Chestnut Acres Family Farm

Week Three of CSA.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 26 Jul 2009 17:01:00 +0000

The third week of CSA deliveries has come and past. There have been some set backs that we have had to overcome and are still dealing with. We have been slowly regaining control in the vegetable gardens. We could not get in the fields to cultivate because of all the moisture. It was stressful not to be able to see what was growing withing the weeds. Now with a lot of the weeding done we are more confident with the progress of the gardens. Because the weeds grew so fast we are now discovering what seeds were smothered out and are doing some reseeding. We have not started selling at the Kingston Farmers Market yet because we are focusing on the CSA and making sure that we have what we need each week for the bags. The potatoes are doing much better than last year. We will be offering new potatoes this week in our bags.

We have been making some final decisions about the open farm day. August 15th will be the day. The time will be between 1pm and 4pm. We will be putting more details in the August newsletter.

Week 3
Spring Turnips
Green Onions
Mixed Lettuce

Carrots

Beet greens

Garlic Scapes

Snow peas

Tatsoi

At least we have rain...

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Mon, 13 Jul 2009 11:44:00 +0000

The weather hasn't been too cooperative this year. With all of the rain it has been hard to get on the fields to even weed. The weather has been great for the slugs unfortunately. The slugs ate a whole bed of lettuce in the greenhouse. The temperatures have been cooler here as well.

Thinking back to last year this year is a lot better already At least things are growing even if not as fast as we would like them. Last year there was no rain for irrigation and the irrigation spring on the mountain couldn't recharge itself fast enough. We dug two new irrigation holding ponds on the mountain.

July 8th was our first CSA delivery day. Because we took on more customers this year it takes a full day of non-stop work to get the bags ready for 4:00pm. It will take a couple of weeks to get the systems going smoothly. The most trying part of the evening deliveries was finding street names and house numbers but we found everyone.

Because of the wet weather we were just able to get the lime and pelletized chicken manure spread on the fields. The oats and clover will be sowed this week.

KINGTSON FARMER MARKET

If you have been to the Kington Farmers Market you would have noticed that we have not been selling our produce yet. We are aiming to start in August. We have put off going to the market to concentrate on the CSA bags.

In the above picture there is Mizuna with honey mustard, balsamic vinegar and alive oil. Tangy but good. Andrew made up some club sandwiches using our lettuce, chicken and bacon. We had swiss chard, spring turnips and tatsoi sauted with chinese cabbage and garlic.

More Pictures

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Mon, 27 Apr 2009 13:57:00 +0000

We have been eager to get on the fields. Today the garden that will have mostly greens and some root veggies is being tilled and hilled. Hopefully we will be sowing this particular garden today or tomorrow with crops that don't mind the still chilly temperatures. (spinach, lettuce, green onions etc). The drip irrigation has been placed the in the greenhouse. We invested in the drip irrigation last year and it has proved to be invaluable. We were taking too much time hand watering the previous year. We used drip irrigation on the outside gardens too last year and we are hoping to put more down this year.

We are very pleased that our garlic survived the winter. There was some damage from deer traffic through the field this winter. Most of the damage was the garlic being uprooted by the deer walking through. The garlic is now almost four inches tall.

A New Season.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sat, 14 Mar 2009 14:27:00 +0000

I thought it was about time I updated our blog considering that the 2009 season is about to start. We have been seeding leeks, celery, green onions and bulbing onions. We are keeping the trays under growing lights in our hallway and in the basement. This is our first year mixing our own potting soil. We have started to prepare the greenhouse for spring planting. We will be planting the greenhouse the first of April.

Our parsnips are still in the ground from last season. We hope that the mice and deer didn't find them during the winter. We will putting up crop protection from the deer this spring. We have never seen deer as we have this winter. There has been alot of damage done to the apple trees and cedars.

We have been corresponding with our CSA members from last year and the response has been great for the upcoming season. We are happy to be adding more spaces for this season's CSA.

The seed orders have been placed and now we wait for them to be delivered. We will be trying some new varieties of fruit and veggies this year. Ex. melons, squash, onions, tomatoes and garlic. We are excited to see if the garlic we planted last fall has survived the winter season. There was plenty of snow cover and we mulched it well so everything should be good.

Week 18

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Thu, 30 Oct 2008 20:03:00 +0000

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.

