Since the start, the idea of a daily full garden inspection—”doing the rounds”—seemed to make sense. It sounds easy enough, but somehow, it doesn’t get fully done all that often, there’s almost always something that seems absolutely pressing to do early in the morning or in the evening when a stroll about is most practical and pleasant. But of course, I do get around to see everything every couple of days at least: checking for weeds alone insures that. Today, Conall and I managed to do a pretty full walk about. You look to see how things are doing in general, check for the start of new weeds and pests…it’s amazing how things can creep up and then jump out at you if you’re not watching closely. Here, we’re checking out the onions. So far, they’re doing well!
People
Beet greens harvest
Andrea and Conall harvest Cioggia beet greens in the hot mid-afternoon sun. In tiny farming, it seems that every action has several different effects and offsets, some good, some not so, and a balance, hopefully leaning to the positive side, is struck each time. Here, harvesting greens in the heat is not the greatest for the freshly pulled leaves or the plants that remain, but this is the time we had (a cloudy afternoon with a mild, refreshing breeze every harvest day would be nice!). A quick bath in cold well water instantly refreshes the harvest, and the plants will recover overnight. This particular bed of beets had gotten quite weedy, so weeding while harvesting slowed things down. But, the fairly dense piles of pulled weeds, spread between rows, dries into a decent mulch that’ll help retain moisture and prevent more weeds from germinating. And, the harvest is also a thinning session, giving the remaining plants the space to fill out into proper beets. It all works out…!!
Team harvest!
Today was the first team harvest of the season and for this tiny farm… I’ve certainly had harvest and packing help in the past, but this time, it’s with a regular crew who will hopefully be around for the season. The BIG difference is the size of the harvest, which is at least double what I’ve done before. This was more of a runthrough, with Jo and Erin harvesting spinach, giving it a water bath to cool off, spinning it in the Maytag, and packing a few 400g bags to try out…bagging. Conall and I finished up through the evening. In the harvest this week: radishes (French Breakfast, Rebel), mesclun, bok choi, lettuce, spinach (Bloomsdale, Spargo), green onions. Not bad for the beginning of June.
More people in the field…
At work transplanting really tiny basil in the still-to-be-shaped-up herb patch, Andrea is doing her very first day of tiny farm gardening. It all worked out very well! After nearly a month of working with Conall, the all-new organic grower, almost every day, and having several other people out for a few part-time hours, it’s a different season for me compared to the previous four. Not less work (we’re planting way more than ever before), but the energy is different. Before, largely working alone, it was more of an against the odds thing as I faced the fairly massive task of each season’s start-up. I liked that solo mission adrenaline and challenge. Now, it’s more of a people puzzle, as this season’s small crew assembles. By the time it comes to more substantial harvests in three or four weeks, I’ll be totally reliant on teamwork to get it all done. No going back: it’s like, Tiny Farm II: People in the Field. :)
Fieldwork!
Towards the end of the day, Conall waters in newly transplanted eggplant and peppers. Over the last week, focus has moved almost entirely to the open field. The seedling room is empty, the last of the seedlings are now in the greenhouse, and the push is on to get things in the ground as quickly as we can. My juggling of HELP is on-going. Word-of-mouth recruiting has gone surprisingly well, there’s quite a list of willing workers, and it’s tempting to call in a whole crew to transplant all at once. On the practical side, having to explain and coordinate takes a lot of time, I don’t yet have a System that works for several people in the garden at once, so I’m going along more carefully, working with Conall and at most one or two others per day. And one can’t forget the budget. In any case, everything should be in over the next 10 days. Think fast, take it slow!
Evening harvest
In the greenhouse, harvesting in the first and last couple of hours of the day is the only way to ensure tasty salad greens. Daytime harvest is near futile, as the leaves go limp and require serious rehydration. In the chilly evening weather, plants perk up, and it’s all right as rain! Here, cutting greens in the evening before market means clearing the arugula that bolted during the week and rapidly buried the lettuce. Out of arugula chaos comes delicious, garden-fresh salad mix! (On the tomato front, yesterday’s field transplants did well, only a few leaf burns where they touched the cover, this despite quite a hard frost. That’s good.)
Tomatoes go in
The first of the tender, warm season transplants—tomatoes—hit the field today! About 175 seedlings went in: Juliet, Striped German, Stupice, Emerald Evergreen, Mule Team, Yellow Stuffer. On the transplant team: Conall, Sherry and, new to the season’s crew, Jo. Compared to doing transplants alone or with one other person (my experience so far), this was quite the operation. Teamwork!
Juggling the weather and part-timer scheduling, I took a bit of a risk transplanting today, with patchy frost forecast for tonight. Still, the plants have been through highs and lows in the greenhouse, row cover will help, and tomatoes have…never let me down. I’ll be up at dawn to see how it went. Everything’s a gamble!