Common Thread Farm
3424 Lake Moraine Road, Madison, NY 13402
315-882-0086
info@commonthreadcsa.com
Our Values:
- We value the Earth and strive to work with and to the benefit of its ecosystems in growing food.
- Food and farms connect people to the land and to each other. It is important for people to have opportunities to experience those connections: to know and love the land that sustains them, and to come together as a community, in work and in celebration, around food and land.
- We value a local and regional food system for its many benefits. These include the health benefits of fresh, minimally processed food; conservation of farmland and open space; transparency, accountability and community connections; and contribution to the self-sustainability of the regional economy.
- We care about food justice, including fair wages for farm workers and access to healthy food for people of all income levels.
- We value our relationships with family, co-workers, friends, and farm participants and seek honesty, open communication, inclusiveness, and trust.
We use sustainable growing practices. We prioritize soil health, using a permanent raised bed tillage system and planting about a third of the farm to cover crops each year. We do not use synthetic pesticides or fertilizers, GMOs, irradiation, or sewage sludge. If you have questions about our growing methods, we are happy to answer them.
We respectfully acknowledge the Oneida People, who have stewarded this land throughout the generations.
What is CSA?
Know where your food comes from:
Eat fresh, seasonal food from a local farm!
Community Supported Agriculture is a partnership of mutual commitment between farmers and a community of supporters. CSA shareholders commit to support the farm throughout the season, joining the farmer in assuming both the risks and the bounty of growing food. The farm provides, to the best of its ability, a “CSA share,” a generous supply of fresh produce throughout the growing season.
Community Supported Agriculture (CSA) is a model of agriculture that fosters a direct relationship between the farmer and the community. CSA promotes fair prices for both the farmer and the members by eliminating the “middleman.”
Members of the community purchase a ‘share’ of the farm’s annual harvest before the growing season. Shareholders then visit the farm or another pick up site weekly to pick up their share of that week’s harvest of fresh, high quality produce.
The CSA model, in which members commit to support the farm for the growing season, provides the farmer with the financial stability necessary to operate in a sustainable way. At the same time, it offers farm members the opportunity to have a direct relationship with the farmers who grow their food, and to have access to fresh, seasonal food that will support their health.
Our family just moved to the area from the Boston suburbs. We have participated in many CSAs through the years and I have been blown away by the variety and quality of your produce.
This CSA is top notch, exceptional and go far beyond the standard farming practices! I travel a lot and have the chance to see what is out there in farmers markets and CSAs from Florida, Mississippi, California and Hawaii. Still there are so few with the attention to detail, work ethics or quality of management as well planned as this CSA. We do have several CSAs in our area, but I chose to travel 45 min each way to be able to have the quality of veggies they have. They take the extra time an effort to rotate crops, amend the soils and grow such a wide variety of produce. Their quality and flavors are spectacular.
We have just completed our second season as members and can say that, without a doubt, this was the best investment we’ve ever made. Not only was it financially sound, but much more important, it provided us with an amazing bounty of fresh… produce to feed our hearts and souls. We have the peace of mind knowing we are not ingesting pesticides, and the joy of preparing fantastic recipes, using familiar as well as newly discovered varieties of fruits and veggies. Finally, the other grand benefit is the communal fun of meeting other members on pickup days and other CSA sponsored events.
For our first time as CSA members we were so pleased with the entire process, from sign up to our last share pick up. We learned a lot about new foods that we never tried before. The emails were very informative, including the variety of recipes we tried. (I forwarded them to my family because they were so interesting.) Each week we were excited to see what was in our box. The quality and quantity were spectacular!!! It was definitely a healthy eating experience…And best of all we learned so much volunteering on the farm.
Bravo and Kudos to both of you and your staff. And many many thanks for all the hard work and your enthusiasm in providing us with such a bounty of healthy and delicious local food. You succeeded in spades, despite the drawbacks handed out by Mother Nature. The winter share option is a great addition and I love the fact that potatoes are one of your crops. I’m looking forward to next year π
I particularly enjoyed the setup whereby one could choose which vegetables to take home and could even get enough to do some preserving. I was thrilled to be able to make a batch of pickles. The vegetables were fresh,attractive and very tasty. I have developed several new favorites including fennel and celery root
Vegetable quality is outstanding. Quantity is abundant. Variety is appealing. I like the challenge of finding a good way to use every week’s vegetables — it prompts us to eat more vegetables than we otherwise would. And we find your food so healthy; it’s far tastier and nutrient-dense than anything I find in supermarkets (even in the organic aisle).
I thoroughly enjoyed picking up our share on Saturday mornings at the farm. It was fun to choose veggies in the company of other members; to see children playing in the children’s area; and to chat with Wendy and Asher. The produce was abundant, beautifully presented, fresh, and delicious. One of my favorite experiences is picking flowers in the field. We are now enjoying our first experience of winter shares and look forward to next year too!