Wood Duck Farm

December 17th, 2010

Quiet week this week here at the farm. No need to call the fire department, right? The only humorous story to mention was that of a lady wishing to know if the greens on cauliflower were the same as "collard greens." Get it? Cauli-greens.! Must be my accent?

Hard freeze earlier this week. Planted lots and lots of onions this week, red, yellow and white. shallots and garlic too. Several thousand I'm guessing. They'll be ready in the spring.  Speaking of spring, we began ordering tomato seeds today as the week between Christmas and New Years is when we begin sowing tomato and pepper seeds in our greenhouses for transferring later to the fields in March/April. Last year we planted over 7,000 tomato plants. Although winter has not officially begun yet, we're already thinking 90 days out, the spring or vernal equinox is usually around March 21^st or so.

Next week is our tenth and final week of our Fall CSA program, which began, back in mid October. Overall it has been a pretty good season; not too cold, not too wet. This past week members received the following:

Baby Leaf Salad Mix, (romaine, tango, red oak leaf, arugula, mizuna)
Button Mushrooms
Cabbage

Radishes
Sweet Potatoes
Turnips w/tops

Grapefruit

While it depends a lot on what kind of weather SE Texas receives, our harvest for the Spring CSA Program 2011 is proposed to begin in early March.  Our Spring CSA registration form can be found at this link WDF CSA Mail-In Form We have two share sizes, Full and Partial.  Partial share prices are apt to increase a few dollars after the first of the year, so please consider purchasing early. For those of you not familiar with the term CSA, it stands for Community Supported Agriculture and is a direct partnership between you and the farmer. 

Shameless Marketing: Looking for that holiday gift that is unique and different? We've put together a festive Holiday Gift card that allows you to present that special someone a share in our Spring CSA program. .  Not only are you providing a gift of delicious fresh locally grown food, but you are also helping your community, investing in cleaner air and water, and helping support a local family farm!  The Ten-week Program Shares are available in two sizes, Partial Shares, good for about two adults @ $220, and Full Shares, for a larger family @ $330. As mentioned above, we beginning to plant now with the intentions of our first harvest/deliveries targeted to begin in early March 2011. The ten weeks of deliveries will extend into early to mid May.  Crops to be planted will be Cucumbers, Green beans, Corn, Kale, Tomatoes, Arugula , Basil , Peppers , Eggplant, Okra , Radishes, Salad mix, Green garlic, Boc choy, Broccoli, Cauliflower, Mustard greens, Spinach, Butternut squash, Carrots, Fennel, Dill, Turnips, Chard, New Potatoes, Beets, Cabbage, and Micro Greens, Send us an email at csa@woodduckfarm.com or call us at 713 876 8645 for more details.  For a link to where we deliver in the Houston and surrounding areas, visit CSA Pickup Locations 

Grass Fed Meat/Dairy Subscription Program   Many of you took a few moments earlier this week to respond to our survey about the viability of creating a Grass Fed Meat/Dairy program to compliment our CSA veggie program.  The results were very encouraging, so we are making arrangements to see how we can put a program together. Likely, the program will be delivered once a month and offer two choices, a combo (pork, chicken, beef) and beef/poultry only.  We'll be at the Urban Harvest on Saturday sampling some the pork that was raised here on our farm and will be a part of the program, i.e. German, Polish, Green Onion, and Chicken sausage links. As mentioned previously, we'll raise our own pork/poultry and leave the cattle to the experts. In fact we've already spoken with two ranchers devoted to high quality grass fed beef, Allen over at PaiDom (pronounced "pie-dome") and Karen at Star Haven.  We'll keep you posted as more details develop. 

Next Farm Dinner?   We've had several inquiries as to when our next Farm Dinner will be held.  Some folks have mentioned that they are interested in coming out the Saturday evening before Valentine's Day, which falls on a Monday this coming February.  It could definitely be a cozy event inside the "ol' school house" on a cool winter night.  Let us know what you think.   

Visiting the Urban Harvest Farmer's Mktl on Saturday morning?  Please stop by and say hi!

Incidentally, a lot of our farm events and details can be found on our Face Book page as well.

All the Best,

Van Weldon

Cell 713 876 8645

www.woodduckfarm.com

email csa@woodduckfarm.com