Forecasting a COOL June ☺☺ and Green Thumb Prospecting

This year's month of May has so far confirmed the blessings of a longer spring.  Just what we hoped and asked for.  So far we've been able to elongate our harvests a bit as the much warmer weather hasn't settled in quite yet.  Soon we'll install white shade cloth with extra hydration as we love to bring you kales, lettuces, radishes, greens, etc., for as long as we can and of course this will be of good use to help with the tomatoes, peppers, etc. 

Ron and I finished fencing in the front yard last week to keep the dogs from running and playing through the front yard gardens, knocking down plants as they go.  I promised photographs and have taken a lot to document and share, now I just need to take the time to go through them and post.  We're still having trouble with the neighbor's horses coming over and tearing up fences, gardens, etc., as the grass is always greener on the other side.  With us not having financial means to put up livestock panels, I think we're going to try putting up a pallet fence.  It'll be temporary as the wood isn't treated and I'll mount potted plants or something to spruce it up. 

We've received a request to sell our organic produce to a local restaurant.  Due to limited growing space (we'll begin our search for additional property(ies) this year - yes, we need that 50 or 500 acre farm :) ) We haven't promoted ourselves in the restaurant communities but look forward to adding this to our line of deliveries.  Soon you'll see us promoting more.  As we create this wonderful network of hobby gardeners that take pride in growing strict organic, we've picked up another local organic honey and produce farmer this week and will be getting more honey and potatoes from him soon. Yes, we grow potatoes and soon we'll have our own bees but as we network more, we're able to provide to a larger clientele, we need all that want to eat healthy, to have that opportunity.  On the other plus side, it promotes and provides a wider variety of items, if our broccoli isn't ready to harvest yet, one of our partners' a little further north of us may be....elongating the harvests to bring to you sooner for a longer period of time.  We love encouraging the stay-at-home parent, the retiree, evening gardener, etc., to get their green thumbs out and their hands dirty, and work with us to sell the remaining.  We are considering adding a subtitle to our Farm name.  We are almost but not exactly sure what the name will be yet, to develop and promote, large and small gardeners with the same mission. We want to encourage any and all that have a love of the outdoors and dirt on their hands to grow something they love and network with us.  If we can encourage this by giving them an avenue to help disperse their extra organic farm fresh to a stranger's table or restaurant kitchen, we are on our way to feeding the world a healthier, non genetically modified product and making a lot of friends along the way.

We thank you for your support of our Farm and our Mission.

Ron and Annette Layton
Little Eden Heirloom Farm
850/274-7690

Welcoming Spring with Cheeps, Chirps, Squash, Cucumbers and UNwelcomed Bugs

Spring has brought a lot of cheeps, chirps, quacks and meows around our Little Eden.

If the thousands of seeds that are now plants and those germinating soon could talk, wonder what they would sound like.  Hmmmm.

Aside from the biting bugs and we won't mention the fact that we have to share a great deal with the little monsters that try and at times succeed at eating our produce..I mean mint...good grief..  Of the seven varieties of mint we have, it's the chocolate mint....well let's just say we humans (for those humans that do, that is) are not the only ones that like chocolate. 

Cute tomatoes and little yellow squash are poking their heads outs and we welcome them back for another great year to be followed up by more beans, peas, cucumbers, zucchini, etc.  Yes, we are in full swing of spring.  We'll soon say goodbye to some of the cool weather crops although we'll extend our harvests of these with the use of shade cloths as far out as we can. 

We thank you for your support of our Farm and our Mission.

Ron and Annette Layton
Little Eden Heirloom Farm
850/274-7690