Fruit deliveries begin
The garlic harvest continued through the week, but the yields are poor, as we mentioned last week.
The tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, garlic, summer & winter squash that we planted at Farmer Scott’s farm are doing well. We have about 1 acre of crops planted there and they have bounced back from the deer damage earlier in the season. The harvested fava bean & pea patches have been mowed down, but the ground needs to be tilled for planting another crop. We plan on planting mustards, oriental greens, radishes & turnips in this area. We do need to ready the beds in the lower greenhouse for planting too.
Fruit update – This week is the first of the fruit deliveries from Windy Brow Farm located in Newton, NJ. We have been delivering fruit from Farmer Jim for many years now and they grow many varieties of peaches, plums and apples. The variety of peaches this week are Flaming Fury, a great freestone peach with yellow flesh. These are great for eating or for your favorite peach recipes.
From the Fields: This week, we are behind. We lost 2 of our crew members, who decided to start working locally in a factory. That leaves us quite short with farm help, but fortunately the bulk of the planting has been done. Our Farm Manager Leslie remains and is a true asset to us.
The potato harvest started, but will have to wait until this week to harvest the rest.
Neighboring Farmer Adam (who has the large farm machines) has cut our upper fields of hay, and this hay we use for mulching. He will also be brush-hogging the back field where the garlic was and help with preparing a new field for us.
Weather Report: There has been little rain during the week, just enough on Monday last week to help, but the fields are still in need of our irrigation system. Fortunately the system has been working great. We have a problem with the pump for some of the overhead irrigation, but we’ll be talking with our neighborhood “wizard” to help us with the mechanical issues. We are using water when necessary, which is practically every day and our water supply, the pond, is beginning to drop. We are down about 4” as of Sunday. Hopefully rain will be on the way this week.
Animal report: Another groundhog has broken into the fence, apparently looking for a new home among the veggies. Leslie saw him and chased him out of the fields and he was seen heading for the woods. Hopefully he won’t be able to find his way back. We find that in times of very dry conditions, we have the most problems with the wild animals breaking into the fields. Perhaps it is because they are not finding sufficient forage elsewhere and they peek in through the fences and see quite a smorgasbord!
From the Wild Side this week! Periodically we get requests from members desiring some wild edibles. This week’s we had enough Amaranth to bunch up for everyone. Many wild edibles are quite nutritious and amaranth is high in protein, lysine, calcium, iron & fiber. More below & on the harvest identifier as well.
Amaranth greens can be served as a good substitute for spinach. Great for stir-fry, steamed, and put into soups.
More on the Harvest Identifier!
Farming Quote of the Week: There is not a sprig of grass that shoots uninteresting to me. Thomas Jefferson
Pick of the Week: click on the links below or to the right to bring you to the delivery specific to your pick-up location. Deliveries will be of similar variety & poundage, but may contain different items. Occasionally, some crops are ready to harvest but not enough to deliver to all our drop-off locations. What we do is start to filter them in each week to a different drop-off until there is enough to delivery to everyone.
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