Once Upon a Farm - March Newsletter

Author

Sam Once Upon a Farm
March 31, 2026

🌱 The Backyard Farm Update

Welcome back to another month at Once Upon a Farm!

We finally got rain. I probably shouldn't sound so relieved about that when half the world seems to be dealing with too much of it, but we had a proper dry spell through late summer and the grass was looking pretty tired. I was keeping the irrigation going on the gardens but there's only so much a hose can do when the ground itself is baked. So the rain coming in as I sit down to write this feels like a gift, and the garden and the grass seem to agree.

Most of the summer crops are done now. The tomatoes have been turned into salsa and passata, which is always a big job but one of the most satisfying ones of the year. The last of the fresh tomatoes are coming in for lunches and dinners and I'm savouring them because it'll be months before they're back. I've been eating a lot of apple and peach crumble this month, sometimes with frozen blackberries from the summer harvest thrown in, and it really does feel like harvest time produces the most delicious food. All of it grown here, all of it preserved or picked or frozen at its best. There is nothing in a supermarket that comes close.

I've sowed three of my garden beds into cover crops now, which is the start of the experiment I talked about last month — the chicken grazing rotation through autumn and winter. The rest of the beds will follow as the chickens and I clear them. It's satisfying to see the first ones going in, and I'm looking forward to seeing how the cycle plays out once those greens are up and the chickens get their first pass through.

And we have chicks! I set eggs under two hens this autumn, and the hatches have happened with two very different outcomes — which I'll be sharing in some upcoming videos, so I won't say too much here. But there are many adorable little ones out there right now learning about the world, and they've already had an early introduction to rain. I remember one very dry year where the chicks didn't see rain until they were about three months old, and they were truly dismayed by the water falling from the sky. These ones are getting it sorted early. There's going to be some really lovely content coming through in April following these chicks, so keep an eye on the channel for that.

🤔 Pottering Ponders

I was watching the new chicks the other day, the ones that are only a few days old, and their mother was showing them how to scratch for bugs. She scratches, they watch. She scratches again, they try. They're terrible at it. Their little feet don't really know what they're doing yet, but they try and try and the hen just keeps going, scratching and clucking and showing them where the food is. She doesn't get frustrated. She doesn't simplify it for them. She just keeps doing it, and they keep learning by being near her.

I think about this a lot, actually, in the broader sense. How much of what we know about farming and growing food was passed down exactly this way — not through instructions or manuals, but through being near someone who was doing it. Watching. Trying. Getting it wrong and trying again. My parents had chickens and gardens, and I found it all quite boring as a child. But I absorbed it without realising. The knowledge went in through proximity, not through effort, and now here I am decades later reaching back for things I didn't know I'd learned.

We've lost a lot of that, I think. Most people alive today didn't grow up near anyone who kept chickens or grew food in any serious way. The chain got broken somewhere in the last few generations and now we're all having to learn it fresh, mostly from the internet, which is a very different kind of teacher. I don't say that to be discouraging — I'm part of the internet teaching system myself, and I think there's real value in it. But I do think there's something worth noticing about what gets lost when knowledge stops being passed on by doing it together. The hen doesn't explain scratching. She just scratches, and the chicks figure it out because they're right there with her. There's a kind of teaching that only works through presence, and I wonder sometimes whether that's the piece we're all trying to recover.

🌍 What's in Season?

What's In Season — March 2026

Northern Hemisphere — Early Spring

The light is changing, even if the weather hasn't caught up yet. This is the month where things start to feel possible again in the garden.

Planting: If you started tomatoes and peppers indoors last month, they should be coming along nicely under lights. Peas can go directly into the ground now in most temperate areas — they don't mind cool soil at all. Broad beans too, if you haven't already. Lettuce, spinach, and radishes can go in under cover or direct-sown if you're in a milder area. Onion sets can go in the ground. Start your brassica seedlings indoors (broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage) for transplanting out in a few weeks.

