Farm Update

Plants, planting, contest and near disaster at the dump We are finally beginning to prepare some new beds and a few other areas for planting! We are officially on our way into the 2014 season. We have our spring organic veggie plants now available. Broccoli, cauliflower, kale and chard. Fifty cents per plant. Vicky will have her planting clinic soon. We will keep you posted. The first veggie of the season is always asparagus. Because you never know when those first delicious spears are going to pop through the soil, we have decided to play Americas number one fun game, "WHEN WILL OUR ASPARAGUS SHOW ITS FACE"! Go to our Facebook page submit your guess and if your date is correct you win a coveted Rousedale Farm t-shirt! If we have more than one correct guess we will draw one winner from them all. Good luck. The other day when it was snowing, who knows which snow day it was, I headed to the dump with our trash and recyclables. I made my way to the giant dumpster to toss my paper and glass in. I decided not to use the metal stairs to carry my large plastic trash cans up to dump the contents, but instead lifted the trash can over my head to empty it over the side eight feet up. When I did all the recycles crashed down on to the floor of the nearly empty massive dumpster, but so did my trash can, as I lost my grip on the slippery handle. I was somewhat startled at first. I had never thrown in my trash can along with the trash before. I climbed the metal stairs to take a look down into the cavernous steel dumpster. There lay my ten dollar trash can. It was in practically new condition. What was I to do? It was a goner. There was no way to reach the thing. It was on the bottom of the steel cavern. I thought to myself, "maybe the darn thing cost twenty bucks". I looked around. The dump was quiet that snowy day. I put one leg over the side. I looked around again. Should I really be doing this? I put the other leg over and I jumped into the dumpster. I immediately sensed I was dropping a lot further than I thought i would. I made my way over to my thirty dollar trash can and tossed it back to safety. Now I had to get out of the house sized dumpster. I went back to where I thought the stairs were. I reached as high as I could and grabbed the top of the wall and attempted to pull myself up. I struggled. I tried to get leverage with my feet on the wet steel walls. A sense of panic began to come over me. "What if I can't get out of this thing? Do I yell for help from inside the dumpster? It's got to be against the law, roaming around in a dumpster. Do I call Vicky and ask her to come and save me? I can hear the conversation now....You're WHERE! Plus I may be buried alive before she could save me." Terror turned into panic. Panic turned into fear. Fear miraculously turned into strength and somehow I pulled myself up and over the side to safety. I looked nervously around. I appeared to be alone with my embarrassment. I picked up my fifty dollar trash can and drove home. Vowing to always keep a strong grip on my trash cans from now on. Thank you for allowing me to come clean with my story. I didn't even tell Vicky about this. Guess I'll find out if she reads the blog.

Locally Yours, Vicky and Steve

We will have organic veggie plants to sell this year!

As I sit here waiting for another 1/4 inch of ice and 12 inches of snow, I close my eyes and smile because I know our farm plan this year is to start planting in 14 days and, darn it all, we will do it!! We are actually expecting our onion plants to be delivered Tuesday! I wonder if anyone has ever planted onion plants with a snow shovel and a pick axe? But enough of this hilarity...I know a number of you love to plant some of your own veggies. I know it's relativily easy to find vegetable plants, but not so easy to find organic vegetable plants. Well, we are going to make it a lot easier this year. We are buying extra plants this year, besides what we are planting, to share with you. The first group that we will have by mid March, and their variety will be:
Broccoli-Blue Wind
Cabbage-Farao and Primax
Cauliflower-Snow Crown
Chard-Fordhook Giant
Kale-Winterbor

The second group we will have mid May and their variety:

Cucumber-Marketmore
Canteloupe-Athena and Ambrosia
Watermelon-Sugar Baby and Crimson Sweet
Pepper-Red Knight. California Wonder and Hot Wax
Yellow Summer Squash-Multipik
Zucchini-Raven
Tomato-Celebrity, Big Beef, Cherokee Purple,Brandywine, and San Marzano

Most plants will be .50 cents per. Melon plants will be 1.00. Tomato and peppers plants .75 each.
We also will hold two planting and growing clinics at the farm to help you get started.

On the chicken front, 100 hundred new laying chickens have arrived and are being housed in a brand new coop building. Some of the rest of our flock are getting older and it was time to infuse with some young ladies to keep those eggs a'comin!

Remember you can follow along with various farm adventures on our facebook page. Just click on the box on this page and it should take you right to it.
Locally yours,

Vicky and Steve

What's That??

Rousedale Farm

Posted by Steve Rouse · a few seconds ago

This is Grace. Grace is a freshman at North Harford High School. She is taking the magnet ag class. As part of that, she has been helping take care of our chickens. Grace got her own chickens a week ago. Either Grace is wearing a funny chicken hat, has a strange chicken shaped growth on her skull or one of her chicks found a comfortable resting place on her head.

