Trooper’s story is one of glamour, sadness, faith, hope, & love. The story is a common one. Trooper’s story ended with happiness … many do not.

Trooper is a Standardbred race horse. He was born in 2005 on a big prominent breeding farm in Illinois. Named & registered as Bill’s Iscape, his dad is Artsplace, a VERY successful pacer. His mom is Teatime Hall, the dam of a handful of very noteworthy racers.

Bill raced from 2008 to 2010, being in and out of the limelight throughout his racing career. Having won a total of $31,105, he was retired from racing at age 5. He just didn’t have what he needed to be more competitive. Throughout his racing years Bill was pampered & treated well like most race horses are. But then he was sold.

There is a span of ten years that we can’t track. Ten years of no records to show where Bill was or what his job may have been. We assume Bill had been sold to the Amish and lived a life of a carriage horse. That’s common for Standardbreds that are retired from racing. Although we assume he was treated well, life as an Amish carriage horse is very demanding. It’s a life of long drives on hard roads and more often than not, a life of health and leg problems.

At some point, after ten years, Bill was sold and found at an auction in Pennsylvania. He had been beaten up by other auction horses, was depressed, and extremely thin and underweight. His fate was unknown until he was discovered and saved by the Standardbred Retirement Foundation.

In March of this year, the VonThun family was looking for a horse to add to their riding lesson program. Someone had suggested adopting a Standardbred from SRF, which led Cindy to do some research on the breed & organization. Kristie & Kellie agreed to look at a few of the retirement foundation’s rescue horses just to please their mom.

Bill far from impressed Kristie & Kellie the day they met, but there was something about Bill that tugged on Cindy’s heartstrings, and within two weeks Bill was brought to the farm as a temporary foster.  He was quickly renamed Trooper, as it was apparent that he must had been a real trooper to withstand all he had been through. It didn’t take long for the old, skinny, broken horse to become a favorite of the barn kids and the quest to help him gain a few hundred pounds was a challenge accepted by all.

There was no doubt that Trooper wasn’t a lesson horse … he had only been actually ridden TWICE before he arrived here at the barn! Trooper needed lessons himself to unlearn all his racing training and learn how to become a riding horse.

Just before Mother’s Day this year Kristie & Kellie called SRF to officially adopt Trooper. They then gathered all the barn kids and gifted Trooper to Cindy as a combination Mother’s Day/Birthday gift. There wasn’t a dry eye in the barn when it was announced that Trooper had found his forever home & was at the barn to stay!

Trooper’s training is still a work in progress, but after being at the farm for just three months he’s gained weight and has more than proven himself to be an asset to the farm. Trooper has given beginner riding lessons, is used for the farm’s Equine Scout and summer camp programs, has been ridden on trail rides, and was used for numerous photo shoots by the barn kids.

Faith, hope, and love saved Trooper … and we are super excited to have him with us as part of the family. Trooper turns 16 this year, and we thought it was only fitting to throw him a Sweet 16 Party and share his story. Yes, a birthday party for a horse seems a bit ridiculous … but the rest of his story is too. No animal should ever be neglected or left to face an uncertain fate. We hope you’ll join us for Trooper’s Sweet 16 … proceeds will benefit the Standardbred Reteirement Foundation in hopes of saving more of these sweet, wonderful retired race horses!

Welcome to CSA 2021!

Thank you for your commitment to eat fresh, eat healthy, and eat local! We sure are excited, and honored, to be chosen as YOUR farmers for the upcoming season!  This blog post will serve as a hub for our CSA family to visit for online account links & how-to information.

March 29 … Find someone to share your share with & SAVE!

Folks often struggle with deciding what vegetable size share to buy, and it’s common to have members upgrade to a larger size once the program starts. In these uncertain times, we’re hearing that a little extra Jersey Fresh produce to can or freeze (I’ll send you videos on how to do it!) for the winter might not be a bad idea.

When signing up for CSA most folks don’t look at the size options & cost in this way… If you find a friend/neighbor/family member to split your CSA with, you’ll save on the cost of your CSA share.  I’ll explain, using our Washington pricing. If you’re a So. Brunswick CSA member, you’ll save even more!!

