring in about a third of the crop.

We have needed to harvest large quantities of lettuce in the past few weeks in order to not lose them to bolting in the scorching heat. Some of these varieties do not hold well and the coolers are getting quite full. We will be sending 2 different types of lettuce in the shares this week. Hopefully you won’t mind eating lots of salad this week. We also had to harvest the Napa or Chinese cabbage this past week, so that will be in the share. While I planted sufficient quantities for all the members and to have for market, a substantial number were lost to either rot or bolting, so we may need to substitute regular green cabbage if we run short.

The share for this week will be: Romaine Lettuce, green leaf lettuce, Napa cabbage, choice of kale or Swiss chard, elephant garlic, carrots, summer squash, cucumbers, peas and/or green beans, and choice of an herb. Enjoy!  —Farmer John

Update for July 7

Hello Folks,

I hope everyone had a pleasant Fourth of July weekend. We don’t get to take much of a break for the holiday here at the farm. Today, Monday was a regular workday and I spent most of yesterday on a marathon mission to finish planting the winter squash.

I confess that I did catch some blues music and fireworks (ooh-ahh) in the nearby town of Sparta. The lack of rain in the last 2 weeks has us moving the irrigation equipment around from field to field, a task that interferes with our other pressing duties. Oh yes, and it’s been really hot, in case you hadn’t noticed. Many things are burning up in the fields, especially my workers and me.  It looks like it will cool down a bit by the end of the week and we have a couple of chances of thunderstorms to bring some much needed precipitation.

I’m all for Alliums. I rarely cook a dish that doesn’t start with onions, garlic or some member of this tasty family. This is why I try to include some type of Allium in each delivery. I apologize for the absence of the pearl onions that were promised in last week's share. I know we planted them, but we just couldn’t seem to find them in the field.

Everything gets name stakes as we plant but sometimes they get lost and at this point it’s hard to distinguish the cippolini onions and shallots from pearl onions. No matter though, we have lots of large onions that are ready earlier than expected, so last week's delivery should be the only one of the season absent of Alliums.

The cucumbers have started producing heavily and a few groups received some last week. If you didn’t, you are likely to get some this week.  The pea season has gone by in a flash owing to all the heat. We have some sugar snaps left and also a meager harvest of Fava beans, which we will offer as a choice this week.  The bean crop is coming on strong and will be ready to fill in as the legume family member in 2 weeks, if not sooner.

The share for this week will be: Lettuce (either Boston or Oak leaf)  broccoli, beets (either purple or Chioggia, also known as Candy cane), kohlrabi, sweet onions, summer squash, cucumbers, Swiss chard, choice of sugar snap peas or Fava beans and choice of an herb (basil or parsley). Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for June 30

Hello Everyone,

Well, it was a scorcher of a week!  It’s summertime in New Jersey just like I remember it—hot and humid. While the hot warm weather crops such as the tomatoes and peppers have been in their glories, the cool weather plants have been looking quite dejected—wilting and droopy. Fortunately the heat wave is predicted to break and we will have some milder temperatures by mid-week. There’s no rain in sight though, and the ground is getting pretty dry. We are moving into the time of summer when passing thunderstorms are our best chance of precipitation. We find ourselves hoping for them, with the caveat that they not be accompanied by high winds or hail.

We are in the weeds, as they say; only in this case it is meant both literally and figuratively. We have been fighting to keep the grasses from swallowing the potatoes and the leeks and pulling the pigweed out of the carrot and beet crops. Once we begin deliveries and markets, harvesting occupies so much of our time that it’s hard to keep up with the maintenance. The pea picking is especially labor intensive and for that reason I wish to thank profusely the volunteers who came out on Sunday to help with the pea harvest. They picked nearly 300 lbs. of sugar snap peas, more than half what we will need for the week. The Guatemalan workers I have been waiting for finally had their interview at the embassy this past week and were given visas. They will arrive this Wednesday day night. Hallelujah! Help is on the way!

We were visited this week by a gentleman named Mark from the state insect labs. He brought with him and released thousands of parasitic wasps. Parasites, you say?  Yes, but fortunately they only parasitize the larva of the Mexican bean beetle. This undocumented alien was once the scourge of bean growers throughout the state until this wonderful biological control program was developed. It’s a beautiful thing; one less crop that has to be sprayed and it’s good to know something good is being done with our tax dollars.

