row covers

Fresh Eats For Dinner – Winter Veggies

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Home from a short break at the beach, we are happy to be back on the farm. Things seem to be ok despite some warm temps, heavy rain, strong winds all followed up with chilly temps. You, know…the weird up-and-down weather we’ve been having as of late.

Here’s what my peek under the row cover revealed:

Kale

Kale

Yummy!

Yummy!

Yes!!! Harvest size achieved and will be taken advantage of tonight…along with

Chard, Perpetual Spinach, Collards

Chard, Perpetual Spinach, Collards

and…

Spinach

Spinach

Nothing like a pot of fresh greens to make ya feel warm and cozy on a chilly day.

For other action, here are some lettuce heads coming along as well as the patch of mesclun:

Lettuce heads

Lettuce heads

Mesclun

Mesclun

Here’s to a farm fresh supper!

Garlic and greens under cover

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Not much is going on at the moment because of this:

 That’s what we got Wednesday night. Highly unlikely that our area is under drought conditions any more!

Aside from a row of carrots and oodles of potatoes that we are over wintering, here is all that’s happening so far for our fall prep: 

 – not a ton of stuff, but tucked in under those covers are our garlic cloves and a row of lettuces, greens, and turnips. 

Hopefully, we’ll have some drying of the soil and can resume raised bed construction.

First Planting for 2016

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Approximately FOUR HUNDRED and EIGHTY cloves later….we got our garlic planted,

Planting garlic cloves

Planting garlic cloves

top dressed with compost,

Cloves "fed"

Cloves “fed” and straw mulch coming

and mulched with straw

Cloves "put to bed"

Cloves “put to bed”

And so begins our 2016 growing season!!!!

The first significant snow of 2014

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Just back to the farm from being in town to find this:

2014 first snow

2014 first snow

Row covers are flattened. Metal hoops are down or bent. Some fiberglass hoops have snapped, tearing the row covers.

After sweeping

After sweeping

It was a wet snow. Temp is now 39 degF. Melting has begun, but the weight of it all is too much for the simple row covers. I tried to sweep some off, but it was a bit much. It will just have to be as it is.

Snow isn’t a bad thing for a garden. It is actually insulating and protective to the growing plants. Provides good moisture.

Snow is NOT good for light season extension equipment. Time. Money. Effort. Bleh.

Oh well. Our minimalist try at season extension wasn’t ideal from the start. We’ll still have deliciousness we can dig out and enjoy, but our market season, for sure, is over.