2020 CSA Newsletter #4

I hope folks had a good weekend. We finally, for the first time since March, had a social distance outdoor gathering with another family and boy, was it nice, especially for the kids. I love my family and would be lost without them but we were a bit stir crazy.

It was a short week at the farm with the interns last week but a lot of essential tasks were still completed. Some planting, cultivation, seeding, potting on and weeding all got done. Additionally, the first round of “suckering and trellissing” of the heirloom tomatoes was finished. I mentioned last week how we tie up the tomatoes in the hoophouses. Well, after we do that, we have weekly maintenance of the plants. Tomatoes are a crazy plant. They can root out of their stem and send out all this new growth through side shoots. We call them “suckers” and because the plant has a limited amount of energy for root, foliar and fruit production, we prune off the “suckers”. This gives us less fruit per plant, but because there is less competition for energy, the tomatoes should ripen earlier and be a little larger. The plants have started some tremendous growth and are already 2.5 – 3 feet tall with small green tomatoes starting to form. It shouldn’t be too much longer for fresh tomato sandwiches.

It’s going to be me staffing the pickup tomorrow, so no Meet the Interns segment. But my daughter may be, so let me tell you a little about her. Her name is Sadie and she’s 6.5 years old. We struggle to get her to try new things to eat and even though her dad’s a vegetable farmer, she doesn’t really like veggies. She loves fairies, rainbows, Star Wars and unicorns. I may be losing the vegetable battle but she’s into Star Wars, so I’m definitely coming out on top with this one.

With the late start and dry weather, we’re entering a little gap this week. Most of the greens hit their limit with the heat and lots of things we planted have just stalled. Their are some beautiful heads of fresh garlic and if you are getting them this week, there are 2 things you can do. First, you can use it just as you would cured garlic. The cloves will be a bit milder but with some great taste. If you are going to use it, keep it in the fridge to have it last longer. Or you could start to cure it. The stems are cut but we leave them nice and long to help pull the moisture out in case you want to cure it. The basil is being grown in the greenhouse this year, and it is beautiful. Lastly, for those of you getting fresh mint, I leave you with this.

Have a great week!