Update and Reminder from CSA Pastures
Dear Members, CSA order reminder for February 9,
We are writing this reminder for our delivery coming up on Saturday, February 9. The order deadline is Monday, February 4 at midnight. We thank you for indulging us these days for preparation of the orders as the number of farms we coordinate with has increased and the number of orders has increased. Thank you for your support, we love our farm life, as busy as it can be at times!
This month on Lewis Waite Farm Late January is close to being the quietest month on the farm. Since the
ground is frozen and covered with snow the most important tasks are keeping the animals fed and comfortable with good nutrition to bolster their health during the most trying months for them. The pigs eat and sleep a lot in their hay beds and only recently have been venturing into the pasture to poke around through the snow. The cows are out in the hayfields where we move the feeders daily to spread their fertilizer and leave them with the remnants of the previous days bales to provide more comfortable sleeping areas. We have taken a hint from the animals lately and are taking more time for resting, planning, and learning so we can be ready to gear up for the coming spring. Only six more weeks of winter when the woodchuck wakes up! It has been so gray this winter; I don’t think there will be any shadow for him this time. Today is raining, gray and a black and white picture outside. The snow cover is melting on the southern facing slopes and the wind is howling. Today was a day for the footwear that gives you traction on the ice - yak traks. It certainly feels better doing chores outside to be able to just walk across ice and slippery snow without having to watch each step.
We had a wonderful time at the NOFA, Northeast Organic Farming Association, conference last weekend. What a great gathering of wonderful folks, topics and enthusiasm for growing things. We attended the seminars each day - one on Friday and 4 on Saturday and Sunday. There were so many choices we had to split up to be able to see the ones that interested us the most. The topics included:
How to get started with organic certification
CSA open forum
Healthy pasture, healthy animals
The future of raw milk in NY
Raising organic beef with heritage breeds
Pastured hogs
Root cellars, constructing, filling and cooking
Multipurpose edible perennials for the northeast
Carbon sequestration and credits for organic farms
Drying herbs in upstate NY
Developing sustainable animal wellness plans
Introduction to vegetable lacto-fermentation
Record keeping for greater farm profitability and organic certification
So many interesting things to explore, so little time to delve into all of
them!
I was especially interested in the edible perennials presentation. The presenter, Ethan Roland, advocated for permaculture cultivation of our gardens so the soil is less disturbed, the combination plants complement
each other in function and form much like a forest. The book Edible Forest Gardens was highlighted as his inspiration (the author is his friend) to design and plant a mix of tall, medium and low growers so each one filled a role. The roles are: ground covers to prevent weediness, nitrogen fixers to promote the root health of all, heavy feeders which are supported by the mix, nutrient accumulators with deep root systems to bring up nutrients from deep in the soils, and insect nectaries to support various beneficial insects or to deter insects from the other plants in the combination. The perennial plants he described for our region are not as well known as the standards like rhubarb, strawberries and asparagus. Some of these include sea kale, miners lettuce, orach, mintroot, Welch onion, ramps, walking onion, Good King Henry (a leafy green), skirret, Turkish rocket, giant fuki and climbing spinach - all perennial. In our effort to feed ourselves from the farm, these options sound very appealing as they offer a regenerating bounty of foods for a seeming similar management effort as a perennial flower bed - and you get to eat it too! I have already decided to try a plot or two around our dwarf apple trees, currants and blueberry bushes as a start. The herb drying farm operation was pretty interesting too - I’ll be incorporating herbs into the permaculture planting too.
We did bring home the certification book of organic program rules, the NOFA synopsis of the application and compliance of the rules and the application for organic certification. Our lives will change if we do indeed forge ahead with certifying the farmland, pastures, hayfields and woods. The number of things you have to keep detailed records about is a bit daunting. The records ultimate story, year after year, certainly proves to the world that everything you have bought for use on the farm, everything you have done on the farm, and everything you have sold is in the spirit of organic compliance. If you were to certify your farm, grow some vegetables for sale, some livestock for sale, and make rhubarb jam, all certified organic, you are required to keep as many as:
5 kinds of forms for inputs to the farm,
3 kinds of forms for seedling and transplant records,
4 kinds of forms for each field records,
12 kinds of forms for harvest records,
7 kinds of forms for livestock records,
11 kinds of forms for processing records (for the jam), and
8 kinds of forms for sales records from the farm.