The share for this week will be: Green leaf lettuce, pearl onions, radishes, spinach bok choy, arugula, sugar snap peas, broccoli, summer squash, choice of escarole or endive, and choice of an herb.  Enjoy! —Farmer John

Update for June 23

Hi Folks! 

The first round of deliveries seems to have gone fairly well, from all reports. There will generally be some glitches and confusion with the first couple of deliveries, especially with new groups. Some lucky groups got broccoli last week, an item that wasn’t on the list. Those that did not, will receive it this week. The earliest variety of broccoli we planted is producing a meager harvest due to stress from temperature extremes soon after transplanting. Stress in plants, it should be noted, is completely unconnected to stress in humans, except as it relates to my stress levels. Plants react to stress by flowering, which since broccoli is a flower, should be good, but the flower forms when the plant is still too small and hence produces a small bud. There are 4 other varieties in the field for which I have good expectations (not great though--sorry, Charles).

We should have sufficient quantities for all groups several times in the coming weeks.

We are also beginning to cut summer squash, though not in great quantity, so we will begin a similar delivery rotation with this crop until we have more in 2 weeks. Which leads me to the following disclaimer: We reserve the right to omit or change any item on the farm update list from your actual share for that week. We also reserve the right to add a vegetable to your share which was not on the list. All legal facetiousness aside, the update list should be considered a close approximation, my best guess, of what will be in the share. I can’t be 100% accurate all the time.

We have at present, what I suppose should be called a good problem to have--we have too much stuff (foodstuffs). There is enough spinach for this week and probably next week as well. It still looks beautiful but it won’t hold as we head into some hot days this next week (and I was trying so hard not to talk about the weather!). The problem is that we don’t have the time to harvest it all, and don’t want to overwhelm you, the members, with too many greens all at once. The Swiss chard looks great, but will have to wait. The bok choy is ready too, but next week will have to do. 

All of the mustards--tatsoi, broccoli raab, and green wave--are bolting to flower and the arugula is already too far gone to salvage anything from this planting. We will be sending as much broccoli raab as we can as a choice with the mustard greens this week. The flowers have been damaged a bit by a new pest--the tarnished plant bug--but the leaf is nice, and there’s never much of a bud with raab anyway. There will also be Hakurei salad turnips in the share this week, a favorite among the veterans and hopefully a new treat for the neophytes. They are delicious eaten raw, sliced like a radish or grated in salads or can be cooked.  The root is sweet and mild flavored and the leaf can also be steamed or braised.

I apologize that there was so much soil on several items last week. We had a torrential downpour last Sunday and it splashed a lot of soil onto the leaves. We can’t practically wash the leafy greens like lettuce and spinach, because if they remain too wet they rot quickly in storage and transport. My crew compounded the problem a bit by not removing enough of the lower, dirtier leaves, during harvest and so soiled the other heads in the tub. We will try to do better!

Many thanks to the pea picking volunteers who came out to the farm to lend a hand today. We had representatives from Metuchen, Jersey City, Westfield and Staten Island. Together they picked about 120 lbs. of peas.

The share for this will be: Red leaf lettuce, scallions, salad turnips, sugar snap peas, spinach, a mustard (tatsoi, broccoli raab, green wave), choice of endive or escarole, broccoli (some groups), summer squash (some groups), and choice of an herb (parsley, cilantro, dill). Enjoy! --Farmer John

Update for Week of June 14

Hello Everyone, 

The battle is in full swing now and we are completely and exhaustingly engaged. Make no mistake about it: producing quality vegetables is a battle from start to finish. It’s quite amazing how many critters there are that want to dine on your veggies before they can make it to your plate. We have fenced around the pea patch to keep the deer out and buried fence along the periphery of one field to try (unsuccessfully) to exclude the ground hogs. Compared to the four-legged creatures, the six-legged ones don’t eat as much but they’re much more numerous. Our two worst insect pests, the flea beetle and the cucumber beetle, have attacked with a vengeance this spring, and we are spraying to control them before their populations explode even further.  We use only approved organic materials--products that are naturally derived, have low toxicity to humans and break down quickly.

