We are sending our weekly email out early this week as we will be closed this weekend for Labor Day. The summer’s gone fast, my rain gauge has recorded 26” thus far, with a record August for cool and wet. The weeds love it! I had to get a heavy flail shredder mower for my tractor to knock down the jungle in some areas. As mentioned before I certified 12 ac of production with the FSA this year. This fall I plan to plow down another 5 acres of alfalfa on the west side, that will bring production up to 17 acres, half of that (8.5 ac) will be farmed next year when our new irrigation system is operational, the other ½ will be fallowed for weed control then planted to a soil building cover crop mid-summer. We believe we will be able to handle about 150 shareholders for the coming year. We hope you continue to help us grow by referring your friends and coworkers. We hope to have a large standalone cooler outside near the asparagus building soon. We plan to expand our chicken and egg sales by the case to University offices. You can get free chicken and eggs by taking case orders from your office, department, or coworkers. I currently have ½ hog for sale: cut, wrapped, smoked, cured, at Steiner Locker in Yankton… its good pork!
We will be open this Wednesday 4-7pm with: lots of potatoes, (red and white), Sweet corn, leeks, onions, garlic, summer squash, zucchini, melons, some eggplants, cucumbers, and maybe some beans if we can get some “pickers”. Our “kid” help has gone back to school now, so we are short of help.
Finally I was notified this week that I received a National award for our work on the farm for pollinator protection, the 2014 “Farmer –Rancher Pollinator Conservation Award” will be given to us in Washington DC on Tuesday October 21 at the Department of Ag Whitten building patio. My oldest daughter Sunni who works for a Conservation district in Montana graciously nominated me. We hope she will join Heidi and I at the award ceremony in Washington DC in October.
We thank you for your community support of the Heikes Family Farm.
Sincerely, Sam and Heidi