Thank You for a great season! Having your support is what makes this farm work. We are currently planning and getting ready for 2018 and are really excited to offer the flexible 10 week punch pass. If you have any questions or concerns regarding the punch pass please let us know. Membership is almost full!! Hurry and Join. www.fieldtofork-farm.com If you are not able to join our CSA please look for our products at Natural Grocers.
We love offering the CSA program and having a connection with friends and families who enjoy our products is very rewarding. For 2018 we are going to really focus on Gourmet Salad Blends and discontinue a few challenging crops that we don't enjoy growing. Our Salad Blend is our #1 selling crop and most popular crop by you. We love growing lettuce and we also have an opportunity to grow lettuce for the local School District 51. We see working with the school as a link to reach nutrient dense food to the youth and future generations who need it the most. Eating well and making good choices starts young and what a better way to teach kids about healthy farming and food, by simply having it on the plate.
For 2018 we will be growing: Lettuce, Radish, Beets, Carrots, other specialty root veggies. Red Slicer Tomatoes, Cherry Tomatoes, Heirloom Tomatoes, Hot Peppers, Sweet Peppers, Eggplant, Garlic, Cut Flowers, Cucumbers, Watermelon, Sweet Melons, Winter Squash, Sweet Cherries, Peaches, Plums, Nectarines, Apples and Pears. We do have some friends who grow some crops we don't, We trust their growing methods and we like to support others if they have something exceptional and grown with care. We can't grow everything and we want to focus on the crops less available as well as choose gourmet varieties that take more time and need focus to grow.
Organic does not mean local and local does not mean organic. Organic means using the native soil and the land with which you farm and grow. Organic means that we use nature and create a positive ecosystem for our biological controls. Using our native pollinators and beneficial bugs to increase or decrease bug habitats, organic means that we only use plant, animal or mineral based inputs to grow the crop. It is also a way of life, we are proud to be a Certified Organic farm. We are proud to have jumped through the hoops and filed the paperwork and paid the fees to show our consumer we farm with a conscious.
We don't use any petroleum based chemical inputs which is what conventional farmers use. Petroleum based inputs like chemical fertilizers are harmful to the environment. Farming Organically is making choices, we carefully choose our inputs. We continuously are looking for wood chips, manure form small farms and other waste components like grape pressings from the local wineries to make compost. Compost takes years to make and we also grow cover crops and rotate crops for soil health and added organic matter.
It would be easy for us to save money and time by buying compost from a feed lot or use the municipal compost but those products have many trace chemicals. Feed lots have manure with trace elements of hormones and antibiotics that we do not want on our farm or in the food we are growing. We also don't agree with the style of feedlot agriculture. Municipal compost has weed and grass clippings that have been sprayed by homeowners. It contains trace elements of herbicides that will make plants sick and die.
We have also made the choice to stop using Coco Core for our potting mixes. We have never been impressed with it and feel peet moss with a compost based living soil works better for us. Coco Core is the fiber in coconuts and is being farmed at devastating rates it is imported from tropical areas where deforestation is happening. The transportation and Deforestation contributes to global warming. We feel the tropical rainforests are such a huge part of our global eco system we do not want to contribute or encourage that farming practice. These are just some of our choices for our farm and for our consumer. We really care about the way we achieve plant health.
#plasticsucks Every year we use less plastic row covers to grow our crops on. When we remove it, every fall, it breaks into a million pieces and then we have pieces of plastic in our soil for years. We feel growing food on or in plastic is gross and we just don't like it. Sadly it does help us reduce labor but as we continue to invest in the proper tools to cultivate weeds we hope to be a plastic free farm by 2020.
Living in Palisade someone is spraying trees or crops everyday Organic or Conventional these chemicals are entering our ground water and surrounding us. One reason we purchased this farm was the location. 2 of our neighbors that surround us practice Organic Agriculture. We know what they are spraying and we know if they over spray or spray on a windy day it won't contaminate our leafy green crops. Some of the conventional sprays can not be ingested for many days and that does not work for us. You as a consumer vote everytime you shop. Start asking farmers how they fertilize and control bugs. If something is to shiny and looks waxy or fake you might want to think twice about what is on the food to make it look perfect!
As a farmer who lives on my farm I too don't want to be surrounded by harmful inputs.We are farming with a conscious and making good choices for our end consumer. The fore fathers and leaders of the Organic farming movement have been education the deeper meaning of farming Organically for over 40 years and when you apply the deep organic methods to your farm you quickly see the soil respond. There is nothing exciting and fancy about farming organically it is just hard work and being in tune with your crops. Once you start seeing and feeling the soil and listening to the crops life happens and food grows happily with out synthetic inputs. The earth and soil will take care of us if we take care of it. We are proud of our growing methods and sleep well at night knowing we are making good choices for you.
For more information about this topic please follow this link:
Scott and Jessica Washkowiak
Field To Fork
3526 front street
Palisade Co
fieldtoforkcsa@gmail.com