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Farm Update

Spring will come sometime, right? So it's supposed to start warming up this week. We were so excited to hear that.  Then some weatherman said it would be a "brief" warm up. I yelled at the TV like a madman, "Brief, you have got to be kidding me!  How much longer can this go on?!?!?"  Our plans for the spring included the first plantings to go in the week of March 17th. We have another 100 laying chickens coming in less than two weeks.  We have their home being delivered the end of this week and still need to clear the area and lay a foundation where it is going.  AHHHHHHH!!   Ok, alright, I'm better now...sorry, I lost it there for a minute.  I think it's time to, as Olivia Newton-John once sang, "Let's get positive, positive.  I wanna get positive."  or something like that. We always figure our asparagus is ready by the Orioles opening day.  Since opening day, this year, is in March, we probably won't make that, but soon thereafter.  Let me give you the list of other veggies and fruits we are growing this year. Broccoli-Spring and Fall Cauliflower-Spring and Fall Cabbage-Spring and Fall Carrots Spring Onions Sweet Onions Garlic Various Leaf Lettuces Head Lettuce Spinach Kale Swiss Chard Zucchini Yellow Summer Squash Tomatoes-Traditional & Heirloom Cucumbers Cantaloupe Watermelon Winter Squash Turnips Radishes Potatoes Green Beans Chinese Cabbage Peas Peppers Strawberries Blueberries Beets Eggplant Herbs Sweet Corn Many of these will include more than one variety as well! Wow, I feel sunnier all ready! Also this year we will be accepting credit cards, so you don't have to run to the ATM before you come to see us.  See, more good news. You'll be stopping by our market before long and I'll be standing there all sweaty and dirty saying something like, "Oh man, could it get any hotter?!?!"  Feel free to remind me of this newsletter. Don't forget to like us on Face book and check out our face book page once in a while!

Locally Yours, Vicky and Steve

Farm Update

Our 2014 produce CSA is filled.  Still room in the chicken CSA.  Details on our CSA page.

Vicky and Steve

2014 Chicken CSA May we present to you the 2014 Rousedale Farm chicken CSA!  Our chicken CSA runs for 24 weeks from June 4 until November 12.  It gives you the opportunity to feast on our tasty farm grown, free range chicken on a regular basis. The CSA cost reflects a discount of our regular prices, so it saves you money too!  Our chicken is grown in the best, most humane way we know of.  We only raise 100 at a time to insure the birds have plenty of room inside and out.  They range on grass, get plenty of fresh air and our birds even see the sun!  Along with their ranging around for bugs and worms, they receive a non-medicated, all vegetarian, all natural feed.  This means no antibiotics, no arsenic, no growth hormones and no nasty animal by-products. With our chicken CSA you also have choices as to how many birds you would like to receive each month. Plan 1--1 chicken a month ($105 for 6 chickens) Plan 2--2 chickens a month ($200 for 12 chickens) Plan 3--3 chickens a month ($295 for 18 chickens) Plan 4--4 chickens a month ($385 for 24 chickens) You will receive a whole chicken weighing approximately 4 pounds.  Chickens will be frozen with the exception of weeks we process.  Those weeks you will have a fresh chicken.  That will be about every fourth week.  Pick up day for your birds will be every Wednesday at the farm.  You may pick up once a month or pick up each week you have a chicken coming.  It's up to you. Payment for your plan is due by March 1.  Please email or call to join the chicken CSA or if you would like more info. You don't have to be a member to purchase our chicken.  It will be available like always year round. Speaking of CSA's we only have a few spots left on our produce CSA. BTW..eggs and honey available year round too.   Along with the 12 oz honey bears, we now can offer larger quantities of honey at a slightly lower price per pound. RBTW...Please like us on face book!

Locally Yours, Vicky and Steve

Farm Update

2014 CSA We have decided to offer a CSA program this year. We have found over the last couple of years, when we didn't offer a CSA, that most enjoyed coming to the farm and purchasing their produce when they wanted and buying what they wanted. However, there were still some CSA die-hards that said they missed the CSA! For those who aren't familiar with a CSA, it stands for community supported agriculture. With your payment, you are purchasing a share of the farm's harvest. You also understand that with purchasing a share in a farm's harvest comes a certain amount of risk as well. There is always the possibility that a crop may fail, that the locusts attack or Mother Nature gets angry. We will still have our regular market for the non-CSA members, as we have for the last couple of years. That won't change! Our 2014 CSA will cost $500 for 17 weeks of organically grown produce. You will receive about a half bushel of goodies each week. Our Rousedale Farm wooden crates are a half bushel, just to give you an idea. The CSA will run from 6/4-9/24. Our members will get some optional u-pick opportunities, if they choose to have them. We know that some enjoy picking their own green beans or blueberries and some just don't have the time. We will leave that up to you. We will offer only full shares. You can certainly split your share with a friend, co-worker, neighbor or family member, but you will do the splitting. As in the past, we will make the Rousedale farm pond(swimming pool) available for members and their families to cool off on those hot summer days. Members will have the "help yourself" herb bed for themselves. They also will receive a discount on produce that might be available before the CSA begins and after it ends. Members will also receive a discount on other items like T-shirts. Although it's not written in stone yet, Wednesday will probably be the pick up day again here at the farm. March first is the deadline to have your money in. With just 20 members, it may fill up fast. We do want to reiterate, we will still have our regular market with all the goods we've had for the last few years too. We will be open 6 days a week, 9 hours a day. You don't have to be a member of the CSA to get produce! If the CSA is something you're interested in, don't wait and be disappointed, sign up now! Simply email or call us if you would like to join. We don't have our entire list together on all that will be grown this year. If you have something specific you're wondering about, call or email. That goes for any questions you may have about the CSA as well. BTW..eggs, chicken and honey available year round. RBTW...Please like us on face book! Some nice stuff on our page

Locally Yours, Vicky and Steve