2022 Farm Share Week 20 - The End! 2022 Season Review.

This is the end of our 2022 Farm Share! Read on for my annual season review and a lot of gushy virtual hugs from me to you.

A Few Quick Highlights/LowLights from 2022

New infrastructure: lifted 3rd greenhouse, put new plastic on 3rd greenhouse, raised roll up sides of all greenhouses, improved air circulation in greenhouses, expanded prophouse tables

New equipment: compost spreader, more sprinklers, quick seeder trays for the prophouse, auger for drilling holes in landscape fabric

Best crops: greens (salad mix), tomatoes, beets, spring onions, beans, dill, cilantro, cabbage (second time around), fall carrots, leeks

Worst crops: peas, onions, eggplant, peppers, winter squash, chard, parsley

Longest crop: we had cucumbers and zucchini from week 3 til week 16, a new record!

Biggest lesson: compost

Most fun: fresh watermelon, awesome crew

Least fun: Sarah injuring her knee, hornworms in the tomatoes, caterpillar moths

Biggest successes: Our 3rd annual seedling sale, our farm store got much more traffic and we got to the milestone of OVER 100 Farm Share members 

2022 Year End Summary

When sitting down to write this final newsletter, it's hard to imagine how to summarize our season. But here we go:

It began way back in January, when we were ordering our seeds during our vacation to Vancouver, and finishing up our crop plan.

When we came back in February, we hit the ground running and began to work on our biggest infrastructure projects for the season; raising our 3rd greenhouse so we could plant tomatoes, increasing the sides of all of our hoophouses to improve air circulation and extending the tables in our prophouse to accommodate a bigger seedling sale.

April and May were a challenge because of wet, cold weather and our struggle to find staff. We planted, but the weather didn't favour what we grew in April. Fortunately, Sarah returned as our greenhouse manager and took care of things in the greenhouse like a pro and we had a very successful seedling sale. We spontaneously decided to attend a second market for the season – Covent Garden Outdoor Market. We started off applying so we could sell our seedlings there, and we decided to stay. Luckily, we found Jennifer to run the Strathroy Market for us. Despite the challenges, we planted, planted, and planted some more! We got a crew of folks to come help us with our spring plantings as a fun event, and we're hoping to make this an annual tradition.

By June we were harvesting weekly for the Farm Share, markets, and our store while also still bed prepping and planting and pruning - and now throwing weeding in there too.

We soon encountered our biggest lesson of the season - don't mess with the compost! We misjudged the fertility needs of our soil and switched to a lower fertility compost. We quickly saw the results in our field with crops that were failing to thrive. We switched back but a lot of our spring planted crops like peppers, eggplants, cucumbers, zucchini, onions, winter squash, broccoli and cabbage were already planted. We fertigated with some natural fertilizers and fish emulsion which helped a bit but it wasn't enough to get them up to the level of production we expected. By the end of June we were back to our original compost. 

Because of these troubles, we reached out to a farmer friend of ours, Chris from Common Ground Farm in St Thomas. He grows organically on a larger scale than us and we thought he might have extra produce. We've often tossed this idea around in our heads, as we know other farms who supplement their farm shares with local produce that they themselves do not grow. Happily, our unfortunate circumstances led us to a good relationship that allowed us to diversify our farm share and offer more variety to our members, all while contributing to our local food system. Even as our yields increased, we continued to get produce from Chris to round out our offerings. It took a lot of the stresses of running a Farm Share off our shoulders, as our biggest concern is always whether we have enough quantity and variety for our members. All in all it felt like a win-win situation for everyone, so we are glad to have had this door open up for us. Sometimes it is easier to make decisions in the moment.

July, everything was coming to peak BUSY. In many ways, things were on the up and up and we found ourselves with the biggest farm team we've had yet. Sarah, Tristan, Dean, Breckin, Gabriella, Guro and Jennifer helped us get so much done in a way we hadn't really experienced before. And the farm was a happy hive of activity and laughter. However - Sarah tore her ACL and other ligaments in her knee playing soccer, and she was out completely for three weeks. It was hard not to have her help, and we missed her greatly. But she isn't one to go down without a fight and she was back on the farm by the end of the month, despite her continuing injuries. I'll be forever impressed by her tenacity and strength of spirit. She came back to guide the crew and manage the harvest/process so we could take our planned week off in August. We are forever grateful for having Sarah on our team. With our lively and hard working crew, we managed to get all our fall crops into the ground in time and take off for the a week's holiday, which is quite the feat. We were so grateful to be able to leave the farm in good hands and spend some quality summer time with our family.

August, as always, was a blur. Tons to harvest, fall crops getting finished, our regular weekly plantings, and suddenly a ton of weeding to do because the rain finally decided to come. We were very fortunate to have a team of urban farmers from London come and volunteer with us to save our fall carrot crop from weeds. We also harvested honey for the very first time as we took over the hives previously managed by Z&Bee Co on our farm. Oh, and we ate a lot of tomatoes and watermelon.

In September and October, the field work slowed down but the harvest of fall crops increased. We said goodbye to our teenage crew and had to work a few late nights to get everything done, but by September we know the end is approaching so we persevered. We got the tomatoes out, the hoophouses planted, slowly began field clean up and jarred honey for the first time. Sarah planted again for the first time!

And now, here we are. It’s still hard to believe our 2022 Farm Share is over and I suspect it won’t sink in for awhile. Of course, this year is a bit different because we continue to attend Covent Market until the second week of December, and starting in November we’ll be running our first ever 6-week fall share! We’re excited to be able to continue to feed people and extend the income we make on the farm, while still getting a chance to breathe a bit easier, and maybe have some time to make some delicious fall soups. So, thank you for being part of our Farm Share this season – whether it’s your 4th season, your first, or you’ve only been with us the last couple weeks. Having you along with us on this farming journey makes it all possible. Thank you, thank you, thank you! 

 Veggie Highlights This Week

We have 5 lb bags of bulk carrots available. We also have “cooking tomatoes” aka green tomatoes that have ripened on our greenhouse tables. We’ve been cooking with them and enjoying them, even if they have less flavour than our summertime tomatoes. NEW this week from us is mini fennel! We really enjoy this in the fall and winter with roasted veggies, it adds a unique sweetness. We have sweet potatoes, butternut and delicata squash from HOPE ecofarms collective, and rutabaga, potatoes, and *NEW* celeriac from Common Ground Farm.

Thank you - and bye for now!

Again, thank you for making the choice to buy from our farm this summer. It means so much to us! We grew to over 100 members this summer. As I always like to say – thanks for keeping us growing. We’ll continue selling veggies online through Harvie and at our store until Christmas, so we may see you yet. If not, then have a cozy and happy winter season.  

Hugs from your farm-ily,

Kim and Alex

Rosemary and Lark

and the whole team!