Heat, Begone

I think I underestimated, undervalued, underprepared for this past week's heat wave, the longest and hottest of the summer. Perhaps because it was on the heels of a relatively cool and kind August, I forgot what it's like to work through terribly hot and humid days. Every task feels a bit harder, unexpected challenges cause a bit more stress, worry about crop tolerance and water needs increases, weather forecast and radar watching becomes constant, work clothes quickly become disgusting. Thankfully, the heat has broken and rainfall was received. Thursday's rounds missed us and Friday's were threatening to also, but we lucked out and received .4", enough to sate my stress and provide a drink to the newly transplanted, most sensitive crops, as well as the additional acre or two of cover crop seed sown where beans, edamame, early summer lettuce and herbs, and potatoes called home.

Now that it's cooling off and with fall officially commencing in ten days, the race to get the last few rounds of crops in the ground and other crops out of the ground begins, before the threat of frost actually becomes real, normally in mid-October. The final round of crops were seeded this past week, including arugula, mustard, radish, chard, and bok choy, and the first round of crops were transplanted into tunnels, including lettuce mix and spinach. Probably in about three weeks time we'll be finished transplanting for the season. Crops with a retrieval deadline include the remainder of the potatoes (about 25% left, maybe 2500lbs), sweet potatoes (hopefully 4000-6000lbs), and butternut squash. Summer crops are really starting to wane but tasty fall crops will be slowly replacing them in the pick up room, including leeks, potatoes, winter squash and pumpkins, kale, beets (maybe with their greens), and romaine.