Hungry For Spring? Farmers Ask You to Invest in Your Menu

With freezing temperatures outside, warm weather feels like a far-off fantasy. But of course spring and summer are just a few months away, and it's time to start preparing.

So you prepare your taxes, plan spring and summer vacations and ready your home for spring cleaning. But what about planning your food? Larry Legard, owner of in Darnestown, says you should. He is.

Good Life Farm is one of a handful of farms asking locals to participate in planning and investing in their spring, summer and fall menu this year by joining its (CSA) program. A CSA is a membership program where people invest in the farmer's harvest. Each week, customers get a share of the crops, and the farmer then has a guarantee that a crop will be sold.

Members of the Good Life Farm CSA can or opt to have it delivered to their home.

Not only is CSA membership a way to have a selection of fresh fruits and vegetables each week, it is a simple way to support the local economy, said Kristina Bostick, Senior Conservation Associate with the Montgomery Countryside Alliance, which supports local farms and advocates the preservation of the Montgomery County agricultural reserve.

"Your food dollars are staying here, staying locally," Bostick said. "If you spend money at the grocery store, there is no guarantee that money will stay here. If you go with a local farmer, you are directly supporting that farmer on the ground here."

This will be Good Life Farm's second full year offering a CSA. In 2010, it offered both a spring/summer option and a fall option. This year, there will be one total program.

"We had a really great fall," Legard said. "It went all the way through the second week in December, then we got knocked back by that bitter cold weather."

Legard opened registration for this year's CSA last week, offering both a 30-week share and 15-week share option. He said he hopes to have it completed by March 15 so he can begin planting.

"By then I'll know how much to plant," Legard said. "With a CSA, the farmer gets paid ahead of time so he can buy the fertilizer ahead of time for the number."

The first year, with a CSA, Good Life Farm had just under 200 members. This year, Legard said they hope to expand it to 300.

According to Bostick, there is no shortage of demand for local produce in Montgomery County. The bigger problem, she said, is not having enough farmers to meet that demand.

"There simply aren't enough capacity to meet the number of people that would like to be a part of a CSA," Bostick said. "There are often waiting lists. A number of those CSA's, have long ago filled."

For example, she noted Red Wiggler Community Farm's CSA, which was the first in Montgomery County, is already at capacity for the upcoming season.

"New people haven't been able to get into there for years and years," Bostick said.

Even though thinking about summer tomatoes may seem premature in February, Bostick said this is the time of year farmers begin planting crops, and the CSA registration allows them to know how much to invest in the harvest.

"This is the time that farmers are sitting down and thinking about what they are going to grow," Bostick said.

"Farming is tricky. ... This is taking the economics out of the situation and giving the farmers a more stable footing. With the CSA they know what to plant. It's a good way for them to have some certainty."

Good Life Farm is offering an early bird special for anyone who registers before March 15. Full details and registration information is available on its website.