With farming, we are living in the present, the near future and the distant future all at the same time. In the present, we are hyper seasonal with our produce and flowers, things are always changing. You see that in how add-ons change every week. In the near future, we’re weeding and keeping on the crops that are coming up. And in the more distant future we’re planting crops, seeding crops, ordering seeds and making notes on what we could do better next year.

Present! We are enjoying our current summer crops rolling in! It’s the season of Solanaces: Tomatoes, Peppers, Eggplant! This week’s Tomato Quarts have even more Colored Tomatoes and Heirlooms coming in. We are excited about some of the new purple and multicolored varieties we got from Wild Mountain Seeds.

Today Field Manager Sarah wanted to share and highlight an organization she has been volunteering with and whose work she is deeply aligned with to spread awareness. North Bay Jobs with Justice (NBJwJ) is a growing, grassroots coalition of over 30 labor and community organizations fighting for economic and racial justice. After the 2020 fires that decimated Sonoma County, a movement started to advocate for the farm workers impacted.

This week is the last week on the farm for Lola, our Farm Manager. Lola has been working full time with us for three and a half years and along this time has taken on more and more responsibility. She has kept this farm growing. Don’t worry, she’s not leaving us hanging, she’s helped train a cadre of amazing people and has already stepped back from leading to provide support as they have taken the reins.

Lola is exceptionally dedicated, hard working, detail oriented and thoughtful… plus she has a great sense of humor, her laugh soars through the fields and she is a deep conversationalist. Lola is also an amazing chef, especially of veggies. Last summer when Elizabeth was on vacation she took over the newsletter one week and I love what she wrote.

“Whenever I am asked why I’ve gotten into farming, the answer boils down to a pretty simple truth: I love food. I love to grow food; I love to cook food; I love to eat food; but above all, I love to share food with those around me.” And share food Lola does. She’s shared the food that she’s been a part of growing with you the last several years.

If it’s not already on your calendar, we highly recommend the Gravenstein Apple Fair this weekend. It’s a sweet little fair but a big event at Ragle Ranch, and it’s a fundraiser for Farm Trails which has been a tremendous support for farms in Sonoma County for over 50 years.

Farmer Elizabeth will be speaking on the panel “Protecting Agricultural Diversity” also including Alice Waters, Dan Imhoff, Kyle & Katina Connaughton (SingleThread), Albert Straus (dairyman), Tuker Taylor (gardener at Kendall-Jackson), Sara Silva (Green Star Farm), and Hector Alvarez (Hector’s Honey) with moderator Clark Wolf. It should be fun! Saturday at 1:00pm and Elizabeth is first in the line up.

Today’s newsletter by Field Manager Sarah (2nd from left in photo).

You guessed it, corn! For the first time in over 12 years, we have super sweet corn in your CSA boxes. One of the most important elements of our farm crew is the collaboration between crew members and the Kaisers. There are many ways this manifests on the farm, but the most tangible is in crop planning and experimenting with new products. We are trying a few new things this year, but one of the most substantial is sweet corn (see 7/17 newsletter for more). Jose, who joined the farm in March, was born and raised in South America and has experience farming in that hemisphere. Corn has deep roots in South American culture and cuisine, and Jose was a big advocate to bring this new crop into rotation at Singing Frogs. So with the collaboration of Kaisers, and crew support from Lola and Sarah (mid two in picture), dreams have come true!

The person who writes this newsletter is primarily Elizabeth who took a vacation this past week, getting home late last night and so I cannot give much of a Farm Update. I do know that it was hot! Very hot! Like 100 degrees hot on the farm. I do know that our crew really rocks, you all received emails from Sarah and some of your from Lola too. I did a farm walk this morning and it’s beautiful.

