Orchard Hill Farm CSA
Spring, 2008
Dear Members Past and Present,
Another year has rolled around! We are anticipating spring and the seedlings for early transplants are coming up in the greenhouse. Some head lettuce and Pac Choy have already been transplanted to our hoop houses. Our apprentices are lined up for this growing year. Yehuda Nestel will be returning for his second season. Jessica Foote, a future farmer who expects to have her own CSA in 2009, will be joining us for the months of April and June. Anna McFaul, a farm girl from Prince Edward County and University of Guelph student, will be here for the full season. Maciej Jamrozik, a University of Toronto Forestry and Geology student will be here from May to the beginning of September. They will be a good team to work with and we hope you will enjoy getting to know them during the coming season.
The bunkhouse is up with the windows, doors and the solar electric panels in place. The frame came from the woodlot, the straw from the farm field and the clay for the plaster on the walls is dug out of our hillside. We enjoyed two work bees in the fall, when many of our CSA members came and helped with the frame raising and straw bale wall building. The building has taken on a wonderful energy from the natural beauty of the wooden timber frame and the fun that everyone had in its construction. Building the straw walls reminded me of a making forts in the barn when I was a kid. At the end of the day my cheeks hurt from smiling so much. I can hardly wait to get into the mud pie stage when we cover the straw with clay.
Michelle Jory, who apprenticed here for three years, is starting her own farm business this year. She is renting land from us and using our horses and equipment. You will be hearing from her about her Fall/Winter CSA.
After much consideration Ken and I have decided not to renew our organic certification when our current certification runs out, since all of our produce is now marketed locally to you, our CSA members. Organic certification is required where organic products are shipped long distances and the consumer needs assurance from a certification body that the producer is indeed abiding by the spirit and the letter of organic agricultural rules. We will continue to use organic practices and are happy to answer questions you may have and explain our methods to you. We feel we are going well beyond compliance with organic rules by using draft horses to address concerns about fossil fuel use in agriculture. We also hope to have the whole farm off the electrical grid by 2010 by using renewable energy sources, because of concerns about nuclear and coal electrical generation.
It is with a great sense satisfaction that we share the bounty of our local organically grown harvest with you our CSA members.
We hope to see you in the spring,
Martha Laing
519-775-2670
kmlaing@execulink.com