This time of year means lots of “computer farming” — financial planning, crop planning, supply orders, etc. Most people don’t think of spreadsheets when thinking about what farmers do, but it’s actually a huge part of what allows everything else to happen. Our 325 line crop plan, and 1.5 million large seed order, is no joke!
New VIDEO! + Community Engagement in 2021
Our Food Access initiatives succeed because of the strength of our community partnerships, and the time we invest in them.
These relationships, both locally upstate and throughout New York City, center on outreach, distribution and connection with the communities we feed.
This is in stark contrast to the majority of existing food aid in our country which separates, hides and dehumanizes those who can not afford healthy food. Typically people have no choices beyond highly processed, shelf stable foods with very little nutritional value.
2020 has amplified something we've always known to be true.
The growing season is officially over! Exhale.
We had a wonderful last few weeks as a team. One highlight was getting to spend a couple days helping out on other local farms (shout out to Rise & Root and Soul Fire). We also had lots of team meetings discussing 2021 systems improvements, coop development, crop planning, public programming and much more. Plus, we completed the final harvests for our local food access outlets, weatherized and cleaned up the farm and tackled other end of year infrastructure projects.
Season highlights! (And get your butt out to VOTE)
Tomorrow is a big day for our little farm. It will be the final harvest + pack out for the 2020 CSA, with about 200 boxes headed out on Saturday morning.
Plus, we’ve got a hard freeze coming tomorrow night, with a low of 18 degrees and snow predicted. Ouch! We have a few more orders going out to local food pantries and food access partners over the next couple weeks, so this week we’ve been trying to save as much food as possible from the fields to store in our coolers. Even hardy crops can’t withstand temps that low, so today and tomorrow will be a serious sprint.
2021 CSA is open for registration! AND, we’re making Winter Care Packages for members who join now.
The day has come! We just opened up registration for next season’s CSA, and we’re doing something fun this year:
If you sign up by October 15th, or are among the first 50 to join, (whichever comes first) —we are going to send you a sweet Rock Steady care package for the Winter!
A no-cost opportunity to support our Food Access Fund + renewable energy.
Shout out to our CSA pick-up sites!
Why our model matters: sliding scale stats
The enthusiasm and support for local food is an encouraging trend coming out of this brutal time. Because of COVID, we’ve shifted our plans for this season to meet an increased demand for our CSA, which will hopefully balance out the significant decrease in our restaurant wholesales outlets.
Unsurprisingly, another change we’ve seen this season is an even higher percentage of folks needing financial assistance and coming in on the “lower income” end of our sliding scale - we are glad people know we are here to provide affordable access to nourishing food.
If you’re curious, here’s the current breakdown . . .
Video recording + highlights!
HUGE THANKS to all who showed up for our “Meet Your Farmers” online event on Tuesday night. We had 95 people register for the call! If you couldn’t make it live, or if you were there and want to revisit anything, you can watch the recording, linked in this post. We’re also sharing some top highlights from the call, and pics from the farm this week!
A big week! Lots to share.
Spring is not canceled! Our COVID pivots so far . . .
It’s a strange time to be surrounded by so much new life and beauty – trees are budding, seeds are sprouting, anemones are blooming and tulips are getting taller.
Our greenhouse is packed with seedlings! It also happens to be snowing today, which is typical Spring here, too.
Despite several recent losses due to COVID-19, we are heartened to be able to support our community with the necessary and nourishing service of responsibly grown food. Learn more about where we’re at, and how we’re responding.
COVID-19 FAQs & updates
To our 2020 CSA members & folks considering joining: This is a quickly changing situation, so we’ll keep this post updated with the steps we’re taking in response to the coronavirus pandemic. In this post, we want to address specific protocols around what we’re doing on-farm to prevent the spread of COVID-19 and ensure food safety for our customers.
Resilience and food security — our thoughts and commitments.
There is so much uncertainty and concern right now around COVID-19, we hear it and we feel it, and here is what we know:
Everyone has a role in a global crisis. We are committed to ours, as your farmers.
We will have our hands in the soil. (We’ll wash them often!)
We will continue to sow seeds in our greenhouse, and soon in our fields.
We will grow nourishing, sustainable food with care for our land.
We will safely transport that food directly to our CSA members, friends and neighbors - and be ready to innovate and pivot creatively as needed.
We will lean into our community and ask for the support we need to fulfill these commitments.
We will take care of each other.
Big flower update + 2-min survey!
Winter blues?
February. It can be a little brutal around here, with so much cold/grey behind us and still a solid stretch before we see some green. That said, when your local grocery store veg is wilting away, there’s nothing like daydreams of summer bounty to get you through the Winter slog, am I right?! Fight the Winter blues, Join our CSA!
Meanwhile, I have to keep reminding myself that Spring is closer than we think -- in just two months, our farm crew will be back and plants will start sprouting all over this place. For now, we’re plugging along on the hefty list of off-season to-dos and unique opportunities that are keeping us very busy. Here are some highlights . . .
Wow, 2019: Our Top 8 Takeaways.
Before we turn the corner into a brand new year, we wanted to take a moment and look back on a pretty remarkable season. All in all, we are feeling proud of what we were able to create in 2019, and determined to grow our impact and keep going in 2020. Check out our key lessons learned in 2019, and how it’s shaping the year ahead.
