Abbe Hills Farm CSA

Greetings shareholders,

This week, we should have kale, kohlrabi, cabbage, daikon radish, onions, cilantro, collards, Chinese cabbage, perhaps beets, and the last of the lettuce.  We appear to be without broccoli, which seems impossible since there are thousands of plants in the garden, but I guess we are just in between crops.  There may be some for the Thursday people.   Since the deer have finished off almost all of the lettuce, they've moved on to beets and swiss chard.  Whatever I can wrestle away from them, we'll have for you.  I keep planting more, hoping they will reach their limit and stop robbing us for a while.  Maybe I should plant some more lettuce to divert their attention away from the beets!  

Sometime in the next two to three weeks, we will have leeks, green beans, cucumbers, garlic, summer squash, summer onions, and potatoes.  Not as early as those things appear at the farmers market, but that's OK.  We're not about earliness here, but rather variety over the long haul.  Earliness is an awfully big challenge when you're trying to use organic practices over such large plantings.

Strange as it seems, I'm very glad we are getting some rain tonight.  We had a wonderful week of work - the first full week when we could be in the field every day since last September.  We weeded and cultivated everything, which should let a little oxygen into the soil and give everybody a boost.  We planted the last 150 tomato plants, plus lots of winter squash, beans, and watermelons, (and okra for Imran).  These are all crops that should have been planted in early June, but since we couldn't do any planting or tillage for more than three weeks because of mud, I was sure glad to see the plants and seeds finally going into the ground.  Only 85 days until the killing frost!  The rain tonight will get things off to a great, fast start.  I'm pretty sure we're going to have some gaps in some vegetables because of the messy May and June, but hopefully it will all sort itself out by fall and we'll have plenty of everything we expect from the September and October garden.

Monday people:  If you picked up your vegetables between 4:30 and about 5:15 last week, you might have gotten some broccoli that didn't store well.  We got the boxes mixed up and I think I set out a box that I shouldn't have.  If you are one of those people and you weren't happy with your broccoli, tell me and I'll give you some more tomorrow.  I've got some left from last Thursday that is still quite nice. 

More for Monday people:  Be prepared for mud tomorrow night.  My buddy Schnackenberg says it's going to be a long, rainy day.  Mud on your shoes, mud on your car, and probably some mud on your vegetables.  We'll do our best to minimize it for you, but you know how it is on stormy Mondays.

Bad news about movie night - IT'S CALLED OFF.  We'll still have a garden tour at 7:30, but we have to give up on the plan to show "Up".  One afternoon last week, Megan from Hollywood called to tell me (while she was reading my website to me) that we can't have movie nights unless I buy licenses for the movies I show, or I'll be in trouble.  The rules apply for every movie ever made, and they cost from $150 to over $300 per showing.  That, plus trouble, is more than I can afford.  Not only that, but Disney (who made "Up"), has a "worldwide agreement" (I wonder who spoke on behalf of the world?) that none of their films can be shown anywhere any time that they have movies in the theaters, so even if I could afford to show "Up", we can't do it until after August 16th.  (She didn't really get the Heritage Days concept, that it only happens in early July.)  And, it's also not permitted to collect any money for anything except the ticket price when you show a Disney movie.  So, we wouldn't have been able to sell popcorn and give the money to the food pantry without me getting into trouble.  I always knew that there were licenses for movies out there, but I sure thought there must be exceptions for free movies shown on the sides of machine sheds in Iowa with the popcorn money going to the food pantry.  Guess not.  So, I'm sorry that we won't have a movie night this upcoming week.  We will have the garden tour at 7:30.  If you want to see what's going on in your garden, this would be a great time to come take a look.

Here's a link to an article about a big report released last week on sustainable agriculture and food production.  For the policy wonks among you, here is a deeper look at the same report from the National Academy of Science.  Local, sustainable food systems are getting more attention every day.  And we - you eaters, me, my workers, scientists who study here - we're on the cutting edge.  Once again, cool before it was cool!!! 

Remember the garden tour, Wednesday evening, 7:30.

See you this week,

Laura