Tomato plants! We have lots of tomato plants (cherry, heirloom slicing and paste varieties) and are offering these for sale in 4″ pots. Starts are growing in organic potting soil and seed is high quality, High Mowing, organic seed.
Shop our new online store for farm pick up! For Wood River Valley customers, contact us for delivery dates and locations. http://agrarian-harvest.square.site/
This farmer has a dream . . . . . . . another dream. Some days I would say, “Oh-no, I don’t want to hear it because I don’t want to raise another type of animal!” But this dream doesn’t involve another animal. And without the farmer dreaming we would not be here or be farming today. We are both big dreamers and believe everyone should dream and work toward your dream until your dreams come true.
We started with dreaming to farm, that evolved into organic farming, then to organic farming of a large diversity of produce and herbs (almost 20 acres worth). Now the dream is opening up a storefront on the farm, an on-farm market. It’s an idea that I’m liking. A farm market in our garage; a market that we don’t have to load up . . . drive to . . . unload and set up . . . take down . . . load up again to then have to drive home exhausted . . . to have to unload yet again all that wasn’t sold (which is usually around 10 or 10:30 pm for the markets in the Wood River Valley). . . then go irrigate and feed the animals before bed.
An on-farm market is less work for the farmer and more time on the farm so we can sell at wholesale prices. The vision for this on-farm market is to offer a one stop shopping for fresh food that is in-season. We will be offering all our produce, eggs, herbs, meat, soap and laundry detergent along with products from other local farms like milk and cheese from Old Almo Creamery.
Our on-farm market is open on Wednesdays from 1 to 6 pm. Giving everyone a chance to come to the farm to buy product at discounted prices.
So here’s to another dream! Fear less, dream more and may life be happier!
It felt kind-of like a “normal” farm around here this week. We had our wheat thrashed with an actual combine, no harvesting by hand (with market garden farming everything except our peas and beans are harvested by hand). Getting the wheat thrashed takes a little pressure off, but kept the farmer busy with “normal” farm work instead of the market gardening type of work. It feels good to check a harvest off of the to do list and have it be done for the year. Now to swath the straw, bale and stack it, water the stubble and let the pigs out in the field.
Speaking of pigs, we are having issues with pigs. We have not been able to keep them in this week. Apparently the old saying is true, it’s greener on the other side of the fence. We have spent a lot of time putting the pigs in and fixing fence. Some say that pigs respect a hot wire. Well, ours don’t! They go right through the hot wire, lift the panels up, destroy the woven wire (they will go through and destroy three fences in 30 seconds flat!) and go where they please. . . . which has been into the squash and corn patch. So we will have very little corn and winter squash this year thanks to the pigs.
So that leaves us thinking: what to do now? What to do differently around here? And most importantly, how to manage pigs that don’t want to be managed?
For the market garden farming, the ladybugs have arrived! The kale is not on
ly covered with aphids now. It is also covered with ladybugs that are feasting on aphids. The ladybugs are not as abundant as the aphid population, but the ladybugs are plentiful and busy feasting. It is a beautiful site to see from our point of view.
And the apricots are ripe and plentiful! The sweet taste of fruit in the summer is so pleasing and such an easy snack. When we get hungry when we are out working, we simply stop by the apricot tree to have feast of apricots. And now to think of recipes to use apricots.
At planting time last year, we were amazed at all the earthworms and had to do a little research on them. We still a lot of earthworms; large, medium, and many babies. This Spring we have been seeing Armadillidida or commonly known as roly polys or pill bugs everywhere on our farm and lots of them. These “bugs” (they really aren’t bugs; keep reading and I’ll go further in-depth on that) have always been fun to find for the kids. They love seeing roly polys roll up when touched, which is a defense mechanism, then wait for them to unroll so they can touch them again and sometimes roll them around the palm of their hand.
We are seeing a whole lot more roly polys than we have in the past. So, of course, this lead to a little research project. Part because we love learning and part because we were wondering if they were beneficial or are they going to be pest. We were quite happy to learn that they are beneficial and help with the decomposing process. They eat decaying plant and animal material. We provided the organic matter and now they have moved in to help with the breaking down of the organic matter, to increase our soil fertility. Hurrah! We read that they could feed on seedlings and plant roots, but tend to eat decaying material when it is available. We have a lot of decaying plant material available and have not had any problems with them feeding on plant roots or seedlings. There are thousands in the cold frame where we have greens growing and started all of our seedlings. They haven’t kill any seedlings.
It was also quite interesting to learn that they are actually not a bug, they are a land crustacean and are related to shrimp. They like dark moist places and have gill-like structures used to breath, but can’t live underwater. They don’t urinate, but instead release an ammonia gas through their exoskeleton. And they shed their exoskeleton as they grow. The back half sheds first, then the front half. The females carry their eggs and newly hatched babies in a special pouch before they start crawling out to walk on their own. Huh. . . . the things we learn through hand-on activities and work with curious minds questioning everything! This little organic piece of Earth we live on just amazes us!
