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CSA Week 26: Frosty Start to November
News
Expected Harvest
Hot and Cold
by Farmer Derek
Fall carrot harvest has begun!
Harvest #26 (Week B) should include sweet potatoes, potatoes, carrots, salad radishes, hakurei turnips, beets, lettuce mix, celery, bok choy, kale, arugula, red mustard greens, fennel, and a minuscule amount of broccoli and cauliflower. Some items may be a choice. U-pick should include herbs and flowers.
A quiet heads up that the broccoli and cauliflower yield is most definitely low/abysmal this year. We'll point the finger at bug and disease and weed pressure, exceptionally wet weather at certain times, and the September heat wave. Can't win 'em all, apparently.
A reminder that there are 28 harvest weeks this year. The final week of pick up for Week A Half Shares is November 6th. For Week B Half, Medium, and Full Shares, the final week of pick up is November 13th.
Herb garden fall scene.
Notes From The Field
Garlic Planted and Mulched, Check
by Farmer Derek
Planting the final beds of garlic cloves for the 2024 harvest season.
A significant task was successfully started and finished last week while we enjoyed some of the nicest dry and warm autumn weather we could ask for. I have so many (bad) memories of planting and mulching the next season's garlic in either too wet conditions or with a hard deadline due to impending bad weather that I could not resist embarking on the project this past week, almost two weeks ahead of what's become our normal planting date.
Beginning on Monday and wrapping up on Wednesday, it was good to know that we had most of the week to finish the job. We even managed to plant and mulch the whole patch 'in-house', i.e. without the help of CSA members during workshifts. It's not every season that we have three full-time farmer helpers onsite this time of year and we were able to make pretty quick work of planting the almost 400lbs of garlic clove/seed spread out over 3000 feet of beds. CSA members did provide great help in splitting up the garlic bulbs into 400lbs of cloves as well as the harvesting, tying, and hanging of many thousands of bulbs back in July. So a team effort, indeed.
And that, my friends, was the very last planting of this season, this year. After using 12.5 large round bales to cover the entire area with straw, the garlic cloves will slowly wake up and send roots downward and a sun-seeking sprout upwards. Depending on future temperatures this autumn and winter, we may not see above ground growth until late February or early March. Then, it's quick growth until we eat the first iteration of this amazing plant in early May, known as 'green garlic', when the entire plant is edible.
Now that we've planted the garlic, we plan to resume distributing unused bulbs during the final two weeks of Main Season. Enjoy!
Garlic Planting Process. Step 1: run the transplanter wheels down the beds to achieve uniform spacing (3 rows, 12 inches apart, 6 inches in row) and indent soil for standard depth control. Step 2: drop the cloves into the holes. Step 3: push the cloves root side down into the soil and then cover. Step 4: spread straw mulch 2-4 inches thick over entire area.
Final Week of Workshifts for Season!
by Farmer Derek
Help us harvest carrots this week!
If you signed up for a share with a work discount and you're unable to put in the time that's a-okay, just send us payment to cover the full cost of your share ($15/unworked hour. Half Share = 4 hours. Medium Share = 6 hours. Full Share = 8 hours). Thank you for understanding.
This week's workshift schedule:
  • Monday 10/30 10am-12pm
  • Wednesday 11/1 10am-12pm
  • Sunday 11/5 8-10am
Bring gloves, water, a hat, sturdy shoes, and a pad for kneeling (if necessary for you)! We meet under the large red maple at the end of the barn by the pick up room.