2025-01-27 newsletter

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm,

We are grateful to have survived without significant crop damage from
the cold weather last Saturday morning. We recorded 32.2 degrees on the
farm and had a strong frost. We had covered the most sensitive crops–
eggplant, tomatoes, zucchini, and peppers. The majority of the other
crops did spectacularly well.

We have 2 upcoming workshops!

This coming Saturday, Feb. 1, we plan to have an open house with free
farm tours. There will be a salt workshop at 10 am led by Don Slinger
for those interested in learning about the Sea of Cortez salt and its
many benefits. There will be ongoing farm tours led by our staff and an
array of delicious foods prepared from farm produce for you to enjoy.
The open house runs from 10 am to 1 pm.

On Saturday, Feb. 8, Anna Klein will be giving a medicinal cooking
class from 10 am to 1 pm. There is a suggested donation of $30-50 for
the medicinal cooking class. Anna has led a number of workshops over the
years and the feedback we receive is overwhelmingly positive.

To rsvp or for more information, email [email protected]. Please
indicate which workshop(s) you are interested in.

The Sanibel drop site went well this past week. Thank you to those
who tried that out and especially to Melissa Lehman, the host. We hope
this new option provides a helpful and/or closer option for many of you
on the islands.

For those ordering for Thursday farm pickup or home delivery please
order by 8 pm Tuesday. And for the Bonita market on Saturday by 8 pm
Thursday.

Here is our schedule for this week: 

TUESDAY CAPTIVA FARMER’S MARKET: Market runs from
9am-1pm. For those wanting to preorder for the market, please do so by 8
pm on Sunday for pick-up at the Tuesday market.

TUESDAY SANIBEL DROP SITE: A free drop site in
Sanibel each Tuesday from 9 am to 3 pm. This site is hosted by Melissa
Lehman. Her address and phone # should be on your order confirmation
email. This will be a self-serve option. Pick up at their home in their
screened foyer which is easily accessible from their driveway. Produce
will be on shelves. There should be 1 spot open their driveway for a
quick pick up. Order online and please pay by credit card (no cash or
checks please) ** .** If you see Melissa, please thank
her for providing this option. Order by 8 pm Sunday for this option.

THURSDAY FARM PICK-UP & HOME DELIVERY: Place an
order online before 8 pm Tuesday for Thursday all day pick-up at the
farm or to receive a home delivery. For farm pick-up, use original farm
entrance, 14840 Old Olga Rd. Order is usually split between cold produce
in walk-in cooler and the air conditioned structure just left of walk-
in cooler.

 SATURDAY BONITA SPRINGS FARMER’S
MARKET: Market runs from 8am-noon at the Promenade at Bonita
Bay in Bonita Springs. For those interested in preordering for the
market, please do so before 8 pm on Thursday for pick-up at the Saturday
market.

SATURDAY SEA OF CORTEZ SALT WORKSHOP AND FREE FARM
TOURS : This Saturday, Feb 1, at 10 am we are hosting a salt
workshop with farm tours and delicious farm salads to follow. Open house
runs from 10 am to 1 pm. Please RSVP at [email protected] for this free
event.

Here is the label we have for the Sea of Cortez salt. This salt is
known to contain 90 valuable minerals. The taste is extraordinary. I
consider it the finest of all salts and this is what we use in our home
as our main salt source. It was Dr. Maynard Murray who back in the 1930s
studied centenarians (i.e. people living > 100 years old) and
concluded that a diet near the sea with the full complement of sea
minerals were critical to human health and longevity. He researched
various salt deposits around the world and determined that the salt
resulting from evaporated sea water from the mineral rich Sea of Cortez
was an exceptional source. He promoted its use among farmers to
remineralize soils. Dr. Maynard’s vision was to see this inexpensive
fertilizer source be applied to mineral deprived soils across the US
which would result in more nutrient rich foods and thereby reduce some
of the debilitating diseases he was seeing as a medical doctor.

