What’s in Store for 2025
2025 is here and in about a month we’ll be starting the first seeds of the season. As we’ve gained experience we’ve settled into a bit of a pattern and the year to year changes don’t always feel as drastic as they used to. Here’s what we’re looking forward to in 2025 and what we’ll be switching up or changing to improve our farm.
New Farm Manager position. We’re excited to announce that we’re planning to hire a Farm Manager position for this season. Now that our family has grown we’re recognizing that for both health of the family and the farm that it makes sense for Lara to take a step back in the summer. Lara had essentially been fulfilling this duty from June - August: making sure the daily task list got done on time and in accordance with our quality standards. But as the farm grew we now need this role fulfilled in May, September & October as well.
New Scallion, Broccoli, Cabbage, Snap Pea Varieties. We switch up some varieties almost every year. Usually if we feel a crop under performs or we notice that it doesn’t have the disease and/or pest resistance we look for. This year, we’re trying a new purple scallion that we’re really excited about. Green Onions/Scallions have been a hit so expanding on this made sense to us. In both the broccoli and red cabbage in particular we were unhappy with the disease resistance from last years varieties so we’re switching these up and we’ll see how it goes. We also want to grow more snap peas so we’ve added an early variety and another mid season variety. We’re hoping for TONS of peas this season!
Dropping A Few Crops. It’s always hard to stop growing a crop. With everything we grow we’ve heard from at least one customer that they love the crop and we hate to disappoint. But, the crops we’re dropping are incredibly unpopular and/or labor intense to grow OR have unsuitable replacement variety options. Crops we’re dropping this year include daikon radish, arugula, and french breakfast radish.
Entry Level Harvester positions. We’re adding a new entry level position where the only duty will be harvesting some of the more tedious crops to harvest like green beans, peas, & strawberries. We see this as a great opportunity for a high school aged person to get some on the job experience. We envision having a small harvester crew of 3-6 people who would work morning to harvest crops in season.
Self-Serve Farm Stand. We’re going to test out a self-serve farm stand this season to see how it goes. It will be pretty straightforward: we’ll have a small stand in the shade at the end of our driveway that’s stocked daily with fresh produce from our farm. We’re a little skeptical that this will work since our farm is located on a gravel road and is located 30 minutes from any larger city. Still, we’ve heard from enough neighbors and through our Facebook/Instagram that we think this is worth trying.
New Winter Tunnel. We’re planning to construct a new “winter” tunnel sometime in the next 1-2 years. We’ve got an application in with the National Resource Conservation Service (NRCS) for one of their programs that can help with the cost of constructing the tunnel and depending on how it goes construction could start as early as spring 2025. This tunnel will be designed for winter growing in mind and will be equipped with a double layer of greenhouse plastic for better r-value, a heater, and passive ventilation. We have very high demand for winter crops like lettuce, spinach, green onions and more and for most of these crops it’s just a little too risky to attempt to grow them without supplemental heating for the coldest nights.
My favorite photo from 2024: our tunnel tomatoes after a pruning session. Look at all those tomatoes!