News

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, We had our final Bonita Springs farmer market of this season. Now we will open the market at our farm for Saturdays in June. You are welcome and encouraged to preorder for the Saturday market since production becomes more limited as we enter the final month of our selling season.…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, We are in the final 6 weeks of vegetable season here. The heat has been unrelenting. Thankfully, we know at some point it is going to be like this and so have already adjusted our planting calendar to include mostly heat tolerant cultivars for this final phase of growing. Even…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, The heat and humidity are really intense here and certain crops like cabbage, celery, and zucchini are nearly done or finished. The crop diversity declines when we get intense and prolonged heat/humidity spells like this in the spring. The tomatoes are still doing exceptionally well as we are still harvesting…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, We have entered the final couple months of this season. This week we scale back to just one market per week in Bonita at the Promenade Shops. As I have mentioned in previous seasons, the south Florida farm season is book-ended by incredible heat and humidity– the opposite of northern…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, This Tuesday, April 30, will be our final Captiva market of this season. Thank you to all of you who have attended that market and supported 12 Seasons Farm. We do plan to start delivering to Sanibel and Captiva on Tuesday, May 7. We will evaluate to see if there…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, This Tuesday, April 30, will be our final Captiva market of this season. Thank you to all of you who have attended that market and supported 12 Seasons Farm. We do plan to start delivering to Sanibel and Captiva on Tuesday, May 7. We will evaluate to see if there is enough…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, The farm continues to be productive even in this intense heat. It is cutting short certain crops like Baby Butterhead lettuce (forcing us to harvest at a much younger stage), celery, and strawberries, but most crops are doing fine. Our current plan is to do the Captiva market through the…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, The tomato quality is superb right now! The added heat and length of day creates a sweeter and deeper flavor profile on the tomatoes. Strawberry season is winding down, but we have really good papaya if you are looking for some delicious sweet fruit. The Tuesday Naples market has officially…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, The tomato quality is superb right now! The added heat and length of day creates a sweeter and deeper flavor profile on the tomatoes. Strawberry season is winding down, but we have really good papaya if you are looking for some delicious sweet fruit. The Tuesday Naples market has officially ended. Thank you to…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, We still have high diversity as we are actively harvesting most of the crops we have grown this season except cauliflower, green beans, and avocado which have all but ended. Citrus too is mostly winding down except for some grapefruit and late season oranges like ‘Valencia’ and ‘OLL-8.’ The past…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, Production and diversity continue strong on the farm. The warm season crops are prospering in this weather with lots of solid tomato, cuc, zuc, pepper and eggplant production. Baby butterheads and romaine will start to slow down in this heat though the forecast ahead looks good with mild temperatures except…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, Thank you to all who came last week to the markets in Bonita, Captiva and Naples. All markets were busy though Saturday was less so due perhaps to people’s concern over inclement weather. We are encouraged to see the Captiva market strong again. We are grateful for a very devoted…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, Overall the farm is producing very well. The more extreme heat this past week through today– with very warm days and nights– made it more challenging to manage the crops. Harvests need to be very timely. The lettuce is quicker to bolt, the broccolini needs to be harvested very young…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, It is encouraging to see so many crops producing bountifully at the moment. We have generous crops now of strawberry, zucchini, cucumbers, broccolini, onions, tomatoes, cauliflower and more. We have a good diversity for the Tuesday Captiva and St. John’s Naples Farmers mkts. Both markets run 9am-1pm.  The Captiva Market runs through April and the…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, It is encouraging to see so many crops producing bountifully at the moment. We have generous crops now of strawberry, zucchini, cucumbers, broccolini, onions, tomatoes, cauliflower and more. We have a good diversity for the Tuesday Captiva and St. John’s Naples Farmers mkts. Both markets run 9am-1pm. The Captiva Market runs…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, Many people at the markets ask how the current weather is affecting the crops… for a most of this season it was about the extended cool fall and winter and now recently it is about the warm weather. Each of the crops respond differently with their own environmental preferences. For…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, Life on the farm is very busy as markets have been strong and crop production decently high. There is a strong weather shift coming to SW FL this week where days and nights will be significantly warmer. We have enjoyed the stretch of cool weather as outside workers and we…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, We welcomed the rain on Sunday as it reset the moisture levels to a goodly amount in our vegetable beds. Some of our beds were beginning to have some drying with last week’s warmer temperatures. The rain does have its negative impact on the fruiting crops like strawberries, cucumber, zucchini,…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm,We hope this newsletter finds you well. I have been writing two newsletters each week. I send one out on Saturday night for the Sanibel and Captiva residents since they order for a different day. Then I send one to all newsletter recipients usually on Monday. I accidentally sent the Sanibel/Captiva newsletter to the…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm,We are anticipating the next crop of tomatoes to begin ripening with this warmer weather. We hope the same for a rebound with the zucchini, peppers, and the damaged cucs from the rabbits. Usually, when there are successive days in the 80s, the tomatoes and other warm season crops begin to really push…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm,The cooling trend continued this past week and it is I think the longest time from tomato transplant date to harvest date that I have witnessed. The 3rd planting of tomatoes which was put in the ground around Nov. 1 still has yet to be harvested– over 90 days. We have a…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, The produce diversity is very good except for cucumbers and zucchini. The cool weather and the rabbit pressure on the cucumber plants have been devastating for those crops. There are many highs and lows in farming. One of the advantages of being a diversified farm is the ability to weather these losses.…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, Tuesday at the Captiva market was the biggest yet. Thank you to those who came out. It was great to have beautiful weather and a strong turnout. Last year at this time we were set up alone at McCarthy’s Marina. This season there is a larger group of vendors. It is…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, It was wonderful to finally have a market day without rain or inclement weather. Last Saturday was a fun market day. Thank you to all who came out! We started harvesting cauliflower for the first time this season. The celery continues to be a surprisingly great crop for us this season.…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, We received nearly 5 inches of rain this evening. This was the most intense rain we have had since Hurricane Ian. Thankfully, the farm should do fine with it. In spite of our low elevation, the water does infiltrate quickly into soil. The healthier the soil the better it absorbs.…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, This is an interesting winter for Florida with really cool temperatures and very wet conditions. We had over 2 1/2 inches of rain on Saturday with many more wet and cloudy days forecasted in the next 10 days. This weather favors a lot of the crops we grow like kale,…

Happy New Year from 12 Seasons Farm, New crops are coming into season as we begin this new year. We just started harvesting green onions, parsley, green beans, and carrots. We also plan to harvest celery at the end of this week. We had another good day at the Bonita market last Saturday. Thank you.…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, We hope you have had a wonderful weekend with family and friends. Life has been very full here. I wish you all could see the beehive of activity that exists here at the farm. The amount of hands and coordinated activities it takes to cultivate a crop and bring it…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, I wish you all could see the beehive of activity here at the farm. The amount of hands and coordinated activities it takes to cultivate a crop and bring it to fruition is impressive. This week was one of those weeks where a lot of timely, significant work was achieved.…

Greetings from 12 Seasons Farm, Tomorrow we are returning to the Captiva Farmers Market as it reopens. The market location is in the Starbucks parking lot near the South Seas Island Resort. The market takes place every Tuesday, 9am to 1pm. We have enjoyed serving the residents of Sanibel and Captiva over many seasons and…