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Author: Amy

  • Cyclospora and Local Farms

    We’ve all been hearing about the Cyclospora outbreak. A few customers have been asking if our produce is safe. I received a message today from an email list I’m on called Farmhand that gave an excellent explanation as to why small, local farms are almost never involved in this kind of outbreak. Here’s what they said:

    “Weeks into this outbreak, the most important detail is still the one nobody prints in bold: officials can’t find the source. That’s not because the investigators are bad at their jobs. It’s because the industrial food system is built in a way that makes the question unanswerable. A bag of salad greens passes through growers, consolidators, processors, distributors, and retailers — so many anonymous hands that by the time someone gets sick, “where did this come from?” has no answer at all. The anonymity isn’t a bug in that system. It’s the design.”

    At Red Wagon our produce is only handled by us! It goes straight from our field to our pack house to you. It doesn’t pass through many hands in different facilities with the potential to be involved in a nationwide food-borne illness outbreak.

    You should always follow common-sense food safety procedures like washing your produce and using clean hands, tools, and surfaces for preparation. But you can rest assured that nothing you get from Red Wagon has passed through the black box of the industrial food system in our country. It’s one more reason to support local farms year-in and year-out. So we can stay in business and be there when you really need us!

    With health and food safety,
    Amy

  • Thank you for supporting small and local!

    Do you ever feel like the world is rapidly collapsing into just a handful of enormous corporations and you’re left without many choices? I’ve had one of those weeks.

    As CSA members you are making an important choice to support your community! The superstore across town or the app on your phone might be less expensive, more convenient, and offer endless choices. For now. We don’t know what they will do in the future. These faceless corporations buy up small businesses or put them out of business until the big corporations are the only ones left standing. You have fewer choices as a customer and if you are looking for a job you have fewer employers to choose from.

    When you choose a small, local business you are supporting our community and our local economy. You get to know all of us at Red Wagon when we see you at our CSA pickups and at events on the farm. These are experiences that feel real. And a lot of the money you spend on your CSA share goes right back into our community in the form of paychecks and money we spend with other local businesses. On top of all of this you get to enjoy fresh, delicious food! We are so lucky to live in an area with a vibrant farming community made possible by a combination of people who love growing food and others who value what we do.

    Owning a small farm is hard. Really hard. And recently it’s only gotten harder. Why do we keep doing it? Because of you! I feel an incredible amount of loyalty to our CSA members and other customers as well as our employees. It feels like we’re all working together for something we believe in. Despite the challenges I feel surprisingly upbeat right now. It’s because I got to go to the first few weeks of CSA pickups and connect with a lot of you. This is the 20th summer of our CSA. It’s amazing to look back and see what we’ve all built together!

    With gratitude,
    Amy

    Mo and Audrey at the farm CSA pickup.

     

    I spend most of my time in my little office on the farm.

  • A Topsy-Turvy Spring = Small CSA Shares

    Does anybody else feel disoriented? What happened to winter? I’m still thrown off a bit when I realize it’s already the end of May. We started with an exceptionally dry winter and spring with a record-breaking heatwave in March. It felt like we might get some relief in April with some much-needed rain. But storm after storm missed our area. By May 1 things looked truly dismal. That’s the date when water providers in our area usually take stock of the water situation and make plans for the year. Municipalities and other water districts started announcing voluntary and mandatory watering restrictions. By then Wyatt had started calling around to try to lease irrigation water from anybody he could think of. Then on May 5 we finally had a big snow storm. I have never been so happy to walk through our muddy fields! A second big storm on May 17 gave me more hope. (Although it came with a few minutes of heart-stopping hail.) We are not out of the woods in terms of the drought but the moisture we received in May has helped a lot.

    Wyatt and I have been through all kinds of weather challenges in the 22 years we’ve been farming. But this year feels like the biggest curveball yet. Every year we plant a handful of crops (mostly alliums) in the fall to over-winter and have them ready for the first few weeks of CSA pickups in the spring. Those crops woke up way too early this year. Those of you who came to our harvest event last week got some walking onions and green garlic. But that was at the very end of the harvest window for those crops and now they’re too mature and woody so we’ll miss having them for our CSA pickups this year. You should see some garlic scapes in your shares this week. If you’re a long-time CSA member you might remember that you normally see those in mid-June. But again, the over-wintered crops are weeks ahead of when they’d normally be ready.

