top of page

Sprout Farm Newsletter Nov 11, 2023 open 9-5 daily until Thanksgiving

sproutfarm.net

 

Hello Everyone, Happy Veterans Day.

These weeks before Thanksgiving are usually our slowest time of the year, The pots are in trays, ready to be filled with soil and planted with plugs next spring. What needs painting has been painted and now comes our end of the season sales. Our remaining Side Hill Farm Jams are on sale for $5.00. The Vermont syrups will be on sale but the price is to be determined at a later time. That means that as of Sat. night, Jay hasn't done the math. Some of you know that before up until 2001 Jay ran the garden shop at K-Mart. He would walk around the store with a pencil tucked behind his ear and on a routine basis, figure out prices and costs of truckloads of plants. When it comes to pricing plants, he never asks what another garden shop is charging for a similar item. When it comes to produce he may ask for a Stop & Shop price just to get a general feel for the price. After all, he doesn't buy veggies when he shops and he seldom eats veggies unless they are raw and washed straight from the field.

We still have lots of apples, nearly fourteen varieties but we are running low on Fugi, Empire, Gala apples. The many varieties of Mimi's Micro-Greens are fresh and delicious too.

News from Jay: You may want to plan to arrive at the farm after 3:00 pm when the road construction for the sewer wraps up for the day. If you want to go to the farm during construction hours you must start at the Mashpee Rotary and go south on Rte 28 towards Hyannis. Before that time you can try going down Orchard Rd but you will have to make a U turn and go back up Orchard Road and head up towards the Mashpee Rotary. Yes, I forgot, once, Let's hope that was the one and only time. Three o'clock is also a good time to buy our produce as we can't harvest produce from an early morning frosty garden. There's a little bit of this and that in the cooler, We have two kinds of turnip but Jay won't let me mention one by the name of a certain town on the lower Cape. The carrots are great. I remember picking out every single weed out of the row so the carrots would grow without competition. I gave up weeding weeks ago but the weeds didn't return and the carrots are the best we've ever grown. Jay picks them as needed.

The kitten report: Mother cat and kitten have been reunited. Ziggy is fine post surgery and enjoys hanging out with her kitten. Wheezie is happy when mom is sitting on the counter and her tail is dangling down just enough to tag. Ziggy has that inscrutable, regal cat look on her face while she entices Wheezie to practice hunting the dark tip of her tail. We will be tying the Christmas tree to the hook on the ceiling, again this year. Last year's kittens were big enough to put on a full frontal assault on the tree and it would have toppled over many times but for the hook left over from the macrame craze. Wheezie is older than the kittens in this video and without her litter mates I don't think she will be quite so adventurous. We are making progress with Tux. We can pet her now and she is secure enough to sleep on our bed. She still startles easily with unexpected noises but by spring she may be a normal cat, I hope.

 

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=x058GN7PFQM Yes. Most of the Christmas ornaments survived.

Stop by and see us soon,

 

Jay and Phyllis Sprout

We are open every day from 9-5 

Sprout_farm_stand_June_2020[1].jpg

Sprout Farm Stand

Sprout Farm Newsletter        July 22, 2023           open 9-5 daily          sproutfarm.net

Hello Everyone,

We have corn, most days.  I've been on the road to East Bridgewater MA to pick up the corn at a beautiful farm but like most farmers these days he's having problems with weather, insects, etc.  I think I've been leading off these newsletters like this for months.   When I picked up the corn this morning he told me it was machine picked so there may be a few kernels at the tip that are crushed but it is still good corn.  He was right the corn is good.  So I said, "Do you have a machine to pick corn?"  I would have been very surprised if he had said yes.  He said he got up at 2:30 AM and traveled to a farm in Worcester for the corn.  So We can still identify the farm where the corn comes from and I really appreciate the trouble he goes to to make the corn available.  I tend to get home from a corn/blueberry  around 10:45 to 11:00. We will probably take down the tomato signs for a week or so.  We cut the tomato vines in the tomato house that have been providing the tomatoes since early June.  They have done their job and now it's time to put in the new plants for our late fall crop.  The tomatoes in the high tunnel are starting to ripen so we will have a few every day but they don't last long at the stand.  The field tomatoes are very green.  We have lots of cukes and yellow and green squash.  Jay is digging some potatoes every day and new potatoes are a treat.  The guys harvested the garlic this week and set it out to dry.  I was surprised to see how large the heads were.  The suppliers recommended planting only the large cloves but Jay had the room so he planted all of them and I'm glad he did, they all produced respectable heads of garlic.  There is still time to plant carrots, beets, turnips and cabbage if you want to plant cabbage.  Keep an eye on your tomato plants.  The Barnstable County Farm has come and gone; it is time for the tomato hornworm to put in an appearance.  If the leaves at the top of your tomato plants look like skeletons, please look for that big green worm with the red horn.  What you do with it after you find it is up to you but I recommend you remove it from your plant. 

