Whew, it’s hot out there! It seems as though this week we’ll be experiencing a more typical St. Louis summer with hot temperatures and not much rain in the forecast. We haven’t needed to use our irrigation system for much other than watering in transplants, but with the lack of rain expected this week, you all may get a chance to see more of the irrigation system in practice. With the summer temperatures comes the need to really take care of yourself on hot workdays. Please feel free to take breaks at any point during work shifts. Josh and I aren’t always aware of when you all need a break, and although there is always a lot to get done, taking breaks when needed is most important.
Greenhouse Update
The fall brassicas are looking nice in the shade structure, although we’ve started to notice a little flea beetle damage on the tender leaves. There’s not much left on the greenhouse schedule for the rest of the year now that our fall brassicas are seeded. It’s mainly just some flats of scallions and lettuce left to be seeded this summer. This past week we seeded our fall swiss chard (bright lights, the same variety planted in the spring) and reseeded some cucumber seeds that the mice attacked.
Field Update
We are slowly mowing down our spring brassica area. The only crops that remain from our spring plantings are some green cabbage and the bed of kale that we might get a few more harvests from. We’ll be putting down cover crop seed this week in these newly cleared areas. Now we’re just waiting for our summer crops to really kick in. It’s time for the tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, and watermelon to shine!
Monday’s farm shift began by harvesting summer squash, cucumbers, zucchini, and green beans. We also harvested all of this year’s garlic and hung it in the basement to cure. It was a pleasant smelling and tasty job (James even ate an entire head of garlic, roots and all!) A few of you also finished up spraying the tomatoes with Oxidate, a hydrogen dioxide solution used for fungal diseases. A week later the tomatoes look just as bad so we’re thinking the Oxidate didn’t do much to remedy the spread of the disease. We also began weeding the sweet potatoes for a second time (hopefully these will vine out soon and block out some of the weeds).
Tuesday’s crew spent the morning harvesting for a large wholesale order for Dave Matthews Band. After the mostly enjoyable task of harvesting was complete we began tackling the not so enjoyable task of finishing up the sweet potato weeding. We were able to get all but a quarter of a bed done before calling it quits.
Friday’s crew spent the morning harvesting for CSA and farmer’s market. We had a long and diverse list of crops to harvest including our first pepper and eggplant harvests of the season. Hopefully we’ll be adding cherry tomatoes to that list this week! Friday’s afternoon shift tackled weeding the most recent succession of green beans.
Saturday’s shift also spent the majority of the morning harvesting for CSA shares. The afternoon was spent finishing up weeding the last section of the sweet potatoes and green beans. We moved on to weeding the most recent succession of summer squash and our winter squash. It really is amazing what the leaf mulch and black plastic has done for us in the crops we were able to use it in. We would have experienced much more weeding (and a much weedier farm) without its use.
See you all this week!
Stephanie and Josh