    So if the alliums are early why are other spring crops behind? The short answer is that most of the spring crops are planted in March and April. Wyatt told me to blame him for not having those crops ready now. But I gave him a big eye roll and asked how anybody could have known the right decisions to make since it felt like we’ve been in uncharted territory with the weather the last few months. We planted a few rows of crops in March and watered them with tap water to make sure we had them ready for the harvest event last week. However, Wyatt waited to do a lot of his usual March planting because it was so hot that he thought there was a good chance those crops would be ready before CSA pickups started. And we were having trouble getting water at our home farm on 63rd St which is where we do the first spring planting.

    We were also delayed in doing our spring field preparation. The soil needs to be the right moisture before we can plow and till. When it’s too dry the soil is rock hard and you can’t do those things. We normally wait for rain or snow in the spring to soften the soil then we plow and till just as the soil reaches the right moisture while drying out. In April Wyatt would look at the weather forecast and see a storm heading our way and make plans to plow. Then the storm would miss us. I think that happened 3 times in April. One option when the fields are dry and there’s no rain is to irrigate the soil so it is the right moisture for plowing. But in a year when irrigation water is so precious we were trying to hold off in the hopes that we would receive some moisture from the sky. Hence, my ecstatic response to the May 5th snow storm! It was pretty soggy after that storm. The downside of receiving so much moisture is that the fields are too wet and you have to wait a little while for them to dry out before you plow or you compact the soil. But at least that’s a problem we’ve faced before and know how to work around it.

    In between all of this Wyatt did use a little bit of our irrigation water to prep the fields in early April so he could plant the arugula and turnips you are receiving this week. He also decided to prioritize our summer crops so we could get those in the ground on schedule. Many of those crops are grown using drip irrigation and it felt like we weren’t using up a lot of our precious water with them.

    One result of all of this is that our CSA shares this week are much smaller than we would like. The timing didn’t work out this year and we didn’t have a road map to show us how to navigate through these challenges. However, thanks to the moisture we received in May many of our spring crops should be caught up in the next week or two and we should have our regular offerings for your CSA shares. Plus we should have enough food to make up for the light shares this week!

    Fortunately, our wonderful farm crew has been working hard to get things planted whenever the weather allows. Even though the timing has been a challenge I am amazed at how good things are looking in the fields. You can see a handful of photos below that I took on Saturday when Wyatt and I were looking at the crops.

    To our CSA members, thank you for your continued support. I’ve said it many times before but I’ll say it again. You are the reason that we can keep farming. Every farm season brings its own challenges. This season has been the most mind-boggling yet so far. But we’re able to keep moving forward knowing that you’ve got our backs.

    With heartfelt gratitude,
    Amy

    We normally harvest garlic around July 4th. It will probably be ready in mid-June this year.
    This lettuce needs just a few days before it’s big enough to harvest.
    Only a few weeks until we are harvesting basil.
    All of our tomatoes are in tunnels this year and they’re looking vibrant and healthy.

  • How is Red Wagon Able to Keep Farming Year After Year?

    If you’ve been with Red Wagon for a while you know what I’m going to say…the biggest thing supporting Red Wagon is our CSA! It might not be obvious why it helps us so much more to have you as a CSA member than to buy our vegetables some other way—like through another farm stand or market, at a local restaurant, or even at our own farm store! Don’t get me wrong, all of these things help but it’s our CSA members that keep us going.

    Our CSA gives us gives us predictability. You join early in the year then we can make a plan for the whole season based on our CSA membership numbers. We can’t change the number of tomatoes we have in August if we decided to start too many or too few plants back in March. Farming is all about the long game and we need to be able to plan in order to be successful.

    Our CSA also helps us to cover many of the upfront costs each year. There are a lot of expenses at the beginning of the season. So far this year we’ve spent over $90,000—and it isn’t even April yet! Some of the biggest expenses are seeds, organic fertilizers, irrigation water, payroll, rent, insurance, accounting, and fuel. You probably think of some of these when you think of a farm, but others are just part of having a business.

