Today's Harvest Postponed

I stepped out of my truck at 5:15 this morning into ankle deep water. After a review of the garden and driveway of the Center, we decided to postpone harvest. Harvest pick-up will be tomorrow, Saturday morning at 8:00 am. I apologize for any inconvenience this may cause.

BLIGHT!

Thinking of my Irish ancestors who left Ireland due to potato famine, I tore out seven rows of blighted tomatoes this morning. Thank God we eat more than tomatoes and potatoes. But blight? It's horrible, turning beautiful tomatoes into wretched blackened compost.

We still have tomatoes, but there is no guarantee for how long or how many. Cross your fingers, say your prayers, be grateful this won't send you down to Passage West (Ireland) and out to sea looking for a new home. If it does, let me know, I'll put some corn in your bag.

A Rambling Garden Update

Look around, things are in various stages of growth, from seedling to dead overgrown plants. The tomatoes are still producing but have some disease - not blight, or they would be completely dead. Even the late planted tomatoes are suffering from the wet weather. The eggplant is thriving, as are the peppers. The potatoes are harvested; many were overly wet from all the drainage from the fields above the Center. It's fun having green, yellow, and purple beans to choose from. I was blessed last week to see some of our members at the garden for close to two hours, carrying away bags of produce. It makes all the hard work worth it. We're officially settling on our house tomorrow, so if you come after 2:00 I won't see you. Thanks for all your support. Our waiting list is growing thanks to your many referrals.

Small Landowners

The great gardener and visionary Thomas Jefferson wrote, "The earth is given as common stock for men to labor and live on . . . The small landowners are the most precious part of the State." It's been my dream for years to be a small farmer and my .33 acres has been a little too small. So, we are buying 4 acres of land nearby and are hoping to move there soon. Just a few thousand things to do before we move out of this house and move into a not-yet-existing house. It's seems a little overwhelming, but so does weeding a row of cucumbers that you ignored for a few too many days. And then you do it, it's done, you look back with satisfaction and wait in hope for a pile of cukes. And hope you beat the groundhogs and beetles. Our plan for next year is to turn the fenced gardens at the Heritage Center into almost entirely you-pick rows of peas, bush and pole beans, cherry and paste tomatoes, scallions, pickling cucumbers, hot peppers, flowers and a few other things that are enjoyable to pick (especially for children). We will grow a majority of the other crops on our land in Oley and bring the harvest for pick-up to the Center on harvest days. Thanks for all of your support this year and last!

Weeds

"Since the best way of weeding
Is to prevent weeds from seeding,
The least procrastination
Of any operation
To prevent the semination
Of noxious vegetation
Is a source of tribulation.
And this, in truth, a fact is
Which gardeners ought to practice,
And tillers should remember,
From April to December."

New England Farmer, 1829.

Note, "ought" and "should."

On the Bright Side, Groundhogs are Cute

Except ones that eat two hundred heads of lettuce and half a row of green beans in a single evening snack. Out of OUR garden. He apparently worked up an appetite by digging under the new fence. Also on the bright side, my drip tape irrigation is still nice and dry, stored in the barn. Water is good, except when it floods, and wipes out your new plantings. If you strolled last week, you would have seen carrots, beans, and corn under water. Cool weather is nice too, except when late frost kills your sweet corn and - you guessed it, more beans. (The night of May 18 also stunted some covered heirloom tomatoes, which are better now.) As a farmer, there are so many variables associated with growing food that the weather challenge sometimes is overwhelming. Maybe that's why I love farming: it leaves my brain as sore as my muscles. Anyone need a pet groundhog? Reply needed immediately.

See You Tomorrow

for harvest! Pick-up will be held on the porch of the house between 11 and 3. We can't wait!

1979, no. X by Wendell Berry (The Sabbath Poems)

Whatever is foreseen in joy
Must be lived out from day to day.
Vision held open in the dark
By our ten thousand days of work.
Harvest will fill the barn; for that
The hand must ache, the face must sweat.

And yet no leaf or grain is filled
By work of ours; the field is tilled
And left to grace. That we may reap,
Great work is done while we're asleep.

When we work well, a Sabbath mood
Rests on our day, and finds it good.

Fullness

Yesterday, two things happened. At 10:02 am we had a baby boy! His name is Peter Jeremiah Zech!...which means Rock - the Lord exalts, or more humorously Rock - the Lord throws! Either way our hearts are completely full. Mommy and baby are both healthy and tired.We couldn't be happier.

The other thing, which pales to compare: the CSA is full. We received payment for the last two open shares in the mail.

We look forward to a great growing season. As Raffi sings, "Everything grows..." Babies do!