The Open Gate Farm
May 3, 2009
Opening the Stand This Thursday!
Dear Friends of the Farm:
There is something magical about “opening day”. Yesterday was “opening day” of the boating season down in
Here on the farm, however, yesterday was spent weeding and planting and digging and watering and running to the store for more paint and supplies and then collapsing at the end of the day. For you see, our “Opening Day” will be this Thursday. For us, this is the day the stand gets launched upon the ocean of hope. It is the day that the lettuce we planted back in January takes center stage and is paraded out for your purchase. It is the day the most tender rhubarb of the season is gently plucked and set out for you to make into sauces, pies, cakes, cookies and for us to run out of fresh eggs from the ladies down in back. It is the day we start giving tours and hear the stories of what you all have done over the winter.
It is also the day before 29 artists here on our little island open their studios to the public for tours. This Mother’s Day Weekend event is well publicized, for which we are grateful, for our little 2 acres is located on a main road for their traffic. So when you come up to see the paintings and pottery, stop in and pick up some
But leave your dogs in the cars. Snickers wants all your attention too.
This Spring, there has been a rising note of anxiety in the agricultural press regarding food safety. We too, are concerned that no one gets sick from eating anything we provide. Toward that end, we have spent time this winter just past studying up on this issue. We’ve never heard of anyone getting sick from our food, but we have changed a few practices here to enhance that level of safety for you.
Bad bugs come from two sources primarily. One is animals (wild ones like deer, especially). The other is cleanliness. We addressed both of these last year and enhanced our security measures this year again.
Fencing in the garden has eliminated the deer and rabbit salad bar. You will notice it is a tall net fence along Lake Grove. It has been up for over a year and we have not seen it broached yet. The fence on the yard side is lower, and made of wire. But the 2” square openings are too small for even a rabbit. We know because we saw Peter try one evening this week and he left with an empty shopping basket. And we are in the process of installing fencing along
Cleanliness. No matter whether you buy your food from us or up at the store, you must wash it before you eat it. We rinse ours all off here before putting it out for purchase, but that is more for looks than for a guarantee of sanitation. Shiny carrots sell better than muddy ones. If you want to munch a radish on the way home, we suggest you wait. But we are putting in better washing facilities down in the garden, and looking at how to keep the produce hydrated on the stand.
Because many of our items are heirloom, they tend to be tender and fragile and don’t stay crisp and fresh as long as the pesticide grown ones from stores do. This means we don’t pick as much at one time and we need to keep them chilled and sprinkled during the heat of the day. When you think of how often the sprayers go off in the stores which are air conditioned, then you’ll understand why shade and cool breezes are important to our efforts.
One other point of interest may be the manure we use. While it comes from happy cows, it is still cow manure and we use it liberally around here. But this year, we are following the guidelines we found. We built that big composting box for reason. We filled it last fall and monitored the temperature to make sure it spent 3 days at over 170 degrees Fahrenheit. This is the temperature that kills salmonella. Additionally, it sat for over 90 days, the time by which it has been established bad bugs die in compost. Only then does it get spread on the ground and dug in to feed the food we eat.
This is actually a good thing. The composting process takes time because the manure and wood chips and straw rot down and are converted into a form which is far easier for the plant roots to absorb. That is why lettuce fed composted manure will outgrow lettuce grown in fresh manure every time. And time is what this is all about.
We just ran across a note from last year. It seems when we planted some radishes between a couple rows of lettuce, that lettuce grew twice as fast as the ones without radishes by their feet. Don’t know why…but we’re going to trundle out to the garden and see if it works again this year. The “why” may make a good research project for Kathryn, our intern, when she gets here.
Several of our readers do not have high speed internet access. To keep their lives free from the boredom of long downloads, we do not include pictures with these newsletters. However, we have started a blog, thanks to our son, Adam, and his patient tutoring of the old woodchuck. You can visit it at www.theopengatefarm.blogspot.com where there are pictures and more articles. It will not be replacing this newsletter, but augmenting it. You will also find this newsletter there, if you want to pass the blog address along to friends.
Blogging is not, however, high on the list of activities of Snickers, our small farm dog. He has been very busy lately, supervising the work around here. His extraordinary digging skills are evident in the lawn and flower beds which by now should be pretty much rock free. He does like to run past the chickens at top speed and has figured out exactly how close he can come to them so they will be startled but not scream which gets him into trouble. And he is always ready to guide the squirrels back up their tree and point Peter back to his hole in the sun filled grove of trees by the back lane.
It’s been a good winter, a delightful spring, and if you folks come by for a visit, the summer will be excellent. Hope to see you soon!
Happy Hoeing,
Jon and Elaine and Snickers the hustling farm dog, Mystery the sleepy farm cat, Jerry and Harley and the girls from the girl choir, and of course, Chai, DD, Quackers, and Cheese the dog watching ducks
The Open Gate Farm
360-387-4449
Opening Thursday, May 7th!!!
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