Have I mentioned that it’s been RAINING a lot all summer, like, a few times a day? We’ve taken to planning the Friday harvest to fit the slots between downpours, using…weather radar on the web! It works pretty well, checking the national and local maps, you can see precipitation quite accurately up to 3-4 hours out (it’s a little…high tech, but so is this crazy weather!). To avoid a late morning downpour, we started picking beans—finally, our first snap bean harvest of the year!—first thing in the morning (Maria, Lynn and that’s my bin at the top left of the pic below), so that we wouldn’t be messing with wet bean plants (they really don’t like being touched when wet, they get…diseased). That was pretty satisfying, picking about five bushels before the first shower, which arrived as foreseen. And so it went for the day. You can work between the daily rains, but mud avoidance is not an option—Michelle illustrates!
That’s a great idea Mike, about using the online weather radar! I am going to have to look into that….congrats on the bean harvest! I am still waiting for mine, but the plants do have a Lot of flowers on there….now I wait for the beans to show up!
By accident, it seems to be turning out that our place is taking a turn towards Market Farming…that is, I am getting people who live in the area calling me to see if I will sell them any veggies!
That wasn’t our plan, we wanted to grow as Much of our own food as possible, and also grow for our pigs and chickens….But I have been selling a few veggies, and I can see dreams starting about a Farm Stand…I’ll have time to think it over all winter, lol!
Annie
http://countrylivinginacariboovalley.blogspot.com/
I would love to have a weather radar near where I live. Sadly the London on your map is Ontario and not England! I think they have one of those at the Wimbledon tennis so they know when to stop and start matches. I would also be able to know when to take my dog out for a walk without getting wet!!