After months of tedious work in the tomato field, setting stakes, stringing the plants, weeding and negotiating with caterpillars the Sun Gold tomatoes are ripe and sweet. If you have pint containers please bring them in to take your tomato share home in.

Also this week the carrots are now large enough to harvest. We will begin harvesting the largest ones into bunches, they are very sweet.

Another root crop we will begin harvesting this week is Daikon radishes, the name means large root. It is a Japanese radish, very good raw shredded over a salad or in a veggie wrap or can be added to stir-fry and soups. Not as spicy as regular radishes. We are also starting to harvest Tatsoi, a type of bok choy that can be eaten raw in salads and is also excellent in stir-fry.

We will continue harvesting Arugula and Mizuna, both Asian Greens that can be eaten in a salad mixes, steamed, in pizza or made into a Pesto.

Now that the weather is getting cooler its a great time to enjoy hardy soups with all the fresh greens like Kale and Collards.

Happy eating!

Our first full two weeks have passed and everything seemed to go pretty smoothly!  You should have picked up and started to enjoy at least one share by now.

Weather is staying cool and our root crops are getting happier and happier. Our delicious sweet carrots are very close to harvest time, yum and so are the daikon radishes and beet root. So look for them in the share in the next couple of weeks.

Hope you are all enjoying those green beans, this has been one of the best yields of green beans we have seen in a while and they sure are tasty.

Those of you that do not have a compost bin in your yard are welcome to bring your kitchen scraps (veggie only) to the Sweetwater compost bin located in the chicken yard behind the barn. Place items inside the lidded bin and all the bacteria and microbes will transform that waste into valuable compost. Let’s keep valuable organic material out of the landfills.

Reminder to new members that we do not have parking on Comanche Avenue in front of the farm. This is to respect our neighbors wishes. Parking is available across the creek on Comanche Ave. or through the back gate parking on Mohawk Ave.

The first week of harvest and member pick up was very successful, good to see all our continuing members, and very nice to meet many new members. Good job Week A members! Please be sure to sign in every time you pick up your share, and only pick up on your designated week. This will help us keep track of shares and make sure we have enough veggies for all of our members. Also be sure to only take the amount on the chalkboard for each item since we harvest just enough for a given amount of people. When folks take more, that means other members miss out. There will be farmers around the pick up area to assist if you have questions.

We are finally enjoying some well deserved cooler weather which makes it much easier to work out in the fields. Come out and enjoy one of our Sunday Markets. We had our Grand Opening last Sunday and everyone had a great time. Pictures will be on Facebook soon!

We are very excited to start another season of fresh vegetable harvest and community building at Sweetwater. Thank you all for supporting this community, we have sold out of memberships in record time this season.

All our farmers and volunteers have been working very hard for several months now in preparation of this harvest. It has been a little tricky without any rain for the past couple of months but even so the crops are growing well. Thank you to the new members that have already come out to volunteer in the fields, your help is greatly appreciated. Looking forward to seeing you all at the farm.

Remember to bring your own containers on pick-up days, be creative, you can use baskets, coolers, re-usable bags etc. We harvest fresh for each pickup day, so if you can not make it to your pickup just send a friend or family member. Shares cannot be made up, any left overs at the end of the day will be donated to a local food bank.

We will have a “help” table set up at the first few pick-ups for anyone who missed the orientation and needs assistance or has questions.  If you have a full membership, you’ll be picking up this week.  If you have a half membership, you are picking up if your last name begins with A-K.

This week we are harvesting Turnip greens, they are tender leaves from young plants. They can be cooked the same as collard greens or just added to your stir-fry or soups. Have fun and be creative.

Hello to all of our new CSA Members this season.  We are so glad that you have decided to give Sweetwater a try this season.  We think you will be amazed at the difference you’ll see in quality and freshness of the produce.  There is just nothing like a freshly harvested head of lettuce.

We’d like to invite you to a New Member Orientation this Saturday, Oct 16th.  We will hold orientation in Tampa and in St Pete.  (See Events).  If you are unable to make the orientation, don’t worry, we will have a “Help” table set up for the first few pick-ups so we can help you through the process of pick-up and answer any questions you may have.

CSA Share pick-ups are set to begin the first week of November.  If you are picking up in Tampa you will need to decide if you are picking up on Sundays from 12-4 or Thursdays from 12-6.  St Pete members will be picking up at the Saturday Morning Market from 9:00-2:00.  Half-Membership people will pick up every other week (Week A or Week B) according to the last name on their application.  Full Membership folks will pick up every week.   Please print a full schedule for reference as some days/times may have changed due to holidays.  Go HERE for pick up schedule!

Remember to bring a reusable bag(s) for the produce.  Follow parking directions on our website (there is NO parking on Comanche Avenue in front of the farm – our neighbors may decide to tow.)  There IS parking on Comanche across the creek (get there from Hanley).  Parking is also available on Mohawk Ave.  If you still have questions please contact us.  We are looking forward to seeing a bunch of you this weekend at orientation.

Peace,

Roberto Saenz, Farm Manager

Thank you all for supporting another season of local organic community agriculture.  We are well on our way preparing for the start of yet another great growing season.  For us farmers, the summer season is very short, we have been working non-stop since the end of last season.  I’d like to share with you some of the projects we have been focusing on…

At Sweetwater one of our main goals as a sustainable farm is to create fertile, biodiverse soil.   Every season we try to improve the soil instead of depleting it.  An important tool we use for this is applying large amounts of organic compost (which we make on site).  We recycle local organic ‘waste’ and through lots of work with our bucket loader tractor and billions of bacteria, we convert it into dark rich earth-smelling compost to feed the soil.  We have made hundreds of tons of compost this summer!  Another way we give back to the fields is by planting a beneficial cover crop in the off season.  This summer we successfully grew Sorghum, which when mowed adds a large amount of organic matter to the the fields.

So now that our fields have all this organic matter, we are ready to plant.  We have already been very busy planting fields with all the warm weather loving crops.  So far we have growing tomatoes, peppers, summer and winter squash, basil, onions and scallions, green beans, kale and collard greens.  And the greenhouse is already full with lettuce, herbs and all sorts of greens.  Anyone interested in learning about how we grow these crops can come out and lend a hand between Tuesday and Saturday every week. We get started at 8:30am, if you’d like to join us please contact us!

Thank you all again for supporting this great effort in Tampa Bay, hope to see you all at the farm.

Peace,

Roberto Saenz, Farm Manager