Fall is in the air! The mornings this week have been crisp and cool and have had us reaching for our sweatshirts in the early hours. It feels soooooooo good.
We are happy to report we had a couple rainstorms and cloud cover at the farm this week! Aaahhh, it feels like the fields (and the farmers!) are taking a deep breathe. It was incredible to see a few puddles and have mud on my boots on Sunday afternoon. MUD! Needless to say excitement levels were already high and then one of the most beautiful sunsets we have seen this summer followed. So gorgeous!
What whirlwind of a month it has been... August always brings the endlesss to-do lists, non-stop harvests, deliveries, seeding, and of course weeding. Mike and I are running the farm solo this season which has made keeping on top of things a bit more challenging. Add in weeks of smoke, heat and then the news on August 10th that our irrigation water was getting shut off for the season. Bah! It can make morale at the farm a little rough at times. We knew our irrigation season was going to be short but it doesn't really set in until water is off and we're still in 80s every day and there's hot, smokey, dry wind ripping through in the afternoons. Fingers crossed we see a lot of significant moisture this Fall and Winter. Oh 2018, you're one for the books. Thanks for keeping us on our toes... we will never take a 'normal' year for granted again.
Crop update. Most of the storage crops we planted are sizing up and are ready for harvest. This past weekend we started pulling carrots, cleared a bed of cabbage and pulled the red onions! The red onions are now set up and curing before they head into storage in a couple of weeks.
Mike is mowing all of the potatoes later today - CSA Members, they'll be in your shares starting next week! The beets, storage carrots, turnips and rutabagas are all sizing up and the winter squash is looking lovely.
The tomatoes and peppers have been loving the heat this summer! Our evening temps have been in the 50s until this past week, which is unusual for us. Normally we have many nights throughout the Summer in the 40s. The warm nights have had the tomatoes producing like crazy and the sweet peppers ripening weeks ahead of schedule. Enjoy those Sweet Chocolate Peppers, Jimmy Nardellos and Stocky Red Roasters - so delicious!
I hope everybody has been enjoying the summer bounty and is almost ready for a change in flavors... think less cucumbers and summer squash and more potatoes, onions and greens. This week's harvest is complete and we're excited to see you all in the next day or two.
Have a beautiful day!