Harvesting: The tail end of stored winter crops — root vegetables, squash, anything left in the pantry. Early greens if you had anything overwintering. Rhubarb is starting to come back in many areas now.

Simple Recipe — Pea Shoot Stir Fry: If you planted peas, you can harvest some of the young shoots and tendrils for a quick stir fry. They taste like spring. Toss them in a hot pan with a bit of sesame oil, garlic, and a splash of soy sauce for literally two minutes. They cook down fast. Serve over rice or noodles. It feels like a celebration of the season turning.

Southern Hemisphere — Early Autumn

Down here, the pace is shifting. The big harvests are done (or nearly done) and we're turning our attention to what comes next. It's one of my favourite transitions, actually. There's a sense of completion mixed with anticipation.

Planting: Now is the time for autumn and winter crops. Get your brassica seedlings in if you haven't — broccoli, cauliflower, cabbage, kale. Direct-sow beetroot, carrots, turnips, and leafy greens like silverbeet, spinach, and lettuce. If you're growing garlic, start thinking about which beds you'll use — planting time is coming up in the next couple of months (traditionally on or near the winter solstice, but any time through late autumn into early winter works). Sow cover crops into any empty beds.

Harvesting: Late tomatoes, peppers, and chillies. Pumpkins and squash should be ready to cure and store. Apples and late stone fruit. Beans for drying if you've left them on the plant. Corn if you're drying it.

Simple Recipe — Apple and Berry Crumble: This is what I've been eating all month so I might as well share it. Core and chop a few apples (no need to peel), toss them in a baking dish with a handful of frozen blackberries or whatever berries you have. For the topping, rub butter into oats and flour with a bit of brown sugar until it's crumbly. Pile it on top and bake until golden and bubbling. Serve with cream or yoghurt. It's the simplest thing and it never stops being good.

🔬 Science Spotlight

How Chicks Learn: The Science of Social Learning in Poultry

I've been watching new chicks learn to eat this week, which got me thinking about how remarkable the process actually is. A newly hatched chick is able to peck from very early on — that's instinctive — but what they peck at, and whether they learn to avoid things that are bad for them, is heavily shaped by the hen.

Research into social learning in poultry has shown that chicks raised with a mother hen learn what to eat and what to avoid significantly faster than chicks raised without one. The hen makes specific vocalisations when she finds food — a rapid clucking sound that draws the chicks in. She picks up and drops food items in front of them, and the chicks quickly learn to associate those calls and demonstrations with safe food sources. They also learn what not to eat by watching the hen's responses. A chick that sees its mother avoid something will avoid it too, sometimes permanently.

This is more sophisticated than it might look. The hen isn't just feeding the chicks — she's actively teaching them about their environment. Studies have found that hen-raised chicks develop broader, more appropriate diets and show less fear in new environments compared to artificially brooded chicks. They're also better at foraging as adults. The presence of the mother during those first weeks doesn't just keep them warm and safe, it provides a kind of education that shapes their behaviour for life.

For those of us who hatch chicks with broody hens rather than incubators, this is part of why it matters. The hen is doing something that we can't replicate with a heat lamp and a feeder, no matter how carefully we set things up. She's passing on knowledge — what to eat, where to find it, what to be wary of — through her behaviour, and the chicks absorb it by being near her. It's the oldest form of teaching there is.

Did You Know?

Hens begin communicating with their chicks before they even hatch. In the final days before hatching, the hen makes soft vocalisations to the eggs, and the developing chicks vocalise back from inside the shell. By the time they hatch, the chicks already recognise their mother's voice and will preferentially move towards it over the voice of an unfamiliar hen. The relationship begins before they've even met.

📺 Last Month’s YouTube Spotlight

Thanks for reading. Things are slowing down here on as we tip into autumn, and I'm looking forward to the quieter pace that brings. If you're heading into spring up north, I hope the soil is warming and the days are getting longer where you are. We've got some really exciting chick content coming to the channel through April, so make sure you're subscribed over on YouTube if you want to follow along
- Sam