This Week on the Farm 9/2
It has been another busy week on the farm. We spent Monday weeding and irrigating the new lettuce and Bok choi plantings. We noticed some flea beetle damage on the Bok choi, small round holes on the leaves, so we placed yellow sticky traps along the rows. Within one day the traps were full.
On Tuesday we removed the row covers from the cabbage field. The only cabbage crops remaining in the field are Brussels sprouts and kale. The cabbageworms don’t seem to like eating kale leaves and they don’t affect the buds of the Brussels sprout plants so we removed the covers from the field. We are planning on using the covers again this year for frost protection of cool season leafy greens.
Now that much of the cabbage field is out of production and doesn’t need to be watered or protected from frost, we removed most of the irrigation equipment. Next year we are going to try to have fall crops of cabbage and broccoli to increase the diversity of the fall boxes.
Brady spent his last day before school started trimming weeds in the carrots. Because we can’t pull the weeds that are interspersed with the carrots for fear of pulling out all of
our carrots, he trimmed the seed heads off of the weeds. This should reduce the amount of seed that enters the seed bank. Hopefully this reduces the number of weeds that germinate in that area next spring.
We found out that Wash may be a contributing factor to the damage our sweet corn plantings faced this summer. He has found out how delicious the corn is and will pull ears of corn off of the stalks with his teeth. Since he lacks opposable thumbs, this takes a lot of pulling and ripping and results in trampling of nearby corn plants. Once out of the corn planting and back in the shade, he will then drop the ear of corn on the ground, place one front paw on the end of the cob and rip off the husk with his teeth. Once the husk is removed, he trots around with the corn cob in his mouth and savors the corn pulp until all of the kernels are gone. Then he goes back and finds another ear of corn.
The ground is quite wet today and the mosquitoes are terrible. We are spending the morning inside working on bookwork and planning for next year’s crops. We are hoping for a drop in humidity this afternoon so we can go out and pick beans. We have to pick beans when it is dry out because any moisture can help spread rust from plant to plant.
We hope you take advantage of our apple share at some point this fall. The apples we have had so far have been absolutely delicious!
WE NEED HELP! Now that a lot of our help has returned to school, we are short staffed on harvest days. If you are interested in helping out with harvesting and packing one Thursday this fall please let us know! E-mail kate@burroakgardens.com It’s a blast and treats are provided!