May Newsletter

Zero to Lightspeed in Less than 60 Seconds
The weather in April went from "Oh no you don't" to "Hurry up, you're late" in a frighteningly short period of time.  Tammy and I have now entered the season of Advil (we could go another nine innings), Insta-tan, peach/lemon smoothies, VAPs and difficulty concentrating while writing monthly newsletters.

As a result, we will just show another picture.

Weather Wythards
This year, April really outdid itself.  Just see the weather facts from our weather station below:

April's Report
High Temp: 83 (April 30)
Low Temp: 10 (and we hit 11 as a low temp four times as well)
Heat Index: 81   and   Wind Chill: -3
Highest wind gust: 46 mph out of the northeast (Apr 30's top speed was 37 out of the south)
Rain: 1.04"
Snow:  Yeah, yeah.  We got snow.  I'm not counting that anymore.... pfffft.
Barometer Range: 29.49 to 30.50

Year Through April
High Temp: 83 (in fact every day in the last week seemed to set a new high for the year)
Low Temp: -20
Lowest Windchill: -34
Highest Wind gust: 46 mph
Rainfall: 4.5"
Barometer Range: 29.39 to 30.89

Picture of the Month
You have probably figured out our picture of the month is usually last month's picture.  Surely you didn't expect a picture from THIS month when I write this newsletter (usually) in the prior month?  You do?  Oh.

I guess I'll work on that.

We showed everyone more than enough pictures of the pretty snow in April in prior posts.  Instead, we'd like to show you how we tuck our plants in at night when it gets cold outside.  In fact, the night of April 30 is the first night we have NOT tucked plants in for the night.  Sadly, as soon as I saw this picture, I started to panic that I had forgotten to do this nightly chore.  Then, I looked at the current temperature.

Normally, we'd like to be hardening these plants off at this point.  But, there is a difference between hardening them off and finishing them off.  We'd like to aim for the former and not the latter if at all possible.

May Calendar
 We are going to enter the month of May with our calendar completely in flux.  This is not a normal state for us as we usually have some set deliveries to announce.  But, when the produce isn't showing signs of really getting going, we just have to play it by ear.  We did see a couple of scout asparagus spears, but it will still be a bit before they really get going.  And the rhubarb is about 2 weeks a way if we had a guess.

• May 1 - Egg and Spinach Delivery
• rest of month TBA

See!  There IS rhubarb there.

Song of the Month
This time there isn't a YouTube link to the song that I can find.  Not that I looked terribly hard mind you.

The song is Walking Backwards by the Mellowdramatic Wallflowers.  Their album Daffadowndilly can be found here.  There's just something about a tune that starts with the words "Five million dandelions bloom.."  It just SCREAMS May, doesn't it?

Heirloom Plants Available
 We have extra plants that will be available for sale.  We will not set up special sales or go to the farmers market.  But, if you want some heirloom tomatoes or peppers (and maybe eggplant), please let us know and we can arrange a way for you to get them.

CSA and Chicken Shares Still Available
Yes, we are still taking sign ups for 2018.  Hey, the season has been slow to get started and no one really had much chance to even think about Spring, much less CSA's.  Let's get this party started!

News Shorts
There farmers are tired, but there is much to report.  So, we'll adopt the short blurb method!

• We are still taking CSA signups and chicken share signups.
• We are working on contacting everyone for billing (whether paid or not).  A little patience please as we adapt to new schedules and work loads.
• We are looking for a little help with each of our distributions and/or someone to help with either social media presence or membership tracking.  Anyone interested?
• The potatoes went into the ground on April 30 - on a full moon.  That's a good sign, right?
• Rob attended a training workshop for produce safety that has been created in response to new Federal regulations.  The certificate certifying that Rob is certifiable is now in our possession.  He also knows stuff about produce safety.  Ok, he knew stuff about it prior to the training, but now he has a piece of paper saying that he knows.  Isn't that fun?
• The Genuine Faux Farm has a new organic certification as well.  My, we sure are being certified, aren't we?
• Rob and Tammy (with some help from Jocelyn and Kennedy on the first day) managed to get through all of the tomato, pepper and eggplant potting.  Usually that doesn't happen until a bit later.  What?  You didn't think we did nothing when it was cooler, did you?
• The Poultry Pavilion outstrips the number of grounded outlets in our house by a good measure.  And, where might the grounded outlets in our house be?  How about the basement - where we start our plants.  Hmmm.  Priorities, what might they be?
• The new hen chicks are doing reasonably well.  We were able to keep their area in the brooder room warm enough during cold we had in early April.
• The first broiler chicken batch is now doing well, but we lost about a third of them early on.  Sadly, they arrived during some of the coldest weather and we just couldn't keep them warm enough.  We have long since gotten past the idea of putting chicks in our basement.  Did that ONCE.  Not doing it again.
• The kitchen project continues in our 'spare' time on the farm.  We have managed to move the old cabinet and sink to the basement, where we can wash eggs and dishes during the transition period.  We are hopeful the transition period won't last longer than a few years.....er... weeks.  Ya, that's what I meant.  Right?

Time to Have Pun
We pulled our bicycles out of the basement.  Now we're both two-tired to pun.  We had to adjust the calipers and pads so we would be prepared to take a brake from punning.  I could pedal our puns to you but that would only work if we spoke out loud.