With the end of the summer in sight, my farmer’s evaluation of the 2023 growing season is that it certainly proved to be very challenging.
However, we were very fortunate to have almost always harvested at least a portion of our crops. In contrast, many of our farmer friends in other parts of New England may have lost entire crops in flooded fields or spring frosts.
As many of you know, the market was quite busy this summer, and I appreciate all the support from our many customers.
Given the large number of daily visitors and the difficult working conditions around the farm, I am very grateful for the many members of our farm team who carried out the numerous and varied tasks seven days a week, from early morning to late in the night in our farm market, farm kitchen and bakery, garden center, fields and greenhouses, and numerous other areas that are all part of our farm. (There’s a lot that goes on behind the scenes!)
Many of you have asked about the new building construction behind our farmhouse across the street. I am pleased to say we are having a new barn constructed on the same site as the old barn my family used for generations to raise livestock and store feed.
Our new barn will serve as a vegetable processing and storage facility, replacing functions now taking place in the much too small green building, our first permanent farm stand, located beside our parking lot.
The neat part of all this work is that we can build a barn that will be used to serve the operations of our current farm, so different from the days of the livestock and dairy cows from my grandfather's and father's time.
Elsewhere on the farm, we continue to be busy. We continue to pick food from you from our fields. In some of our greenhouses, we are growing crops for you to enjoy in November and December. Other greenhouses are filling up with plants for fall and the holidays. Our garden center is full of plants for you to enjoy now, plus perennials and shrubs to plant now so you can enjoy their blooms next year.
Our field crew has also been harvesting pumpkins and it’s quite fun to watch them load the trailer for the trip to our market and garden center. (See a video by clicking here.) For those who like to pick your own pumpkins, our “pick your own” pumpkin patch opens this Saturday, September 23, along with our corn maze.
For our 2023 corn maze, Wes again came up with a design that ties into our farm history. Read about our corn maze design here.
So as our yard and garden center with pumpkins, gourds, and corn stalks, we’re ready to welcome you to our farm and fall!