We're moving slower at the farm this morning, savoring the dark clouds and drizzling rain. RAIN, oh my gosh, it feels so refreshing outside! It rained (lightly) last night, and we're hoping it continues throughout the day. Either way, we're grateful for some moisture.
I just came in from checking on the propagation house. All of our starts are looking great and are about ready to make their way into the field and greenhouses.
We have a few plantings on the schedule for later in the week: potatoes, onions, tomatoes and various greens. It's the first real planting push of the season and I'm excited to get all of these starts in the ground.
We successfully moved the two Moveable Tunnels on Friday! This is a nice task to have complete and thankfully the skies stayed calm while we pulled the tunnels across the field. I have nightmares of wind gusts tossing them around. So, these tunnels are all set up in their Summer Plots and are prepped for planting tomatoes on Saturday.
The early carrots and beets are now out in the open enjoying the sunshine, wind and rain! We have row cover set up to keep these lovelies warm as the temperatures drop over the next few nights.
WATER UPDATE: We want to keep our CSA Community up to date on what our irrigation season is looking like for 2018. As we all know we're in a drought, one that they're now labeling as 'exceptional' in Southwest Colorado. The latest drought map put out by the U.S. Drought Monitor shows a painful dark red, representing the drought intensity as D4 (exceptional drought), covering our corner of the state.
Our irrigation water, which we use to irrigate your vegetable crops, comes from snowpack runoff in the mountains. We anticipate our irrigation water is going to be shut off come the first hay cut in our valley, which usually happens early July, and then it may come back on sporadically here and there. This is scary for us, but not surprising, considering how dry it has been. When if feels like we did not have a winter, it's impressive we have any irrigation water. We will keep you all posted as the season progresses and as we learn more.
We want to extend a HUGE THANK YOU to all of our CSA Members! Thank you so much for supporting local agriculture and for believing in us to grow your vegetables! We take our role as farmers very seriously. Please know that we are going to do our very best to provide a bountiful and steady supply of produce to you all this season. Please also keep in mind that the weather is out of our control. I have reminded friends and fellow farmers recently that every time we plant a seed there is an element of hope involved. As farmers, we have to have hope every time we seed and plant. Hope that our crop(s) will not be knocked out by pest pressure, disease, a hail storm, etc. And this year, we just need to have an extra level of hope. Hope that rain will come, sooner or later.
This season is challenging Mike and I in new ways. I feel like spring is normally a very physically challenging time of the year, but this spring, it's more of a mental and emotional game. Ultimately we believe this is going to make us better farmers. It's going to force us to evaluate how we can be resilient and care for our soil during dry spells like this.
Thank you for reading! Keep your fingers crossed for rain and have a wonderful day.
Your Farmers,
Mindy & Mike