    Joining our CSA is about more than getting your weekly veggies. (Although, that’s a pretty fantastic part!) You’re supporting your values. It is difficult to farm anywhere but Boulder County has felt especially challenging the past few years. One reason is that it is expensive to do anything here whether you’re trying to run a business or just cover your living expenses. We are never going to win if you are just comparing prices at our farm versus the grocery store. That’s where putting money towards your values (in the form of a CSA membership) comes in. Instead of supporting large corporate farms you’re supporting a small family farm where we focus on sustainable practices and ecosystem health. You’re helping to keep money in our local economy. You’re preserving agriculture in our community and helping to strengthen our local food system (we all remember how important local farms were during COVID!). You’re supporting us while we try to navigate the challenges of our changing climate. The last handful of years have brought more frequent wildfires, hail, extreme heat, early snowstorms, and drought. We wouldn’t be able to try to adjust to these new challenges without our CSA members facing the risks with us. Do you think about all of these wonderful things you’re supporting when you sign up for your CSA share? You should!

    Many of you go the extra mile and contribute to one of our funds: Farm Worker Support (extra money for our farm workers), Sharing the Harvest (reduced-rate CSA shares), and Red Wagon Supporter (helping our farm to keep going!). I don’t acknowledge these contributions as frequently as I would like to. But my heart is truly touched by the fact that so many of you give just because we asked.

    Barn at Thomas Open SpaceI also want to give a shout out to Boulder County Parks & Open Space and the City of Lafayette Open Space Division. Did you know that we are tenant farmers? Red Wagon does not own any of the land we farm. Over time it has become more profitable to sell land to developers than to use land to produce food. That’s part of why farms have disappeared from so many parts of our country. But we are all lucky to live in a place where our local government saw this coming and had a vision of preserving our open spaces. The Boulder County Parks & Open Space department was created just over 50 years ago. One of the main things they did was purchase open space to preserve for recreation and agriculture. Our farm on N 63rd St is on one of those Boulder County Open Space properties! The City of Lafayette has also done its part to preserve local agriculture. They purchased Thomas Open Space about 20 years ago when a developer was planning to build about 100 homes on the site. The City had the vision to keep the land in agriculture and we are fortunate to be the current tenants. It’s now where we have a large part of our farm operation, including our farm store and largest CSA pickup. I don’t think Red Wagon would exist if it weren’t for the visionary people working for Boulder County and the City of Lafayette.

    Wow! It really takes a village to support a family farm like ours. You might ask why we put so much effort into our farm given the challenges. There are a lot of reasons, but the biggest one is simple. Wyatt and I and the rest of our team love growing food for our community. We are all connected through food and it feels good to be an important part of what keeps our community together. I ran into my good friend, Anne Cure (of Cure Organic Farm), the other day. We were commiserating about the many challenges our farms have faced recently. I told Anne I was determined to redouble my efforts to keep our farm strong and moving in the right direction. I said this is not the time to have small farms disappear from our communities. Anne agreed and added that our farms just make so many people happy. That feels pretty great. Well said, Anne!

    With gratitude,
    Amy

  • Windstorm Damage

    The windstorm on Friday, December 19th was the worst we’ve had at our farm on 63rd Street in the 16 years we’ve lived here! The wind tore the roof off of one of our greenhouses. Fortunately the metal structure is mostly intact but we will have to re-sheet the greenhouse.

    Wind damaged bok choi

     

    During January we normally harvest greens for our winter CSA from inside our greenhouse. It’s usually so cold by then that our greens that are growing outdoors or in our unheated tunnels are mostly dead. Unfortunately, the strong winds a few weeks ago beat up the tender greens like lettuce and bok choi that were inside the greenhouse. They might recover a bit. Or we might be short on greens in January. Fortunately, we have a lot of other veggies in storage so you won’t go hungry!

    However, another unusual weather pattern might mean we’ll have plenty of greens in January after all. It’s been so mild out that our field greens still look beautiful! As of today there aren’t any really cold temperatures in the forecast. This is only the sixth year we’ve had a winter CSA and each year seems to bring it’s own surprises. We’ll see what happens in the next few weeks!

  • Thank you for another season!