So we thought maybe we could start by seeing if we could certify only the pastures, hayfields, woodlots and our own garden areas as a beginning. That way we could reduce the numbers of daily recording forms by 18! So we’ll
have only 32 new sets of record to keep!
So this time of year with the wind buffeting the windows on our hillside, Alan and Colin are outside putting siding up on the new barn (be sure to check out the pictures this month at the distribution) and I can be inside perusing the permaculture websites, plowing through the seed catalogs to place our orders for spring, and reading about organic practice guidelines. Hope you all are having as good a time as we are!
Our Farm Food Network includes all these farms. See their products under the categories shown below.
Delicious Bread baked at Rock Hill Bakehouse shown under Bread, European style.
Hand made artisan cheeses from 3 Corner Field Farm,- Cheese, Sheep’s Milk and Yogurt. From Consider Bardwell Farm - Cheese, Goat and Cow’s Milk and West River Creamery - Cheese, Cow’s Milk and Goat’s Milk. Gillis Acres Farm raises Alpine goats and offers their farm made dairy items under the Cheese, Goat’s Milk category. They make chevre in 4 flavors, tomme, feta, blue cheese, aged cheese, cottage cheese, kefir, yogurt in 3 flavors and bottle pasteurized goat milk.
All Natural Chicken, Duck and Turkey - whole or parts of chicken, whole duck, and small whole or ground turkey from KNK Poultry under the categories, Chicken All Natural KNK, Duck All Natural, Turkey All Natural KNK. This farm and processor is NY State certified. Large whole turkeys are also offered by Stonewood Farm, certified by the State of Vermont and are found under the Turkey All Natural Stonewood category.
Our natural Eggs collected by Cornell Farms. The chickens and their feed are raised at the farm are shown under the Eggs, fresh and free-range category.
The Tilapia fish are raised in Vermont’s most unique natural greenhouse at Laughing Duck Farm. The few we have left can be found under the Fish, Aquaponically Raised Tilapia category. Unfortunately, the Westport, NY tilapia operation is being closed down for the winter. Don and his wife have moved to Burlington VT to work full time on a new venture to promote local foods to the Burlington VT community and schools. The Intervale Center project can be seen at http://www.intervale.org/ Don is very excited about this project to promote local agriculture in the Burlington area and hopes to make the organization a model for other cities to see, use, or inspire. We wish him well and hopes that he can find a buyer for his present operation to continue raising the fish in a humane and sustainable way.
All Natural Goat and Kid are offered by 2 farms Manx Station Farm and Consider Bardwell Farm. These items are offered under the category for Kid, Goat and Goat, Kid respectively.
USDA processed Lamb is offered by two farms. 3 Corner Field Farm lamb eats a small amount of grain as a supplement to the grasses and hay and can be found under the Lamb, Grass-Fed category. Argyllshire Farm lamb eats only grasses and hay and is found under the Lamb, Grass fed & finished category. We are sorry the selection of lamb is dwindling this time of year, but it seems that everyone is beginning to “buy local”.
Our home made Jams and Sauces are home grown or hand picked by Rudi’s Lakeside Garden and can be found under the Jams ands Sauces category.
The Maple Syrup from Sugar Mill Farm is collected on their farm and another farm at the bottom of our hill.
Our wildflower Honey is collected in southern Washington County and the bees are tended by Harry’s Honey House and is shown under the Honey category.
USDA processed Beef and Pork are raised by Lewis Waite Farm. The beef is 100% grass and hay fed with trace minerals from kelp and salt. The pigs have a pasture too but are fed with corn, soybeans, hay and kelp (especially in winter). These items can be found under the Beef, Grass Fed Grass Finished and the Pork, All Natural, Pastured.
We are proud of the 15 farm network we have created to provide you some of our regions fresh and family grown products. We hope you enjoy then all and we also hope to expand our offering as time goes by and we get better at our coordination with everyone.
Don’t forget, the next order deadline is next Tuesday, February 4 at midnight, and delivery is on Saturday, February 9. Please remember to place your orders on time as late orders can be a disruption to all of the farms involved.
We wish you well, Nancy and Alan Brown
Alan & Nancy Brown
135 Lewis Hill Lane
Town of Jackson
Greenwich, NY 12834
Lewis Waite Farm
Grass-Fed Grass-Finished Beef
Natural Pork
www.csapasturedmeatandpoultry.com
www.lewiswaitefarm.com
518-692-3120 or 518-692-9208