Thursday 30 October 2008

Week 18






This week was number 17 for the CSA boxes. This week we had beets, carrots, potatoes, parsley, green cabbage, leeks, broccoli, kale, bulb onions and parsnips.

Today was a big day for us. We got our windmill up today. It went up really easy.


















Saturday 18 October 2008

Autumn Leaves


We are putting out a request for autumn leaves. We need leaves for mulching the greenhouse and our newly planted garlic beds. The leaves need to be from yards with lawns that have not been treated with herbicides, pesticides or fertilizers. So, if you annually rake your lawn or have them raked for you, you can either email us or give us a call and we will come and get them. All of our contact information is on our website. http://www.chestnutacreslimited.com/


Friday 17 October 2008

Harvest Season.

There are only four more weeks of CSA deliveries. We are now taking it one week at a time hoping that the weather co-operates with us. Winter came early last year. The deer have been really hard on us this year. They seem to have figured out how to move the row covers to the side to get at the vegetables that are left in the garden. One of the fields we will be using next year will be closer to the house, maybe that will help some with that problem. But then there is always the option of more electric fencing.

This week in our CSA boxes (bags) contained red potatoes, carrots, fennel, parsley, green cabbage, buttercup squash, green onions and a bag of apples. We are not sure what kind of tree that these apples grow on. This tree was planted before we bought the farm eight years ago. They almost taste like a red delicious , they are crispy like a red delicious but they don't have the size or the bumps of the bottom of the apple. Bugs do not seem to bother this tree. We have been trying to nurture this tree so we will have it for a long time yet. We have had a few of our fruit trees included in our annual certification process. We are hoping to improve our apple quality so we can include more apples in our CSA program.

The past couple of weeks have been focused on harvesting produce, preparing the greenhouse for spring, firewood, and getting the second half of the barn ready for a new concrete floor. You can't put a price on our barns. They could never be replaced.

Our girls brought their pumpkins to the Kingston Farmer's Market on Oct 4th for the annual pumpkin contest. They were thrilled with the whole process of weighing and the giving out prizes. We gave the girls each a container with pumpkin seeds and sunflower seeds in June and let them plant them in their own spot. We had a bumper crop of sunflowers and 14 pumpkins.

JG