We are trying to do this on our own farm since 2017 and believe it is
making for healthier soils and crops. We have been applying it to our
soils to remineralize them and enhance crop health and production. In
later years I learned about its role also as a valuable table salt. It
was Don Slinger who I met while he was visiting the Captiva Farmer’s
market years ago who introduced me to its use as an edible salt. Since
2021 we have made this available to you. I still purchase the Sea-90
agricultural fertilizer product from Seven Springs Farm Supply in
Virginia and the table salt I buy through Don Slinger who is a promoter
and distributor for this healthy and tasty salt in Minnesota. We hope
some of you will come this Saturday to the farm and hear from Don
himself and learn more about this amazing salt.

If you have questions about the farm, upcoming workshops, or your
orders please feel free to text or call Danny at 239-229-3579.

 Place orders at
12seasonsfarm.com

This is what we are harvesting:

• Strawberries
• Swiss Chard
• Curly Kale
• Flat Kale
• Mixed Kale (a mix of multiple kale varieites)
• Mustard greens
• Collard greens
• Arugula
• Summercrisp lettuce
• Romaine lettuce
• Baby Butterhead lettuce
• Large leaf Butterhead lettuce
• Heirloom and specialty tomatoes
• Cherry tomato
• Carrots
• Beets
• Round radish
• Watermelon radish
• Daikon radish
• Broccolini
• Cauliflower
• Cabbage
• Cucumbers
• Zucchini
• Eggplant
• Basil
• Cilantro
• Dill
• Mint
• Chocolate Mint– NEW and limited
• ****Rosemary
• Papaya (very limited)
• Passionfruit
• Lemons
• Pummelo
• Grapefruit
• Honeybell Tangelo
• Bananas (very limited)
• Starfruit
• Avocado
• Sunflowers
• Saw palmetto honey
• Wildflower honey
• Sea of Cortez salt
• Mango, Monkey, and Strawberry Butter

Last Tuesday in spite of being a tough weather day we had one of the
best Captiva markets of the season– cold, rain, wind, and all. A big
thank you to Carrie and Justine (seen in photo). Well done enduring all
morning the cold, wet and breezy conditions. And thank you to all who
came out!

We had a lot of work on Friday preparing for the cold weather. We had
to close the endwalls and sides of the greenhouses. It is a lot of work
preparing for these cold events.

For the vegetable crop protection, Jack made a special bamboo cutting
jig to cut strips of bamboo and then bend and heat treat them to keep
their form around burn barrels. He used an old machete that was cut to
pieces and welded the pieces inside a metal pipe that he pushed the
bamboo through to end up with bamboo strips.

The arches were then placed over the sensitive crops.

And then the frost cloth was placed over the top of the arches. This
minimizes the contact between the crop leaves and cloth. Leaves in
direct contact with the frost/freeze cloth often get damaged as the
frost settles on the the outside of the cloth rapidly conducting heat
away from the leaves touching the underside of the blanket.

We had a heavy frost but thankfully the most sensitive crops were
covered. The crops like the flat kale in the above photo tolerate heavy
frost as we had this morning.

The largest area of our vegetable production occurs in a low-lying
part of the farm that is especially susceptible to cold temperatures. It
is the same part of the farm that floods as cold weather sinks and flows
like water draining to the lowest part of the farm. We recorded 32.2 in
that area this morning.

But thankfully with the heroic efforts of a great team, the sensitive
crops were well protected and came out unscathed.

We are proud of the team that worked hard this week in the cool and
wet conditions. Rose and Ann are seen working in the rain harvesting the
dill.

Jeanna and Susanna worked very hard in cleaning and washing the
lettuce under less than ideal conditions.

And the kids worked hard late at night checking temperatures, turning
on the propane heaters in the greenhouses, and working during their
chore time in the morning on some tomato maintenance of pruning lower
leaves.

Now the weather is beautiful and this morning we are harvesting
cauliflower for tomorrow’s market.

Early mornings, late nights, cold and wet days– farming is not easy
especially last week; but, with such a great team there is little time
to contemplate the challenges. Rather, we rejoice in the gift of being
able to labor hard among such an amazing team in a noble effort to bring
high quality food to customers who genuinely appreciate these
efforts.

Thank you for supporting us and allowing us the continued
opportunities to serve you!

All the best,

Danny, Vicki, the kids, and the 12 Seasons Team