Yesterday afternoon, while pruning blueberries, we heard the first spring peepers of the season. Spring must really be near. We’re hearing a whole lot more birds than when we started pruning in early February. The blueberry pruning is almost done. Next blackberry and raspberry pruning, then on to strawberry planting… We looking forward to a great season.

Cold weather in the forecast. We spent most of yesterday and today mulching the strawberries with straw. We had a big crew: Meg and Jim, Carlos and Erin, Neil, Matthew, David, Heather and Paul, Phillip, our new guests, Chris and his 7 year old Noah, and even a little help from our “competitors” from Coneflower Farm, Dennis and Ellen. And Tutuk and Louise provided snacks. We worked in sun, wind, rain, snow and sleet, got tired, but all in all had a good time. I figure we got 7 or 8 miles of strawberry rows covered, but haven’t finished yet. We might get snowed out tomorrow, but that will be OK, because the snow would serve as insulation from the cold Wednesday night.

Plow Creek Bakery will be taking part in the Princeton Christmas Walk celebration on Saturday, November 21, from 10 to 4 PM. We’ll be located with some other farmers’ market vendors near the Apollo Theater on south Main St. We’ll be featuring three varieties of a new product–dessert rolls (raspberry, blueberry and chocolate) along with our regular products. It is always hard to know just how much to bake for a new market opportunity, so if you would like to be sure your favorite bread, rolls, or cookies will be available, please email me at stahnke@plowcreek.org, or phone me at 815 646 4851, to place an order as soon as possible. There will probably be a little bit of produce, such as winter squash, pie pumpkins, or popcorn. Email farm@plowcreek.org if you want to be sure to have such items.

Plow Creek Farm is now taking orders for our grass-fed beef. The beef, pastured right here on our farm, is 100% grass-fed and no hormones or antibiotics are ever used on the cattle. Customers have the option of purchasing a whole beef, half beef, or quarter beef. A whole beef will give you around 360 lbs of meat, half 180 lbs, and quarter 90 lbs. This will include all cuts of the beef including steaks, roasts, ground beef, and more. The beef will be butchered sometime in December and once the meat is brought to the meat locker you will have the option of letting them know how you would like your meat processed (how to package your ground beef, how thick to cut the steaks, would you like any of the beef made into patties or hot dogs, etc.) The cost of a whole beef is $2.25 per lb of hanging weight. Hanging weight for a whole beef is around 600 lbs and produces about 360 lbs of cut meat. After the processing and butchering fees, we estimate that the cost per pound of cut meat to be around$4.78/lb for a whole beef. The cost of a half beef is $2.35 per lb of hanging weight and we estimate the cut meat to be around $5.00/lb. A quarter beef is $2.45 per lb of hanging weight and we estimate the cut meat to be around $5.20/lb. For your reference, a quarter beef takes about 3 cubic feet of freezer space. If you have any questions or are ready to place your order, please contact us at farm@plowcreek.org or call Matthew at 815-646-4249.

Clouds moved in early and Saturday night did not get nearly as cold as forecast. Most of the red raspberries survived. Although quantity is much smaller, we do plan to be open for raspberry picking this week, and have some raspberries for market.

With freezing weather this weekend, this will probably be the end of the red raspberries for the season. We will have good quantities at the Princeton and Peoria farmers’ markets. We also will bring lots of pumpkins, acorn and butternut squash, as well as chestnuts and black walnuts and our own whole wheat flour. We also will have some grapes and watermelon. In Princeton we will also have Plow Creek Bakery goods. We don’t know if there will be raspberries to pick on Saturday; it depends on how cold it gets.

We have a good crop of Concord grapes this year. You may come pick them by appointment (email farm@plowcreek.org or leave a message at 815-646-4862). They are $22 / bushel which is about 40 pounds. If you want us to pick you a bushel or more, they are $44 / bushel. Market price is $1.60 / pound.

This Saturday the Bureau County Farmers’ Market will be in the lot south of the Princeton Amtrak station, just west of Darius Miller Park, where we usually are. We expect the roads on the north and south side of the park to be closed. You can get to the market on Pleasant Street, which parallels Main Street one block to the west. We recommend you come early to avoid the congestion due to the Princeton Homestead Festival in the afternoon. It was hard getting shoved around to make room for a beer advertisement. Please support your local Farmers’ Market and find your way to us.

Red Raspberry U-Pick will be open this week on Monday from 8 a.m.-7 p.m. and Wednesday and Friday from 7 a.m. - 7 p.m. The picking will be at the raspberry patch between the strawberry fields, just south of the white market barn. It will be self-serve and instructions will be provided on how to pick and pay for your berries at the raspberry patch. Since production is still ramping up and there are currently a limited amount of ripe berries, we ask that customers limit their picking to no more than 4 pints this week.

We had a great blueberry season, but they are almost all picked. U-Pick is now closed for the season, although we may be bringing a few to market the next few times. Thank you to all our loyal customers. We expect to be open for red raspberry u-pick in about 2 weeks.

Temporary Help Wanted Now Weeding strawberries. Flexible hours up to full time for a couple weeks for a few people who can weed carefully, thoroughly, and quickly. Contact Neil or Tutuk Horning at 815-646-4501 or email farm@plowcreek.org.

Our white and yellow sweet corn is in. Sweet and delicious. Price is $5.50 / dozen. It is available at Princeton and LaSalle Farmers’ markets and at our Market Barn farm stand. We will soon have good quantities that we could sell for freezing. Ten dozen or more, pre-ordered, is $4.50 / dozen.