The weather has been okay, too hot and a bit too dry, but it’s better than wet and cold!  Most of our chances for rain over the past three weeks have been from scattered thunderstorms and none of these potential storms have materialized so far. We have a cool front moving in for the week ahead, which will make working conditions much more tolerable and hopefully bring some rain ahead of the front.

We are in the process of transplanting out into the field all the warm season crops. We have planted about a third of the 5,000 tomato plant and all of the eggplants, 1,800 or so.  On Friday, the sweet potato plants arrived and we needed to get those in immediately as they have hardly any root and wilt quickly. They looked quite sad as they baked in the blazing sun, but most of them should take root. This week, we will be planting the peppers, melons, summer squash, ground cherries, and the rest of the tomatoes.  We also have herbs and flowers to set out.

The peas are flowering profusely and I expect an abundant supply for the first delivery and during the subsequent three to four weeks. The brassicas (broccoli, cabbage, etc.) are growing well for the most part. They could use a good rain and will enjoy the cooler temps forecast for the week ahead. One of the early varieties of broccoli is showing sign of “buttoning” because of the stress of several extremely cold nights in early May. Buttoning means flowering when the plant is still too small and producing a tiny head.  If this variety is a complete loss, it will reduce the number of weeks we will have broccoli in the shares during the early summer harvest.

I have also had problems with the emergence on my potato crop. Several varieties did not come up at all, and several others came up so spotty that I will have to abandon them. These few problems notwithstanding, most everything is growing well and we have lots of great stuff coming on for the beginning of the season, now just a little more than a week away.

Thanks to the volunteers who came out to help with covering the greenhouse on May 15th. We were able to get it done on the first try this year! --Farmer John

Farmer John's First Update for 2010

Happy Spring, everyone!  Welcome to the 2010 Starbrite Farm CSA season.

The weather has been beautiful this spring, or so you thought. For those new members, you will soon learn (if you follow these updates) that what most folks consider great weather is not always the best for farming. For the veterans out there, you are already accustomed to my weekly griping about the weather—it’s too hot, too cold, too wet, too dry; and all in the same week!

The weather is always a rollercoaster ride in NJ in the spring, but the ups and downs do seen to be becoming a bit more extreme. With two mini heat waves and a hailstorm already gone by, the biggest challenge this spring has been a scarcity of rain in April and early May. The biggest annoyance has been the wind, which has been blowing hard a lot this spring, and steadily and fiercely for the last three days. These are critical times for transplanting and for direct seeding of the cool weather crops such as broccoli, and peas.

Fortunately, we’ve gotten just enough precipitation to get by. The pea and fava bean crop has germinated well and is growing beautifully and the lettuces and cabbage family crops, which are transplanted, have taken root and are beginning to grow. My crew has planted over 80,000 onion plants and we are more than halfway through planting the 4,000 lbs of seed potatoes that we have ready for this year’s crop. The garlic and shallots, which were planted last fall, have come up well and are growing nicely. Carrots, parsnips, beets, spinach, and chard, which were planted several weeks back, are coming up well. I recently sowed radishes, turnips, arugula and other types of mustard greens as well as cilantro and dill. 

My workers and I have been busy since early March with greenhouse planting and we have thousands of tomato, pepper, cucumber and squash plants that will soon be ready to be set out. We’ve been working hard for you and I believe we’re on track for a great season.

Thanks to those who came out to help cover the greenhouse on May 1st. Your help is greatly appreciated!  Next chance is this Saturday as we will attempt to cover the big high tunnel greenhouse in Hardwick Township. Keep your fingers crossed for calm winds!  —Farmer John

Photos from the June 7, 2008, Spring Farm Trip

All photos by Lenny Librizzi.

The farmhouse on rented land.

A view of one of the barns on the rented farmland.

John Krueger and members of New Jersey CSAs on the farm visit day.

We stopped to water the flats of seedlings that were parched on this 97 degree day.

John showing us one of his small tractors to which the tools are attached in front instead of in the rear.

Rows of multi-colored greens at Starbrite Farm.

White row covers, an organic technique to help keep weeds down and moisture in the soil.

Red row covers for tomato plants. The purple flowers in the foreground are vetch used as a cover crop.

Julian Librizzi at Starbrite farm on farm visit day.