This farm is far far more than Farmer Elizabeth although it is me that you hear from most often… it is the crew who works on the hot days, shows up every morning, seeds, preps, plants, weeds, harvests and tends for the 300 beds, 90 varieties of veggies, 20 varieties of fruits plus 90 varieties of flowers. They are hard working, idealistic and dedicated to building a healthy planet, a healthy food system and growing great food!

Of note… photo of our weasel friend taken and shared by Lola.

Farmer Elizabeth was interviewed for Savoring Sonoma: The Hour which aired this past 7/14/24 on KRCB 104.9, Northern California Public Media. If you missed it, you can certainly still listen to it on their site (above). They switched dates on us, otherwise we would have written about it last week.

Host Clark Wolf is hilarious and I was smiling and laughing through much of the production as we had fun talking about growing fresh food, nutrient density and farming but also singing frogs looking for their lovers and much more. I hope you’re able to listen, and find it entertaining.

We made a really big change to our farm eco-structure the last two weeks specifically for our hoop houses. We are taking out two very large Cottonwood Trees that we planted 17 years ago from little saplings pulled out of Paul’s mom’s yard. They have grown so much that they completely shaded one and half of a second of our hoop houses (we have five total). It’s been sad, really sad, and it lets in a little more wind, but it’s been necessary. We are also leaving a tall stump thoughtfully, recognizing that these riparian trees will sprout back up in a big bush, which is honestly just what we want.

But check out the view from above!

It’s been a hot full week. Hopefully this sleeping honeybee at dawn all covered in fresh dew is refreshing to you.

This week’s newsletter is only Produce Notes & Recipes.

The end of June is a hard time because there is so much anticipation for summer produce including tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, and fruit. We need patience. There are a lot of green and small fruits on all varieties. Our tomatoes and peppers especially look really good and are starting to be loaded with lots of small and green fruit but it will take a couple to few weeks at very minimum for them to be harvestable. This cool and cloudy weather does NOT help unfortunately.

Our Tomatoes have had more love, pruning and early trellising that most years. You will have weeks and weeks of Cherry and Heirloom tomatoes plus the ability to purchase bulk tomatoes, it’s really August and September as their season, get ready! We hope you can come and see Sunday. The Peppers likewise have had more pruning…

Singing Frogs Farm hosted the North Bay Farmers gathering last night. We had almost 70 farmers from Longer Table, Coyote Family, Open Field, Three Springs, Front Porch, Beet Generation, Fledgling, Filigreen, Paul’s Produce, Strong Arm, Little Wing, Chiatri de Laguna, Little Saint, Yagi Sisters, Shone, Costal Land & Livestock, CAFF and a few others plus of course crew from Singing Frogs.

We’re excited to invite you to our second CSA member event of the year.

CSA Member Summer Farm Day

Sunday, June 30th 10:00 am - 1:00 pm

It’ll be a Pick-Nic Party…

• Light Pick-Your-Own Berries! Including some Blueberries, Mulberries, Strawberries;

• Pick-Your-Own n Cherry Tomatoes;

• Pick-Your-Own Flowers (just a few varieties)

• Bring a Picnic brunch, lunch or snack

• Explore our farm from small bugs, to crops to hidden spots

• Adult and Kid Farm Tours

RSVPs desired. Please email Charlie and let Elizabeth know.

The heat is the topic of the moment.

On the farm we are used to heat waves in May and June, foggy mornings and cooler days in July and August and then heat waves again in September and October (interspersed with frosts). As such we adjust our crop plan to have a wider diversity of crops in the spring (especially lettuce and other light greens) because a heat wave will make each variety act differently and we might have 2-3 successions of one variety bolt but another variety not. As such, today you have one of our spring varieties, Vulcan.

But this heat wave is stronger than we’ve had before. I don’t think we’ve hit the high nineties in the first week of June in our last 17 years (it got up to 98 on the farm yesterday). We’ve had frost and we’ve had rain but not 98 degrees!

