Blue Gate Farm News – Volume VI, Number 2
– March 15, 2008
Well here we are…a
week until the official start of spring and already the snow is nearly gone and
we are starting to see glimpses of green.
There have been a number of interesting sightings here in the past
month. We had our first on-farm bald
eagle sighting about two weeks ago. We
had been seeing them in the area late this winter, but this one flew across the
bean field and right over the house and high tunnel. We were much more impressed by the sight then
the chickens were…there was much rushing for the coop on their part. We’ve also been seeing herds of deer on a
daily basis. Other sure signs of spring
include huge V’s of
The sunroom is
looking also decidedly greener these days; the 17 flats of onions, shallots and
leeks are growing nicely. The tomatoes
(nearly 400 plants), peppers (7 varieties) and eggplant (6 varieties) have
recently come up and have moved from the germination mats over to the growing
area, as have the seed-sown herbs. The
edible flowers for the salad mix were just sown this week and next up on the
mats are cabbages, broccoli and garden huckleberries.
Back outside, the
spring cleanup has begun. We are still
picking up twigs and branches from the December ice storm. We are also able to see the gardens for the
first time since then, and they are primed for cleanup of last season’s plant
debris and getting ready for spring planting. This week we’ve been working on improving the
drainage around the high tunnel (which is like a swamp with all the melting
snow), pruning fruit trees and planning for the arrival of more than a dozen
new trees in the upcoming weeks. Several
of our bee hives fell victim to the harsh winter – they literally starved in
hives full of honey as it was to cold for the cluster of bees to shift a few
inches over to fresh supplies of honey and pollen. Blue doesn’t much care if it’s warm or cold,
she’s just happy to have people outdoors with her. She has especially enjoyed the woodcutting
activities all winter, as she’s certain that we are really out there to supply
her with a winter’s worth of throwing sticks.
We are still
partaking in several indoor activities right now, mostly computer and
organizing work, but some fun stuff as well. Jill finally learned to knit over the winter
and recently (thanks to Maggie at Prairieland Herbs) took up fiber spinning. Talk about an addicting habit! So if any of you are spinners, knitters, or
other fiber folk…make sure to bring up the subject when you have a moment to
chat about it.
A membership
update: We are now full for the 2008 Summer season. With that said, we want to take the
opportunity to say welcome to our new members and welcome back to the veterans.
We still anticipate beginning weekly
deliveries for 2008 in late May or early June (depending on the weather) and
running into October. Our drop off
location in
For those of you
who might have missed last month’s newsletter, we are considering changing over
to an e-newsletter (similar to this) during the delivery season, as opposed to
individual paper copies. We have gotten
a couple of responses from members, but if you have a strong feeling one way or
the other, be sure to let us know.
More next month…
Best from the
farm,
Jill & Sean