September 18, 2007
We just had our first hard frost. The tomatoes, peppers and
eggplants weren’t damaged but after a few more frosts we’ll lose
them. So now is the time to savor them. Along with our
regular harvest this week we’ll be starting our winter squash
harvest. Like some of the other crops we cure the acorns and
butternut squashes before we give them out in the share. This
makes them sweeter and helps them store longer. To harvest
the squash we first windrow them in the field by hand, then drive
alongside and load up the wagon. We then unload the wagon into
the greenhouse, where they’ll harden up a bit for long term storage,
which will eventually be in the barn. It’s all heavy
handwork, so expect to see us moving slowly this week! You should
continue to see the delicata and sweet dumpling in your share this
week. Hope you’re enjoying the first taste of fall!
The first of your fall carrots are in this week. They’re quite
sweet, as we harvested them this morning in the cold of the
frost…Harvesting them in the cold seems to bring out the sweetness,
maybe due to their storing of sugars in the root to get through a cold
night.
Please savor them, they’re quite hard won.
New field update: We received our soil test results and
unfortunately they weren’t great. Dan has a lot of work ahead of
him. Years of haying without replacing nutrients has stripped the
soil bare. If you go out and look you won’t see any earth worms
in this particular field. Dan’s been spreading soil amendments
and compost and will cover crop it with rye/vetch for the winter in
hopes of regeneration by spring. The soil in all other
areas has proven quite resilient and improvable given a little
TLC. We’ve noticed more and more earthworms with every
year!
It looks like spring out there in the fields now with all our last
plantings of greens and cover crops coming in. We’d gladly
receive another dose of rain to help along the last of their
growth. There’s lots of arugula out there in different stages of
growth. My suggestion for using it is to wilt it on pasta or with
poached eggs. There’s only so much raw arugula I can enjoy.
But cooked, it becomes a whole different veg. (Especially with a little
Chubby Bunny Farm bacon!) Delicious!
This week’s harvest: fennel, carrots, tomatoes, eggplant, peppers, onions, lettuce, kale, delicata, garlic
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Archival Farmer Notes
September 11, 2007
August 21, 2007
August 14, 2007
August 07, 2007
July 24, 2007
July 10, 2007
July 3, 2007
June 26, 2007
June 19, 2007
June 12, 2007
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