    To be honest, I am normally burned out by this time of year. There are so many ups and downs throughout the season. The hail storm in July was a big loss for the farm. We (mostly Wyatt) have been struggling with big irrigation problems for the past two years. I’m exhausted from working the last 4 months at our farm store with only 2 or 3 days off. There have been some large unexpected expenses and this is the time of year when I sit down to the unnerving task of figuring out if we made enough money to cover our expenses. And there are more and more headwinds for small farms and small businesses in general. You would think it would be easier to run a farm after doing it for 22 seasons but it feels like it’s only gotten harder.

    All of the struggles can overshadow the many bright spots. We had a great crew again this year and I am so thankful for our workers from Tapias de Santa Cruz, Mexico. Growing our cucumbers in our screened-in greenhouse successfully protected them from the cucumber beetles that have been decimating our crops for a number of years. Our caterpillar tunnels protected the plants inside them (mostly tomatoes) from hail and we’ll likely continue to grow more crops in tunnels. I had a lot of fun working on our u-pick flowers with Mo and we’re already making plans for improvements next year. I’ve learned that high school boys make good, reliable farm store employees and I’ve had fun working with my nephew and his 10th grade friends at our store.

    The biggest thing that lifts me out of my end-of-season burnout is going to the last week of our CSA pickups. I went to the pickup at Nevei Kodesh last night and my attitude was completely turned around in about 15 minutes. People talk about all of the great food they’ve made over the summer and tell us that the CSA pickup is the highlight of their week and they tell us how much they will miss us over the winter. I get to see how much the kids love the food and I feel like we’re helping to teach them to be good vegetable eaters!

    My job feels like a public service to me and I am proud of the work that we do at Red Wagon. Our CSA members are our partners in making this wonderful thing happen–local food and family farms. You have my sincerest gratitude.

    Amy

  • Winter CSA 2025/2026

    We are excited to announce our 2025/2026 Winter CSA! Click here to join.

    Details:

    • Two Pickup Locations:
      • Wednesdays at Red Wagon Farm at 7694 N 63rd St, Longmont (near Niwot).
      • Thursdays at Red Wagon at Thomas Open Space at 1640 W Baseline Rd, Lafayette.
    • Pickup times: 3 to 6 pm.
    • Pickups are from 10/29/25 – 1/29/26
    • Weekly Veggie Share $643.50 (13 pickups)
    • Biweekly Veggie Share $346.50 (7 pickups)
    • Mushroom and Coffee Shares also available.
    • Prices are prorated if you join after Oct 29.

    Possible crops we will have (depending on weather and availability):

    • Greens: lettuce, spinach, arugula, bok choi, kale, chard, collards
    • Onions, garlic, leeks
    • Potatoes
    • Carrots
    • Beets
    • Cabbage
    • Roasted chiles
    • Winter squash
    • Pie pumpkins
    • Herbs
    • Rutabagas
    • Celeriac
    • Winter radishes
    • Turnips

    Select here to see what was in our Winter CSA shares every week last year.

    Click here to join now!
    Email csa@redwagonfarmboulder.com with questions.

  • Casualties of Hail: Melons and U-Pick Tomaotes

    On July 11 in Lafayette we had the worst hail storm that I think Wyatt and I have seen in our 20+ years of farming in Boulder County. It can be difficult to tell how bad the damage is right after a hail storm. Some plants have strong root systems and will eventually grow through the hail damage, though with lower yields. With other crops you don’t see the full extent of the damage for several weeks. The hardest hit crops from this hail storm were our melons and our U-pick tomatoes (among other crops) and we will feel the effects of the hail storm for the rest of the season.

    Diseased tomato plants

    On July 12 the tomato plants looked damaged but they were fairly well established and we thought they would eventually recover. However, in the few weeks after the hail storm the plants were in a weakened state and therefore more susceptible to disease. Now over 75% of the tomato plants in our U-pick area are dead and it is a sad sight! There are still some tomatoes out there are we are holding U-pick events on Saturday mornings. But you really have to hunt for the tomatoes and it is not the bounty we had planned for! The good news is that the tomatoes we have for our CSA members are in caterpillar tunnels and were protected from the hail. That’s why we are still able to bring beautiful tomatoes to you every week! We are now leaning towards putting our whole U-pick area into tunnels next season. It just feels too risky to plant tomatoes outside.