Many of you may wonder why our email address is Charlie the Llama yet we don’t have a Llama. We had a Llama the first 11 years of this farm who was beloved by all, he was super sweet, loved getting kisses and greeting CSA Members. When he passed (at the ripe age of 24) our CSA Members told us to keep the email address and so we have.

Read more about Charlie and our other animals…

The big deal this week is that we’re planting our first round of WINTER SQUASH this week! Hundreds of feet of Delicata, Red Kuri and Black Futsu! The second round will include Butternut and Kabocha plus more Delicata! We only are just coming into our Summer Squash plants and yet our mind is on Winter Squash. That’s farming for you, you’re living both in the present but also 6 and 9 months in future!

We’re trialing something new out this year. A lot of the squash are going into beds that have a lot of weed pressure. Some are being planted into black plastic but we’re also trialing seeding a low growing clover at the same time as a living mulch. We’re excited about this trial.

Pictured is Red Kuri Winter Squash plus Cauliflower and Fennel for today’s boxes.

The heat wave of last week had us feeling like summer. Now this week, it’s back to spring weather but we’re very focused on summer crops at the moment.

We’re exceptionally excited to have our first Cucumbers coming in. We have two beautiful successions coming along with the next one just germinating in the nursery! Our hoop houses are stacked with all our Peppers and Eggplant PLUS a more full Summer Squash planting than last year. They’re beautiful.

Every week we Curate a Box of a mix of what’s seasonal and growing on the farm. The weather and season are absolutely reflected. For instance because it’s early May we have a lot of light greens right now and salad is big. But generally we follow a recipe that includes: a head lettuce, a bunching or other hearty green, in the winter and spring a light green as well, a root (Daikon is filling this this week), something with weight (squash, broccoli and onions this week), an herb, fruit when we’re able (about 1/2 weeks) and something else seasonal. Now this flexes a lot. In high summer we will have tomatoes weekly and our fruit might be rotating cherry tomatoes and strawberries. In winter our weight might be winter squash and fruit meyer lemons. Family boxes will usually receive 1-2 additional items and/or bigger of other items, they usually have the most diversity. For instance if we harvest a crop of cauliflower, some heads will be twice the size of the average, these will go to Family Boxes. Lastly we absolutely track what goes into the boxes and their value, which we based on Farmer’ Market value. We might have a box that’s a little less in value and will make sure to bolster a box soon. We also make sure we keep a diversity of products going into your boxes. If you ever have a question about what’s in your box, don’t hesitate to ask.

Today, May 1st, is Beltane or May Day. A celebration of the peak of spring and certainly fertility! Technically it’s half way between Spring Equinox and Summer Solstice. We are feeling it on the farm. The days are already long and everything is growing at a tremendous speed! Put a flower in your hair, dance around a May Pole or just enjoy the sound of the buzzing pollinators and the bright green fresh growth on life around you.

Welcome New CSA Members

We’re excited to welcome round 2 of new CSA Members for 2024! We have a total of 40 new members joining us this year in three rounds and 130 members continuing from last year (or many years). With all this new energy, we’ll focus on some basics in the newsletters this time of year.

We love partnering with some of the amazing non-profit groups doing work in food and farming throughout the Bay Area. We wanted to tell you about a few with whom we’ve been sharing. We’ve are thankful that we are well positioned to give what is needed in specific situations. Your support allows us to share where we can.

We had a delightful time welcoming CSA families onto the farm to this past Sunday at our CSA Member Event. We recognize the weather wasn’t optimal and so we had small groups.

We had fun learning about bluebird nests, looking for insects, but also learning about our farming practices, checking out the produce and much more. Surprising, one young CSA member has learned a secret of our farm, we host an amazing number of 4-leaf clovers. She hunts for them when she picks up on Wednesdays. We do plant a lot of clovers in our roadways but aside from that we have no idea why we have this blessing. She herself found 17 four leaf clovers (and a new friend found at least a dozen) plus they found ONE 5-LEAF CLOVER! That is the biggest news of the farm this week.