It's been awhile since I've had time to blog. Sorry for the long delay. We simply could not be any busier. Harvest days are now taking up a good portion of our week. We harvest three days a week and it takes most of the day to get everything in, washed, bunched, sorted packed and delivered. Sales have been good which means the orders are consistently growing in size. We are coming into a slight dirth for a week or so. We are just in between on a few early season crops and our main summer producers. Peas and fava beans are just flowering and it won't be long before they are on. I fell short on space for sowing greens so it looks like we may have to back off for just a bit. I'm scrambling for time and space to get back into full swing. It seems to happen every year no matter how much space we have. It's something I will have to continue to improve on.
When we are not busy with harvest, deliveries or doing the Farmers Market we are concentrating on weeding and getting everything planted out. There is still lots to go in. We did get the first round of pumpkins and winter squash direct sown yesterday so we are on schedule there. A second round of the varieties that mature a little faster will be going in in a week or so, depending on how fast I can get a new area prepped. Indoor tomatoes are in and doing well. Outdoor toms will be going in this week. It's just been too cold to put them out yet. Melons are in in one of the greenhouse's. It's a gamble of a crop for here, we'll see how it goes. Beans are up and doing well. Corn is up and it looks like we had good germination. Weeds are also up with a vengance! The first direct sown summer squash are just coming up and we'll be putting more in this week. Strawberries will be on this week! Hopefully this coming week we will also be able to clear out the prpogation greenhouse, prep beds and install peppers and eggplants. Sadly this process will involve dumping hundreds of starts that we were unable to sell. Plant sales were off big time this year. I think we'll most likely cut way back on this service next year and just take care of producing enough starts for our own use. We also have a few rows of potatoes to get in still.
So as you can see, there's alot going on. My sights are set on July when we have some additional help arriving and I will be able to take a well deserved break. I can't wait.
Gotta roll for now. It's time to start getting ready for market. Hope we have a good day. The weather looks like it's going to be beautiful.
Keep well,
The Farmer
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Yesterday was a good day. We had a good harvest and I was able to get a handle on a couple of problem weed areas. There's still tons of weeding to do but at least you can see the rows now. The rain makes it easy to pull the weeds.
I checked out the potato field. They are just beginning to emerge, and so are the thistles! I'm not for sure how to handle them at this point. It could pose itself as a major problem. Why did it have to be thistles? they are so hard to erradicate.
I got started on the pea trellises on our second succession of peas at our westbeach site. I'll have an early morning mission before work to install the wire and netting. My aversion to and lack of motivation for trellising continues. I'll especially enjoy crossing that project off the list.
Baby beets are on! We will have a thinning harvest available for delivery beginning on Thursday. They look great. The turnips are sizing up too and there is a second and third variety just coming on.
This should be a busy weekend at the market and our Thursday restaurant orders are looking like they are gearing up for a big weekend too. Needless to say it will be a big harvest day on Thursday and Friday. Having our walk in cooler will help me spread things out a little so we don't have to scramble too hard.
That's all for now I need an early start today so I can be back on the the farm by 8:00 to prep for my off the farm job.
Take care,
John
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Thank goodness it's raining. Things were beginning to be so dry i thought that it may never rain again. I am so thankful. It's saving me a lot of worry. Our potatoes are dry cropped and this will really make them come alive. We just sowed corn too and I have not been able to get it irrigated yet so now I can have a little breather. It should be up in about a week.
There is just so much to do right now it's completely overwhelming. I have to admit that yesterday I had a bit of a breakdown. I am realizing how far behind we are and I got completely discouraged. So many things need to be cultivated and maintained. Weeds are completly taking over in a couple of areas. We are in danger of losing a few sowings simply because we have not had the time to weed the beds out. We maybe have some extra help coming today so maybe we'll make a little progress. The rain may slow us down a bit, we'll see. It's hard to keep your chin up sometimes. A pint of Ben and Jeryys Cherry Garcia for Dinner offered little respite.
Somedays I think it's just better to walk away from the whole thing and forget about it for a day. I normally don't work on Sundays but yesterday I felt there was no way I could not try and get few things done. I mostly walked arround in a stupor and ultimately didn't get much done at all. Shold have just rested instead and come back fresh today.
Today is a new day though. I got an e-mail from out intern Abby, She will be here June 5th and thats not a day too soon. I hope she's ready to hit the ground running. I was happy to hear she's on her way. The list of things to dao is long and tedious. I think I'll start with the things I want to do the least ( as they are the most important ) Hopefully we'll get some of them done and I'll feel alright. Thers nothing more exciting than crossing completed projects off the list.