Personal share – $310 (often considered a 1/4 share)
Half share – $400
Full share – $560

Look at the pricing and it’s obvious… If you now have a personal share ($310) and upgrade to a half share by finding a partner to split it with, you and your partner will each pay $200 …. that’s a savings of $110 on almost the same amount of produce AND the half share usually gets a little more of a variety each week.

If you now have a half share ($400) and upgrade to a full share by finding a partner to split it with, you and your partner will each pay $280 …. that’s less than the cost of a personal share!! And that’s a savings of $120 for the same amount of produce you would receive from a half share AND the full shares do get a little more of a variety each week.

For those of you that are picking up your share at a host site- if you split your CSA share with someone  you’ll save on your delivery fee too!!

Each CSA share comes in one bag and you are responsible for sharing. That can be an inconvenience. And yes, there may be times that certain items cannot be shared whole (melons, cabbage, etc.), but with that cost savings, you can buy an extra melon or you can cut the melon, cabbage, etc, in half to split it.

If you want to upgrade your veggie share, you can go into your online Farmigo account and make that change yourself. If you would rather we make the change, just email us and ask!

March 23 …

Spring is finally here! Hopefully Mother Nature will cooperate & we’ll have some great weather. We still need some freezing nights to keep our berry fields & orchards in check so they don’t go into bloom early and get frozen out closer to our frost free dates. And of course some warmer, drier days will allow the farmers to work the fields and get ready for planting.

Our greenhouse seedlings continue to grow well … and that’s a great thing, as there’s just 10 weeks until CSA starts!

March 16 …

Jersey Fresh Fruit Shares. They’re popular … CSA members receive 6 fruit shares per year, randomly spaced throughout the season. Fruit share availability depends on when local fruit is available.

We don’t grow a whole lot of fruit, so we don’t include a lot of fruit in our regular vegetable CSA share. Our fruit share was designed for just that reason! Although we do include our homegrown fruit when we are able to (peaches, nectarines, strawberries, blackberries, apples), we do try to include some additional fruit (pears, plums, blueberries) that we are able to buy locally from farmers that share our same growing techniques.

Want to add a fruit share? You can do that yourself via your online account!

March 9 …

Have you signed up for our farm fresh egg share? If not, it’s not too late. You can simply go into your online CSA account and make an update to include eggs. With previous CSA software our members were not able to make account changes themselves. Farmigo is different! (We told you you’d love farmigo!)

Although the eggs in our egg shares are predominantly brown, we do have a few hens that lay blue/green eggs, so you just might find one of their eggs in your egg carton from time to time. Occasionally the egg size may differ too. Sometimes the hens get stressed (HOT weather, thunderstorms, etc) and lay smaller eggs. The actual inside is usually the same size, it’s usually just the shell that is smaller.

If you haven’t tried farm fresh eggs, what are you waiting for? Our CSA members love them!

March 2 …

Just 13 more weeks until Jersey Fresh season … oh, we can’t wait!

Here’s some links that you might find useful the next few weeks …

• Email to contact us: CSA@VonThunFarms.com
• To access your online CSA account: https://csa.farmigo.com/account/vonthunsfarm
• To make a CSA payment: https://csa.farmigo.com/pay/vonthunsfarm
• Sign up link to share with family & friends: https://csa.farmigo.com/join/vonthunsfarm
• Link to VonThun’s Homegrown Inspirations Facebook Group. We’ll have lots of great recipes, how-to’s, & member interactions in the FB group this season … be sure to join & don’t miss out!
• VonThun’s CSA Handbook

February 22 … Update your online CSA account!

An online CSA account was made for all members that signed up early in the season before we started using the Farmigo CSA management software program.  You will need to update your account to make sure your contact info & email addresses are correct. Your online account will be your ‘communication hub’ this season!

February 15 …

Not much has changed this week other than we are one week closer to the start of CSA … and we’ve sure got lots of growing to do between now & then. Tim has been busy with crop planning – spring can’t come soon enough!

