It looks like we’ll have a couple nice sunny, soil-drying days coming up. This is good news! If we can avoid the next round of possible rain we might be able to get back to work in the fields. Right now we’re taking advantage of the down time to plant lots of seeds into our soil cubes. It short cuts the growing cycle in the fields, which we can’t plant into when muddy, and also eliminates part of the weed cycle. That’s what 10 inches of rain does. Hopefully this won’t happen again for another 20 years.
The cukes, zukes, sweet potatoes, melons, tomatoes, and peppers are doing great growing for the “second season”. Corn is getting huge. Broccoli is ready to head out. The kohlrabi is bulbing and the cabbages are heading. Beets and carrots are growing although they need weeding desperately. It’s impossible to weed in mud. I can’t wait to get the tiller back to work and replant for the fall. Friends with small backyard gardens have harvested broccoli but they we’re able to plant their 6 seedlings early. It must be nice to be able to take the chance realizing that if they died, they could run back to the store and get more. We can’t take the chance with a couple thousand plants.
With the cooler than average temperatures, the asparagus hasn’t yet gone into the “fern cycle”, so we weed whipped everything down to ground level to expose the stalks hidden in the weeds. A couple more harvests and hopefully we can get through with the tractor-pulled green cultivating machine and hill it to eliminate the weed pressure for the future.
Life and stress goes on. The hoop houses are not exactly high and dry either. The ground water level is about 3 inches below the surface so we don’t even need to water in them. In fact, the rows have “suck-your-boots-off” mud. But all is growing well in their raised beds.
We call this the summer doldrums. Lots of lettuces and spring crops are peaking out and the mid summer crops are in their growth spurt. So not much change in the picking sequence just yet.
Think positively. It’s just another year in the weather cycle. Bill reminded me that we had just laid 30 drip lines because they would be needed if it didn’t rain in the next day. I think that was the curse.