Last week's lettuce mix prior to picking (from greenhouse)
EARLY E-MAIL THIS TIME!
Wanting to spend the weekend in New Orleans celebrating our son Jim's marriage to Hilary Kane, we are sending you this week's e-mail several days earlier than usual. For those of you who know Jim, you can congratulate him with his (their) decision!
WRAPPING UP THE SEASON
The season now comes to an end; thanks for sharing it with us! (Actually the Thanksgiving and Storage shares are still forthcoming!)
Try our salsa and pickled beets, or the (frozen) cider pressed from Dave Bohnhoff's unique mix of apples, all available from the on-line store, that can be included with (or alongside) your final tote!
WINTER ON THE FARM
Some winter activities for us at Springdale -- mulching the 25,000 cloves of garlic that we just barely got in the ground before the ground started to freeze; making compost with the variety of collected materials from local sources (city of Plymouth leaves, our own vegetable wastes, old hay and straw, local dairy and chicken manure, spent mushroom compost, household kitchen waste from area households (from Gretchen Gibb's Waste Not Compost collection service)), all mixed together and inoculated with a small percentage of mature compost and soil; preparing veggies from storage, and also seeding and harvesting assorted microgreens, that we offer to several indoor farmers markets (at the Domes, and in Sheboygan and Manitowoc) for the next 5 months; figuring out how we can utilize this Harvie software better!!; trimming and sending to local processors the new crop (hemp!) we tried this year (to be turned into CBD oil); resting and relaxing; repairing our assorted tractors, equipment, buildings, greenhouses, and delivery vehicles that need constant attention; and researching and thinking through how we can do everything better!
PLANS FOR 2020!
As mentioned in a previous "Farm Happenings", we will be giving the Harvie support crew, and their unique software designed for CSA farms, another go for the next season. Hopefully we can improve on our experience from this past season! One aspect of Harvie that will be initiated in the beginning of December is their auto-renewal policy. All of you will be automatically renewed (with the same vegetable share and add-ons that you purchased this past season), with ample opportunity for you to either opt out of this automatic enrollment, or change your preferences, and choices. If you are still contemplating whether to sign up again, then simply opt out for the time being, and you could still join later (though we won't be taking on more members than we had this season, and we expect to fill up eventually, so perhaps best not to wait till May!) It is very helpful that a percentage of you are willing and able to sign up long prior to when you actually start receiving any vegetables; thanks much for that! Similar payment options that we utilized last year will also eventually be available -- pay by check, or pay by credit card, and with the credit card payment(s) options being to either pay the entire amount due all at once, or pay with Harvie's installment plan (which is 25% deducted at sign-up, 25% deducted with the first delivery, and the remaining 50% divided equally among the remaining deliveries). You will be receiving other e-mails with reminders and details. (Hopefully not too many that you get annoyed by them! :)
A BILL TO SUPPORT
In other years we have spent more time, and space in newsletters, devoted to communicating some wider concerns about organic food and farming, and related political issues and policies. We have been very negligent at doing the same this year, though it's not due to any lessened interest on our part. Rather, our days easily become totally consumed with taking care of the many plants, (as well as the people!), that inhabit (and work at) Springdale, especially as we are challenged with seemingly never-ending extremes of temperature and precipitation variations, to go along with the usual obstacles of weeds, diseases, pests, fertility issues, etc. Often it seems we just barely make it all happen, and in fact this year it seems likely that we won't be able to harvest all of the potatoes in the ground that we planted, which would be a first in over 30 years of growing, and although we have enough potatoes for your late season shares, we have already had to communicate to the Colectivo coffee shops, whom we have been supplying for all of their potato needs, that we simply don't have the potatoes this year for them as we had agreed. Other farmers, who plant and harvest other crops than vegetables, are also in stressful predicaments; we are all affected! We know that many of you are aware of, are in support of our (sometimes difficult) situation; we thank you much for that!
But there is one bill that would be worth supporting, that we could call your attention to--it's the Wisconsin Rural Revival Act, Statute 97.31, and it would probably make it less cumbersome for farms to sell directly to consumers. Do a little research, as you have time, and urge your Assemblyman or Senator to co-sponsor or support this bill. Here's a little summary of what the bill would do: https://www.wisconsinruralrevivalact.com/about?fbclid=IwAR0gqZYyrqT0fKWRB7JudcCk5Mu1RDzwyvIWjNDyUyO5qe9N9IIALAOe-54
Thanks!
And as far as additional feedback goes, do send us an e-mail with your suggestions and comments regarding what produce we are sending your way, and how we are doing it. At this point we may not be sending out an extended formal questionnaire, as we have always done in the past, but your feedback is still obviously important to us. Thanks!
