Your organic farm in the Eastern Townships
Cooler weather but relatively sunny skies mark the end of the regular CSA basket season at Arlington Gardens. Twenty full weeks, sometimes wet but mostly hot and dry, the likes of which we hadn’t seen in several years. We’ll do a seasonal post-mortem in a month or two, once winter will have settled in, as…
Early Monday morning routine calls for a farmer’s tour of the fields, although said tour takes less time, nowadays. As the wet grass drenches my boots, I know already that some pressing farm work will not get done. Three days without rain are not enough to dry out several recently harvested plots. I’m chomping at…
On this Thanksgiving Monday, while I could thank Mother Nature for her gifts and generosity, I would rather mention those without whom our family enterprise would flounder, our four seasonal employees, Mexicans all, who form the backbone of this farm. That’s not to say that we don’t have other employees. At the season’s peak, we…
Fall has arrived suddenly at the farm, like an unexpected guest. In just the past few days, we’ve had to switch from shorts to pants and from comfortable shoes to heavy boots. Don’t mistake me, the grass is still green, thanks to abundant morning dews and nocturnal rains, but our fields are no longer as…
I know I’ve been talking about if for a while now, but it was only this past weekend that we truly finished harvesting our winter squash, under the blazing sun. To be more precise, more than a week ago we had cut the squash off their vines and left them in the field to cure…
Even as the forecast is calling for yet another summery weekend, this week’s basket reminds us that fall is looming. Beyond last Saturday’s first frost, it is the general state of our solanaceas and cucurbits that is the true harbinger of fall — plants that have given so much during the peak season have started…
As I write these lines, the much anticipated winter squash harvest, heralded last week, has yet to be done. A build-up in farm chores, each more pressing than the next over the past few days, has been such that we have decided to harvest them one at a time, starting with this week’s special, our…
High season at the farm continues, unabated. A sticky heat, with a humidex reading through the roof, makes these late August days bear an uncanny resemblance to the dog days* of July. Before writing these lines, I tour the fields to take in the sounds and smells of the late afternoon and surprise, surprise –…
We’ve reached the peak of the season, a time when we begin to anticipate the ebb which will inevitably follow the flow — and quite frankly, this year’s succession of hot, steamy days is bordering on the obscene. This week will be yet another dry one, with little to no precipitation in sight. That said,…
Summer continues in full swing for this, our 10th week, and basket, of the season. It’s been in full swing for a while, now – 2018 will definitely be a season to remember – with alternating bouts of drought, gang-buster growth, goings-to-seed and weeds galore – the latter the only true constant in a crazy…