Two Feet in the Dirt

After two weeks with nothing more than a spitting of rain, we finally had a decently wet day on Monday, which was a relief both to the plants and to my arms, which are getting awfully sore from watering! While we are able to rely on drip irrigation to water many of the plants on the farm, the real trick during dry periods is getting the crops that are seeded directly into the field to germinate when it’s not raining. Some things, like arugula and salad mix, germinate fairly quickly, only requiring a few days of watering. Others, particularly carrots, take a lot longer, so it was unfortunate that I had just seeded hundreds of row feet of carrots just as the weeks of no rain began! I spent significant time over the last two weeks watering the carrot beds twice a day to ensure continued soil moisture and was delighted when I began to see tiny sprouts emerging from the soil at the end of last week. Hopefully the slugs, which have been a nightmare for all farmers in our area this spring, leave the carrot seedlings alone long enough for them to continue to prosper! 

Meanwhile, the summer transplants that were planted early last week have settled into their new home in the field and are beginning to put on new growth. And the beans in the hoop house are showing their first flowers, so it looks like we should have some warm weather crops showing up in the near future! This week’s harvest list is below. We’ll see you at the markets!

Farmers Katie & Mike

Harvest List:

• Lettuce salad mix
• Arugula
• Winter salad mix
• Lettuce heads
• Radishes
• Spinach
• Hakurei turnips
• Red Russian kale
• Curly green kale
• Lacinato kale
• Collard greens
• Rainbow Chard
• Kohlrabi
• Carrots