Your organic farm in the Eastern Townships
Go-with-the-flow is the watchwordwhich best captures the farmer’s stoic acceptance that it is Mother Nature who decides how one’s days are spent. This week is a case in point, as we compulsively await every Environment Canada weather update to plan our day, our week and our day of rest. The upcoming week is looking to be…
This entry marks the launch of our 2023 CSA basket deliveries!We’ve been busy over the last month, and what a month it has been! Four real frosts, some pretty chilly weather AND our first heat wave of the season…We did what we had to do, but it demanded an extraordinary expenditure of energy installing protective…
One month since our last newsletter and the pace is really picking up. Seedling production is going full tilt, so much so that our seedling greenhouse extension is bursting at the seams. One of our big cold greenhouses is already full (with spinach, lettuce, beets and coriander…), the other two will be filled this week.…
The opening of our seedling greenhouse is something of a ritual,a familiar routine that one cannot circumvent, a to-do list that one repeats year after year, albeit always with some apprehension: will the furnace fire up as it should – or not? Will there water flow – or not? Fortunately, the furnace started; but sure…
Although another winter chill is in the offing this weekend, it is high time for us to shift gears, to imagine for a moment that Spring is upon us, and to launch the 14th growing season at Arlington Gardens with great fanfare. We have already received most of our seeds (a source of endless delight),…
Had someone told me that I would be able to serve up tomatoes in the third week of October, I would have smirked, guffawed, or perhaps both,in a manifestation of total disbelief.In truth, no tomato plant can go unprotected this long in the fields, particularly if it has been subjected to three hard frosts and…
A market customer asked me yesterday if market farmers eat betterthan most during the long winter months.Unfortunately, I had to admit that we too despair in winter, particularly when our supplies run out and even we have to trudge off to the grocery store for our weekly provisions. I exaggerate, but only a bit. Most…
Week 12 of 23, almost mid-season already,so I must seize this opportunity to mention a couple of things that will soon be upon us. First, our potluck dinner.It will be on October 10, Thanksgiving Monday. The concept is simple : you will be asked to confirm your participation by email; to bring a dish of your…
Have you noticed them lately?The first cool nights of August,an infallible sign that summer has reached its point of inflection, an impossible-to-ignore indication that – despite the many beautiful days still to come – we are slowly but surely entering into autumn. For all the plants in our fields, the cool nights are an open…
Following a few false starts, summer has finally arrived –its presence was timid at first, but has become brash and unapologetic over the past weekend. It was about time : solanaceas and cucurbits are not philosolic for philosolia’s sake. Indeed there exists a long list of vegetables that need a double dose of heat – tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, and…