Manoff Market Gardens
Solebury, PA
Product Types
Strawberries, cherries, rasberries,blackberries, white and yellow peaches, white and yellow nectarines, pumpkins, flowers.
About
Throughout the year, we grow what is in season. This includes strawberries, peaches, nectarines, blackberries, raspberries, apples, pumpkins and flowers. We started farming 25 yrs ago on old orchard ground. It took us almost 20 years to clear and set up the farm for our work. We enjoy growing fruit even though we started farming with a vegetable Market Garden approach in mind. As our family grew we needed to streamline our products and have moved into having fruit from June through January. Our children participate during the summer: Michael grows Melons and Pumpkins and Chelsea is in charge of starting, planting, and gathering Flowers. Her bouquets are available from the beginning of Peach season into the fall. Our yellow lab, Hale, is the official Greeter. She’s thrilled when everyone comes to see her.
Ingredients
We like to grow many varieties of fruit. White Hale is a peach variety grown on our farm in the 40′s and 50′s. While it’s hard to find the trees we’ve had luck having some custom budding done so we can continue to offer it to our customers. We also like to try new things like Donut Peaches. Our white nectarines took some years to figure out, but they are appreciated by our customers as well for their honey sweetness. We grow 6 varieties of strawberries, 1 kind to be forced early in our High Tunnels, the rest to extend the season in the field. We use Remay row covers to protect our strawberries from early frosts.
Practices – Standards for raising or making our products
We use an Integrated Pest Management system which incorporates Organic, Sustainable and Traditional methods of growing our produce. Our crops are rotated around the farm and green manures like buckwheat, hairy vetch, sudax grass and rye are used to enhance the soil. We use drip irrigation because it’s the most efficient use of our water. Sprays to control insects and bacteria are used judiciously, we are careful of the honey bees that pollinate our blossoms and the lady bugs that feed on the aphids. An effective program of pest control includes using “zero days to harvest” pesticides. Meaning, the active product is not going to stay on the plants. If the bug isn’t there- it’s a waste of time. We never spray anything Post Harvest- a huge advantage to buying Local. We live and work on our farm with our children, therefore our own interests are at stake in our caretaking.