Welcome back to Notes from the Fields, a new Substack blog written by Alice, the partner of one of our SCA growers. Each month, she’ll be sharing a glimpse of life on the farm as the seasons turn. These notes are a way of staying connected to the food we grow, the land at SCA and the community of people who care for it.Be sure to follow Alice’s Substack to get the latest notes as they’re published.
The year is turning, and signs of the new year are all around, if you just look (or listen) closely.
The ravens, who have been so noisy over Christmas, have gone eerily silent, a sure sign they are now sitting on eggs and wanting to keep their nest location secret from prying eyes. Great tits, known by many as the “squeaky screwdriver bird” because of their distinctive call, are in full song in the woodlands and trees. Some are already inspecting the nest boxes we made in partnership with the Somali kitchen last year!
If you catch the farm on a particularly still morning, you might even hear a sound of summer as one the starlings near the pack shed is mimicking the call of swifts – don’t be fooled by this master mimic – swifts are still at home in sub Saharan Africa and won’t be making their visit to us till May!
Of course, the clearest signs of spring are the snowdrops (known as ‘February’s Fair Maids’) and crocuses around Hawkwood. On sunny days, look out for Queen Bumble bees searching out for that first feed of the spring. All of this recent rain has warmed the soil, and if you look down, you can see the signs of what Darwin nicknamed “nature’s little farmers”. Earthworms are quietly busying beneath our feet, breaking down organic matter, aerating the soil with their tunnels, and leaving behind nutrient rich casts that feed everything that grows.
This month, we’ve welcomed two new faces to the farm: Daniel and Joe. They’ve brought a lot of fresh energy to SCA and have been settling in well. It’s no mean feat starting in the depths of winter, one of the drearier months of the growers calendar!
In our weekly share, root vegetables are taking centre stage. Carrots, beetroot and parsnips are staples at the moment, along with our autumn stores of cabbages, squash and celeriac.
Root vegetables like carrots, beetroots and parsnips are staples at the moment in our harvests, and the veg boxes this week have again been filled with vegetables from our autumn crop stores. Our homes have been filled with the smells of comforting leek and potato soups, hearty carrot and cabbage stews, and slow warming winter meals.
Our volunteers have been busy despite the cold, carrying out the often unseen work that keeps the farm moving through winter. This month has included careful weeding in the mizuna, mibuna, rocket and spring onion beds, alongside the digging of Jerusalem artichokes. Trenches have been filled in around the water butts, and helped to restore the ground where they’d previously sunk.
On 2nd February, we celebrated Imbolc, a pagan celebration of the first signs of Spring. It welcomes the return of life to the land and the spirit and dates the halfway point between the Winter Solstice and the Spring Equinox. The word Imbolc is believed to come from the old Irish ‘Imbolg’ meaning ‘in the belly’: a reference to the pregnancy of ewes at this time and the stirrings of new life.
February is full of promise and it’s a month where life is happening in the details.
