January/February Harvest Extension #5 should include potatoes, garlic, beets, radishes, turnips, celeriac, napa cabbage, and kale. Perfect ingredients for soups and roasts.

Please respond via e-mail by 9pm, this Wednesday, February 3rd to reserve your share for this week. Pick up this week is 1-8pm on Thursday, February 4th. The share is $30 once again and needs to be paid for when you pick up your produce (check payable to Anchor Run CSA or cash labeled with your last name). There will be a box in the pick up room for you to deposit your payment. Also, please remember your bags or a box to carry your produce home!

In less than a month the greenhouse will be in full production mode as we begin seeding and nurturing crops for the 2016 season. This will be our 8th season at Anchor Run (13th overall CSA season) which has come and gone in the blink of an eye. We're looking forward to making small improvements around the farm, in the pick up room, in the fields, everywhere we can. We have a good crew lined up to work here this year; all have prior farming experience and aspire to be involved in farming in their futures. This puts a bit more pressure on us as employers and farmers to make sure we can provide a good learning experience, live up to expectations and satisfy the reputation of Anchor Run CSA. Pretty soon we'll finalize our crop seeding, planting, and ground preparation schedules as well as the crop rotation master plan. By the end of this month we'll have to decide the number of members we want to have picking up at the farm each week. Last year we had around 250; this year we're considering 200 or 225. This number is important because it determines how much produce to grow. Of course, growing extra is our best insurance policy to ensure members receive enough.

With the benefit of a relatively calm winter mind and the perspective of hindsight, we've realized we made a mistake regarding our split share policy and the blanket approach we took to cover the entire CSA community with updated split share policy language that was a bit overly harsh and/or negative. We regret offending some of our members who are courteous, respectful, and follow farm rules. What initiated our need to address the issue was mainly confined to a few specific problems we were having and we should have only addressed them at that specific time while we brainstormed a better approach and policy over a few months instead of having a knee-jerk reaction during a very busy time of year. We feel that we made a mistake with how we dealt with the problem and are sorry if we disrupted your CSA experience. We feel that we unfairly blamed some of the problems we were experiencing on share splitters without considering the entire issue.

At this point in time we have come to understand that some of these problems are definitely not confined to share splitting and can be more simply addressed by focusing on the positive attributes and tenets of a true and traditional CSA farm, namely: the honor system; mutual respect between members, farmers, and the land; courtesy and patience; and community involvement. Ideally the CSA farm experience will be positive for everyone involved and that should include all members who follow the above tenets. Thank you for understanding that we're trying to grapple with farm issues and improve your experience here! You are our community and we are your produce farmers and hopefully with a little intelligent dialogue and discourse we can reach a positive conclusion that works for all members equally well.