THIS WEEK, OCTOBER 19, 20, AND 23 IS LAST WEEK OF 2010 SUMMER CSA

Supporting Agriculture and the Rural Lifestyle of Kitsap County

Thank you for joining the Kitsap County agricultural community when you joined our CSA or shopped at a farmers market. Frankly, although I want to keep you as our customer – look at all the opportunities you have to subscribe to next Summer’s CSA and buy at our Farm Store, I will only be sad if you turn your back on Kitsap grown and processed foods.

Rural Kitsap with active farms is endangered, however some in Kitsap County government are working to re-establish its small farm agricultural industry. The county has nameD a Food and Farm Policy Council, on which I serve. Currently the Kitsap County Community Development department is working on Kitsap County’s rural policy plan. You can read all about it online at http://www.kitsapgov.com/dcd/community_plan/rural_policy/Rural_Policy_default.htm, or you can call Katrina Knutson at the Community Planning Division (360) 337-5777. On this web page, you will see notices for a “stakeholder” group that actually has no farmer member. While that may change, the agricultural community, that means you, need to get involved. All you need to do is respond to the policy development and, I hope, support agriculture in Kitsap. There are many ways to do this, but clear support for agriculture and its infrastructure is needed and appreciated.

What is agricultural infrastructure? It is all the pieceS that make farming possible. Right now, Kitsap is missing the following pieces of the agricultural puzzle: a livestock veterinarian, land access, meat processing, feed and seed, commercial kitchens for food processing, access to a trained work force, and regulations that make it legal to do traditional farming.  As you know, the weather, pests, and such make  agriculture a challenge, but the lack of these other pieces can be  truly devastating.

Someone recently asked me why Nikki Johansen and I are good friends and support each other ‘s farms when we are competitors. The fact is, we are not competitors. We are co-conspirators in bringing healthy food to our neighbors in Kitsap County. We are joined by other farms, restaurants, stores, and people like you who are turning things around.

Why support agriculture in Kitsap? We have a growing customer base that is seeking fresh and healthy food, locally made products, and economic stability for their home community. Again, thank you.

Autumn has arrived

Our Farm Store Opens November 9

Claim your Summer 2011 CSA Share

As we are planning for next summer's CSA, we are planting for winter. Instead of putting the garden to bed, we kept planting all through August and September, which should provide vegetables in November. We are currently planting vegetables for December and January.

We are doing the regular Fall planting for next year. Garlic has to go into the ground in the fall. We are transplanting perennial herbs and will be planting our cherry bushes as they go dormant.

We are expanding our Fall planting to include plants that can survive our damp maritime winters. There are mostly brassicas such as cabbage, kale, kohlrabi, Brussels sprouts, and some varieties of bok choy. Fall peas are growing. Carrots, shallots or green onions, join cold tolerant lettuce varieties, spinach, chard, and parsley. Today, we are laying plastic mulch for leeks. We are going to try an early crop of potatoes.

Our winters are mild compared to many areas of nation, and if winter crops can be grown in Maine, we should be able to do it here. Yes, we will be using those high-tunnels and the row and ground covers. The coming weeks will tell us how successful we will be. Since we have had good growing year-round most winters, we know that somethings will flourish. We are planting enough that even if we are only half successful we will have an abundance. The result of our efforts will be found each Tuesday at our soon to open Farm Store.

Farm Store OPENING November 9, 2010
Hours: Tuesday, 2 p.m. to 6 p.m.

Our farm store will open with the first of our off-season produce. This represents a year of developing ways to grow produce year round. Yes, the summer was like winter, winter may be like it is in Maine.We do not make any promises, but with your continued support, our modest effort will succeed.

Your response to the small variety of locally grown and made products that we had this summer inspired us to expand the products that you can pick up here. We will continue to feature locally produced grocery items including Personal Roast Coffee, Dungeness Valley Creamery Certified Raw Milk, and Hansville Creamery Certified Raw Goats Milk – when the girls are milking. You will also find Oils Of Paicines Certified Organic Olive Oil, and it is first cold press, from California. We will have other high-quality, hard to get products available to you, also. I talked with Rob Story, and he will be providing fruit and other items from more far flung local sources.

VEGGIE BUCKS

CSA Summer Share 2011 SIGN-UP TIME

GET YOUR EARLIEST-BIRD DISCOUNT − taking it back to 2009!

Thank you for your support. We believe in rewarding our current customers and their friends. As is our tradition,  we are offering next season's CSA Shares for this year's prices. Yes, there will be a price increase. However, if you buy your 2011 CSA Share now, with the Veggie Bucks bonus that you can redeem at our Farm Store, or if you are quick at the Poulsbo Farmers Market, the cost to you of your Share equals the 2009 price.

New and returning members can enjoy this savings, too.

We know that times are tough for everyone. We also appreciate your support through the difficult weather this summer. However, this savings lasts for a limited time only, to November 30. After that, while there will be a discount, it will be above the 2010 price. See our brochure for next year’s prices. Click on the prices below and you will be taken you our CSA page. You can either join using a credit or debit card or PayPal account, or download our brochure and mail or drop off a check. 

Earliest-bird discounts
Mini Share — $250 plus $15 of Veggie Bucks
Small Share — $420 plus $25 of Veggie Bucks
Large Share — $645 plus $35 of Veggie Bucks

Older Than Dirt

While most articles start out telling you that it took millions of years to create the Earth's soil, and it did, topsoil, humus, is made daily. Soil is a combination of its "parent rock" and organic matter that is broken down by living organisms. Topsoil, according to soil experts, ranges from one percent to about thirty percent organic matter. Deserts typically have about one percent organic matter, and rich organic land has twenty to thirty percent.

As an organic farm, we feed the organic part of the soil with natural nutrients, and use the naturally occurring rocks for much of the needed minerals. When we work the soil in the garden, for example when we rototill, we are not only returning the plant matter (green manure) to the living organisms that break it down into dirt, we are breaking apart rocks that release the minerals they contain. We have to add many trace minerals and lime. Our wet maritime weather, with the weeks of heavy rain, can make the soil more alkaline, and to sweeten it and make it in the range of pH neutral, we use lime flour.

The organic materials in the soil are living organisms, dead but identifiable remains of macro organisms, living microbes, and finely divided nonliving organic materials. The minerals in the soil include silicon, aluminum, sodium, calcium, iron, magnesium, and potassium, according to Soils and Soil Fertility (4th ed. Thompson and Troeh). Everyday these pieces blend together to make dirt.

Humus is the brown top part of the dirt. Generally, humus refers to not only soil but compost, too. We compost both animal waste and vegetative waste. We are moving to using vermicompost, that is worm compost, and compost tea. Vermicompost may be the most nutrient-rich organic fertilizer and soil conditioner. The composting is done by using earthworms, night crawlers, red wigglers, and white worms to digest decomposing vegetable matter and manure. The result is known as vermicast or worm castings.

Using these methods, we will be able to increase the depth of our soil, the humus. This is an ongoing process that we will continue to do as long as we are farming. The more nutrient rich the soil, the more nutrient rich are the vegetables we grow.

Beneficial Nematodes

• Washington State University (WSU) identified Steinernema carpocapsae as the most effective nematode to use in the Pacific Northwest.

• Beneficial nematodes attack other larvae, disrupting the live cycle of the insect pest.

• Beneficial nematodes cannot be stored because they die quickly

• They need to ordered within 4 days of use.

• We bought our Steinernema carpocapsae  from Gardeningzone.com.