Autumn Leaves

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sat, 18 Oct 2008 14:22:00 +0000

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/

Harvest Season.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Fri, 17 Oct 2008 09:52:00 +0000

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

Week 12

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 23:32:00 +0000

This weeks box share contained twelve items. Celery, Parsley, Basil, Green Onions, Patty Pan Squash, Cabbage or Cauliflower, Swiss Chard, Tomatoes, Cucumbers, Red Pontiac Potatoes and Carrots.

Deliveries all went well it was nice to see some of our members that we haven't seen for a couple of weeks.

Sorry for the lack of posts.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Wed, 17 Sep 2008 09:47:00 +0000

Everything has been going good here on the farm. Sorry for the lack of posts. Since out last post there has been camping, fairs, first days of school, VBS at both Baptist and Anglican churches, play dates, swimming lessons and it goes on and on. Anyone who has children knows that there is always something going on.

We had a small problem with the well pump yesterday but that was fixed prompty. The headgasket blew on our Massey Ferguson but is now repaired.

We have had a lot of problems with the deer this year. But that is okay. This is just our second year and we are learning. We are already thinking of prevention methods next year. We are given these problems to learn from. There will always be issues every year and we just need to take them as they come.

The CSA boxes (bags) are going great. We are gradually becoming more efficient at the packing and harvesting. Sometimes there are issues but everyone has been very understanding and helpful.

Brucshetta (?) pizza. Pizza dough with Italian salad dressing spread all over the dough. Then I put peppers basil and tomatoes grated mozza and parmesan cheese. Bake at 400F for approx 15 minutes.

I will post again later. The girls have to get up for school.

Heavenly Rain!!

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Thu, 24 Jul 2008 13:41:00 +0000

Our girls were excited to see the rain. Beth was "Singin' In The Rain".

We are so very thankful for the rain that we are receiving this week. We were in deperate need of it. Our lawns and pasture were turning brown and the gardens were really slow to get going. We now have a bountiful harvest each week for our CSA boxes and for the market on saturdays. Last night was week four of our box delivery.

This weeks boxes contained new potatoes, beets with greens, mizuna, tatsoi, white globe turnips, garlic scapes, snow peas, pod peas, lettuce mix, radish, green onions and carrots.

On the left there is a picture of mizuna being suateed in olive oil with a tsp of maple syrup and a tsp of apple cider vinegar. It should be cooked for about six minutes.

Today.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 06 Jul 2008 23:46:00 +0000

As I sit here I am watching the sheep out on the back pasture leisurely grazing. They don't have a care in the world. Andrew is out hunting for potato bugs and I am baking sugar cookies for VBS this week at our church.

Today Andrew started to plough our back field. It had not been ploughed in at least thirty years and he began to get frustrated.

We were back at the market this Saturday. It was really busy and we sold everything that we had brought down.

The top picture is our Khatadin Ram "Rambo".

First CSA Box Night.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Thu, 03 Jul 2008 00:45:00 +0000

Our first CSA night was a success. We added some certified organic strawberries from Richard and Heather Brown's farm in Bloomfield. Everyone worked well together this afternoon in gettting the boxes prepared. Andrew and I delivered the boxes without a hitch and the route took less time than we expected. We really enjoyed meeting everyone tonight and putting a face to the phone calls and emails.

This weeks' box contained Carrots, Green Onions, Swiss Chard, Turnip Greens, Lettuce, Beets with Greens and strawberries.

See You Next Week,

More Rain.....Wonderful!!!

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Tue, 01 Jul 2008 01:46:00 +0000

We are so thankful for all of the wonderful rain. We can already see the difference in the gardens from this weekends rains. Today we spent the day seeding and putting row covers on a lot of the crops. We did this even in the blissful rain. We were muddy and wet but kept on working.

JG

Better Late Than Never.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 29 Jun 2008 00:50:00 +0000

Things are coming along here on the farm. The calf is settled in and there are four new piglets on the farm. The chickens only have five more weeks left. We got the meat chickens a month earlier this year because we thought it would be one less thing we would have to worry about in later in the summer.

All of the raspberries, blackberries, rhubarb and fruit trees that we planted have survived the spring transplanting.

Andrew and his father were trying our my grandfathers old hay mower today. It seems that they figured it out. The sheep will appreciate the efforts I am sure.

Water has been our biggest battle so far this season. We have only had two good rains in the past two months. "chances of showers" just isn't doing it for us. We have been installing a drip irrigation system and doing a lot of hand watering in an effort to keep the crops from stunting or bolting and even germinating has been a problem in some cases.

