Farm Update

Every growing season in New England is so very different. You can never plan on ideal conditions. We take one day at a time and adjust as we grow.  This May was a cold wet month with very little sun, these conditions lead to a challenging start to our growing season. At first we were concerned that we would have to push back the start date of our first CSA pick up.  However Mother Nature has turned around and the crops are now flourishing. After a slow start we are now full steam ahead getting the seeds and plants in the ground as fast as possible.

Strawberries

Today I picked my first strawberry of the season.  The field is loaded with fruit, and looks to be a bumper crop.  The heavy winter snow cover provided great insulation and gave the plants a great start going into April.  We also had no late frost so 100% of the blossoms where protected.  We are irrigating the fields for about an hour each day to cool the crop; our goal is to have even continuous production.

Tomatoes

We have planted about 20,000 tomato plants and our heirlooms will be ready to plant next week. This season we are experimenting with a few new verities of heirloom. They should add some great color and flavor to your shares.

Sweet Corn

The sweet corn has really taken off this week loving the hot humid weather. Our first planting is already about 24in high. Up to date we have planted about 75 acres of corn. We have also made two plantings of Miari  (our popular yellow corn) and a planting of white corn.

Seed bed

We are a little late on our second seed bed will re seed by the weekend and it should catch up fast with the hot weather and irrigation

Lettuce

So far it looks as though we have a nice continuous supply of lettuce, we are now planting on white plastic to help keep the crop cool and slow it from bolting. We will continue to make multiple plantings but it does get challenging as the temperatures rise.  

Summer Squash & Cucumbers

The crop is growing well and is still covered with row cover. If you are driving down linebrook road look past the pond on the kozaniski property you cannot miss the large white blanket. Next week we will take the cover off to allow the bees to start pollinating as well as get ready for our next planting.