When is your produce picked? How long does it take between when its picked and when it gets to the market?
A: Our produce is usually picked between 2 to 3 days before it reaches our farmers market stands.
Is your produce certified organic?
No. However, we follow the principals of organic farming, but we use some benign conventional fertilizers, which do not have petrochemicals.
How should I wash fruit and vegetables?
Simply rinsing and scrubbing produce well with water should be enough to clean it thoroughly. For fruit or vegetables with thick, uneven skin, just scrub the skin with a brush. Researchers indicate that it isn’t necessary to use special fruit and vegetable washes and they actually caution against using antibacterial soap to wash produce.
One study’s findings are detailed in this National Public Radio piece
What do you use to fertilize and control pests on your plants?
We use a comprehensive strategy called Integrated Pest Management. This includes fertilizing with both natural chicken and cow manure, as well as organic and benign conventional fertilizers, which do not have petrochemicals. To manage pests, we introduce plant-friendly predatory insects which eat non-plant-friendly insects and spray plants with distilled water mixed with some soap and ground chile (pepper). Lastly, we use some pest management products which include copper and sulfur to kill mildew and other plant-eating fungi. Neither copper nor sulfur is poisonous in the small amounts we use and sulfur is in fact the oldest known pesticide, having been used for more than two thousand years.
Eggs
Are your eggs fertilized?
In general, our eggs are unfertilized. On a few rare occasions, we have brought some fertilized eggs to market. We want you to be completely satisfied with our eggs, so if you have any questions about our eggs please contact us at your local market or through our contact page on this website.
Why do some eggs have two yolks? Is this more common in eggs from free-range chickens?
Generally, this happens in younger chickens which are still adjusting their egg production cycles or in certain chickens which are actually biologically-predisposed to producing eggs with multiple yolks. Without the intervention of humans, chickens actually can’t sustain twins since the egg white, which feeds the chick, has only enough nutrients for one baby.
