Author: Tristan Klesick

In a bygone era, when a community was just beginning to form, the fabric of society was more intertwined by rivers, forests, and land and natural resources were the bedrock of a community. We are blessed to have the Skagit, Stillaguamish and Snohomish watersheds that tie us together.  

We live in a farmhouse that was built in 1892 and added onto in 1914. The old barn (which no longer exists) and our home had a unique presentation to the road. But when you think about when it was built and what the primary driver of the economy was, you can understand the logic. 

In most of our communities, the loggers came in first and cleared the land, but it was the dairy and crop farmers who followed in their footpaths that formed the base for sustainability. Old-timers talk about the “milk check” and how it anchored the entire farm and local economy. It was because that steady weekly check supported veterinarians, feed and fertilizer dealers, mechanics and multiple jobs, which in turn helped establish communities. The access to water like seaports and rivers also enabled the efficient transfer of goods and when coupled with good farmland, communities prospered. 

Our home and barns faced what use to be the Stillaguamish River. It makes sense when you think about the sternwheelers, barges or canoes going by your house, knowing you’d want to have efficient access to the markets. The Stillaguamish River shifted in 1912 and our farm now is located on the “old channel” which is a shadow of its once glory. 

A lot has changed since 1892 and now we have planes, trains and automobiles. Our rivers are not as important as they once were, but they continue to carry value in the preservation of farmland, providing habitat and flood water storage.  

Last week our dairy farming neighbor cut and harvested our pastures for silage (cow food), one of the most beautiful sites of spring is a freshly mowed field. In some ways that “milk check” is still prevalent and relevant to the success of our farming economy and our local communities.    

-Tristan  

We planted beans a few weeks back when the weather was unseasonably warm. I knew it was early and slightly risky. The reason it was risky is because we usually plant our first planting of beans in mid to late May when it’s predictably warmer and then every few weeks after that. But I could hardly wait with that amazing early stretch of weather to get a few rows planted at least. Okay, it was more than a few rows. The germination was good because the soil temperature was just right. They’re looking like they’d prefer a little warmer weather now, but doing pretty good. 

The funny/ironic thing is and what I did anticipate is that when they emerged it might be colder. And if those beans were able to roll their eyes like a teenager responding to one of my dad jokes, they would have surely said, “Really, you couldn’t have waited 2 more weeks so I wasn’t freezing my butt off when I came out of the ground!” Of course, my response would be to roll my eyes back and sheepishly apologize and then move onto the next crop, which happens to be more lettuce starts.  

Looks like the March 9^th and the 27^th plantings have stacked up and will be going out at about the same time. We plant on a schedule, but nature can speed things up or slow them down.  With the weather, in this case, the March 27^th plantings got the benefit of that warm April weather and caught right up. The opposite can happen just as easily, or the plantings can come just as they are scheduled (NOT USUALLY!).  Lettuce plantings 2 and 3 will be going out together this week and planting #4 will be much later because the weather was cooler for those seedlings.  

A New Grandbaby! 

The newest farmhand was born to Alaina and Jordan on Saturday 4/24. Nolani is a beautiful little girl and joins her big sister, Hadlee, and big brother, Bazil. That brings the total grandkids to 5 roosters and 2 hens, ages 8 and under. When we all gather the energy is reminiscent of when Joelle and I first started this business and our children were little ones, except now all that energy gets to go home at the end of our visit! 😊. 

We are blessed to have had the opportunity to share our life and story with so many of you.  -Tristan

Early on in my farming adventure, or should I say career change with a huge learning curve, I learned that plants need a job. Nothing I have ever attempted has been as hard as farming. Even the simplest task of transplanting a little lettuce or cabbage start can go sideways. Is the ground temperature warm enough? Is the soil worked up enough? Did the plants get planted straight down or laid in sideways? Did they get firmed in enough when planted to reconnect capillary action? So many things that can be learned in a textbook, but really sink in when you have 3000 plants “talking to you.”

The last few weeks we have been in transplant mode with lots of lettuce, cabbages, kohlrabis and onions being transplanted out, plus peas and beans were directly seeded and thousands of more plants are getting seeded to be transplanted at a later date. I have learned over the years that once you “open the soil” the next few months are going to be anything but normal.

As an example, when we planted out those first transplants, we didn’t expect a mini heat wave. I have gotten more steps in a couple of days last week than I did all January. Those little plants went from a warm and coddled environment in the greenhouse, with daily watering, to being socially distanced and placed into soil. As hard as we try, those little plants rarely take off without some coddling. And coddling for us usually means filling up 2 gallon watering cans and walking up and down 200’ foot long rows watering every plant. Back and forth, back and forth, we could fire up the irritation (aka irrigation), but this early in the season it would be wasteful and efficient.