    I remember traveling in France on a trip many years ago and the narrow village streets were lined by walls with one door for the home and garden.  It seemed like every Frenchman was a serious gardener.  The story went that after WWII France was able to recover faster than Germany because the populace was used to growing their own food.  We will be selling our garlic because we weren't raised in families who cooked with garlic.  The garlic that Jay harvested would be the perfect amount for one French family for a year.  Well, maybe two families.  It makes me stop and think how much gardening the French incorporate into their everyday life and family tradition.  There is one tradition we are now encouraging now that small paper bags cost us 10¢.  Please BYOB, bring your own bag.   I had saved up dozens of bags from Stop & Shop and they were recycled at the stand in just a few days.  My Stop & Shop strategy is if I only have a few small things and I didn't bring my own bag, (you know we all leave them in the car), I go to the produce section and use one of the tear off plastic bags to bag my small order.  The bags are very strong and surprisingly roomy.  We have those same bags and they cost far less than the paper bags.

I'm going to spend a little time collecting some seeds and planting them in time to vernalize the plants over the winter.  If I do this right I will have a few more perennials ready to bloom next year.

The kitten report. Ziggy had her kittens four days ago, two weeks after Tux had her kittens.  True to form Ziggy found a half filled box on the top of a shelf in the basement and quietly started her new family there.  Even standing on a chair it was difficult to see the kittens.  The most important thing is that she had two orange kittens.  Everyone is doing well and Ziggy is constantly begging for more food and we are happy to comply with her wishes.  Jay came out to the garden where I was busy weeding and he said, "Hey, are you keeping secrets?"  My life is an open book with absolutely no secrets so I gave him my standard blank stare and said, "Secrets?"  "Ziggy has five kittens, not four."  No one was able to count the kittens until he moved them to a nice open spot in the bathroom.  I went into the house to really check out the kittens for the first time only to see Ziggy dashing down the cellar stairs.  Wait, there's only two orange kittens in the new spot when there should be five.  What's going on?  Ziggy is moving the kittens.  I waited at the foot of the stairs and saw her going into the craft room with an orange kitten in her mouth.  Anyone who has seen that room will seriously doubt her motive for placing kittens in a room with glitter and other stuff waiting for a good cleaning.  Like Tux, Ziggy found a narrow place under a small table and tucked her family into that corner of the room.  We could dismantle the table but she went to a lot of trouble to settle them there so we'll leave her alone for a while.  I expect Jay to start bringing out kittens to the stand in a couple of weeks.  Tux's kittens are still getting their sea legs so they have some growing up to do.

That's all for now.  Stop by and say hello and we'll see you soon.

Jay and Phyllis Sprout

poppies 2023.jpg
planters 2023.jpg
Dan 2023.jpg

Sprout Farm now has a News Letter.
We no longer advertise our weekly sales in the local newspaper so the best way to learn about our sales is to visit our
facebook page on Saturday mornings, listen to our radio ads on WXTK and WCOD local shows, or sign up to receive our very brief Sprout Farm News Letter.  Any sales in these publications are valid for that week only.   Learn all about our weekly sales in your email box on Thursday mornings. I don't share any email addresses and everything will arrive BBC. So if you would like our sales ad to arrive in your email box first thing Saturday mornings, send your email address along with just your first name to: sproutes@comcast.net
- subject, newsletter,
and I'll take care of the rest.
Thank you,
Phyllis Sprout

bottom of page