Hello Dear Friends,
We hope that you are staying warm and cozy on these frigid Winter days. There's a benefit to having a real Winter here on the farm, but the flock would beg to differ! Having a real Winter forces necessary plant dormancy, killing pest populations, and protecting roots from freezing via insulation. Deep cold allows perennial, tree, and shrub roots to store energy, ensuring stronger spring growth, so hopefully we will have a glorious Spring to look forward to.
We have been busy bees this Winter planning for our larger CSA, researching and purchasing equipment, and interviewing new Team members. We are also in the planning stages of building two new barns. It's been a lot of work, but we are so excited for the growing season and year ahead.
We are happy to announce that our 2026 CSA product listings are now live on our website. We will be offering 50 shares, with the ability to sign up for the waitlist if we sell out. We believe that we would have the capacity to add additional shares if needed.
There will be two pick-up day options (25 shares each on Wednesdays and Thursdays), so please click on the one that works best for you. If one is sold out, that means that there may still be shares left on the other pick-up day. The CSA is scheduled to begin June 3rd and finish on November 18th. Please see the links below to the Product Listings:
Wednesday Pick up: 4-6:00 pm- 25 Weeks- $36.00 per week
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Thursday Pick up: 4-6:00 pm- 25 Weeks- $36.00 per week
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We have a delicious addition to our Organic, Fair-trade Chocolate bar offering for Valentine's Day: Organic dried blueberries and rose. Also, just a reminder that we still offer our fan favorite Rosemary Thyme Shortbread dipped in chocolate as well! Here's our new chocolate bar mold. We think it is as beautiful as it tastes.
We still have two spots left for our February 20th Succulent Workshop. We will be providing the materials to create your own tabletop succulent garden, including a few surprise accents. In addition, we will be discussing different types of succulents, including edible succulents. Purslane is a common one found in our landscape in early Spring. We will be talking about Spring Ephemerals and foraging local forest delicacies in Spring. It is sure to be a fun time of learning and we will also enjoy a few treats from our Prep Barn Kitchen.
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Great news from the egg hotline (aka Farmer Martha). In spite of the frigid weather, the hens and ducks are increasing egg production due to the daily incremental increase in sunlight. I often say that you eat with your eyes first. Our newbies are laying some really beautiful colors as you can see from the photo below. I love the dark khaki green eggs from our Olive Egger hens. The great news is that our soy free, organic fed forest ranged eggs are delicious and healthy too.
This past Monday was the ancient Gaelic festival of Imbolc that marks the halfway point between the winter solstice and the spring equinox, so we are now officially halfway to Spring. Warmer weather is coming!
Four of our ducks are really happy about that because they ended up with a condition called "wet feather", which means that they lost their ability to produce the oil that makes their feathers waterproof due to the cold temperatures and frozen duck pond. Luckily they got a nice spa day with a bath and stayed in the barn for a few days. The girls will be back with the flock in a few days after they begin preening again.
In the meantime, we leave you with a video of what the sheep thought about venturing outside this past weekend when it was about 7 degrees. We can totally relate. This is our try at farm Youtube videos, and also wanted to let you know that we are currently creating content for our very own Youtube channel. There are so many great topics that we would like to cover; we promise that they will be educational and entertaining!
Wishing you a wonderful weekend and as always, we thank you for your support of our Regenerative Forest Farm. May God bless you and your family today and always.
Sincerely,
Michele & the Maranatha Farm Team