    Battered melon plants

    Our melon plants were also badly damaged and we could see that right away. Before the storm the foliage was thick and lush. After the hail most of the leaves were stripped off and the plants were mostly stems. This was our first melon succession of the season and by far the largest. Usually we would be harvesting hundreds of melons from those plants right now. But this year we’re just getting a trickle off of the plants. We always plant a second and third melon succession but those are much smaller plantings. So the short (and sad) story is that there will be a small melon harvest this year.

    Other crops were damaged but not as badly. The tender zucchinis that were on the plants during the storm all had hail marks. You might remember the beat up looking zucchini the following week! But the plants mostly recovered. The beet leaves were shredded and the beets aren’t forming the way they should. The pepper plants had each put out their first pepper or two. Those peppers were damaged and had to be removed from the plants. We had to wait a few weeks for the plants to recover and put out the next peppers which is why we don’t have any red ripe peppers yet—like Carmens.

    Caterpillar tunnels
    Caterpillar tunnels

    We’ve used row cover for years. For a long time we mostly used a lighter weight row cover and much of that was shredded in this hail storm. But it did provide some protection for the plants that were under the cover. In recent years Wyatt has started using a heavier and more durable row cover. That paid off and there were hardly any holes in the heavier cover!

    It’s more expensive and requires more work to build caterpillar tunnels every year or to use what feels like acres of row cover. But when we’re facing challenges like hail or cucumber beetle infestations we really see the benefit. We will likely keep adding more tunnels to our farm in future years.

    Just a few minutes of hail can greatly impact our whole growing season. It’s a constant source of stress that you just have to live with as a farmer. The good news is that we plant crops all throughout the growing season. We still have a lot of beautiful veggies in the field and will be able to feed you for the months to come!

  • Fundraiser for Tapias de Santa Cruz, Mexico

    For the next couple of weeks, you’ll see a donation can at your CSA pickup. Just a dollar or two will make a difference!

    Tapias de Santra Cruz is an impoverished agricultural town in the central Mexican state of Zacatecas with a population of 1,400. Red Wagon has had a long relationship with Tapias. If you’ve been with Red Wagon for a while, you’ve surely met Javier who has overseen growing operations here for the last 15 years. Tapias is Javier’s hometown. In the past few years Red Wagon has struggled with the shortage of qualified agricultural workers. Last year Javier came through for us and found a few friends and family members from Tapias who were willing to come to Colorado on work visas and work at Red Wagon. This year we have 6 people from Tapias working in our fields!

    We are now trying to help with a fundraiser for the church in Tapias. The church is the center of this small community. Among many other things, it acts as a safety net and performs charitable work for residents in the community.

    The Reina de Tapias de Santa Cruz is a young woman who spends a year acting as the ambassador for Tapias and is responsible for fundraising for the church and the community. Javier’s daughter, Andrea, is a contestant to be the next Reina of Tapias. We are trying to help Andrea raise money to provide for her family and community in Tapias. We hope you’ll join us!

  • Thank you Winter CSA Members!

    We are delighted that you joined us for our Winter CSA! It makes us happy to be able to feed you for a few extra months each year. I hope it has warmed up your winter to have local veggies to take home. All of the roasted veggies and soups. And the fresh greens that you just can’t get anywhere else this time of year.

    Things are quieter at the farm in February. Wyatt and I will be busy with indoor work like ordering seeds and doing repairs on equipment. The rest of our crew takes most of the month off. But we start things up in the greenhouse the first week of March. The first crops we start are things like onions, kale, and tomatoes. We also do our first outdoor planting of peas, radishes, and arugula in the middle of March. There aren’t many months of the year that we don’t have something growing even though we’re in Colorado!

    The crops we start growing in March are what we feed you when our Summer CSA starts in late May. You can join now and look forward to warmer weather and fresh veggies. That always helps to get me though the final cold, dark months of winter.

    Our CSA members are the foundation of our farm. We plan everything around our CSA and you’re the ones that keep us going year after year. It is beyond challenging to keep a vegetable farm running and we have so much gratitude for all of your support in this journey.

    Amy