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Wow, we can’t believe that a full farm season has just about come to an end, marking the end of a very important year for this new little farm… Our first official CSA season. This was a year of rapid growth for us. We fed four times as many families per week as last year, three quarters of which were comprised of CSA members! We multiplied the number of crops that we grew from last year, made major infrastructure improvements, and built relationships with like-minded hyper-local producers to offer a selection of additional products that we felt complemented our offerings. This season would not have been possible without the commitment of you all, our CSA members. Coming on the heels of our first frost, we look back on 2023 and share our reflections and aspirations for 2024! We have a real wash/pack station! With a new sheltered concrete pad at barn level, we can easily wash veggies. Two walk-in coolers allow us to store at two different temperatures to suit the needs of different vegetables. This was a HUGE improvement over last year’s situation - washing underneath the barn and having to walk everything down and then back up the driveway into cramped household refrigerators. Plus the wash station has a lovely view of the farm and our neighbors’ adorable cows!
We expanded this year to offer two pickup days, adding Wednesday as a new weekday option. This meant two chances to see your lovely faces each week and the opportunity to harvest our crops more frequently for more customers. We had hardly any waste/compost at the end of each day. Next year, we are excited to extend our open hours an hour later on Wednesdays to make pickups more accessible for folks who work later on weekdays and/or are coming from a distance.
Tyler has developed a real groove and skill with direct seeding! We use a push/walk-behind single row seeder to evenly seed all of our direct seeded crops like carrots, arugula, beets, cilantro, dill, spinach, radishes, salad turnips, rutabaga, and more. Direct seeding on this land is still a battle, though. The soil is very fertile due to years of animals being raised on this land (since the 1850s!), but opening up still very “new” land and growing organically means our little seeds do a gallant battle with a lot of residual sod, perennial weeds, and rocks… So many rocks. We plan to invest in new planting and cultivating tools (flame weeding!) to improve yield in all these crops. We can’t wait for more regular carrots, spinach, and beets especially!
Lettuce has been a challenge over the past two years. Last year was incredibly dry and this year was incredibly wet, neither of which is helpful for everyone’s favorite salad crop. Next year we plan to double the size of each lettuce planting and employ methods like movable fencing to exclude critters from enjoying the leafy greens before they can be harvested. We also plan to plant more arugula as a tasty insurance plan for assured salad eating.
Our onions this year were fantastic! Huge and plentiful, the gamble we took paid off in planting them in sets (3-4 plants per hole) in landscape fabric. It is a lot of work to make each custom piece of landscape fabric, but it’s worth it to save us from weeding or spraying herbicides!
Our team grew! Tyler joined Amanda in farming full-time this year, which is the culmination of a lifelong dream. We also can not say enough about our two new stellar employees, Nicole Haley, who you all see each week at distributions and Caitlin Murphy, who is our weekly farm crew helper and harvester extraordinaire. Thank you to these two special people for helping this become the farm we’ve always dreamed of and for being a huge part of this community we’re growing together.
Tractor. While we still do all of our bed preparation and cultivating by hand or by use of our BCS walk-behind machine, the acquisition of a new-to-us traditional tractor is already proving to be a huge game changer. To start, the bucket and forks alone are aiding us immensely in fall cleanup and we can’t wait to put the tractor to good use the rest of the year too!
A new field! Matt is helping us to open up a new third field in the apple orchard. This field will give us room to grow more of lots of the most beloved crops instead of just a taste (think cucumbers, zucchini, potatoes, and winter squash for instance). Given the popularity and versatility of these crops we want to substantially increase the amount we plant so that we can ensure a plentiful harvest even when the weather doesn't cooperate. The new field also provides lovely views of the whole farm and is very close to the old irrigation pond that was in use when the property was a fully operational apple orchard.
Nicole has been indispensable this summer with helping bring our little farm business to the next level. Among other projects (hoodies, ahem) she worked hard to help us get approved to accept SNAP/EBT as well as Granite State Market Match, a program that doubles SNAP/EBT dollars for folks to use at NH Farmers Markets and Farms. We are so excited to become more accessible to our community.
And last, but not least - THE GREENHOUSE! The lack of a real greenhouse this year provided a cavalcade of problems. Frustration with bureaucracy aside, our what-we-planned-as-temporary early season mini greenhouses ended up being our permanent setup for the entire summer for all of our transplanted crops. We dealt with sub-par seedlings all season due to too little light, difficulty watering, too little space, wind damage due to said weak seedlings, all just to name a few of the issues. All of our succession plantings (those crops we like to plant over and over again in a season like lettuce, scallions, crops like fennel, kohlrabi, radicchio, etc) and brassicas (cabbage family crops like broccoli, cauliflower, etc) were especially challenging this season as too little light resulted in very leggy (growing too tall in low light conditions) transplants. Our new greenhouse will give us all the sunlight and space we need to grow stout hardy plants plus provide ventilation, heat to guard against cool late winter and early spring nights, and the ability to water from above with a hose - oh what luxuries! We are ecstatic and can’t wait to move forward into this exciting new world!
Farming is an endeavor for the persistent student, tinkerer, and wonderer. So many moments this season we called to each other across the field exclaiming, “next year, we need to do/change/try X!…” We are always dreaming of ways to optimize and improve, to cram as much growth, life, joy, and learning into this precious shot we get each year to grow food for you all. We appreciate each and every one of you making the choice to support us, taking time out of every week to spend with us, and growing this little community together. We already can’t wait for next year. From the bottom of our hearts,
Amanda, Tyler, Ben, & Josie and the whole ODF crew
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