Joanna, our intrepid 11 year old, is a tireless worker. When she is not designing doll clothes, she can be found outside roller-blading or in the case of the last few weeks, walking alongside us watering little plants with those 2 gallon watering cans. She fills up 2, sets one down where she last stopped watering, empties the other and then gets the full one and empties it and heads back to the watering station. 20 trips later her row is finished. The other day I came home from the pack and she was out watering the newly planted cabbages.

At that moment, I smiled, she got it. Each of our children have had their own moment when farming became real. So I told Joanna that I have affectionately renamed these first few crops Jo-abbage, Jo-rabi and Jo-ettuce. And as we were walking by the onions and lettuce transplants, she asked if we needed to water these. I told her that just the onions needed water and that she could do the half row and then go play. She didn’t ask about why we weren’t going to water the lettuce, but I will tell you. Early on the lettuce plants struggled a bit and we were watering every other day, but when I looked at them, I knew that they were at the critical stage, where continued watering would actually set them back. They needed a job and that job was to begin to establish deeper roots.

-Tristan

Last week I mused that farming starts when we begin to rototill our fields. Of course, there is way more going on before any dirt is rototilled. Sometimes farming happens the season before like garlic or berries or pruning.

Farming is a catch all term. What does it mean to farm? Is planning farming??? Is ordering seed farming??? Is ordering fertilizer farming??? Is buying fuel or doing maintenance on your equipment farming??? Or are all the activities needed to support farming their own category???

For whatever reason, it FEELS like farming when the rototiller begins to till the ground, everything else is a warmup. But if truth be told all the warmup stuff is really important to growing food. Planning goes a long way to having a successful season and certainly, growing healthy, organically grown food benefits from the planning.

One thing that is really outside my control is the weather. I am able to flex my schedule a little, but sometimes the weather can really throw you a tough pitch to hit! Every year I think the weather is going to be perfect. It is my nature to be optimistic. The weather will be perfect for some crops like cabbages or tomatoes or cucumbers or garlic :). With a plan our farm team can flex as needed with whatever weather pattern shows up.

Last week, the weather turned cold and the soil didn’t warm up, but the first few thousand lettuce plants are ready to go and for our farm it is time to plant peas. The lettuce plants are ready and need to get from the transplant tray to the soil to avoid being root bound. But if the weather is as predicted, getting the pea seeds and lettuce plants into the ground last Saturday will have been a good decision. And with the weather warming, planting peas last Saturday will allow the seeds to gather moisture and the warmth of the soil will help them germinate sooner.

Warm weather is really important to growing crops and for these old joints, the warm weather is definitely a plus! 

The local season is well underway, and the bounty of our NW farmers will soon be a part of every delivery!

Thanks for supporting the Box of Good and it’s local network of farmers,

-Tristan & Joelle

Our team is finally “farming”! We have been out in the field, greenhouses, and in the barn preparing starts. But to me I think farming really starts with the first time a rototiller gets hooked up and turns the earth. That happened last week.  

The first passes with the rototiller are shallow and designed to incorporate the cover crops and weeds. Once we have the organic matter broken down, we then use a spader. The spader is a European designed tool that mimics double digging and works the soil about 10 inches deep. After that we rototill and begin to shape the beds for planting, then we spread fertilizer, rototill again and then mark the beds for planting. 

This year we have really expanded the vegetable production and are literally planning to grow tons more organically grown vegetables.  

I love this season! It is absolutely crazy, but with the increasing day length and the weather warming it surprises me what we can accomplish!  We have a passion for sourcing and delivering the freshest organic foods, but it feels like an honor to get to actually grow food for your family, too! 

Last week, I asked Stephen if he would take on the greenhouses this season. He just turned 14 and has been working on the farm for about 14 years 😊. I told him it’s a big responsibility, but I know he’s ready. He said he’d take it on. I told him thank you and to take note that if he were to forget to water we could lose weeks of work and thousands of dollars in one afternoon. I smiled at him and headed off to my next project. Later that night, he shared with me that he had never thought about the importance of the greenhouse and how much responsibility it was. Of course, I will still pay attention to the greenhouse, but I’m proud of him. The magnitude of this responsibility was not lost on him and he was still willing to take it on. This season a lot of your vegetables are going to come through those greenhouses. 

It is a privilege to serve your families with organically grown fruits and vegetables from our own Klesick Family Farm. Your Box of Good will become more and more local as our farm and our network of other local farmers begin to harvest the northwest bounty. 

-Tristan          

We have been delivering produce for 23 years, 52 weeks a year. I am not sure what sounds more impressive that we have been serving local families since 1998, or for the last 23 years or 276 months or 1200 weeks! But, WOW, it’s fun to look back and reminisce. When Joelle and I started the produce business it was originally called the Organic Produce Shoppe and we sold produce within a whole foods warehouse.  At that time there were very few retail outlets for organic produce, and we loved the idea of making high quality, organic produce more readily available and a year later we started bringing it right to homes! But becoming organic farmers was our long-term dream. It’s difficult in our PNW region to be full time farmers with our short growing season.  

