Harland's Creek Farm: Organic--Historic--Enduring

Mid Chatham Farmers Alliance

A Community of Farmers Providing Food for the Local Community

Mid-Chatham Farmers Alliance offers organically grown vegetables, edible flowers, fruits, and herbs via Community Supported Agriculture [CSA]. Each week subscribers receive a box which contains from 5 to 10 items selected by the farmers. All subscribers are encouraged to visit the farms, and new subscribers are required to visit one of the farms.

In 2008 the CSA will have 29 deliveries over a 30 week period. We will begin deliveries on May 1 and 2, 2008 and finish on November 20 and 21 2008. We will take a two week break the last week of August and the first week of September. The last delivery will be a "double share," which will give you plenty of vegetables for Thanksgiving.

Your subscription will include:

• Seasonal vegetable, fruits, and herbs
• A recipe booklet
• Weekly meal plans and shopping lists for non-share ingredients
• Farm visits - both organized tours in March for new members and individual visits by prearrangement.

We believe you will find the farm visits very interesting and look forward to having this involvement with you. Bill Dow will call all new subscribers to arrange for them to visit to one of the farms.

CSA subscribers support sustainable, local food production. We plan based on the number of subscribers; however, growing conditions may prohibit provision of planned products or planned volume. This means that there are no refunds due to unavoidable weather, pests, or disease problems. In the past, this risk has been slight. For example, Harland's Creek Farm has been operating a CSA for 6 years and has always been able to provide excellent variety and full amounts even though some crops failed.

Because North Carolina experienced drought this past year, the risk may be larger in 2008. We were able to provide our planned amounts in 2007 because we started the year with a great deal of water in our ponds and wells. This may not be the case in 2008. Therefore, unless there is significant rainfall January through April 2008, we will limit the number of subscribers to whom we commit for the entire season to 50. Other subscribers will have their checks returned at the beginning of May 2008.

DETAILS

Pick-up Points

Shares can be picked up at:

• Harland's Creek Farm west of Pittsboro [Thursday-Sunday]
• Chatham Market Place in Pittsboro [Thursday-Sunday]
• RTI International in Research Triangle Park [Thursday afternoon]
• United Church of Christ and selected businesses in Chapel Hill [Thursday afternoon]
• Whole Foods in Raleigh [Friday afternoon]

Cost

The cost for the full season is $494. This payment can be spread over two months by sending a post dated check. Enrollment is on a first come basis; however, returning customers will be given priority for the first 50 slots. Full payment is due at the time of enrollment.

Part of this cost is a deposit on the waxed boxes that we use for packing. At the end of the season, we will refund $1.20 for each box you return to a pick-up point. We will provide a container for you to put the waxed boxes in. Thus, if you return 28 boxes, you will be refunded $34.00. If you do not wish the return the boxes you can keep them, or we will come and pick them up at the end of the year.

For more information contact:

• Bill Dow, 542-5528
• Jerry Fowler, jkfow@aol.com, 542-4362
• Laurie Heise, laurieheise@mindspring.com, 542-4288
• Judy Lessler, lesslerjud@msn.com, 542-4607

Enrollment

Please download, fill out and return the enrollment form. If you're not able to view PDF files, Adobe Acrobat Reader is freely available here.