Farm News- October 29, 2009

Circle Brook Farm
Circle Brook Farm

Hi Folks,

We will be sending out the last few peppers as an extra this week, and this marks the end of the summer crops. The cool weather crops are thriving and look beautiful, although not always growing and maturing as fast as I would like. A case in point is the broccoli, which is big and beautiful, but still heading up slowly and sporadically. We have planted nearly 7,000 broccoli plants; more than half of which were planted in early August and so should be maturing. We had enough last week to send broccoli to a few groups and will have enough for several more groups this week. Anyone who has not received broccoli after this week will definitely get it next week and I expect to have enough for everyone in the final regular season share. Spinach is another crop which endures cold weather but yet grows very slowly. I expect that the spinach will be large enough to bunch for next week’s share. Also on the horizon is escarole and broccoli raab. We have fin- ished harvesting the sweet potatoes, and since I don’t have great storage conditions for them, we will be shipping them out immediately.

In the field, besides harvesting, we are busy with clean up removing posts, trellising, plastic mulch and drip tape and preparing ground for cover crops. We are also preparing beds for planting next season’s garlic and shallot crop. And I am as always, working on fixing broken equipment. This week’s project is the disc harrow which I need for planting the cover crops.

The share for this week will be: sweet potatoes, yellow onions, parsnips, acorn squash, radishes, choice of a mustard green arugula or tatsoi, red leaf lettuce, choice of endive or dandelion greens, and choice of an herb.

Enjoy,
Farmer John

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