Hello dear farm members!
Good bug, Bad bug is a book we've found helpful over the years. Entomologist Jessica Walliser writes clear descriptions, and includes photos to help (organic) gardeners identify the main beneficial and pest insects. She describes each insect's characteristics and the way they benefit/damage crops. And she gives tips on how to encourage/discourage each insect.
Most of you have gotten a brassica, probably mizuna, turnip greens or arugula, from us in the past which was riddled with tiny holes. That is the result of flea beetle damage. Those little creatures are very hard to control. For a start, they are tiny! And, their reproductive cycle includes laying eggs in the soil. We can't cover all the soil to stop them, so we hoe to disturb the soil and kill their eggs. We also use these methods: place sticky yellow cards near the beds to entrap them, hide brassicas between other crops so they can't find them, spray with diatomaceous earth, and cover with netting.
How is it all going, you may ask, having not seen many holes in your produce recently (except kale which browns on the edges where flea beetles have done their nasty work)? Well, as you can see in our featured photo, the flea beetles can eat through the (costly) Proteknet we use to combat them. Their little mouths are so tiny. Luckily, at first they only get the parts of the plant which touch the netting. But, later on holes develop and they are able to take over.
Why is this on our farming minds? Well, we've been planting lots of fall brassicas recently and flea beetles aren't our only fear. The crickets and grasshoppers which have been abundant this year are still around. And, we haven't eliminated the cabbage moth caterpillars, of which there are 3 kinds which all love eating napa cabbage, radish, kohlrabi, and so on. So, we're taking other measures also permitted in organic ag: spraying with BTK (a bacterial application which harms caterpillars not humans), removal by hand, and praying over the crops.
Today in the field we finally got chance to put the last of the Paperpot transplants into the soil, leaving only a few late seedlings to go. All the earliest planted fall crops are looking great - lush, green and ready for the Winter share scene.
And, in the farm kitchen we got another load of tomatoes, eggplant and peppers into the freezer ready for Winter shares.
Now you're in the loop with what is happening on the farm, here's a recipe one of you shared with us which we thought we'd pass on: https://www.loveandlemons.com/eggplant-summer-squash-tian/
All the best, and happy eating!
