Tillage is a very useful farming technique that mechanically integrates plants into the ground. It is like a very aggressive eraser that deletes the previous crop or cover crop (see cover cropping post below), making a smooth bed for planting. Long term soil health and carbon holding capacity has been shown to suffer from tillage, so we have done our best to find practices to fill the same erasure needs on the farm while easing off tillage as much as possible. All of our research into the potential benefits and drawbacks of notill farming has been anecdotal up until this point. 

This year we received a grant from a federal program called SARE (Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education) to do a more careful study. This program is so useful to farmers because it allows us to receive compensation for the constant experimentation we all do every year, to receive technical assistance from research advisors, and to access a treasure trove of other farmers' data and conclusions.

We approached the 2024 zucchini beds in May when they still contained the cover crop of rye, crimson clover, and vetch planted in the fall of 2023. The plants were four feet high and lush. We tilled half of the plot in a checkerboard pattern with a rototiller twice a week apart. This resulted in a smooth fluffy planting bed. For the no-till zucchini, we flail mowed the cover crop twice a week apart (same timing as the tillage), and planted into the cover crop stubble. We will be measuring yield in each plot to compare as well as labor required to prepare and weed the beds, and long term soil health indicators. Stay tuned for results!

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Cover crops are one of our favorite parts of farming at Adamah. They don't result in juicy flavor bursting onto your tongue on a hot summer day like a cherry tomato, or in creamy, soups warming your winter belly like butternut squash. Instead the excitement of cover crops is below ground. 

Farming transfers nutrients from the soil into our bodies. There are many ways to put those nutrients that are so essential for plant growth back into the soil before growing the next crop. You can fertilize with synthetic fertilizers, manufactured using so much heat and pressure that they account for the highest fossil fuel use among agricultural practices. You can mine for nutrients in bat guano or minerals. You can turn food waste and manure into fertilizer (see our blog post on composting below). Or, you can grow your own fertilizer by cover cropping. 

Also called "green manure," cover crops are plants that increase the organic matter and nutrient profile of a farming system. We combine small grains like oats or rye that produce a lot of biomass, compete with weeds, and hold soil in place with legumes like vetch, peas, or clover that partner with rhizobia bacteria to fix nitrogen from the atmosphere (where it is abundant) into the soil (where plants are constantly chasing it as an essential part of their growth needs).

We sneak cover crops into our beds at every moment that they aren't actively growing vegetables. This keeps the power of photosynthesis active and our beloved soil microbes well fed. 

For a few weeks a year, the maple trees along Beebe Hill Road are adorned with metal buckets from which a distinctive plink, plink sound emanates.

Sunny, forty degree days and freezing nights wake up the vascular system of the trees around us (all of them, not just the maples) and nutrients begin to flow from roots to buds in preparation for the explosive growth of spring. Each year during this perfect window for intercepting a little of that sweet sap, we drill shallow holes into the trunks about three feet up, place a spile in each, hang a bucket to catch the flow, and watch them fill with sweet liquid. 

Maple sap is sweeter than that of other trees in our area, but the taste is still very faint with you sip it. To turn it into syrup that can be drizzled on pancakes, we have to boil off the water. 

After schlepping the sap from Beebe to Isabella Freedman's campus sugar shack, we pour it into an evaporator pan with a raging fire underneath. If you drive by Johnson Road in late winter and notice a cloud of steam that smells like IHOP, you're passing by the evaporator. Slowly, slowly, the liquid thickens until we've reduced it down forty times. 

Potowatami Botonist Robin Wall Kimmerer calls our northeastern region Maple Nation- a distinction beyond state or country that celebrates the delicious, storable food source that generations have delighted in. She says in her book Braiding Sweetgrass, 

"It is said that our people learned to make sugar from the squirrels. In late winter, the hungry time, when caches of nuts are depleted, swuirrels take to the treetops and gnaw on the brances of sugar maples. Scraping the bark allows sap to exude from the twig, and the squirrels drink it. But the real goods come the next morning, when they follow the same circuit they made the day before, licking up the sugar crystals that formed on the bark overnight."

