Fourth graders at Happy Hollow School in Wayland finished their study of river habitats with a field trip to Great Meadows National Wildlife Refuge as part of our River Schools program. They explored the Sudbury River and a nearby pond, and compared their observations of the macroinvertebrates and water quality, which they recorded using iPads and hand-written data sheets.
There is nothing quite like the joys of hands-on, outdoor learning!
It’s strawberry time! We’re finally getting the heat that ripens the berries, and they’re coming on fast. We had lots for the stand on Tuesday, and we are confident there will be a good amount for this Saturday, June 21 at Strawberry Day.
Amidst the pouring rain Friday afternoon, Crops Manager Matt Celona and his team harvested crops for the Union Square Farmers Market in Somerville. They picked the early strawberries into pints during the afternoon showers.
We set up a tent at the edge of the strawberry field and ran pints in under cover four at a time as soon as they were picked. Berries left in wet pints tend to mold quickly. But the pints were relatively dry, and the berries were in good shape come market on Saturday morning. Lana reports that people were elbowing past each other to get to our spray-free berries at the market, and they were sold out by 10 am.
Stop by our farmstand during your visit to the farm to buy a pint for yourself while they are available. You can also us at the Union Square Farmers Market, Somerville Saturdays 9 am-1 pm, or at Watertown Market, Arsenal Mall, Watertown, from 3-7 pm June19 and 26.
As we wrap up w
hat little there was of the spring and welcome the onset of summer, Drumlin Farm starts to transform. You may have noticed that there are not many family programs in July and August. Yet, the farm will buzz with activity as 200 kids come each weekday to work in the fields, take nature walks, get up-close to wildlife, participate in farm chores, and play games.
What’s the reason for all the excitement and commotion? Summer camp, of course! This is a wonderful season when kids finally have a chance to step away from school work and electronic devices to go outside, get dirty, explore nature, and just be kids.
What does this mean for the everyday visitor? We may not have as many preregistered programs, but there will still be plenty to see and do all summer long. Our teacher naturalists provide hands-on programming related to wildlife, farming, and the environment each day. On weekdays you can join these drop-in programs at 10 am and 11:30 am and, on weekends, another program is offered at 2:30 pm.
If you’re not sure you want a program, ask for a scavenger hunt when you arrive, check to see if hayrides are running, or take a walk on one of our trails to look for wildlife!
And if you’re still looking for an open summer camp for your kids, we have space available at our satellite camp locations: Assabet River National Wildlife Refuge and Wolbach Farm!
When the CSA (Community Supported Agriculture) movement was beginning in the early 80s, growers and consumers alike were motivated by the idea that people had lost connection with food production on local farms, and would eagerly embrace the opportunity to visit a farm once per week to pick up a share of the season’s harvest. Now, almost forty years later, the newest trend in CSA farming is the weekly home delivery of a boxed share. It’s a measure of farmers’ marketing sense that we continually find ways to increase the appeal of our products, yet it’s possible that in the near future people may again find themselves becoming curious about what it’s like to be on the farm that produces these wonderful boxes of food.
The shifting trends in local agriculture underscore the power of Louise Hatheway’s vision in donating Drumlin Farm to Mass Audubon almost sixty years ago now. Before anyone had heard of a CSA, she believed in the value of being present on a working farm and experiencing people and animals producing food. I was thinking about this as Karen Stein, Lana Cannon and I were out on the walkway selling freshly harvested vegetables and Drumlin Farm CSA shares on Sunday. Hundreds and hundreds of people streamed past, picnicked on the lawn, met up for a tour of the Wildlife Care building, wandered into the Crossroads Barn, and yes, even bought a few CSA shares, all because Louise Hatheway foresaw a need for a place like this and because Mass Audubon continues to support that vision.
We are two weeks away now from our first CSA distribution on June 4, and we still have shares available. The Drumlin Farm CSA is a great choice for those who cook often and like to preserve and share food. It’s likely that a share will provide you with an abundance of produce, especially in August and September. Although it is a founding principle of CSAs that members share the risks and rewards of the farming season, for the past ten years we have consistently provided 15-20% returns over the cost of a share as measured by the retail value of the produce distributed to each member.
Register today for a CSA share with Drumlin Farm. We would love to have you as part of our farm community. If you are already a CSA member, thanks so much for your support! Word-of-mouth is our most effective advertising, so please share this with friends, family, and anyone you know who will enjoy fresh produce throughout the harvest season.
-Matt Celona is the Crops Manager at Drumlin Farm
The 5th graders at Peaslee Elementary School and their teacher Ms. Miranda were excited to welcome teacher-naturalist Danielle Fredericks and some Drumlin Farm residents to their classroom last Wednesday to see the intricate parts of the food web up-close.
