5/31/11

First Vegetable pick up is this week

Dear 2011 LES CSA Members:

It's the first week of the 2011 season!  We look forward to meeting everyone on Thursday, June 2nd.  Please bring your own bags or containers (small and large bags are recommended, unless you wish to mix all your vegies together).


Below is a message from Monkshood Nursery with info about our first share.  Please remember this is a small family organic farm that we, as members of LES CSA, have agreed to support, and the actual vegies for this week may change depending on what is harvested in the next few days.  Because of all the rain, we will have lots of salad greens during the first part of the season (FYI, another local CSA had to push back their first distribution of the season for one week due to the rain).  But looks like no drought this year, so get ready for lots of delicious vegies!

Distribution will be on Thursday, June 2nd, from 5 PM - 7:30 PM.  If you arrive prior to 5 PM, please wait, or help us setup.  Sign in, and then look carefully at what the small share and large share items/amounts are before taking your share.  Each vegie will be labeled with name and amount per share. Volunteers will either pre measure or help you measure vegies that need to be weighed.  Remember to bring your own bags or containers.  We appreciate your patience as we will have 86 members picking up!  Thanks so much.

If for any reason you will not be picking up vegies this week (or any future weeks), please email LESCSA@gmail.com and let us know, so that we can plan accordingly.  You can always have someone pick up your vegies, they just need to sign by your name.  



If you have recipes you'd like to share, please let us know.  We look forward to sharing delicious vegies with you this season!



LES CSA Core Group


Tentative List of Vegies for June 2nd:



Large Share :

1/3 # Pea Shoots
1/3 # Sunflower Shoots
Choice of 1/3 # Mizuna Mix OR Mustard Greens
Choice of 1 herb :  Oregano, Thyme, Mint
1 Bunch French Breakfast Radishes
1/3 # Sorrel
1/3 # Lettuce mix
Spring Garlic


Small Share :

Choice of 1/3 # Pea Shoots OR Sunflower Shoots
Choice of 1/3 # Mizuna Mix OR Mustard Greens
Choice of 1 herb :  Oregano, Thyme, Mint
1 Bunch French Breakfast Radishes
1/3 # Lettuce mix

News from Monkshood Nursery & Gardens



Welcome and Welcome back!  It's great to be able to grow food for you all again this year!  It's hard to believe it's June already, the older you get the quicker time goes by, or maybe it's the harder you work the less you notice the days as they pass in a blur.  



This Spring has been a busy one.  Started out very cold and continues to be very wet.  I know it's hard to remember after the heat wave we've been having these past few days, but try to remember the conditions under which your salad has had to endure in order for you to eat it.  Remember that day about 6 weeks ago when it actually stopped raining?  Well that's when David was finally able to get the tractor in the field to cultivate the soil and make a few beds in the top part of the garden - where it's drier.  Then he quickly seeded them because the forecast said more rain, and he thought - perfect for germinating seeds!  Then it rained and rained and rained and was very cold.  We covered everything with row covers to help keep the soil warm, but even so the seeds took a lot longer to germinate than they would if it was 65 degrees day and night and the plants grew very slowly too.  Then there was another day the week after, when it stopped raining enough for the soil to dry up so the tractor could get into the field again and make some more beds and spread some compost on the soil and seed some other things, like Radishes and Turnips, Beets and Spinach.  These also got row cover on them, because it was still to cold especially at night.  



As it slowly warmed up the seeds germinated, but so did all the weed seeds!!  Yuck!!  The ground was just not dry enough for long enough to make enough beds to pre-germinate the weeds first.  We have been just trying to get stuff in the ground!  We had trays and trays of transplants sitting in the greenhouse all dressed up with nowhere to go.  So in between the rain we were able to get some Lettuce Heads transplanted and some Swiss Chard and Kale and LOTS of Onions, Shallots and Leeks.  We were trying to balance the space we had available to plant in with what needed to be planted, not so easy this year, so far.  



Then, this week we finally got most of the transplants out of the greenhouse and into the ground, Scallions, more Lettuce Heads, Bok Choi, other Asian greens, Cabbages etc. and the weeds have really taken off, the soil finally reached the temperature at which every weed imaginable loves to grow.  It looks so lush and green out there, and then you say - but where did that lettuce go?  So anyway, enjoy the salads for now and eventually everything will catch up and we will have LOTS of different vegetables to tickle your taste buds.

Melinda and David Rowley of Monkshood Nursery

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