Our CSA members have been very understanding with the slow start and are eager for the boxes to start. The boxes are starting July 2nd. We are all excited about the CSA concept this year. We are looking forward to meeting everyone next week and are anticipating a great season.

Some New Pictures.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 25 May 2008 23:45:00 +0000

The sheep have been really enjoying being out on pasture. This is the first year we have used the front pasture for the sheep so they were a little hard to get down there but now they now where the good grass is and they get so excited.

The picture on the top left is of cooked burdock root. Andrew read that burdock root was good cooked to he thought he would try it. If anyone else would like to try there is plenty of it growing on the farm. Andrew found that the burdock root had a mild taste to it. There is probably a better recipe for it than what we used.

This is our newest member of the farm. He is a Holstein calf and our girls have decided that Patch will be his name.

I will write another posting later. Right now Andrew and I are going for a walk before it gets dark.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 18 May 2008 23:56:00 +0000

Sorry for the lack of postings. These past two weeks have been very busy with all of the planting that needs to get done. May 8th we planted half an acre of potatoes all by hand. So far in the gardens we have turnip, snow peas, peas, broccoli, cauliflower, cabbages, green onions, carrots, beets, swiss chard, radish and lettuces. The rain that we received yesterday seemed to do wonders for the germination of the seed. The snow peas, pod peas, turnip, radish, lettuces, beets and broccoli are all up. It is such a wonderful feeling to see the little green seedlings popping up in a neat row.

During the last week we transplanted 30 rhubarb plants that a neighbour generously gave us well as some thornless raspberry canes. We have tripled the size of our blackberry patch. There were over 100 asparagus plants planted as well.

We have started to put the sheep out to pasture in the afternoons. It always turns out to be a family affair trying to get them our to the pasture and then back in again. The girls love it and they get to help with an important job. They are scared they are going to lose one of their baby lambs.

May 17th was our fourth market day. Each weekend is busier than the last. We have been selling out each saturday. There has been a steady interest in our CSA program. Even though we are full for this season we are still taking names for next year. It is our hope that as we see how the gardens are progresssing we may be able to take on more members later in the season.

JG

Updates.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Wed, 07 May 2008 00:04:00 +0000

There is so much is going on here it is hard to decide where to start. May 3rd was our second market day. Everything sold quickly. Our goal is to sell enough to pay for the day and and to let frequent market visitors see that we are back for this season and that we have produce growing now.

I really love going to the market on saturdays. Now that it is our second year I feel as though I am becoming part of the vendor community. We like to buy what we can at the market during the season. The garlic we stocked up on in the fall was wonderful. It lasted until this spring and that is just because we used it all up.

The article in the Saturdays' Telegraph Journal, about the global crisis and how it effects the local producers, was a wonderful opportunity to let area residents know we exist and what we offer. The members of our CSA are all eager and excited about the program. We are exicted as well for the upcoming season.

I guess the season is not upcoming...it is here. We planted .25 of an acre today. I will be feeling that tomorrow morning. It doesn't sound like much of an area but it really is when you are picking rocks and sod. It took three of us all day to plant everything except for the peas and snow peas, this will be our task for the morning. We plan on planting our potatoes tomorrow as well.

Our apprentice started on May 4th. We are all a little nervous, but we are all getting along well and I think everything will fine.

JG

Saturday Is Market Day

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Thu, 01 May 2008 15:41:00 +0000

I will at the Kingston Farmer's Market this Saturday May 3rd. I will be selling Lettuce mixes and will be doing some promoting of out CSA Program.

Hope to be seeing you there.

JG

More From The Greenhouse

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Tue, 22 Apr 2008 23:55:00 +0000

As you can see the swiss chard is doing great. Beet greens as well as the lettuces are ready for harvest. This is good because the Kingston Farmer's Market starts this Saturday.

April 19th we started to plough our fields for this years' planting. One of the fields was tilled today. We are hoping to start seeding some of the hardier greens this weekend outside.

I have been working on the blackberry patch since yesterday. It is hard to start and finish a task when you have two little girls that want you to play with them rather that watch you work. But I finished transplanting 40 blackberry canes tonight. The root system on the plants make them very hard to dig up.

On Saturday we mulched the strawberries with straw. Because we have limited access to equipment we hand raked straw from the field where we planted oats last fall and then placed it on our hay wagon. We (the family) placed the straw around the plants. Our girls thought it was a wonderful afternoon.

Anyone for Radish?

