Bad weather, good news

October 3, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

Everyone reading this blog has been getting a real taste of the main thing farmers think and talk about over the past few weeks- the weather. Recently, NOAA released a drought statement for our area. With DC and areas of Northern Virginia having been classified as “Moderate Drought” with soil moisture levels as low as 0-5%, we’re feeling lucky thus far to have only hit the “Abnormally Dry” stage with 10-20% soil moisture. With a decent rainfall of half an inch on Monday and more rain predicted for the coming week, we’re keeping our fingers crossed that conditions for everyone change soon. On a much better note, we were so...

Waiting on weather

September 26, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

Driving home Saturday evening after a long day at the market, I noticed some clouds that looked suspiciously like thunderheads. By the time we got home, we were seeing flashes of lightning and soon enough, completely out of line with the forecast, it started to rain! We ended up getting about a quarter of an inch, which isn’t too shabby given the extreme dryness recently. The ideal for keeping the crops happy is to get about an inch of rain per week, with more needed during hotter weather. At this point, even getting a quarter of an inch takes some of the pressure off of us and provided us with...

Still no rain

September 19, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

The extremely dry weather has continued since I posted last week and at this point there seems to be no reprieve in sight. We did end up getting another 0.3 of an inch of rain last week, but that still only brings us to a grand total of under an inch of rain since the end of August. And despite how it seems, it’s actually a much larger challenge to have it so dry at this time of year as opposed to in the height of the summer. During the summer, almost everything we are growing is planted as transplants (as opposed to being seeded directly into the ground) and...

A warm September

September 12, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

Well, it doesn’t really feel like the seasons are changing anymore. As I’m writing this on Wednesday, it’s in the mid- to upper-90s outside and we’re running around trying to keep all of the cool-weather fall crops happy. Not only is it excessively hot (and has been and looks like it’s going to continue to be next week), but it has also been an extremely dry September thus far. We’ve only gotten a third of an inch of rain so far this month, which sure doesn’t help keep the fall crops happy in these temperatures. While the weather has had a negative affect on some crops, notably head lettuce and...

Changing seasons

September 5, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

September is one of my favorite times on the farm. The weather is starting to cool down and the workload is getting ever so slightly less overwhelming. During the height of summer, we have multiple crops, including tomatoes, beans, cucumbers, and zucchini, that have to be harvested many times each week. They are harvested so heavily for several reasons. First of all, each of the crops grow fast enough that if left to harvest only once a week, there would be tons that were oversized and thus unsellable. Additionally, harvesting these plants regularly tells them to keep producing more, therefore enabling us to get the most out of each bed....

Multi-colored

August 29, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

One of the wonderful things about shopping at farmers markets is the availability of items that you wouldn’t be able to find at a typical grocery stores. Purple heirloom pole beans and Brazilian broccoli, for instance, are two of my favorite crops both for their productivity and taste, but you’d be hard pressed to find either at the store. This week, we’ll have two other items that fall outside of the typical. Potatoes come in many varieties and this year we grew three- one early, one mid-, and one later season variety allowing us to extend the harvest for as long as possible. We are coming to the end of...

Summer recipes

August 15, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

This is transition time on the farm, with huge amounts of planting for the fall happening each week. The fall cabbage, kale, chard, and collard greens are growing away, along with the first of the fall head lettuce. This week, we put in the first of the fall radishes, baby kale, and turnips and plantings of these will continue in the coming weeks. Meanwhile, many of the summer veggies are at their peak of production and, with this in mind, I wanted to share some of our favorite recipes that make use of these summer favorites and some of our other available crops. Check out the recipes and our full...

Insect help

August 8, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

While we do a fair amount of work on our own to control insect pests on the farm, we actually get a lot of help from other insects. Most people know about the benefits of ladybugs, which eat aphids, a common pest in both vegetable and ornamental gardens. Our new favorite predatory insect is fittingly called the assassin bug. These guys can get quite big and go after many different crop pests that we struggle with on our farm. We became big fans of the assassin bug earlier this summer when the zinnias were starting to bloom and were being overwhelmed by the first influx of Japanese beetles. We were...

Fall planting

August 1, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

Even as the tomatoes are hitting their peak and the peppers are turning from green to red, fall is already on our minds. This week was a big one for fall planting, with lots of kale, chard, collards, scallions, and the first of the fall lettuce all going into the ground. In the next few weeks, we’ll continue to plant weekly rounds of head lettuce along with more scallions, escarole, and the fall kohlrabi! Fall is my favorite time on the farm as we move into cooler weather and the focus turns back to the greens and root crops that are my favorites to grow, so it’s something nice to...

Tomatoes!

July 25, 2019 Market newsletters, Weekly Updates

One week later and the tomatoes are officially upon us! The harvest of both slicing and cherry varieties is ramping up by the day and we’re looking forward to having a good selection at the market this weekend. At the same time that the tomato harvest is starting, fall planting is really starting to kick into gear. The fall carrots have germinated and are ready to be thinned and weeded. The fall beets went in this week along with some cabbage and the kale, collards, and chard will be planted in the next few weeks. We’ll be a little light on the salad mix this week, a casualty of the...