Happy New Year,
 
We are now signing up renewing members for the 2010 CSA season. This year pickup locations and times will be the same, Mondays at the farm and Christ Church from 5:30 to 7pm. One big change is that we have decided to have a substantially smaller CSA this season and will reduce membership from 100 to 70 members. Tanya gave birth to a healthy baby girl on December 22. With two young children, it seems like a good time to scale down the CSA some. We will hold space for renewing members until February 15 and wait list new members until then.
 
Complete information on the CSA and how to sign-up is on our website at www.jugbaymarketgarden.com  As in 2009, you can send an initial installment of half the share cost and a second payment dated August 1. Contact us to make other payment arrangements.
 
So we can get an idea of how the 2009 seasons went and make changes this year, there is a short survey at http://www.surveymonkey.com/s/HG2HDZB
One change we know we will need to implement is having more help at pickup so share distribution goes better. We think we did a pretty good job in 2009 considering it was a season where a late blight fungus epidemic wiped out our tomatoes and those of most other organic farmers on the east coast. However, we know we can make improvements and do better this coming season.
 
This past winter, we switched certification programs from the National Organic Program (NOP) to a certification program that is a better fit for small family farms called Certified Naturally Grown (CNG).  Certified Naturally Grown farms must use growing practices that are as strict as certified organic farms. Compared to NOP, the CNG program requires a lot less record keeping paperwork. The NOP certification process is really tailored for large corporate farms that ship around the country. CNG is a better fit for a small farm like ours that sells directly to customers and we are happy to make the change. More information on CNG is at http://www.naturallygrown.org/
 
Work on the farm never really stops and we have already started to get ready for the season ahead. Right now we are putting up two new greenhouses by the farmhouse. Let us know if you would like to help some this winter. There are a few steps with putting up a greenhouse where you need many hands.
 
Once we put the two greenhouses up, we will make repairs to our large greenhouse. During this last snow storm, Tanya and I were at the hospital and nobody could drive to the farm to brush snow off the large greenhouse. It collapsed under the snowload.  This would have been upsetting if we had been away for something less important. You have a healthy baby and your greenhouses collapses after five productive seasons of tomatoes. I’ll take that trade.
 
Please let us know if you have any questions about the 2010 season.
 
Scott and Tanya