Greetings-
We've made it through another week much like the last two, and appreciated a couple of cooler (though still above average) days. The 10-day forecast looks quite comfortable, with lots of 70s and 80s and even one day in the 60s (!). The humans of the farm and many of the crops will love that; peppers and tomatoes and melons would prefer 80s. I guess they're taking turns. Now if only we could coerce the skies to drop some rain on us...it's looking like Sunday may be the day.
We did get a bit of hail during Thursday evening's storm, but pretty minor and without great consequence. But that makes two hail events in one week - neither was devastating like the August 2020 storm, but it's a disconcerting trend to say the least.
Accomplishments this past week were planting sweet potatoes and installing the remainder of the trellis and cages for our field tomatoes. We will now just have the weekly trellis maintenance, but the post-pounding is complete!
Notes on some items in this week's shares
- Scallions: We brought back this crop for one spring planting to get some onion love in the boxes before full-sized onions are ready. A nice pair with cilantro this week.
- Zucchini: We are approaching full-production in zucchini-land. This is the only summer squash planting of the year, so the next 2-3 weeks is the zucchini heyday in this year's shares.
- Broccoli: Shareholders may get either single small-medium heads or bunches of 2-3 very small heads. This first spring planting didn't size up all that well and isn't as tight and uniform as we like. Broccoli is incredibly sensitive to growing conditions, with hot/dry weather causing suboptimal head development in many varieties. Some folks may receive some "sprouting" broccoli, which is a variety developed for harvesting side shoots (basically individual florets on long stems). These have superb flavor and resist bittering like head-type broccoli. They have looser beads, genetically, so are almost more like broccolini than head broccoli.
- Garlic scapes: Peak season! We have plenty of scapes for this week and likely a decent amount for box 4, then that'll be it! Enjoy this funky spring crop while it lasts :)
- Arugula: This is our second and final spring arugula planting and it will be younger, smaller-leaved, and a bit more tender than the first round in box 1. There are some flea beetle holes, but not too bad and it's great eating.
- Head lettuces: We'll have some lettuce heads trickle in over the summer, but this will be the last big head lettuce week for a while.
- Sugar snap peas: These sweet and crunchy peas are a spring treat, showing up in the next three boxes. Hopefully all members will receive them at least once.
- Spinach: There will be some damaged leaves as a result of last week's hail, but otherwise nice spinach. This is our last substantial spinach planting . The cooler weather coming might allow for a second harvest in a week or two, but this might also be the last of it, so enjoy!
- Cilantro: We long for cilantro all winter but have yet to find a passable way to preserve cilantro - this fresh stuff is hitting the spot for us!
Have a great week!
Dana and crew