Anyone who has driven up Beebe Hill (if you haven’t done so at sunset, I highly recommend) has likely wondered what those skinny white tubes are sticking out of the ground near the apex of the road. 
 
In the spring of 2020, we planted two hundred Chestnut saplings. Young trees are vulnerable to nibbles from deer and rodents, so we are protecting them in tubes that also act as mini-greenhouses, speeding up growth until the leaves begin to pop out of the tops.  
 
Why Trees? 
When Adamah was generously gifted the forty acres uphill of our main farm, we took a full year to observe the land. It was steep, so not great for growing vegetables, had no irrigation or electricity, and was full of brush and invasives. We imagined the hill as it might have been five hundred years ago, likely a forest stewarded by indigenous peoples to better produce forage crops like nuts and berries. We thought about the needs of our planet at this current moment when we have too much CO2 build up in the atmosphere and not enough of it in the soil where it can be stored and support food production. Trees became the obvious direction we wanted to go- edible reforestation to sequester carbon and learn/teach about the potential of agroforestry for our global food supply.  
 
Why Chestnuts? 
While American Chestnuts used to populate these mountains with huge, towering trunks of resilient wood and millions of nutritious nuts falling to the ground, they are no longer viable due to the presence of a disease called Chestnut Blight. We have planted European and Asian chestnut varieties that are resistant to the blight as an homage to the chestnut-rich history of the region and because they are a crop well suited to our slopes. Chestnuts can handle the moisture on Beebe Hill, appreciate our climate, and don’t need much picky tending during the spring and summer when we are busy with other crops. Chestnuts are a tree-grown source of carbohydrates- a huge boon to a food system in which we rely so heavily on grain crops that require a lot of tillage (which releases carbon) for carbs. Chestnuts can live many years, an erosion and climate solution for the generations.  
 
Did I see a goat? 
Yes! Our flerd (herd + flock) of goats and sheep graze in the agroforestry area in paddocks we rotate with electric fencing. As the trees mature, the area will be a proper silviculture with the animals grazing directly underneath the trees, allowing the grasses and brush between trees to be useful forage instead of a nuisance that needs to be mowed. We think the animals will also enjoy the shade of the leaves:) 
 
When Do We Eat? 
We hope to have our first nut harvest in 2027! Good things come to those who wait. Agroforestry is an exercise in patience and in appreciating a timeline outside of our usual calendrical hustle and bustle. Cash flow budgets don’t easily coincide with tree-time, so we are very grateful to those who have supported our agroforestry venture including Berkshire Agricultural Ventures, American Farmland Trust, and USDA's National Resource Conservation Service.  
 
When it’s time to harvest, we hope to host community nut harvest days, to store our own nuts for roasting, and, depending on yield, potentially to sell into the emerging Chestnut flour processing industry in the region.  ​

We see good agriculture as a partnership between farmers and the ecosystem.

The goal is to bring nutritious food to harvest in ways that support the longterm health of the land and all the species on it, including our own. There are many terms that attempt to describe this general orientation toward farming: organic, biological, ecological, sustainable, climate-friendly, regenerative. Each tries its best to capture the enormity of the meaning- to produce human sustenance while understanding the true interconnectedness of the world; to avoid shortcuts like chemicals that lead to temporary high yields but future problems or externalities for others; to work with the relationships between parts of the system rather than to isolate them into their component parts. 


Indigenous peoples across the globe have developed resilient partnerships with ecosystems to maintain both human caloric intake and the health of the overall system. The practices we use on the farm are thanks to the wisdom of the Mahican people indigenous to this place; to each of our ancestors wherever they may have been rooted; to the community of organic/sustainable/regenerative farmers who are so generous with their learnings; to service providers like extension agents and nonprofits; to all the Adamahniks past and present; and to the more than human world itself that teaches us every day.