On the brighter side, We have had many success's and I am trying to focus on the bigger picture. We will prevail in the end. My defintion of farming continues to be a never ending series of success and failure. We will not give up!
It's beautiful outside right now. The dawn of a new day. Frogs croaking, birds chipping, first light misty morning, all is quiet, warm rain falls. The earth smells of a desrt rain. I'll take solace in a new day.
Keep on keeping on,
Farmer John
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The farmers market Saturday turned out to be really slow. It was a windy, cold day so when that happens attendance is usually a little on the slow side. By 1:00 PM the wind had me wore out. We packed up and came home early. We did manage to sell just about everything we had except a few pounds of greens which can go out on Monday. I had full intentions of doing some work around the farm but took a nap instead. I was dead dog tired and really must have needed some down time. I'll pick it back up today. Normally Sunday is a rest day but right now there is just so much to do I need to keep up the momentem. I knew there would be days like this. It's a little hard to motivate but once I get going it's fine. I be able to slow down a little after we get everything in the ground.
Today most of my time we be spent mowing, weed wacking and doing tractor work. The farms a mess right now so i'll spend some time organizing and straightening up. We'll be prepping one of our greenhouse's for plant out of melons. I'm hoping to dial in the Allis cultivating tractor to do some serious path maintenance and bed cultivation. The weeds are starting to get the upper hand in a couple of places and if I get a jump on it I can keep it under control. Theres lot's of hand work that needs to be done where the tractor can't get to and in the plant rows themselves. One block in particular where the onions are is in serious need of hand weeding. I must get pea trellis up today too. My window is closing fast. Soon the plants will be too big to get in there. I have to admit I have a mental block about putting up trellising. even though it's not a hard job just thinking about it makes me want to move on to something else. I'm experimenting this year with variety of pea that is lower growing and does not require a trellis. If that works out I'll be thrilled.
There's lots of transplanting to be done too. We are tight on space right now so hopefully I can get some new beds cleared and re set for plant out. It never ends folks! Just thinking about all the things that need to be done gets me going though. We are having a great year and I am pushing hard to make this season a profitable one. So far I feel like we are pretty close to being on track. I've been able to keep our expenses down and revenues are on the rise. It's all good.
Gotta get rollin
Keep it real,
Farmer John
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Yesterday we had a record harvest of salad greens. We brought in about 53 lbs of our gourmet mix. Small by some standards but for us, a small farm harvesting by hand, a substantial harvest. We also had about 12 lbs of braising greens, 10 lbs of spinach, 10 lbs of arugula and 5 lbs of pea shoots. The greens harvest for the week came in at about 80 lbs. That's pretty good for us.
All in all the week was a little slower than I expected. I was checking back on some previous years records and it's fairly consistent that the third week in may slows down a little. I think it has to do with people thinking about Memorial day weekend. After that, things kick up a notch. More product is coming on every week so harvest time and sales increase accordingly. We are still at the point where demand is greater than our supply.
Today is the third day of our Saturday Farmer's Market. The weather seems like it will be a little cool so it may be a slower day. We'll have to push to sell those greens. I'm sure we can pull it off though.
The push is still on to get planted out. We were able to complete setting out tomatoes in our largest greenhouse. We still have tons to put out outside but I think we'll hold off for just a bit longer. The weather forecast is for mostly showery conditions for the next week. Not exactly what tomatoes like. I am hoping for some rain though. It has been so dry and the newly sown corn would pop right up if we had a couple of good soakings. Salad greens would love it too.
This week we'll be terminating some of our first sowings of greens and most of our over wintered crops. We'll be making beds for transplants and new sowings. We'll be clearing out another greenhouse and setting out melons. We'll also be direct sowing pumpkins and squash and continuing to set up irrigation and installing trellis's for peas, pole beans, cucumbers and tomatoes. So lots of field work. Cultivation, weeding, thinning, transplanting, sowing and harvesting are all competing for our time, not to mention mowing! Indeed it is a busy time. We are also beginning to focus on fall and winter sowings. It may seem early to some but we have big plans for this winter and we are mapping out our farm plan in anticipation. Yes, we are the little farm that never stops.
Well, It's just about 4:00 AM. Time to grab another latte, get some seed organized for an early morning sowing, harvest and clean another 20 bunches of radishes, harvest some beautiful head lettuce water and feed the animals, collect, wash and box eggs, load the trucks and head out to market. See you there!
MRF
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