Close-up of lettuces soon to be part of the CSA shares.

Julian Librizzi and Joseph Kent on antique farm equipment.

Farm Update, May 21, 2008

Hi Folks,

Well, I’m a week behind in writing this update, and probably almost 2 weeks behind with my planting schedule.  There just aren’t enough hours in the day this time of year to keep up with all of the seeds and plants that need to go in the ground at the same time! Throw in limited windows of opportunity in between rains, and equipment breakdowns and it’s easy to fall behind.

We have finished planting more than 60,000 onions and have planted about 1400 pounds of seed potatoes (only 900 pounds to go!). I hope to finish with the potatoes this coming week. This past week we transplanted the second round of lettuces and started the third succession in the greenhouse. We also transplanted out fennel and celery and a few tomatoes in the greenhouse. I expect to be transplanting eggplants and many more tomatoes this week.

As for direct seeded crops, I have planted carrots, beets, parsnips, swiss chard, and spinach. In the next few days I will be sowing radishes, turnips, dill, cilantro, arugula and other mustard greens.  There are cucumber and summer squash plants growing in the greenhouse which will be ready to transplant in a week or so. 

Many thanks to those who came out for the work party on 5/3 and helped to cut up seed potatoes and with covering the greenhouse. It was great to meet all of you and the help was greatly appreciated. I hope to meet many more of you at the second volunteer work day rescheduled for this Saturday 5/24 or at the farm visit on 6/7. 

--Farmer John

Farm Update, May 5, 2008

Hi Everyone,

It’s hard to believe 2 weeks has gone by since my last update; time flies when you have too much to do! It’s shaping up to be another dry spring similar to last year. Various predicted rains have failed to materialize or perhaps I should say, have vaporized. Drought is difficult in any season but it is worse in the spring because so many seeds are being planted that require consistent moisture to germinate well, and so many transplants are being set out that require adequate water to take root and begin growing.

Another complication is with field preparation, which involves plowing under cover crops or weeds (nature’s cover crops) and debris from last years crops to decompose. The microorganisms that perform this brilliant act of recycling require water for their activities and without moisture decomposition grinds to a halt. This has me particularly worried because I rented, and have just plowed, an additional 6 acres of field that has been in hay for many years. The thick sod gets flipped over by a mull board plow to lay face down and rot, which will take weeks or even months. The process can be accelerated by rototilling, but in dry conditions this is less effective and also creates clouds of dust and windborne soil loss.

But don’t worry too much (that’s my job!) there’s rain in the forecast and maybe the weatherman isn’t lying this time. In any event, the first planting of peas is up and growing, as are the fava beans, in spite of having there beds severely trampled by the neighbor’s escaped horses. We’ve planted thousands of brassicas (were you paying attention during that class?) and lettuces these past 2 weeks, watering them in with hoses and watering cans. We’ve also been planting tens of thousands of onions in the past weeks; these at least are a bit easier to irrigate since they are planted on black plastic mulch with drip lines. It’s only a matter of hooking up the lines and opening a valve, a task that needed to be done anyway.

A couple of good rain days will also allow us to catch up on greenhouse work, and begin cutting up seed potatoes. We have thousands of tomato, eggplant and pepper plants that need to be moved into larger soil cells and it’s time for another round of greenhouse seeding. Cutting up seed potatoes into small pieces for planting is a daunting task when you’re sowing over 2000 lbs. This will likely be one of the jobs that I will be requesting help with during the upcoming volunteer work days.

That’s all for now. Pray for some rain, but not too much!

--Farmer John

Update to the update: In between writing the update and sending it out we got about an inch and a half of rain, so I’m sorry I ever mentioned the D word. Now the forecast is for a rainy week ahead, and I’m hoping they’re wrong this time!

John Krueger's First Message

Happy Spring, everyone! According to the calendar we’re 3 weeks into the season, but it’s only been during the last few days that it has actually felt like spring. The forsythias are blooming and the garlic is up and growing. We’ve been busy in the greenhouse for the last 5 or 6 weeks planting lettuce, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, and radicchio among other things. Many of these plants are ready to go outside to be “hardened off”, which means becoming accustomed to slightly colder nighttime temperatures and the drying effect of the wind. I hope to begin transplanting these by the end of the week.