The following are the primary techniques we use on the farm:

Composting
There is no such thing as away! When a pizza crust goes into a garbage can it just ends up emitting toxic methane in a landfill. When it comes to our compost piles, it gets turned into fertilizer for our next crop of veggies! We use a composting method called thermophilic composting. That means that through proper aeration, moisture management, and balancing of carbon to nitrogen ratios we serve as hosts for powerful microbes that transform food waste. We get our compost piles up above 135 degrees to kill pathogens and make fertilizer. Join the party by contributing your food waste! Check out The Farm tab on this website for more info. After the compost is finished, we spread it on the field which feeds soil microbes and helps us grow healthy, lush veggies without expensive fertilizers that cause pollution.

Cover Cropping
We grow "green manures" whenever we can spare a moment for our soil to be out of production. We mix together the seeds of soil-building plants like rye, vetch, clover, buckwheat, peas, triticale, and phacelia. Growing cover crops and burying them in our soil works similarly to adding compost, it feeds the microbes which, in turn, increases our crop yields without buying in expensive fertilizers.

Biodiversity
We cultivate almost one hundred different plants on our farm. Many more wild plants grow themselves in the spaces we leave open. A few farm animals and lots of different wild birds, mammals, insects, and soil microbes call our farm home.  We'd like to disinvite the voles and groundhogs, please, but everyone else is a lovely community member.

Having a diverse mix of crop species increases the farm's resilience because you never know what a season will bring. A wet year is good for leeks but bad for basil. A dry year is great for tomatoes but bad for celery. 

Having diverse wild species increases the farm's resilience through ecosystem services. That means that a good deal of the more than human world is helpful to overall balance. Braconid wasp larvae devour caterpillars so we plant plenty of the kind of umbel shaped flowers their parents need to survive and lay eggs. Mycorrhizal fungi help plant roots reach nutrients and water they wouldn't otherwise have access to in exchange for carbon the plant leaves make through photosynthesis, so we try not to disturb their fungal hyphae as much as possible. 

Crop Rotation
Moving the annual vegetable varieties around each year increases resilience by avoiding pest or disease build up and not over taxing the soil from any one nutrient. 
​
No-Till
"Tilling" is when you disturb the soil to prepare it. There are many ways to till and they are all useful in different ways. Plowing, rototilling, and even digging are all tillage methods. Being able to clear the land to plant is a critical part of farming and tilling is the easiest way to do it. The problem is, tillage is harmful to soil microbial life and to soil structure which are the basis of healthy plants. It also releases carbon to the sky- where we have too much of it- rather than leaving it in the ground where it can be stored. 

About half of our three acres of vegetables haven't been tilled in two years or more. We accomplish this lack of tillage through intensive management techniques like tarping, flail mowing, roller crimping, hand clearing, and broadforking. We find that the soil health and resilience to moisture fluctuation in our no-till plots is excellent but the management techniques don't work for every situation. 

Reduced Tillage
Sometimes, we just want to get crops in the ground more quickly than our notill techniques can handle, For those moments, we pull our rototiller out. We find it particularly useful in integrating big cover crops but we minimize the number of passes we make with the tiller- doing just enough to get the job done but being as gentle as possible on the soil. 

Living Pathways
Our notill plots have permanent living pathways, mostly of white clover. We have to mow the living pathways often and occasionally knock them back from creeping into the beds, but we find that it is actually less time consuming than weeding paths would be. There are huge soil health and erosion control benefits to our living pathways, plus they are beautiful!

Perennials and Agroforestry
Our farm includes about an acre of of perennial fruits, nuts, and berries as well as about fifteen acres of chestnuts. These perennial plants stay in the ground season to season, allowing their roots time to fully establish, sequester carbon, and hold our hillsides in place. We are on our way to grazing our small flerd (flock + herd) of sheep and goats in the understory of the chestnuts as soon as the trees get big enough, a practice called silvopasture.

Rotational Grazing
Our goats and sheep are fenced in (until they're not... and we have to find them down the road and fence them in again... thank you for your patience Beebe Hill Rd neighbors!) on small paddocks that rotate every few days. This allows them to eat all the plants to the ground rather than consistently grazing the tops, which is excellent for the pasture plants and helps with animal health too. We often fence the goats in along roadsides and other spots with invasive issues- they love vines like poison ivy and bittersweet and we love the way they mow them down!