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Wed, 16 Apr 2008 19:17:00 +0000

Sorry for the lack of updates. It seems that we are being pulled in all directions lately. In the past week and a half we have worked on barn stalls, worked in the greenhouse in the evenings, we have gotten the back wheels of the tractor fixed and have been working full out getting ready for our apprentice.

We had our annual peer review meeting with our local members of MCOG. At these meetings the members of a local group go through each members applications. During these meetings we discuss any concerns about we may have about each others applications and any concerns that we are having with our production. There were no concerns about Chestnut Acres application for re-certification. Now we wait for our inspection by a certified inspector in the summer. They will make any recommendations for any concerns they may have with our production.

Yesterday my father-in-law and I went to Fredericton for the day to take part in a cover crop workshop. It is something that we will have to work with to really learn what suits our us and our farm. There isn't a single answer or formula for cover cropping but experimenting and careful documentation is definitely in the cards for years down the road.

JG

The greenhouse starts producing.

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 22:39:00 +0000

Tonight we had a feed of fresh spinach from the greenhouse. We planted it in the fall and it survived the winter temperatures. It was a pleasant surprise when Andrew brought it in this evening.

Today we looked over the back fields to see how we could go about expanding our growing capability for future seasons. Many of the fields have either grown up significantly or have been very neglected. Hopefully we will be able to remedy this in the next few years. Land availability is a constant planning problem. Being situated on the Peninsula we have to deal with a lot of rock outcrops and hilly terrain.

Blacky's sick lamb passed away today.

Andrew penned off one half of the barn for the sheep and their lambs. They are all happy to be together again.

JG

Never Ending!!

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 06 Apr 2008 01:12:00 +0000

Andrew is outside working on the apprentice's cabin and I am doing paperwork for our certification renewal. We are starting to find it hard to decide on a task that needs to be done and doing it. So many things are important and we really need to start prioritizing. Fixing that tractor, building pens in the barn, seeding, weeding, and finishing projects that have been started already.....

Update on Blacky's lambs.
I put the weak one back in with it's mother and brother. I was hoping that the lamb would get up and get some exercise. It is still very weak but is still eating. Blacky seems to have forgotton who the little guy is.

JG

I can't believe it is Wednesday!!

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Wed, 02 Apr 2008 19:56:00 +0000

It seems that all we have been thinking about this past month is the sheep. The last thing we want to do at night is to count sheep to go to help us fall asleep. There is only one more ewe to lamb. We had our 10th lamb this morning. We gave her alittle help. Hopefully the lamb will do well.

Blacky's little lamb that is in the house is doing a lot better. We thought he wasn't going to make it for a couple of days. He is very quiet and he is eating well on his own.

It was wonderful not having to put a fire in the greenhouse last night. If things would calm down in the barn I would be able to get some work done in the greenhouse.

JG

What a weekend.....

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Sun, 30 Mar 2008 20:02:00 +0000

Friday night Andrew went out to the barn to feed the twin lambs their bottles and found another ewe about to birth. The poor ewe was in distress. She is our smallest eweand it seemed that she was having the largest lamb of them all. It had to be an assisted birth. We called the provincial vet for some support. The lamb survived and so did the ewe. We had to meet up with the vet to get some pain medication for her and some other things she needed after her truama. She won't let her lamb suckle probably because of the pain. So... that lamb is being bottle fed too. We are still putting the lamb on it's mother throughout the day to keep her healthy.

Blacky's smallest lamb isn't doing so well. He can hardly lift his head. We have been giving him medication and we have to feed the little thing through a tube. We put him in the front porch.

I don't know what we would do if we didn't have the front porch.

We worked outside for most of the day yesterday. When we were not in the barn with the lambs we worked in the greenhouse. Watering and weeding the planted beds. We also brought out all of the colder weather crop transplants to the greenhouse. I needed the room in the front porch to plant more trays. The transplants will grow better in the greenhouse anyhow. With the better sunlight and warmer temperatures.

JG

Snow!!!

noreply@blogger.com (chestnut) — Fri, 28 Mar 2008 22:13:00 +0000

There wasn't anymore lambs born today. Yet anyway. Blacky's milk still hasn't come in so therefore I am now bottle feeding them every two hours. They learn quickly who has the food. When I enter the barn and starting talking they go to the gate of their pen and wait for me.

My evening is going to be spent watering and seeding in the front porch. With every CSA membership we get I get motivated to plant more trays.