We built a delivery business so we could farm seasonally and have an outlet to sell our harvest and support other local farms and promote and sell organic agriculture year-round! It was with great pride that in 2003 we purchased our current farm where we’ve raised our nine children while raising food crops together! We changed our business name to Klesick Family Farm! We’ve been blessed with the opportunity to work as a family all these years! Our oldest is 30 this year and our youngest just turned 11! As you can imagine a lot has changed over the years!  We have 7 grandchildren and 3 kids still at home!

Within a short amount of time, we started referencing our box as a Box of Good! That tag line caught on quick!  Most importantly, our boxes are filled with the freshest, nutrient-dense, organic fruits and vegetables available! And we are pleased to have added an abundance of grocery and meat items to choose from, as well. 

Providing the highest quality products at fair prices has always been our priority!  The produce that is imperfect or doesn’t meet our highest standards is donated to our local community food banks where healthy food can be distributed freely and nothing goes to waste! That is GOOD!  Beyond great quality with fair pricing, we bring it right to your home, so the burden of sourcing fresh produce is eliminated! We provide recipes and tips and share our farm stories so you can follow along and feel connected to your food source! We have also volunteered and served over the years in our local community in ways that benefit local farmland preservation and environmental impacts, providing long-term food security and sustainability. By supporting organic farming, you are supporting a healthy earth, healthy communities and a healthy you! So much GOOD packed into your BOX! 

As things have grown and changed, much like our family, the evolution and use of the term “Box of Good” has become what best embodies and defines the home delivery part of our business. Klesick Family Farm remains the beautiful place in the Stillaguamish Valley, where we live and are honored to seasonally grow food for the Box of Good.  Because the content of your Box of Good comes from such a variety of certified organic farms throughout the year, we wanted to separate our family farm for clarity’s sake. With all that said, we’ve chosen to rebrand the home delivery portion of our business to Box of Good by Klesick’s. 

As our family begins our 23rd year of delivering organic produce and our 21st year of farming, we are grateful for the opportunity to serve your family and our community and we appreciate how you’ve shared the good over the years!  

From the Box of Good team,

-Tristan and Joelle

Spring is always welcomed and so is its mix of rain, sunshine, cloudy and warm and frosty moments. This time of year, and in years gone by, you had to keep jumper cables nearby! Inevitably you would leave the house when it is dark and arrive at work when it is light and forget to turn off the car lights!?!?! But for the most part, cars are a lot smarter and lights turn themselves off now.

However, those same cars, at least in my price range, don’t roll the windows up when I hop out and head out. Of course, when you head to the store, you would naturally roll up your windows, but I am talking about the times you are at home and hop out and forget to roll up your windows and it RAINS! Who knows, maybe TESLA is working on an App that is synced with a weather station and when it is about to rain it pings the car and it rolls up your windows!

I am a little nervous about all of these intuitive smart choices out there. Anymore, the lights turn on by themselves, the water comes on by itself, toilets flush themselves. I am really concerned about this new generation though as they are always leaving the lights on, the water on and forgetting to flush the toilets! Most of these things will work themselves out when they have to start paying the light and water bills and look for a plunger!

Technology like most things is part useful, and part silly. On the farm we mechanize as much as possible, but somethings never change. Right now, we are busy walking the fields, visually checking the depth of the mud puddles. Or how high the water splashes when one of the grandkids jumps into it! Yep, still have water in them, But they are drying up! 

One day, it will be “go” time and every farmer in our valley will move from tinkering (pacing) here and there to a full-on sprint. Yes, all the preparations like ordering seeds, fertilizers, compost, and fuel are a part of farming, but for me farming begins when we start the tractors and use them every day.

And like any race, I am anticipating the starter’s pistol to go off, but unlike a race I could continue pacing for another day, week or month. The farm team is hanging around the start line waiting for this year’s season/race to begin.

-Tristan

Last week I shared about why and how we transplant.  I grimaced when I shared how an overly warm spring day could wipe out weeks of work by cooking small transplants and or how a slug can eat their way through hundreds of transplants in an evening. You can read it on our blog if you missed it. Well after last week, I have a new potential disaster to add to the trials of growing transplants. 

I was heading out to the greenhouses to check on the onion transplants. On my way, I checked in on the garlic. What a beautiful crop. The green tops look really vibrant and healthy. We have great germination on that planting. All signs point to a great crop in July. 

I also noticed that the wintery weather has been kind to our overwintering chard and kale crops. I am thinking that this will be the last picking/harvest for these two beauties, but if the quality is still good in a month or so, we will certainly harvest them again. Winter imparts a sweetness to chards and kales that has always drawn me to plant them every winter. This year it has worked perfectly – enjoy!