Eating seasonally here in northwest Connecticut never gets boring or rote. Something exciting that we haven't eaten in months is always around the corner. It's hard to beat the immersive sensory experience of tasting the first lettuce out of the ground in spring or the first ripe tomato off the vine in summer. We wait and we wait for our favorite veggies to arrive, and when they do, we are transported and awakened by their flavors and textures. And there is no better way to get that experience than with a CSA share!

A CSA share represents a mix of the crops that are fresh the week of harvest. ​Light leafy greens are the first to emerge in spring until the juicy, sweet crops of summer mature. Heavy roots and winter squash are finally ready in fall and we can store some of them into winter like onions, potatoes, cabbage and... everyone's favorite... turnips!

At Adamah we do our best to plan our field plantings with the goal of having the most balanced shares possible in each season. Every week includes one herb that is freshly available at that time of year; something in the onion family (chives, scallions and garlic scapes in spring; fresh garlic and fresh sweet onions in summer; storage onions, garlic, and leeks in fall); and then as close to a mix of roots, leaves, and fruits as the season will allow. We plan our plantings with balance of shares in mind, attempting to have carrots as early in spring as possible to balance out all the lettuce, kale, chard, and other greens. We try to keep greens going as long through the hot summer as we can but they aren't as tasty as they are in cooler weather so we focus the shares more on what's incredible that time of year- tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, etc. In the fall we bring the greens back to compliment the heavier roots and squash.

Check out this Connecticut produce seasonality chart to get a sense of what is often available when, although of course our farm is unique and we don't grow all of the crops listed.

​

Jewish Farming FAQs:

What makes Jewish farming Jewish?
Does it involve praying in the fields in Hebrew? Taking ancient biblical land management techniques into account when designing a farm? Stopping work on Shabbat (the Sabbath)? Debating how a particular Jewish law about tree fruit production applies to pawpaws? Learning the Yiddish names for certain herbs? Just being on a farm with other people who have a relationship to Judaism?

Yes! and No!

Simply put, there are as many meanings to the term Jewish Farming as there are people with a connection to Judaism who farm.

Jewish farmers might consider any or many of the following to be the Jewishness of being a Jewish farmer: having a spiritual relationship to land through Jewish text and/or tradition; seeking a connection to ancestors in working with plants they might also have grown; studying the intricacies of Jewish laws and applying them, or not, to modern farming; grappling with the story of Jewish immigration to colonized land; saying Shehecheyanu (the Jewish blessing for first-time occasions) when pulling the first carrot in spring; simply being a Jewish person who is also a farmer. 

Is Adamah only for Jewish people?
No way! Plenty of the members of our CSA, tour and workshop participants, food pantry clients, ​and countless others in the Adamah community have no particular relationship to Judaism at all. We grow food for our community, regardless of religious affiliation.

Participants in our residential fellowship program (Adamahniks) each have a deep interest in spending three months in Jewish community, whatever that means to them. We do not have any requirements around particular Jewish affiliation, just that participants are seeking an experience of engaging with Judaism while in the fellowship.

What are some ways that I might encounter Judaism at the Adamah Farm?
Signs: 
You might drop your apple cores and orange peels on our compost piles to be transformed into powerful organic fertilizer for our next crop. On the fence above the food waste you see a sign: "The stone that the builders rejected has become the cornerstone." The placement of this quote from Psalms 118 above a steaming pile of compost invites us to think about the role of the things we throw away and their relationship to the future if we rethink their potential. Signs like these adorn the fence posts and gateways of the farm, lending context and color to our days on the farm.

Shabbat: 
Friday afternoons on the farm are a time of lots of hustle and bustle. We finish up as many projects as we can and then jump in the lake or river for mikveh to transition to Shabbat. From sundown Friday to sundown Saturday, the only farm work we do is the necessary bits for animal health or keeping crops alive in a pinch. The twentieth century Rabbi Abraham Joshua Heschel spoke of Shabbat as "a palace in time," an opportunity for awe, reflection, joy, and rest. 

