Fifth Crow Farm Subscriptions

our fully customizable CSA, bringing fresh, organic produce to over 700 families
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We’ve created our Subscription program with a lot of flexibility and convenience built in, sacrificing the reliability of a traditional CSA model for an adaptable system that suits a wider range of customers. Our aim is to provide organic, local food to as many as possible, and making these subscriptions sustainable for the customers is a key component of that mission. 

Subscriptions deliver from early May-late November. Members can cancel boxes up to two days before delivery and schedule skipped weeks.

How it works – the basics

Once you subscribe, you’re in until you cancel. Here’s an example week in the CSA season for a Thursday subscriber (the timeline is slightly different for weekend subscribers)

Saturday afternoon, we create the default box and your order, and send you a “time to customize” email. This email contains updates and announcements from the farm, details about what’s in your box, and a link the site where you can edit your order.

You have until Tuesday at 5:30am to add and remove items from your order, or to cancel it. We spend all day Tuesday harvesting and prepping for you.

Wednesday afternoon we pack your orders and put them into our coolers to chill overnight! If we run out of anything or make swaps, we will notify you. We run your credit card on file after we pack. 

Thursday morning we pick up fresh bread and load the produce boxes, flowers, and more onto trucks for delivery. 

Thursday morning/afternoon you pick up! 

 

FAQs - the details

Where can I pick up my weekly box?

We offer more than 20 pickup sites throughout our area, including Thursday afternoon/evening pickup at member-hosted sites and weekend pickup at our farmers’ market booths (9-1pm). An interactive map of our pickup sites is available here, or below. If you have any questions or if there isn’t a site in your neighborhood, please email [email protected]

Interested in hosting? We need a minimum of 10 people to add your site as a delivery/pick-up location, and site hosts receive a discount on their share.

What is the pick-up etiquette?

Each pick-up site has specific hours for pick up, which are included in your pickup reminder emails. Farmers’ Market pick-ups happen during market hours; private site hours vary depending on the specific host but most pick-up hours are 12pm to 8pm. The site hosts are volunteers and are not paid. Please respect the hosts and only pick up during specified times. They are not required to make special accommodations if you can’t pick up your box or forget. Boxes that are not picked up during pick-up hours will not be available or held for later.

What's in a box? What do you grow?

Details on box sizes and add-on subscriptions can be found lower on this page.

To get an idea of what we grow, please explore the pages in the “what we grow” top menu.

Does Fifth Crow grow everything in the box?

Yes! We grow 100% of the produce and fruit in your box week to week. To view the spectrum of what we grow, explore the drop down menu above.

Products from our partner meat farms, bakeries, etc. are clearly denoted. If we were to buy in produce, which happens rarely, we would clearly title it as from another farm. 

We want to ensure that you know where everything is coming from, and that it’s being grown with healthy and sustainable practices.

How do I skip deliveries? Cancelling an order or scheduling a vacation

In order to consistently grow the produce for our customers we have to plan months in advance. For this reason, we ask that you please schedule a hold as soon as you know you’ll be skipping weeks. 

Instructions for scheduling a hold and cancelling orders can be found in our customer guide to LFM.

Reduced Cost Shares - Donate or Access

We want to improve access to the nutritious food we grow. We know that the cost of joining the CSA is prohibitive for some. Our “Reduced Cost Share Fund” is a needs-based discount (25% or 50%), completely funded by member donations. In addition to elective donations, if you need to cancel a delivery for any reason, you can donate the cost of your box to the fund. 

To apply, please fill out this form and email [email protected] with any questions. We do not currently accept EBT for subscriptions, but you can shop with EBT at farmers markets (systems vary by market). 

Can I visit the farm?

We encourage and welcome your visits to the farm. We hold at least one Open House event per season for you to see the farm and meet fellow CSA members and Fifth Crow eaters. That said you are always welcome to stop by and see where your food is coming from.  Bring good shoes and be prepared to walk yourself around- we’re pretty busy so we likely won’t be able to tour, but we want you to know this is your farm too.

Subscription Sizes - what's in a box?

