News and blog

Interesting report from the NE Governor's Commission on Land Conservation which recommends a New England Farm and Food Security Initiative. Local farms are seen as necessary! - check it out

Here's an interesting website offering a recipe search database of your favorite cookbooks - www.eatyourbooks.com

Also, check out our searchable recipes page for delicious ways to prepare the vegetables we grow!

If anyone has any recipes with our vegetables they would like to share, please email them to us and we will post them! csa@warnerfarm.com

Just wanted to update everyone on a few new growing methods we will be employing this year in our quest to become self-sufficient and sustainable. First, we are participating in a USDA pilot program to evaluate the use of high tunnels for crop production. High tunnels are mobile, unheated greenhouses. Using a high tunnel, we will be able to plant crops outdoors two weeks earlier, and harvest them an additional two weeks early. Also, high tunnels prevent moisture from accumulating on plants, all water is provided by trickle irrigation feeding the plant roots. This limits leaf wetness duration, an essential factor in disease development. Also, the temperature is elevated in these high tunnels, further thwarting disease pressure. We are excited about using high tunnels because they allow us to reduce disease pressure and lessen the impact of the many issues surrounding excess water and cool temperatures we have had to deal with in the last few years. Also, we will be able to provide our customers with more produce earlier in the year and later in the year, increasing the amount of local food available year round.

Second, we are planning to implement zone-tillage on our farm this year. Zone-tillage stands in contrast to conventional tillage, in which whole fields are plowed and many field operations are necessary to prepare the field for planting. Zone-tillage utilizes a few different traditional tillage implents, combining them into one implement which prepares a strip of soil for planting, rather than preparing the entire field. Rather than plowing in the traditional manner, which inverts roughly the top foot of the soil, zone tillage creates deep slots in the soil with a sub-soiler, then breaks up clods on the surface to ensure optimum seed-soil contact, essential for germination. You can think of zone-tillage as tilling deep "strips" as opposed to tilling the whole field in a more shallow manner. The main benefit if the breaking up of the "plow-pan," a hardpan in the soil about twelve inches down as the result of many years of plowing. The downward pressure of the plow as it moves through the soil compacts the soil at that level so that plant roots will not be able to penetrate much farther beyond those top twelve inches. The zone-tillage implement does not create this downward pressure, rather it tills a deep slot, breaking through the plow-pan. Breaking up the plow pan allows plant roots to penetrate deeper, accessing a greater wealth of water and nutrients.. It also allows water to drain more easily during times of excess moisture, which we have seen much of in the past few years. A second benefit of zone-tillage is  decreased time and fuel spent preparing fields. Zone-tillage requires about half the time and energy to prepare a field than traditional tillage.

We hope these new innovations lead to benefits for you, as the high tunnel will allow us to grow crops for you when we otherwise couldn't, and also allow us to grow clean, healthy, chemical free crops. Zone-tillage reduces our impact on the soil and the environment, and frees some of our time up to concentrate on delivering you all the best produce possible.

Greetings everyone,

                               As we look forward to 2010 and the return of light (which plants love!), we are busy here in Sunderland planning for our growing season. We continue to be inspired by the growing commitment to sustainable agriculture, manifested in the buying decisions of many customers, who are making a point to support practices they believe in with their food dollars. 2010 arrives in a world of unrest, in many ways; as a country we are at war and owe a lot of money. Looking back to the millenium change, I remember a time of relative peace in America, and certainly economic prosperity. Many feel questions inside them arising; with whom should I place my allegiances? Who is to be trusted to fight for a common well-being?

The way I see it, buying local is the best way to support what you believe in, if you believe in local people doing good things for their local community. The idea of Community Supported Agriculture is an idea I see value in for many buying decisions. Support those people who are committed to providing you with quality goods and services locally. CSAs do have a price advantage when compared to other local enterprises, however the idea of "you get what you pay for" still plays through.

Furthermore, as a consumer, the ever-increasing reporting on food security, or lack thereof, concerns me. Buying local produce is a great way to support your family or yourself with healthy, delicious food. Buying a CSA share guarantees you the ability to look your farmer in the eye as they explain how they grew your food. Farmer's markets provide this interaction as well, however the commitment involved in CSAs is something which excites everyone, I believe. Your commitment to us inspires us to do our best in all we do. CSA shares are "guaranteed business," we know you are committed and in return we have committed to being there every week with healthy, delicious food. We'll drive in the pouring rain, and then stand in it as we fill your shares. Your commitment makes this happen.

We are excited for 2010 for a number of reasons. First, we are shifting our growing focus a bit. In the past few years, I have been supplying our farmer's markets and CSA with the produce grown traditionally at Warner Farm. Mike has been managing Warner Farm for years as a wholesale business, developing a reputation as a reliable source of high-quality fruits and vegetable for many of our local markets. While this is a successful business model, it began at a time when direct-market opportunities were fewer for farmers. With the resurgence of commitment to local agriculture in the last ten years or so, farmers are finding new ways to grow diverse crops on a smaller land base. An increase in direct market opportunities allows for more attention and care to the crops being raised. The new model, common with CSAs, is to grow a wide variety of crops really well for your committed customers. The old wholesale model is to grow as much as you think you can sell of one crop. The old model was this way because the profit margins are slim for a farmer selling his produce wholesale. There are distributors and stores working along the way to get the food from farm to table, and they necessarily consume some of the final price you pay at the store.

We will be raising the majority of our crops for our markets and CSA in the new market garden, and will continue to raise crops like strawberries, sweet corn, asparagus, beans, peas, peppers and eggplant for the wholesale market. We are known for raising these delicious crops, and want to continue to satisfy the demand for them. Crops grown in the market garden will be grown in a more diverse, natural setting, with very-limited chemical usage. As with all crops at Warner Farm, we practice Integrated Pest Management.

The idea of the market garden inspires me, because I get to think about more creative ways to use the land. Wholesale growing is very linear, concerned mostly with the bottomline and crop yield in a given space. Diverse, market-garden scale growing invokes a more circular thought process, one which involves the cycle of life and death in the soil, nutrient cycling, pest and plant interactions, and the impact of our growing systems on nutrient quality and also our local environment.

So, for 2010, join our CSA! Help us grow our commitment to sustainable agriculture. The more support and excitement we see from our customers, the more excited we are about growing you all the best possible food we can.