To start off the visit, Danielle helped the students become part of their own food web. Standing in a circle, each student was given an index card with one element of the food web written on it. Starting with the sun, the students passed yarn across the circle to the next “step” in the food web. From the sun to an oak tree, from the oak tree to a squirrel, from the squirrel to a red tailed hawk, from the hawk to a mouse, and so on. By the end, the web of yarn was so intertwined that is would have been impossible to remove one piece and maintain the web, showing the importance of each organism to the others.
Once freed from the web, the students sat in circle around a tarp and plexiglass barrier anxiously awaiting the firsts animal guests—15 mice! Squeals of delight filled the air as the babies darted under the leaves spread across the tarp, demonstrating their instinct to hide from predators. Several students noticed that a few mice had red eyes instead of brown ones, which gave Danielle the perfect opportunity to talk about variation.
The kids were able to get an even closer view as Danielle walked around holding one mouse in a tennis ball container. To Ms. Miranda’s relief, all 15 mice made it back to their carrier, and the students were ready for the next guest.
Moving up the food chain, Danielle sat in a chair to hold the corn snake in her lap. Though corn snakes are not native to Massachusetts, they are similar to the milk snake, which is a native species. Mouths open wide, the 5th graders learned that while humans are limited by the joint of their jaw bone to the skull, snakes can detach their jaws. This adaptation allows them to swallow their prey (like mice) whole. Brave students were able to stroke the tail of the snake as Danielle walked around the circle, showing of the snake’s cold scales.
Finally, Danielle presented a red-tailed hawk. Though this particular hawk is blind in one eye, the students marveled at a hawk’s ability to see mice from half a mile away! Once it has spotted prey, the hawks sturdy wing allows it to dive quickly enough to catch even a moving animal. Danielle passed around a hawk wing for the students to feel, giving them a sense of how a hawks adaptations allow it to survive at the top of this chain in the complex food web.
What an exciting day for the Peaslee School 5th graders!
Quilting—the sandwiching of a warmth-provider like cotton or wool between two pieces of cloth— is almost as old as farming and it can be traced back to ancient Egypt and China. Today, about 14% of all households in the United States has a quilter; that translates into 21 million quilters. Quilting is not just a hobby, it is big business.
The Nature Center and Ice Pond House
I came to quilting about 20 years ago. Engaged daily in cerebral activities at that time, I found quilting, watching something come alive with color and pattern into a finished product, was much more satisfying than the vocation I had chosen. I was hooked. So, when the Drumlin Farm folks suggested a map might be a helpful tool for visitors to find their way around the farm, I gladly picked up the mantle.
Once a rough design was agreed upon, I embarked on gathering fabric for the project. For me, selecting the right fabrics to interpret a work is like a treasure hunt. The colors, the scale, the personality of the fabric all matter. Patterns and designs speak to a project. Thousands of bolts of fabric, dozens of purchased yards, and hours of internet searching later, I finally had a stash of fabric from which to fashion a quilt map of the farm. This search took about six months.
The Red Barn
Fabrics for each building were chosen to not only preserve the integrity of the building but to create a visual impression that would resonate with those looking for guidance around the farm. The animals, the aviaries of Bird Hill and the Underground posed the most challenges. The aviaries are made of regular household screening wrapped in electrical tape (a thank you to Moison Ace Hardware in Bedford for giving me the screening when I told him what I wanted it for) and the Underground is really a piece of air conditioning filter a friend offered for use. The animals posed a harder challenge since Heritage breeds are not on the minds of fabric designers but finally compatible animals were found. Each building was drafted on paper for size, scale, and perspective before it was produced in fabric form.
Drumlin Underground, the vernal pool, the Crossroads Barn, Bird Hill, and the Farm Life Center
Which detail to depict and which detail to delete was a decision that hovered over every aspect of this quilt. The mere size of the piece eliminated some detail, but other detail, like the old fallen tree in the picnic area and the rock protruding from the earth along the walkway from the parking lot to the Admissions window, were too important to our young visitors—and my grandchildren– not to be included.
Finally, when the top had been pieced and appliquéd, I turned it over to Concessa Shearer of Wayland so she could work her magic. A very talented artist/quilter, she machine quilted the top, the batting, and the backing into a completed quilt map.
The quilted map of Drumlin Farm now hangs in the hall of the Nature Center—be sure to check it out on your next visit!
—Linda Conrad is a long-time volunteer at Drumlin Farm
Despite the lingering cold weather, March has been a month of warm fleecy fuzz and the first signs of spring. Take a look!
