2022-12-12 newsletter

Greetings from the farm,

Every day we see more and more progress and a closer return to a
familiar schedule of farming with daily planting, crop care, harvesting,
and a return to market, deliveries, and restaurant orders!

We are now harvesting generous amounts of eggplant, romano green
beans, and cabbage! Kale, arugula, lettuce, and radishes remain strong.
We are starting to see the first peppers, carrots, and larger tomatoes
ready for harvest! The strawberry crop is also looking good and
hopefully will have a good amount at the beginning of the new year.

Here is a summary of our schedule this week:

THURSDAY DELIVERIES & FARM PICK-UP: Please place
an order online before Tuesday, 8 pm, if you want home delivery or farm
pick-up for Thursday.

SATURDAY FARMERS’ MARKET AND PREORDER PICK-UP :
Market runs 8 am to noon. Please place an order by Thursday, 8 pm to
pick up your preorder at the Bonita market. If preordering, please pick
up preorders after 10 am.

If coming on Thursday to the farm, the address for picking up orders
is the old farm entrance at 14840 Old Olga Rd. Farm pick up can be from
9 am to 5 pm. Contact Danny at 239-229-3579 for any questions.

Orders can be placed online at www.12seasonsfarm.com

This is what we are harvesting:

• Summercrisp Lettuce

• Baby Butterhead Lettuce

• Cherry tomatoes (new, limited)

• Heirloom/Specialty tomatoes (new, limited)

• Arugula

• Cabbage

• Curly kale

• Flat kale

• Broccoli

• Green beans

• Cucumbers

• Zucchini

• Eggplant

• Round radish

• Daikon radish

• Dill

• Cilantro

• Saw Palmetto Honey

• Sunflowers

We are enjoying seeing so many of you at market on Saturday, at the
farm, and/or at your house for home deliveries. Thank you for all your
affirming words and bringing cheer! Here is Vicki with Susan at the
stand and Rita in the background. Thanks for all who came out last
Saturday and who ordered!

The farm is a bee hive of activity each work day. Today we have a
crew seeding carrots and Ek and others in the background working on a
tomato trellis and screen structure.

Zach is training Brittany on harvesting eggplant (along with her 2
kids hidden among the eggplants). We had an abundant harvest–80 lbs.
today. We harvest 3 days/week.

We are harvesting a lot of this Romano-type pole bean that we planted
soon after the hurricane. The seed had gotten wet when our refrigerator
that holds our seed flooded and so the seed had to be used quickly.
Furthermore, the greenhouses that were in this location were destroyed.
The trellises remained and were intended for cucumbers but in the
absence of greenhouses we planted these super delicious green beans.
These are an Italian type of flat and broad green bean that are
delicious even when large. We should have them for 2-3 more weeks.

A friend of ours own a construction company. He kindly had one of his
workers drop off several loads of pine logs that we will cut in
preparation to burn on cold nights. Pine burns well and long when cut
without splitting. We burn them in our burn barrels to raise
temperatures during future frost/freeze events. It feels strange to be
preparing for cold while still recovering from a tropical hurricane, but
the seasons march on!

We are building 2 new greenhouses and ran into a challenge with a lot
of bedrock about 2 ft. down. We are having to jackhammer the holes to
break through the bedrock to set the sidewall posts. Here it is Jack and
Jedilo on the jackhammer. We are rotating folks on this exhausting
job.

Ek and Jedilo have been masterful at repairing and rebuilding damaged
greenhouses and adding new structures like this one in the background– a
screenhouse for tomatoes. These two enjoy working together.

My “assistant” Benjamin discovered some ripening tomatoes while we
did a farm walk yesterday. Wow! So exciting to see tomatoes ripening
after such a long absence of production! Benjamin was thrilled too!

We woke up Saturday morning just thankful and excited to be going to
market. As mentioned in a previous newsletter, with all the help from
friends, family, and you all in helping us through the damaging effects
of Ian, we haven’t had time for disappointment or feeling overwhelmed.
We enjoy the opportunity to bring you fresh, healthy, and delicious
produce. Thank you!

We appreciate you all!

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