News From the Farm
Keep current with up-to-date news from Farmer Renee.
Arlington Heights Delivery
Friday, August 22nd, 08:00 PM
Shares will be available at the Arlington Heights site at approximately 9 p.m. this evening.
What's in the Box - Aug. 22
Friday, August 22nd, 08:00 PM
All sites will be delivered by 8 a.m. Saturday (8:30 a.m. for Chicago-Damen).
Here's what's in the boxes this week...
Full shares: Cauliflower, green bell peppers, eggplant, white candy onion, cucumber, rainbow chard, flat leafed parsley, tomatoes, pattypan squash, purple heirloom tomitillos, heirloom vine-ripened stupice tomatoes, banana peppers (in a bag).
Half shares: Eggplant, green bell peppers, cauliflower, white candy onions, green curly kale, heirloom vine-ripened stupice tomatoes, purple heirloom tomitillos, pannypan squash, and banana peppers (in a bag).
Also, there is a bumper crop of tomatoes and so we're leaving an extra box of them at each site for you all to share.
Thank you, and enjoy your veggies!
Elgin Delivery - Aug. 22
Friday, August 22nd, 07:40 PM
Shares will be available at the Elgin site at 8 p.m. tonight. If at all possible, you should pick up your veggies tonight for the sake of freshness.
WELCOME!
About the Farm
About the Farmer
"It is only when we are aware of the earth and of the earth as poetry that we truly live..." ~Henry Beston - Herbs and the Earth
Our farm...
Our 120 acre farm sits on a ridge 1000 ft. above sea level in the driftless region of southwestern Wisconsin. Sweet Earth is just a stone's throw from the Kickapoo and Wisconsin Rivers at Wauzeka.The landscape is rich in hills and valleys, rivers and bluffs, woods and wildlife. Our farm has almost 40 acres of woods that produce ramps, fiddleheads and morel mushrooms in the Spring, and Elderberry and wild plums later in the season The air is clean and the vistas are awe inspiring.
"We've farmed organically for over thirty years because organic practices are life asserting ... for the earth, the environment, for people, and for the food we grow." ~Farmer Renee
Just how do we grow that great stuff?
We work towards a living and balanced soil.To build health and vitality into what we grow, we use seaweed blends, compost, plant teas, biodynamics, and love for what we do. About ten years ago, we became seed savers and heirloom growers. We start our own plants, some with the seed we've saved from plants harvested on the farm in earlier seasons. We blend our own fluffy and delicious looking soil mix to start our seedlings in the greenhouse and when the transplants are ready, "out they go" to the field.
The food you'll love to eat...
We love heirlooms because it ties us to the history of growing food. We especially love heirloom tomatoes... in every color of the rainbow...pink, purple, green, black, yellow, gold orange and, of course, tomato red. At least one variety of every color is grown on the farm each year and harvested vine ripened. Produce is always harvested at its peak for best nutrition and flavor. We vine ripen those tomatoes and melons, and we deliver the energy of garden freshness. Back to Top
The farmer...
Sweet Earth's farmer is a woman (farmess is not a word). Hopefully this is not so surprising. The earliest agriculturalists were women, and even now, in many parts of the world, women are the ones who plant, tend and harvest. "I'm in good company."
I started out studying nutrition in the style of Adele Davis...ahhh!...life unfolds...along came this farm...and I've been Farmer Renee, farming organically for the past thirty years.
Through those years I returned to school to study the science of agriculture. But the most important lessons, too profound for textbooks, came through those two great teachers, nature and farm life itself. There's been no shortage of work, worry, or passion for this chosen life as farmer.
"We've farmed organically for over thirty years because organic practices are life asserting ... for the earth, the environment, for people, and for the food we grow." ~Farmer Renee
This farmer's family...
My children grew up on the farm and worked alongside me as I farmed with horses, plowed, made hay, milked cows and then, when I began growing veggies in 1988. Now, it's my visiting grandchildren that ride the transplanter, dig fingerling potatoes and eat cherry tomatoes off the vine.
THE GOOD NEWS: (in agriculture)...young people...experience the basic social experience that comes from recognition that in cultivating the earth and caring for animals and plants, one must rely on the work of others who cultivated before you, and that you do not necessarily reap what you have planted, but that others may benefit from your work. ~ Trauger Groh Farms of Tomorrow Revisited
AND THE BAD NEWS: In a recent survey of Iowa farmers, over 50% advised their children against farming for an occupation. The IOWA STATE FARM AND RURAL LIFE POLL / Spring 2004