Regular Produce Share

$30 (6-10 items) per week. Contents vary seasonally, but a typical box looks like:

  • 1-2 fruits (strawberries, apples, etc.)
  • 1 bunch of greens
  • 2 heads of baby lettuce 
  • 1 bunch of herbs
  • 1-2 bunches of roots (beets, carrots)
  • 1 bunch broccoli or cauliflower
  • 1-2 seasonal crops (squash, tomatoes, peppers, etc.)

Large Produce Share

$50 (9-12 items) per week. Contents vary seasonally, but a typical box looks like:

  • 2 fruits (strawberries, apples, etc.)
  • 2 bunches of greens
  • 2 heads of baby lettuce 
  • 2 bunches of herbs
  • 2-3 bunches of roots (beets, carrots)
  • 1 bunch broccoli or cauliflower
  • 2-4 seasonal crops (squash, tomatoes, peppers, etc.)
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Add-on Subscriptions

Items also available weekly when you customize your box. Some subscriptions come with a discount for your commitment.

Dry Bean Subscription

$7.50/delivery. Receive a 1lb bag of our heirloom dry beans every other week. Bean subscribers get 25% off their subscription bean bags.

 

 Farm Preserves Share

$10/delivery. Subscribe to receive a rotating variety of our preserved farm goodies biweekly, processed for us by Happy Girl Kitchen. We have a broad range from apple cider and strawberry jam to pickled dilly beans and crushed dry farmed tomatoes.

There is also a weekly farm preserves share, which includes more repeats of our best sellers, and one-off specialty preserves. 

Egg Shares

Our pasture raised eggs are a hot commodity. While we do usually have extras for sale during the season, they sell out fast! There’s a lot that goes into producing eggs in what we think is the right way. Our eggs are always less than a week old, we adhere to strict welfare standards, and they’re colorful due to the heritage breeds in our flock. If you’ve never had fresh pastured eggs, read more about them on our egg page to learn more about the benefits.

We are only able to guarantee a certain quantity of eggs weekly, so not everyone can have an egg share. If you are subscribed to produce and would like to be on the waitlist to get weekly or biweekly eggs, please email [email protected]

Our Partners

Members can get more of their weekly shopping done through our CSA because of our partnerships with local businesses. We deliver products from the following Partners to your Thursday pick up site. You can sign up for these add on shares on our website at the time of registration.

*Add-on products from our Partner Farms are not all Certified Organic

Root Down Farm

Root Down Farm is a queer-owned pasture-based poultry and pig farm located in Pescadero, CA, just a few miles down the road from Fifth Crow Farm. Our mission is to humanely raise the healthiest animals possible, while working within our ecosystem to responsibly steward the land and improve soil health. We work with various breeds of animals to balance our humane standards with the meat folks want to eat. Our animals roam the pastures, are fed an organic, non-GMO grain and are never given any hormones.

Companion Bakeshop

Companion Bakeshop was created in 2006 for the Santa Cruz Farmers Markets. We opened our first location on the Westside of Santa Cruz in 2011. We bake organic sourdough breads and pastries daily. We value our coastal community, nestled between Farmland and Redwoods, and love supporting our local farms and purveyors. Together, our Companion Teams work hard for our community, our food system, and our love for turning great ingredients into delicious pastry & bread.

Steadfast Herbs

Steadfast Herbs is a small herb farm located just down the road from Fifth Crow Farm where they use organic practices to grow over 60 varieties of medicinal plants on one acre of land. In addition to offering fresh cut herbs, they also make small batch teas, tinctures and salves from the plants that they grow in order to support folks in caring for their physical, mental and emotional health. This year Steadfast Herbs’ remedies will be available as a weekly optional extra purchase. No need to subscribe, just buy it when you need and get it packed in your Fifth Crow Box. For more info visit steadfastherbs.com

Markegard Family Grass-Fed

provides the community with locally born, raised, and processed certified grass-fed and finished beef/ lamb and pasture raised chicken/ pork. We are 100% grass-fed certified by the American Grass-Fed Association and were the first California ranch to be certified Bird Friendly by the National Audubon Society. Our philosophy in grazing is to manage the cattle herd to simulate the large herds of Elk and Antelope which once roamed California’s grasslands. We accomplish this by keeping the herd moving with Holistic planned grazing, so as never to overgraze an area, but to stimulate growth and grass-land health through properly timed grazing. We look forward to serving you and your family with the freshest, healthiest local meats in the Bay Area! https://www.markegardfamily.com/