Hello to friends, family and visitors! Our blog has moved! We have so many projects going on over here at the manor, we decided to house all the blogs under one roof. Please visit us at our new site, and tell your friends!

http://sylvestermanor.wordpress.com

Thank you for checking in!

A view of the field from the windmill!

This evening we're trying to create some order by using 3x5 notecards- a rudimentary but flexible project management system for our entire group. The idea is we'll put projects and actions on these cards and then keep them in the office for people to check out and work on. We're going to build a whopping cork board tomorrow to organize and display them.

Our garlic harvest!

Pretty, Pretty, Produce!

Greetings from the Ranchero! I'd love to share some pictures of last week's CSA Harvest with you all.

Thursday night, when the lighting was hitting Shelter Island just right, I went out to snap a few pictures to capture the peace and natural beauty here. We washed & stacked some wine boxes to load our beloved harvest in:

The Guinea Fowls are looking fine as well. They've grown about another 3 inches in wing span since we've let them out of their coop and to munch on the grass. I think they are starting to adjust to being out in the open and pretty soon, they won't even need a protecting net! They sure are loud birds that love to stick together, but they are so adorable, we love to show love.

We've had such a productive few weeks here Shelter Island Farm. Two new members, Alex and Lee, have joined us and are adjusting to the life here quite well. My name is Lee, and I'm the volunteer field apprentice here at Shelter Island Farm. It's a beautiful place and I don't wish to be spending my time this summer any other way. The people, the places, and, did I mention, the produce?!!!!? Take a look for yourself.

Above: volunteer Conner, Bennett, and Lee admire the bountiful harvest.

Our turnips are so good, we can't help but grin ear-to-ear. They are so sweet & juicy, we eat them like apples and suggest you do, too.

A truck-load of food!

Kale!

Sugar Snap-peas, a personal favorite. How could you resist the crunchy and sweet dynamic of these nature's candy?

Bok choi, rhubarb, broccoli raab, 5 types of kale, lettuce, sugar snap-peas, turnips and baby beets are just some of the wonderful veggies we harvested this week!

Overall, things are looking great for farm as you can see. With all this rain and hopefully some more sun as well, our food will continue to flourish. We can't wait to share it with the community. We are having so much fun working, singing, eating and harvesting, the days are going by so quick.  Until next time, enjoy your day!

First CSA PICKUP!

A bunch of proud farmers with our first harvest.

Here we are feeling pretty good after getting those straw bales onto our trailer. Mulching of lots and lots of garlic was in our future.

Back in our field unloading.

Preparing our field.

On this rainy tuesday I will share some pictures of a glorious day last week. The order of the day was to spread the 30,000 pounds of compost over our field using our new spreader. Here is Emma loading up the "Pequea".

The "Pequea" in action bombing down the rows.

After spreading all of the compost, we needed to rake it in to the beds as demonstrated by Bennett. Take note of how beautiful the garlic is coming in.

The past few weeks have been very busy. We have been preparing our fields, starting seedlings, and also transplanting our seedlings from the greenhouses at Quail Hill Farm. Here is Emma with some of our onions coming back to our garden for planting.