Only 2 more weeks remaining with the summer CSA. Final pickups are October 24th to the 26th. We are getting near to the end.
Frost Prep
Frost doesn't end our growing season but it does end the season for some crops unless we can protect them. We are praying there won't be a frost this week and our prayers will probably be answered for your house, but since the farm is located in a valley known as a "frost pocket" the cold air tends to descend on our farm bringing temps down 5 to even 10 degrees below the surrounding areas.
As a result, we are busy preparing the farm. We'll be harvesting what we can early (peppers and beans and some sweet potatoes) to protect against total loss and we'll be covering susceptible crops with row cover fabric that can give a few degrees of frost protection. A good proportion of our crops in the fields at this point are cold hardy and can withstand light frosts, so we aren't too concerned for them. It's the warm season crops that are easily killed by even a light frost.
Ways to help: Sweet Potato Harvest
I realize Mondays, you're probably not available, but if you are, we could use help preparing. We plan to harvest round 2 of our sweet potato harvest to get them out of the ground and safe from the frost. We'll also be picking as many beautiful luscious green beans as we can. They look so gorgeous out there, we want to make sure they have a chance to make it into your 2nd to last box. (we'll cover the remainder that we don't pick, hoping they an survive until the very end). We'll also be picking the pepper plants clean to salvage what we can and we can use help spreading out frost cover and placing sandbags. If you would like to volunteer and probably be sent home with some extra produce, you are welcome to join us and the help would be much appreciated.
Monday's (Oct. 14th) Schedule:
10AM to noon Sweet potato vine removal and prep for plowing and harvesting.
2:00PM to 4:00PM sweet potato harvesting
4:00PM to 6:30 or 7:00 Get everything picked and covered before darkness sets in.
If you can come for any of these times, we'll be excited to get dirty with you. (bring garden gloves and a water bottle).
Fall Festival
We've always wanted to host a big fall event at the farm, however parking limitations, (probably more importantly) our event planing limitations, and the busyness of the fall for us have never allowed us to pull that off.
Our church, however has much better parking and people gifted at event planning and for the first time, CrossWay Bible Church in Blue Springs (701 NW Woods Chapel Rd, Blue Springs, MO 64015) will be hosting a fall festival Saturday October 19th from 3:00PM to 5:30PM. There will be food, games, bounce houses, and live music. The event is free and a way to celebrate what God has done in our community this past year. Kids are welcome to come in costume, and there will be candy!
Your farmers will be there and would be delighted if you stopped by to say "hi!". I'm not sure where we will all be, but you'll find Moriah at the face painting station. She and several of the youth girls are becoming quite accomplished!
Have you signed up with CSAware?
This may seem like a broken record, but I know it's easy to procrastinate or not read your email. I do it too.
We're around three-quarters subscribed for the winter season, so many of you have already taken these actions since we first opened up CSAware a week ago. But some of you may not have gotten the message.
HARVIE ENDING, ACTION REQUIRED! Thank you for your membership this season. We don’t want to lose you as we transition to our new CSA management site CSAware to replace Harvie. If you haven’t yet signed up for next summer or this winter using CSAware, you can sign up at https://redfearnfarm.csaware.com/store/ or you can go to www.redfearnfarm.com and go to any of the “sign up” buttons.
If you do not sign up with CSAware, then your membership will lapse at the end of the summer season on October 26th. You must sign up with us at CSAware to guarantee your spot for the winter season or for next summer.
When you sign up for the first time with CSAware, you will need to continue as a new user. You will need to create an account with CSAware. There is no connection with your Harvie account. Your autorenew from Harvie has no effect. You are considered a new customer with CSAware.
We invite you to sign up now for the winter season which starts October 31st. You can also sign up for the summer 2025 season.
Bread and Cheese
Farm to Market 8-Grain Sliced
Hemme Brothers Garlic-Dill Curds
If you read this far you are a champ and we're especially delighted that you are part of our farm-ily.
Your farmers,
Dave and Sheri
