Category: News

Hello everyone, Oh the critters! Last week it was the coons in the corn; this week our watermelons have started to ripen, and the crow are descending on them to poke them full of holes! We have covered them with netting and old tattered row-cover, but it is a lot of extra work, when we already have too much to do. It is also not completely effective, impedes the growth of the vines and complicates the harvest. Soon the cantaloupes and other melons will be ripening, and they will be feasting on these as well! I have never been good at napping, but I may have to give it another try, since I need to go out at midnight to scare the raccoons, and get up at 5 am to chase away the crows! (more…)

Hi Folks! Our first planting of transplanted sweet corn started maturing over the weekend. The raccoons usually let us know when the ears are ready, and then we put up a temporary fence around it to keep them out. We even use ground staples to peg it down so they can’t slip under it. But they are good climbers and the plastic fencing ripped under their weight. It must have been quite a party out there on Saturday night, because out of more than two thousand ears, they left us about a hundred. There are various other plantings that will be coming in over the next couple of months, but we are going to have to get out the Have-a-heart traps and start a raccoon relocation program. (more…)

Hello Folks! I suppose that you don’t need me to tell you that it has been raining a lot. We were fortunate not to sustain any damage from the storms, and we are blessed with sandy loam soil which absorbs the rainfall nicely. I was able to get some planting done mid-week before the rain rolled in. Most of our crops were unscathed by the heat wave- having well saturated soil helps. (more…)

Hi Everyone! In my last update I mentioned we were receiving some much-needed rain. Well, be careful what you wish for, as the old maxim says. We had two and a half inches fall that night and then another inch and a half from two other storms last week. This is more than we would like, but we take what we can get and fortunately it came without any damaging winds or hail. There are several drawbacks to excessive precipitation, one is that we are unable to cultivate the crops, and the weeds grow like, well weeds. The second is that our planting schedule is delayed, because we are unable to prepare the beds. Working the ground when it is soggy does great damage to the soil structure. (more…)

Hello All! We are currently receiving some nice rain, so far without any damaging winds (knock on wood). It was a mad dash over the weekend to get lots of seeds into the ground ahead of the storms. I have finished planting the winter squash (yippee!) and made a second planting of beets and carrots. Temperatures have been reasonable and seasonable, and the crops are growing nicely. Greens continue to be abundant. Peas will be snow or sugar snap this week, except for a few groups who are owed another serving of English. We have kohlrabi for this round; I like it raw – grated into a salad or made into a slaw. Soon there will be cabbage, broccoli, and cauliflower. (more…)

Hello Folks, so we made it though the dry spell and the second (or was it the third?) heat wave of the season. And that season was spring – we are not even officially into summer yet. The first half inch of rain that broke the dry spell came with high winds that knocked out our power for 36 hours. We had to back-feed the electrical panel in the greenhouse with a portable generator to keep the ventilation fans running. The last two storms dropped a half inch and ¾ of an inch, without such dire consequences. We can take a brief pause in moving the sprinklers around the field and stretching out reused drip tape on the acres of winter squash that I have been planting. (more…)

Hi Folks! So here we are at the first week of the Circle Brook CSA season – lettuce begin! In the Ron Howard movie “Parenthood”, the roller coaster is used as a metaphor for the ups and downs of that endeavor. I think it is an apt one for farming as well. (more…)

Hello everyone, I apologize for not having written an update sooner. The first of my workers finally arrived on April 20th and a few more the next day. Since then, we have been working diligently to get caught up with the planting. My crew has been working 70 hour weeks, and I have been putting in even more hours, which is my excuse for not having written sooner. We are now mostly back on track, although there will still be some consequences to the late start. (more…)

Happy winter everyone! It is time to register for the 2026 CSA season!   Know your farmer. Know your food.

Our season is 24 weeks long, June-November.

Click here to register online!

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Hello Folks! So, we have come to the end of the line, for this season at least. Farming is never easy, but this year was a bit more challenging than most. It is the weather, of course, that primarily determines the extent and the nature of the challenges. This year, ten days straight of drizzle and overcast skies followed by a near 100-degree heat wave in June caused the premature demise of our pea crop. Fortunately, we did not have another scorcher of such intensity for the rest of the season. But we did have consistently dry conditions through the summer and into the fall, which kept us (and the well pumps) busy trying to keep the crops hydrated. The upside is that a dry season is better than an overly wet one. (more…)