The Farmigo staff has been creating the online accounts for CSA members that signed up via our online store before we started using our Farmigo software. They should be done any day.

Don’t forget about our new CSA Referral Program. Our early season sign up ($25 discount) ends March 15 … help your friend, neighbors, & family take advantage of those savings and you’ll get a $20 farm market gift card if they sign up & add your name where it asks how they heard about the CSA program. The best part? There’s no limit to how many gift cards you can receive! Pass this link along for all the CSA details.

February 8 …

The weather outside certainly is frightful, but the greenhouse is toasty warm so our little seedlings can grow! That’s always the case … we don’t see the coldest temps of the year until we start heating the greenhouses.

Our seedlings are growing well. We always put our newly planted tomato & pepper seed trays on heated mats to help get the seeds sprouted. The electric heat of the mats warm the soil where the roots grow, ultimately shortening germination time. Other crops that don’t take so long to germinate were started in between the recent snowfalls. They were started on the greenhouse floor without the heat mats, so they’ll take a little longer to germinate and grow. Those newly started crops include onions, leeks, shallots, & various lettuces.

February 1 …

Uugh, what a week this is going to be! We’re certainly not happy about ALL this snow. Although we do gladly welcome some snow each winter (it’s good for the soil & the farm dogs love it), this is just ridiculous. The guys were on ladders for over an hour in the height of the storm pushing snow off one of the greenhouses so it didn’t collapse.

Our new CSA software is now up & running … we worked out a few glitches, so now we just need to create online accounts for each of our members. Once we have that done we’ll share Farmigo with you … we think you’ll love it!

January 25 …

And, we’re growing! A few tomato, pepper, and onion plants have been started in the greenhouse … the promise of a new season!! Those 3 crops take the longest to grow from seed to transplant, so they’re started much earlier than the other crops. BUT, it won’t be long until we start thinking about the start of those other crops too!

Although our early season CSA sign up with incentives offer is now over, we are still offering early season sign up with a $25 discount … so if you know of anyone who may be interested in joining CSA, let them know. And now that we’re using the Farmigo CSA software, we are able to offer a REFERRAL PROGRAM too! Just have your friend, neighbors, or family sign up for CSA and add your name where it asks how they heard of the CSA program … you’ll get a $20 farm market gift card. Yup, it’s that easy, and there is no limit of how many gift cards you can receive!

January 18 …

Oh, what we’d do for a real, ripe, homegrown tomato right now!! That picture is mouthwatering, isn’t it?  This mild winter weather sure has us all thinking about spring. What about you??! The guys are consumed in all kinds of winter projects, from fixing tractors and horse fence to building a new chicken house and painting wagons. BUT, the project we’re most excited about is our new CSA software system called Farmigo. Tim has been busy for days inputting, uploading, downloading, and tweaking … and it’s almost ready! Once compete on our end, you’ll be able to manage your CSA shares via your own online account. Cindy has been busy creating a new CSA Handbook filled with online account how-to’s, CSA expectations, and a special how to use, store, and freeze produce section. Oh, and if you wanted to take advantage of our early sign up incentives and haven’t paid in full yet (the deadline for full payments was Jan. 15), keep an eye on your inbox. We’ll be sending an email regarding that shortly! And since we’re counting down to the beginning of the CSA program in June, it’s only right to announce that it’s just 19 weeks away. There’s a lot that will happen in those 19 weeks, but it’ll be here before you know it!

January 11 …

Thank you to all who have already signed up and have chosen to take advantage of our best offer of the year, an early sign up savings of $50 AND your choice of a $25 VonThun Farm gift card or a pair of farm season passes (valid for both of our farm locations) if paid for in full by January 15. Unfortunately we were not able to ask which incentive you prefer (gift card or season passes) through our online sign up, but no worries … we’ll reach out to you to get your preference soon after our early sign up incentive period is over. Oh, and we’re excited to share that we found a new CSA software we hope to use to replace Harvie. We have a meeting with a software rep later this week to see if the software is the right fit for our program … stay tuned!