Fall Crops Finally In
On Thursday, Leslie tilled up the vacant areas in the fields to prepare for fall plantings. Upon completion the rototiller died. Apparently it seized up and we are not fully sure what is wrong as Farmer Rich is not really mechanical. Farmer Adam & friend Bill investigated the problem and gave us some insight. It is all dismantled at this point and we hope to have it fixed by next week. Luckily it died after the tilling was done. Friday, Farmer Rich was able to plant beets, cilantro, radishes, mustards and turnips in the open field. Saturday we received some much needed rain which will bring these crops along quite nicely.
NJ State Fair – Sussex Farm & Horse Show continues to August 10th. Sussex Fair Grounds are located @ 37 Plains Road Augusta, NJ 07822, just off of Route 15 & 206.
Fruit – This week is we have picked up Shiro from Windy Brow Farm located in Newton, NJ. Shiro is another Japanese variety plum with medium sized yellow (sometimes with a pinkish blush) fruit. It is pleasantly sweet and juicy.
From the Fields: Farmer Adam is going to be plowing up our two new fields this week. We’ll also have to fence them in, but that can wait until we have them ready for planting next year. The New Zealand spinach is going just great. We are delivering it this week and next week as well. This field was mulched heavily in the spring and has not needed water, which is a plus due to the dry periods we have had. We received a lot of e-mails from members just loving the NZ spinach, so look forward to more. The zucchini have started to slow down. Leslie transplanted lettuce, celeriac and squash in the field this week. We have some great looking cauliflower plants in the field, but they do not appear to be making any cauliflower! We don’t know the cause. More potatoes need to be harvested. Potato varieties include “all-blue”, Rote Ersling, “all-red”, Yukon gold and red norland. More red onions need to be harvested too, and we need to get these soon or they will be lost.
Weather Report: Cooler temperatures and rain were the norm for this week, though on Friday the excess heat & humidity almost caused Farmer Rich to pass out while he was planting in the new beds. Luckily a cold front moved through with rain storms on Saturday and we did not get the predicted hail.
Animal report: So far the “thousands” of rabbits are staying clear of the fields as well as no groundhogs sighted this week. Our thistle plants are attracting the gold finches and we have a neighborhood woodpecker making it’s rounds in the woods. Our resident great blue heron has not arrived at the pond this year. Perhaps he is on a vacation.
Trip to the Farm – August 16th 11 am to ? Some members from our original CSA drop-off in NYC want to come up to the farm and help, so we are putting together another work-day. Projects for the work day will be posted in upcoming newsletters.
Farming Quote of the Week: The farmer has to be an optimist or he wouldn't still be a farmer. Will Rogers
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.
No comments:
Post a Comment