High Ground Organics

with Mariquita Farm

TWO SMALL FARMS Community Supported Agriculture Program

What Is Community Supported Agriculture?

In Community Supported Agriculture (CSA), farmers sell fresh organic produce directly to families on a weekly basis. By subscribing to a CSA, you support a local farmer in growing vegetables and flowers in an environmentally responsible manner. In turn, you get to eat farm fresh organic produce, become more familiar with the local cycles and seasons of food production, and get to know your farmer personally.

Of course, the best part is getting to eat all the wonderful, fresh, organic food. Many CSA subscribers happily report that their families eat healthier, more varied diets. And they find that the produce is fresher and tastier than the fruits and vegetables they get in their grocery store.

A CSA is beneficial to the farmer too. Since we know in advance how much produce we will sell on a given day, we can plant and harvest accordingly. That means we are not completely at the mercy of uncertain markets, and it means that less food goes to waste. The CSA also provides money up front when we need it to buy seed, compost, and other supplies.

What Will You Receive?

In 2002 High Ground Organics teamed up with Mariquita Farm to provide a wider variety of produce to our subscribers. Whereas we can grow cool season crops like lettuce and cooking greens throughout the summer, Mariquita Farm can grow heat-loving items like tomatoes, peppers, eggplants, and melons. With each farm focusing on what we do best, our CSA customers will get the best quality produce, and more variety throughout the season.

Some of the items that subscribers receive are: potatoes, lettuce, strawberries, onions, garlic, cucumbers, greens, leeks, carrots, broccoli, cauliflower, summer squash, pumpkins, winter squash, turnips, tomatoes, peppers, radishes, cabbage, beans, peas, collards, and specialty cut flowers. In addition, we sometimes arrange with other local organic farms to provide a few popular CSA items that we do not grow ourselves, such as corn, peaches, apples, and sprouts.

Our vegetables and flowers are always fresh from the farm. And, unlike much of the produce that stocks supermarket shelves, we choose varieties with more attention to their taste and nutritional value than to their ability to be trucked long distances, ridiculously long shelf life, or uniform harvest time.

Who Are Your Farmers?

High Ground Organics

High Ground Organics is operated by owners Stephen Pedersen and Jeanne Byrne, who live with daughters Lydia and Amelia on a 40-acre farm just outside of Watsonville, California. We have about 18 acres available for production. The other half of the farm is under a conservation easement to protect wildlife habitat and prevent erosion into Harkins Slough.

Stephen is a farmer who really knows his vegetables. Before getting into farming, Stephen cooked professionally for eight years, and his love of vegetables shows in the quality of produce he grows. Stephen developed his love for the farm life during his childhood, when he would spend summers working on his uncle’s Corralitos farm.

We started our own farm business in 2000, after several years farming together with Steve's aunt and uncle at the Thomas Farm. High Ground Organics took over the Corralitos Connection CSA from the Thomases, and we continue their tradition of providing fresh, local vegetables and flowers to our neighbors in Santa Cruz and Monterey counties, as well as to Silicon Valley.

Mariquita Farm

Andy Griffin and Julia Wiley of Mariquita Farm also live in Watsonville, although the main piece of land they farm is in Hollister. Like us, they also sell at Farmers' Markets, and have quite a following among their customers at the San Francisco Ferry Plaza market on Saturdays. In addition to being a great farmer with tons of experience, Andy is a wonderful storyteller. Subscribers can read his sometimes hilarious, sometimes poignant stories of life as a small farmer in the weekly CSA newsletters and in Mariquita's quarterly journal "Root".

How Does the CSA Work?

The CSA runs for 36 weeks--from the third week in March to the week of November 20. Each Wednesday or Thursday afternoon (depending on your pick-up site) you pick up a box full of produce from one of our drop-off points. Drop-off sites may be someone's house, the farm, a school, or a local business. We drop off the boxes at the site and you pick yours up along with your flowers and a newsletter. The newsletter provides farm news, recipes to help you use your vegetables, and notices of upcoming farm events.

You can choose either Vegetables-only or a Vegetables-Plus-Flowers share. The weekly box provides enough vegetables for a family of 2-4 and costs $20 per week. A Flower share includes a country bouquet of bright fresh cut flowers each week with your vegetables. The cost is $26 per week.

This season we will have pick-up sites in

For a full listing of pick-up sites (and on-line sign-up), go here.

If you live in another area and would like to have a drop off site nearer to you, please let us know. If it's a convenient location for us and enough people are interested, we will start a new pick-up site.

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