Wood Duck Farm

January 10th, 2011

 Borrowing a phrase from the Sponge Bob cartoon......"Aaarrggg!" Is what I have to say about this cold weather.  While winter is a necessary part of the annual weather cycle, as it helps keep some of the bad bug population in-check amongst other things, this cold damp weather is making my old football injuries get achy again.  Most of the crops that we are currently growing outside such as garlic, onions, broccoli, mustards etc,  can take the cold, but we'll need to place some heat lamps around our water wells and pumps, as the next few days are supposed to be pretty chilly. The young chickens still have heat in their brooders, but the birds older than two weeks will be out in their moveable coups on their on.  The pigs? Well the pigs huddle around and on top of each other to get warm. When the sun comes out, they get real frisky and chase each other around; kinda' like young kids playing "tag" at school. Sometimes they'll bite one another's butt; as a friendly gesture of course.  Farm humor, yep that is one of the things that "keeps us keeping on."

So How Are We Doing?  As mentioned previously, sometimes it is hard to get feedback as to what our CSA customers really think about our farm and what we grow.  With our wholesale customers, the chefs will just call you and let you know. At the Farmer's Market, customers again will let you know how good (and occasionally bad) something tastes.   The CSA program is a little different as we only occasionally hear comments and/or suggestions from farm members.  Well wishing to receive customer feedback, we sent out a questionnaire last Monday to members of our most recent CSA program. Thus far we have received about 78 responses and are pretty proud of our results, at least so far. When asked about the quality of veggies, 62% rated them "outstanding," 37% being "good."  When asked about value, 76% rated the fall program as being "good value," whereas "okay value" received a 22%. rating. About farm communication, recipes etc,? We scored a favorable 86% rating. Yea!!! When asked about whether they'll "participate in future WDF CSA programs and/or refer to this program to a friend," 67 out of 78, or 86% said yes.  We'll post all of our survey results on our website soon. If you are interested, a link to the results from our Spring/Summer 2010 CSA Survey can be found at  WDF Spring 2010 Survey Results   and at 2010 WDF Customer Comments  Both of these links can be found on our home page under current events.

Progress? For the past two years, we've been washing our CSA produce and packing our boxes underneath shade trees in our front yard.  When it rains, we just pop out our Farm Mkt tents and keep on going. Well, this past week we began building forms for what we hope will someday be a concrete slab. The plan is for us to later erect a building upon where we can wash produce and pack boxes without fear of the elements. We've got an extra walk-in cooler, so we are also hoping to install the cooler with the idea that we can pack a day ahead and possibly begin deliveries early the day of delivery. Wow wouldn't that be a neat idea? Perhaps we would show up on-time more often than not?  The cooler also has a freezer part where we can store meat for our upcoming Meat Subscription Program. We'll keep you posted on our progress.

Spring 2011 CSA Program: Hard to believe that this past week we started sowing tomato seeds for the spring. We seed them individually in cell trays and then heat them with "commercial like heating pads" until they germinate. We then set them out in one of our greenhouses to grow until they are later transplanted into the field.  We just received our field soil sample results this past Friday. While we are a little deficient in some areas, our soil pH range (acidity) is right where we wish for it to be, i.e. 6.2-6.8.   So no lime needed to be applied this year.  Still targeting the early March timeframe for our start date.   Interested in signing up? Our Spring CSA registration form can be found at this link Spring 2011 CSA Registration . We have simplified the registration process to be just a few mouse clicks, completing your contact info, and then paying with your credit card.  If you'd rather mail in your registration and/or pay with a check, you can go to this link WDF CSA Mail-In Form    What's New?  We have added an Alternating Week option to our two share sizes, Full and Partial. The Alternating Week option (AW) is for those not wishing to get receive a full share every week. So with the AW option, a farm member receives a Full share every odd week of the ten week program, i.e. weeks 1,3,5,7, and 9.   Spring, Cypress, SugarLand, Pearland, Clear Lake and Friendswood?   We are looking to add additional Pick Up locations for the upcoming spring program. Let us know if you are interested in becoming a host and/or know of someone/someplace for one of our pick up locations.  We currently deliver to locations in the Houston and surrounding areas, visit CSA Pickup Locations for a current map/listing.  For inquires email us at csa@woodduckfarm.com or call us at 713 876 8645 for more details.

Grass Fed Meat/Egg Subscription Program  A few weeks ago we sent you a questionnaire about what interest/comments you may have in a meat subscription program. After reviewing the feedback from about 68 respondents, we have decided that we don't have enough interest in the Cow Milk to warrant this as an viable option. We did have a lot of interest in the meat however, so we integrated your input and created two choices, 1) our Full Share, comprised of Grass Fed Beef, Pork and Chicken, priced at $210 for a three-month program and/or 2) our Poultry Share priced at $165 for three months. The Full Share will average about 11-12 #s and generally consist of one or two whole chickens, 30-40% ground meats (sausages, ground beef), a roast cut, and possibly a ham steak and/or Canadian Bacon. The Poultry Share each month will be comprised of approximately three young pastured chickens and a Chicken sausage or "kid hotdogs", (made with no pork, beef or "weird" by products.) In case you are wondering, 11# of meat will occupy about 25% of the space in an average sized overhead "refrigerator" freezer.Shares will be packaged, frozen & delivered once per month to your choice of our pick up locations located in the Houston areaToo much meat for your family? Consider splitting a share with a friend. I have included some samples below of what you may receive.

Eggs and possibly additional cuts of beef/pork/lamb will be available as an "add-on" item to your monthly delivery.We'll have registration and related information about our Meat Subscription Program on our website soon or you can email me direct at csa@woodduckfarm.com or call me on my cell # provided below.

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

All the Best,

Van Weldon

Cell 713 876 8645

www.woodduckfarm.com

email csa@woodduckfarm.com

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