May 2012
Plant Sale
May 19-21, 2012
11 am to 4 pm
Yes, it’s time to open up The Mall, our farm-gate stand. It’s always amazing how
quickly things come around again. We are hoping for a warm, sunny, weekend so that we can all plant out our gardens in anticipation of fresh tomatoes with that good old-fashioned flavour. This year we also have eggplant and pepper plants for sale.Because of the drier spring weather this year we have a number of crops in the
field a bit earlier than usual…kales, cabbages, kohlrabi, Asian greens, arugula, spinach, mesclun mixes, leeks, onions, chard and beets. We are almost ready to plant our early crop potatoes as well.Welcome to our 2012 intern team who are all here now to share the season with
us. Joining us May 1st are Nadia and Tippy as well as Fawn who arrived a month earlier. Last week we had our first CRAFT day, which is a morning of education, a potluck lunch, and an afternoon of work where farmers and interns gather to learn, share knowledge and have fun. If you know of any young (or old) people who are interested in learning about farming please direct them to the CRAFT website: www.craftontario.ca/regions/craft-kawartha/On May 2
nd we received 40 more day-old chicks for future egg production. That will give us close to 70 laying hens. Of course, they won’t start to lay until late fall which means we will be able to offer eggs all winter long. Excitement never ends here at the farm…we caught our first swarm of honeybees last week. What a rush, let me tell you. There was no time to be nervous – Gregory lopped a couple of branches and I carried them into their new hive box.
Community
Supported Agriculture
Check out our website for more information, drop locations and to sign up for your 2012 CSA share. www.WicklowWay.ca
What’s Available at
Wicklow Way
…
Plants, artisan sourdough breads, cookies, smoked sea salt, dried heirloom tomatoes, smoked tomatoes, chicken breast and stock, duck breast and stock, soups, sauces, olive oils, balsamic vinegar, mesclun mix, arugula, rhubarb, sprouts, our own honey.
Meat chickens will be ready by the second week of June. Please let me know if you would like to reserve a chicken or two.
One last note
…if anybody is interested in taking one or both of our young goat bucklings home they will be weaned and ready to go by the end of May. I will be quite sad to see them leave but we are not set up just yet to keep our own bucks.Upcoming
Events…
dish
Third
Annual Plant
Thursday, May
17th from 4-6 pm
Between
Spadina and
Annual
Plant
Saturday, May
19th through Monday, May 21
11
am to 4 pm
Check
our website for available tomato varieties
Also
available are peppers, eggplant, lettuces, herbs & flowers
Port Hope and Cobourg Farmers Markets
Cobourg on Saturdays 7 am to 1 pm
Port Hope on Saturdays 8 am until noon
Optimism…
And we’ve decided to bring on a couple of Berkshire pigs this season. They will help us clear, root up, and fertilize some new areas in the third meadow for future planting. They won’t be coming ‘home’ until some time in June so Gregory, et al., have a bit of time to get their housing ‘The Pig Pub’ under way. We are looking forward to their arrival as we’ve been contemplating pigs for a few years now.
The more fertility we create on-farm the more sustainable and economical we will be.
Lastly, we hope you can all drop by The Mall on the May long weekend to say hello. It’s been several months and we find it a most exciting weekend to connect with both old and new customers. We always feel re-energized and rejuvenated on this, the first weekend of the season and feel we can accomplish all of our many ‘to do’ list items. If you can’t make it to The Mall please stop by at the Cobourg and/or Port Hope farmers markets. We will bring plants to both markets in the weeks that follow.
Elaina & Gregory
May 2012
www.WicklowWay.ca
“The most beautiful thing in the world is, of course, the world itself.”
Wallace
Stevens