After checking out the garlic and greens, I looked in on the swallow houses. Should have a few new residents soon. Swallows and other birds are really important to the farm’s ecosystem. They eat their weight in insects every day! 

At about that moment, I glanced at the greenhouses and …. all was not well. We use a combination of sawhorses, 2×4 supports and pallets as temporary tables to hold our transplant trays. When you look in the greenhouses from outside, you can see the “tables” through the plastic. As I approached, it was obvious that eight feet of tables had collapsed and so did 20 trays of onions ☹ Ugh! Not all was lost. We were able to salvage 50% of the onion transplants. We can also reuse the potting soil for other transplants. The thing we can’t salvage is time. We lost 3 weeks of work.

In my 2 decades of farming, I have learned that stuff happens and since I can’t go backwards, I assess, develop a plan of action and move forward. Sometimes a crop gets set back like the onions and sometimes a crop is a bumper crop like the overwintering chards and kales. I do know one thing, if I don’t plant there won’t be a harvest. 

Time to get planting again!

Enjoy those greens!

-Tristan

What’s happening might be tied to increasing day length, or how the birds are starting to gather in bigger flocks before they migrate elsewhere. It could be the color of the grass and how it’s starting to grow. It is probably all of the above. But I can hardly wait to get out and work the dirt and get plants in the ground!  I’m especially excited as we have made significant changes to our vegetable rotations, growing processes, added new equipment, all designed to help us grow more vegetables for you this year. 

I have a morning routine during the winters with pretty much every day starting at 5am. I stretch, make coffee, build a fire, read the Bible, and plan. These are my quiet moments, and they are especially quiet during the winter and a little slower paced. It is my time to prepare for the day, but also to ponder and plan for the upcoming farm season. Our family is busy year-round with the Box of Good, but soon we will be adding farming back into the rotation. My morning routine provides rest and clarity. But, I am also acutely aware that my quiet mornings will soon get scrunched (not eliminated) as the farm season awakens. 

I had an old-timer describe a farmer during the winter months. He said, “Most farmers walk around all winter as if there is a dense fog. And then, out of the blue, they snap to attention, their eyes open, they take a deep breath and the fog clears.” Every year I relive this scenario, just like clockwork! I will be putzing around working on this or that and then, “BAM” I have energy, direction and purpose. The first hint of spring starts coursing through my veins and now I am like a horse chomping at the bit raring to go. 

Don’t get me wrong, farmers do work in the winter, but it’s different. It’s usually lots of fixing, planning, purchasing, preparing…and getting all the paperwork and things done that have been put off all growing season!

Farmers are dreamers and with the first signs of spring that means our visions will start to unfold! We’re honored to have our Box of Good community to share the excitement with and also the fruit of the labor! 

-Tristan & Joelle

It doesn’t appear to matter much who is in control of the White House or Congress when it comes to the USDA Secretary. Back for round 2 is Tom Vislack who served under the Obama administration and is every bit the underling for the Genetically Modified (GMO) or Genetically Engineered (GE) community.  

One would somewhat expect the Republican party to appoint a USDA Secretary that was cozy with the Monsanto’s of the world, but the Democrats claim the environmental higher ground. Too bad it is only political posturing from the left. Talk is talk, but actions speak volumes.  

Essentially, it is business as usual for the Bio Engineered (the new term being used) growing community. In fact, start to pay even more attention to the genetically altering food producers. They are and will be rebranding themselves with cute and friendly imaging to lure and hide their products. 

Sadly, it will require even more diligence to avoid this unhealthy and unnatural part of our food system.  I am especially grieved for the unsuspecting consumer who expects that all foods available at the grocery or restaurants are safe to eat. After all, our government is looking out for us (eyeroll). Yes, they are edible, but eating a diet filled with GMO corn, soy and canola oils, along with excessive sugars will wreak havoc on the immune systems, waistlines and lead to many of our lifestyle diseases. What we eat is foundational to our health.

If our country needs anything, from the USDA, it is a level playing field and less dependence upon an overly processed food supply. Sadly, President Biden’s choice for the next USDA Secretary will be another Monsanto friendly supporter.

I am thankful that there is an organic food system. We are not interested in GMO’s or GE’s. We don’t mince words, organics are the only way to avoid GMO’s and GE’s. But let me also be clear, you can eat a lot of processed organic foods and suffer from many of the same lifestyle diseases. Eating primarily clean meats and organically grown fruits and vegetables is the foundation to better health. And for the last 24 years, I am happy to report that is what we have delivered to our customers. 

We believe that our bodies are resilient and when fed with nutritious foods it can fuel us, fight off disease and heal itself from a host of lifestyle diseases. We have chosen health and a healthy environment as our core values. 

Thankfully, who oversees the USDA does not affect our ability to serve your family or to buy organically grown foods.

-Tristan