April News

Hello All,

Like the tops of the daffodils emerging from the semi-frozen ground we farmers are poking our heads out of garages and greenhouses and, maybe, just maybe, taking off our topmost layer of wool or fleece. What a winter! We slipped and skidded and chipped our way through, but we made it. I try during the cold months to hold onto an earthly sense of the importance of dormancy, of the winter die-back, of the snow – but somewhere along the way I got a little bitter this year. But Spring’s magic has erased all that: in one joyous explosion of sunshine and color, bitterness becomes folly.

We are rearing to go. The greenhouses are filling up with May’s seedlings. The baby chicks arrived today (see below!): a complete work stoppage ensued while we spent an hour playing mother hen, enthralled with their little feet and melting over their little peeps. Our CSAers have risen to a new challenge: the “adopt-a-chick” program. These volunteer chick-foster-families will each rear three chicks and return them to the farm to join our laying flock. We hope the adopt-a-chick program will be a fun and educational way to bring the farm home (temporarily) and to ensure the continuance of a safe local food supply.

In other news:

THE CSA for 2009 is nearly full - We have increased to 150 shares this year in our Community Supported Agriculture Program. CSA and The Hickories were in the New York Times this winter as a potential bright spot for consumers during this economically challenging time. (Click here for New York Times link.) In our food system or in our economy, information that is hidden or shrouded in complexity has proven itself to be extremely dangerous. We are heartened by people’s unfailing support for our work here: growing food and selling it to neighbors is a refreshingly simple business model.

EARTH WEEK – Ridgefield has coordinated a number of festivities throughout the week and The Hickories will be involved in several of them. From local library talks on organic gardening to seed planting activities to Adopt a Chick play dates, I hope everyone can participate in some of the goings-on in our community. On Saturday, April 25th we will be celebrating at Ancona’s Market (planting seeds) and the town’s Arbor Day Celebration at the Rec Center.

I am sad to report that NEW POND FARM, a place that we have respected and valued as both a model farm and a partner in our CSA, has changed its focus. The board and director have called for the selling of the majority of the herds and flocks and, by all counts, taken the farm out of production. New Pond will remain an educational model but no longer be able to supply food to our towns. I do not like to witness the loss of another food production partner in Fairfield County – a county fast becoming a food desert in Connecticut.

Michelle Obama tilled under the White House Lawn, the Farm Bureau’s recent “Grow Your Own” workshop was oversubscribed, and we have been inundated with requests from CSAers eager to adopt chicks for our laying flock: I am so glad to see the bloom of enthusiasm for sustainable farming over the past few years coming to bear real action and real food. Eliot Coleman in a workshop this winter admonished us all to live “Antaeus-like”, Antaeus being the greek god whose strength was unmatched only so long as his feet were connected to the soil. Each year I put out the same simple plea in our Spring newsletter -- join us: start producing some of your own food. Till under your lawn, if that’s what it takes; put in a small crop of swiss chard instead of another bed of impatiens; put out a window box; bring your own expertise to the movement and support local organic farmers wherever you can find them.

All the best,
Dina Brewster