Actually the planting season began in early February with onions and leeks that I started in a vacant room in my house under fluorescent lights. These crops are slow germinators and slow growers and should be transplanted out into the field as early in April as possible. Since it’s too cold and would be too expensive to heat the greenhouse to grow these plants in February, I choose to let my neighbors wonder: “what’s he growing in there?”

We began transplanting the onions into the field this past week, and will be continuing to plant them out over the next couple of weeks. Also planted this past week were about 2200 row feet of Fava beans, and nearly 6000 r.f. of peas.

In the next 2 weeks, I will be spending a lot of time on the big tractor plowing and preparing ground for the many crops that it will soon be time to seed, and the plants which will soon be ready for transplanting. I expect to begin planting potatoes in the next few days, a process that will continue for several weeks. Spring has sprung and the hard work has begun! I look forward to a great season.

--Farmer John

Note: We have scheduled 2 volunteer work days to help cover greenhouses. They are May 3 at Good Hand Farm (rented field) and May 17 at Starbrite Farm. Both will start at 11AM, I have attached directions. Also the tentative date for the farm visit is June 7. Take care, John

Directions to Starbrite Farm: Take I-80 West to exit 12, Blairstown/ Hope. Turn right onto Rt. 521 North. Follow approximately 5 miles to Rt. 94. Turn left on 94 and go to first traffic light and turn right and an immediate right again. This is still Rt. 521N. Follow about 3.5 miles and make the first right after White Lake onto Old Orchard Rd. Starbrite Farm is #4, the 2nd driveway on the right. Follow the long driveway along the wooded ridge until you see the greenhouse.4 Old Orchard Rd. Hardwick NJ07825(Blairstown zipcode)

Directions to Good Hand Farm: Take I-80 West to Rt. 206 North. Follow 206 for about 9 miles. Just north( 2mi.) of the town of Andover turn left onto Brighton Rd. (there is a Brighton Rd. in the Borough of Andover as well, don’t turn there, watch for Simon Peters Sport Shop on the corner). The farm is about 2 miles down on the right, after the road straightens out. There is a long gray barn and a sign out front. 110 Brighton Rd. Andover, NJ 07821.

Introduction

My name is John Krueger and I am the owner and operator of Starbrite Farm. I have been interested in organic gardening for over 25 years, as an avid gardener and as co-founder and an officer of the Cook Organic Gardening Club.  

I earned a B.S. in Environmental Science from Cook College, Rutgers University in 1989. In 1996 I was hired as Farm Manager of Heirloom Harvest Farm in Blairstown NJ.  During my six years at Heirloom Harvest I was able to draw on my experience as an organic gardener and to gain experience in the techniques and equipment for larger scale vegetable production. I was given the opportunity to attend numerous conferences and workshops related to organic farming.

In 2002, the owner of the farm decided to discontinue operations in NJ.  I was determined to continue my involvement with organic farming and that year I began working with Richard Moran at Starbrite Farm in Hardwick Township. NJ.  Dick had been farming organically on his property for 10 years since retiring. 

In 2003, Dick allowed me to take over operation of the farm and I began working with the Bloomfield-Montclair CSA and selling at the Montclair and Morristown farmers markets. In 2005, I added a second CSA group at the Jewish Community Center in West Orange. For the 2006 season, I was chosen to be the farmer for the Downtown Harvest CSA in Jersey City. During the 2007 season, a new CSA group in Westfield was added and Starbrite Farm supplied produce for 200 members among the four groups. 

Over these years I have acquired additional leased fields in the vicinity of Starbrite Farm in order to expand my planting.  In 2007, I began leasing an additional 7 acres from Good Hand Farm in Andover Twp.  For the 2008 season, I will be leasing an additional 6 acres in Andover as well as additional greenhouse and barn space. I anticipate serving approximately 300 members in 2008.

I look forward to meeting as many of you as possible through the course of the season, at pickups, at the Farm visit, or at other social events.

For more on organic farming, see:

Organic.org: http://www.organic.org/

Organic Consumers Association: http://www.organicconsumers.org/

The National Organic Program: http://www.ams.usda.gov/nop/indexNet.htm

Note: Click here for photos and information about Cranberry Hall Farm.