8/1/18
Well, we didn't quite get the weather we wanted for the garlic harvest. Instead of dry and sunny, we received cloudy with 8.6 inches of rain in 5 days! But the garlic was ready to go, and so the crew worked extra hard in the pouring rain and mud to pull in all into the barn. It's now hung to dry, with some extra fans for air movement. Incredibly it's looking okay, even good. Whew!
We are so thankful the river was able to handle all this rain without flooding any of our fields. It was oh so close. 8.6" in a week is definitely on par with a hurricane or tropical storm for us. We do all we can to prepare and manage the risk from these in September and October, using the high ground for the late crops, protecting the soil with strong cover crops, limiting soil disturbance starting in August. A flood in July would be devastating for many of our summer plantings: beans, corn, summer squash, winter squash, tomatoes, celeriac, lettuce, and the list goes on. But there was no flood, this time.
On the positive side, the broccoli, cabbage, and brussels sprouts transplants are loving this weather. They don't really appreciate our normal summer days with highs in the 90's. Last year we had some similar weather in regard to temperature, and had beautiful broccoli in September.
At markets this week, look out for our own field grown tomatoes! They're quite late, but we are just getting in to our big harvests. We'll have both heirlooms and standard red field tomatoes. Do you have a favorite heirloom?
Be Well, Jennifer
Well, we didn't quite get the weather we wanted for the garlic harvest. Instead of dry and sunny, we received cloudy with 8.6 inches of rain in 5 days! But the garlic was ready to go, and so the crew worked extra hard in the pouring rain and mud to pull in all into the barn. It's now hung to dry, with some extra fans for air movement. Incredibly it's looking okay, even good. Whew!
We are so thankful the river was able to handle all this rain without flooding any of our fields. It was oh so close. 8.6" in a week is definitely on par with a hurricane or tropical storm for us. We do all we can to prepare and manage the risk from these in September and October, using the high ground for the late crops, protecting the soil with strong cover crops, limiting soil disturbance starting in August. A flood in July would be devastating for many of our summer plantings: beans, corn, summer squash, winter squash, tomatoes, celeriac, lettuce, and the list goes on. But there was no flood, this time.
On the positive side, the broccoli, cabbage, and brussels sprouts transplants are loving this weather. They don't really appreciate our normal summer days with highs in the 90's. Last year we had some similar weather in regard to temperature, and had beautiful broccoli in September.
At markets this week, look out for our own field grown tomatoes! They're quite late, but we are just getting in to our big harvests. We'll have both heirlooms and standard red field tomatoes. Do you have a favorite heirloom?
Be Well, Jennifer
RSS Feed