It feels like all we do this time of year is plant, plant, plant . . . . . and there is still more to plant. We are nowhere near done planting. This week has thrown other events into our schedule and has interrupted our planting rhythm. We are entering into our market season. So our weekly schedule and rhythm will be changing from a spring planting routine to our summer plant, weed, harvest, market routine. It may sound like a lot and, honestly, some days it feels like a lot. And then other days there is not enough to do, but that has not been the case this week.
It has been a very busy week or at least it feels busy compared to our spring planting routine. We had our organic inspection, which started a day before it was scheduled and lasted into the next day. That was a ridiculously long and drawn out process for the small acres and production that we do. In the middle of our inspection, we had our broiler chicks and ducklings arrive a day early. And now we are getting ready for the first Twin Falls Farmers’ market on Saturday, and then there is more planting. Please nobody call and tell us the market is going to be on Friday instead of Saturday. Everything has been happening a day early this week and it feels a bit like a nightmare. As long as today is actually Friday and not Saturday, then we are pretty excited about this first farmers’ market. We planned better this year and have more produce ready for the market. We will have a lot of kale, lettuce, spinach, arugula, along with rhubarb, green garlic, green onions, radishes, herbs, eggs, salad dressings, handmade soap, and laundry detergent.
In the previous paragraph, I mentioned ducklings. Yes, we now have ducklings! Ducks are our experiment for this year. We are going to try to raise khaki cambell ducks, they are suppose to be good layers. We are all very happy and excited, especially me. Beside the fact that they are the cutest little poultry critters ever! They don’t scratch like chickens (yes!!!) and are excellent foragers. I think the ducks are going to go over very well with the family and become a permanent part of our farm. I will keep you updated on the ducks throughout the summer. I’m confident this duck project will be much more successful than our garlic and sweet potato projects were last year.
The salad greens are thriving in the cold frame. We are very excited to be eating salad on a regular basis again! (Pictured is a mix of spring mix lettuce, arugula, and spinach.)
The curly kale overwintered in the field and is growing. I love putting this kale in our smoothies. The kids even drink the smoothies. These green smoothies are becoming our go-to afternoon snack once again. We absolutely love this time of year when everything is greening up and starting to grow! We’ve even been going out into the yard and harvesting dandelion leaves to eat and for tea. It is simply that time of year when all greens are appealing!
We sell all greens individual, request a mix or buy a CSA share or half share and you won’t miss out on any of our produce.
It’s a Good Friday! Our eggs are dyed and ready for Easter! If you haven’t got your eggs yet, it’s not too late. We still have eggs available. Look at the wonderful colors that brown eggs turn when dyed. Okay, so I have been told that my eggs are ugly. To defend myself, I’m just trying to keep a family tradition. I have a tradition on my side of the family to try to dye an egg black. So every year I use my patience and persistence, sitting at the table long after the kids have finished their eggs, trying to turn at least one egg black. Or as dark and ugly as I can get it. And it is so much fun for me!
This year the kids and Grandpa drew faces and names on some of the eggs, so they each have a special egg to hunt for on Easter. This might be the start of a new tradition.
It is a very happy Easter weekend at our farm. The eggs are colored, greens are ready, daffodils are blooming, the lawn and wheat field are green. It’s a weekend of miracles, faith, and happy times. We had arugula to eat and sell this past week and will have spinach and lettuce this week. It feels like Spring has truly sprung and it is time to be warm and full of smiles when I get to eat a homegrown green salad. And the time is here and now. Have a Good Friday and Happy Easter!
Check out our produce page for prices of greens and all of our other product pages!
Produce Eggs Produce CSA Chicken Pork Hand-Made Soaps
It is so fitting that we ate our first greens (arugula) out of the cold frame on St Patrick’s Day. I have been craving the fresh, wholesome greens grown in our soil and this was the perfect day for our first taste!
We will have arugula available starting March 23th and the spinach should be close behind. Check our produce page for pricing. Produce
The days are longer and I’m not thrilled about losing sleep, but the chickens are loving it. Our egg production has increased, so we have plenty of eggs available, just in time for Easter. Try dying brown eggs this Easter or do some baking or just eat them. Eggs
Spring is almost here and so is the start of our Spring CSA and full season CSA. They start the second week of May, buy your share soon. Produce CSA
Email, call or text us. How To Buy From Us
We are now accepting applications for our 2016 CSA season. It is cold out now, but it is our time to plan for the coming season and order our seed. We work hard all summer and now that it is cold we are spending time together with family, reading books, and planning for the coming year.
If you view the attached pdf document you can view our list of produce that we plan to grow. If you sign up early, we can add requested products to our seed order. Our application is also in the attached document and can be mailed in.
To see pricing and for details, you can view our CSA page, open the pdf below, call us, or email us at myfood@agrarianharvest.com
As a note, we have specific dates and times for pickup. They can be viewed on our CSA page and on the CSA application. If you and friends or coworkers sign up, it may be possible to add locations and times as long as they fit with our farming schedule.
Agrarian Harvest 