Holidays: 
Where is everybody? Its a random Thursday in July- why isn't anyone working today?
Adamah pauses work on the farm for Jewish holidays including:
Spring: Tu Bishvat, Passover, Shavuot
Summer: Tisha b'av
Fall: Rosh Hashana (the Jewish new year), Yom Kippur, Sukkot (the Jewish harvest festival)
These holidays celebrate the seasons, commemorate historical events, invite spiritual reflection, mark the spiraling of time, and bring stories and traditions to life.

Hebrew words: 
We call our high tunnel (the unheated greenhouse where we grow greens and tomatoes) the chai tunnel because chai means life in Hebrew. One of our pet goats is named Kochav which means stars. We don't collect tools and put them into the truck or bring crates of tomatoes from one end of the field to another- we schlep them. You may hear Hebrew  words (or Yiddish, or Ladino, or Arabic words) tossed around in the middle of sentences here and there. 

Shmita
We are inspired by the ancient biblical practice of releasing the land back to its wild state every seven years, a practice that echoes many of the themes of regeneration core to our farming practices, and have put our own spin on it. Our 'shmita plot' takes up about 1/7th of our land and includes wild flowering plants and wildlife habitat and we make sure that at least 1/7th of the produce we grow is for people experiencing economic challenges.

Does Adamah have a Rabbi?
You may have noticed a certain vibe to Adamah's approach to Jewish life- it's not about following the leadership of any individual but rather about the way a particular community of individuals in a particular moment come together. We do not have a rabbi and we have all the rabbis! We are a pluralistic, evolving, vibrant Jewish community of farmers, learners, eaters, singers, and space-sharers partnering with the plants, animals, land, and people where we live.

​Acorn Squash Feeling overwhelmed by squash season? Remember that these wills tore for months so there is no rush to eat them all right away. Roast these acorn squash in the oven in slices or by cutting in half. Try stuffing the halves or scooping out the flesh after roasting and adding to other dishes.


Napa Cabbage This Asian style cabbage is perfect for stir-fries but only cook lightly so they retain some crispness. They also make delicious raw salads when sliced thinly and can be marinated in soy sauce, sesame oil, mirin, and other seasonings.


Tomatoes We keep getting a trickle of a harvest out of our high tunnel. Enjoy!


Collard Greens If you haven’t given these cooking greens a proper try, you’re in for a treat- they are probably my favorite. Southern American cuisine centers these greens cooked long and slow with animal fat. I love to simply sear them in olive oil and then toss in some water after about ten minutes of sautéing, cook for another five, salt, and wallah!


Salad Mix This triple washed array of baby greens includes mild and tender lettuces, sharper mustard greens like arugula and mizuna, and spinach.


Onions and Garlic These should both store well on your counter top.


Carrots Wow. This variety is particularly sweet and tasty.


Parsley This is flat leave Italian style parsley. Add it to salads, sauces, soups, roasted roots, or consider drying or freezing it for winter.


Hakurei Turnips These are not your average turnips! Also called salad turnips, they are juicy and delicious when eaten raw as well as cooked. They can be roasted, sautéed, or pickled in addition to just being sliced or quartered to eat raw. The greens are also super yummy- try them in a stir-fry, in soups, blended up for dips, or just lightly sautéed.

Jester Winter Squash This variety of squash is very sweet and excellent for stuffed squash or for roasting on its own. The skin is edible.


Hakurei Turnips These are not your average turnips! Also called salad turnips, they are juicy and delicious when eaten raw as well as cooked. They can be roasted, sautéed, or pickled in addition to just being sliced or quartered to eat raw. The greens are also super yummy- try them in a stir-fry, in soups, blended up for dips, or just lightly sautéed.


Rainbow Chard Such gorgeous colors to match the fall foliage around us.


Salad Mix This triple washed array of baby greens includes mild and tender lettuces, sharper mustard greens like arugula and mizuna, and spinach.


Cabbage These green cabbage are so yummy! They store well in the fridge so there is no rush to eat them. Make a slaw, steam them, roast in the oven, add to soup- so many options!


Onions and Garlic These should both store well on your counter top.


Peppers This week is the last week of peppers for the season. It’s been a good pepper run all the way into mid-October!


Sage This herb pairs well with winter squash and fall flavors.


Jalapenos These are the last of the hot peppers for 2021.