Greetings from the Garden! This week’s CSA box has lettuce, spinach, salad greens, braising greens, radishes, green onions, asparagus, and herbs Field Notes. Since we have had drier weather, Ken has been busier than ever! Many things are behind the usual planting schedule. He has been planting and transplanting: onions in the garden, greens in the garden and by the mobile tunnel, sweet potatoes in the field, replanting washed out carrot seed, watching the beans …
The mobile high tunnel is now over the heat loving summer crops. And even though we have gotten lots of rain recently, very little of it goes into the greenhouse – even when Ken opens it up all the way. So, Ken irrigates the plants. He moves hoses and uses an irrigation pump to get water from the irrigation pond to the plants Then the water moves from his trenches between the plants to …
Geese are part of the crew here. They not only eat grass, provide us with eggs in spring and meat in fall, they also act as a back up to our canine security system. They only time they are aggressive is when they have eggs or babies to protect This spring the first batch is growing quickly. Although they aren’t fully feathered out, they are no longer the roly poly puffy downy balls …
Ken has been trying to work around the weather. It sounds a bit like Goldilocks and the Three Bears – too wet, too cold, just right. He finally got to put in several seedlings and now there are rows of small plants. Soon they be large and form canopy and fill the garden with green. With the last “weather event” of nearly 2 1/2 inches in under an hour, and close to 6 inches …
Each season Ken constructs a cuke fence. Since he rotates crops the fence is always in a different place from the prior season. This year he got it almost done and I offered to help on the top portion – I lift one end of each panel and hold it in place while Ken ties it in place. Ken finds an angle and vertical growing area for the cucumbers results in fewer curved cukes. People …
Greetings from the Garden! This week’s CSA box has lettuce, spinach, salad mix, asparagus tips, green onions, chives, radishes, and herbs- probably dill. Field Notes. Ken has transplanted the tomatoes and peppers inside the mobile high tunnel. He has also been busy transplanting in the garden – onions and brassica family. After the torrential rain – 2 1/2 inches in less than an hour (nearly 6 inches total), Ken had some places where soil was …
Spring greens also include some stronger flavored greens. In Asia and Europe cooks work to provide the bitter flavor as part of any meal. In America we usually avoid it. In Europe folks buy bitter tonics as a digestive and spring tonic. In Japan every meal we were served had a sweet, sour, salty, bitter and umami (savory or brothy). Here we currently offer chicory and turnip greens. we have offered dandelion greens. Each …
After we moved the mobile high tunnel off the greens, Ken shut it up so the air and soil could warm up for the heat loving crops. Then he trans planted tomato and pepper seedlings It has hot and Ken shed his shirt – not often does one see him without a shirt with collar And of course he got a lot of help from his supervisor – …
Tuesday we got hail. It began to rain. I checked the internet weather and facebook- photos from nearby farmers with HUGE hail. We had just moved the mobile high tunnel so the greens didn’t cook, and now they were exposed to the elements. It was pouring and with our metal roof it is hard to tell whether it is hard rain or hail. I looked out and saw small random hail. Here are some spinach …
Greetings from the Garden! This week’s CSA box has asparagus, spinach, lettuce, salad mix, beet thins, salad turnips, green onions, potatoes, and herbs Field Notes. Ken got the poultry moved, the beds ready in the garden, planted there, and then got everything ready so I could help move the mobile high tunnel to its summer location. It was downhill and went smoothly. Then he anchored it. Next I will need to help with the cucumber …