Onions. They get a bad rep for being too pungent and causing tears, but even an amateur chef knows that onions are a kitchen necessity. Minced, diced, chopped, sliced, or whole, these versatile bulbs are roasted, boiled, sautéed, grilled, caramelized, or used raw in just about any recipe you can think of. And, they are one of the first crops we tend to as we prepare for spring on the farm.
Next week we will begin seeding the thousands of onion seeds that we need for our bunching, bulb, and storage onions in 2014. This is an arduous process, as we hand seed all of our crops and the onion seeds are particularly small. We plant them on a grid, making sure that every seed has the optimum soil, moisture and light that it needs to be a healthy seedling, thereby giving it the best opportunity to grow into a healthy plant that can resist drought, pests, and disease.
Once the onions sprout, we wait for them to grow to 5-6 inches, and then give them “haircuts” to encourage the onions to “bulb out,” or force their growing energy into making large, strong bulbs. After two or three haircuts, we place the trays of baby onions outside on the cold frame, covered with plastic sheeting and row cover, and harden them off before planting them in the fields, one by one.
It is a labor of love, and one that is well worth the effort, as there is nothing so gratifying as pulling a gorgeous spring onion out of the ground and tasting that fresh, sweet flavor that signifies summer.
There are still Summer CSA shares available for 2014 – sign up online or email CSA Manager Lana at [email protected] with questions!
Beneath the blanket of snow, tree buds are starting to move as the tree comes out of winter dormancy.
February has had its fair share of snow, but there are already signs of spring. Just look at the trees! No, you won’t find green leaves quite yet, but if you look closely, you’ll see the buds.
Buds are made in the fall during an early stage of preparation for winter dormancy. Plants create tissues that will be ready to produce leaves, but can survive or even require the harsh cold of the winter season. Dormancy begins and ends as a response to daylight along with other environmental factors. As the length of daylight decreases, plant hormones bring about deeper and deeper stages of dormancy until the tree is prepared to survive the winter.
The white lines on these buds are the result of bud growth.
In late winter, once the daylight has recovered enough, growth hormones are activated and the plant starts to come out of dormancy. Once the hormone cycle restarts the tree will react to temperature, and just a short warm spell will cause the buds to start to move. Even now, in the midst of snowstorms, some plant buds show signs of growth, like the white lines dividing the scales on this bud. Over the next few weeks the bud will continue to stretch until a leaf appears and the bud “bursts.”
Several school groups come to Drumlin Farm to help us track bud burst at the sanctuary with the Harvard Forest Buds, Leaves, and Global Warming program, which has been tracking bud burst for twenty years. Students tag branches and observe the buds week to week to document the timing of changes in the tree buds. Trends have shown that buds are bursting 2-3 weeks earlier than they were decades ago.
Here at Drumlin Farm, one natural reaction to bud bursts is seen in the vernal pools. Once the trees around the pool have buds and show leaves, they draw water from the ponds. This often lowers the pond level, depending on other environmental factors. Does the early budding affect the life cycle of pond organisms that depend on our vernal pools? We don’t know, but many school groups who participate in ponding programs record data regarding the organisms living in our vernal pools, which may give us the data to answer this question in the future. You can find Drumlin Farm’s data on the Harvard Forest website.
Bud burst tracking can be done in your very own backyard. Tag a branch or two, and visit that location every few days to observe the small but significant changes that occur far before green leaves appear. Take a picture each time you visit, and compare the buds over time. Watching the buds burst will show you that spring comes much sooner than you think. You can keep a journal of your findings so you’ll have something to look back on next year!
Starting this weekend, visitors to Drumlin Farm will be able to see our maple sugaring process up close during drop-in hours at the evaporator behind the Pond House, starting February 15 until March 9. A teacher-naturalist will be on hand at 11:30 am to give you the inside scoop on maple sugaring. Here are a few fun sugaring facts to get you started!
We use a “tree-saver” spile that has a smaller diameter than traditional spiles, making it healthier for the tree in the long run. This less intrusive, more compact model doesn’t open the tree up to possible infection in the same way as traditional spiles. This year, 100% of our trees will be tapped with the tree-saver spile!Join us by the evaporator to learn more fun facts about making maple syrup! And if you just can’t get enough of our sweet syrup, sign up for Maple Moo on Feb 28, and Maple Magic on March 7 — two fun Family Programs to enjoy on the farm!
And our annual Sap-to-Syrup Farmer’s Breakfast, March 15 and 16, is always a hit for the whole family! Register early, as spots for both the Family Programs and the breakfast fill up fast! Visit www.massaudubon.org/drumlinprograms or call 781-259-2206 to register.
