lemon squash You all just witnessed our shortest pea season ever. We plant peas as early as possible in late winter. Most years the peas start producing around the first of May, and last until the inevitable 90-degree weather shrivels the vines around the first of June. We planted out peas right on schedule this year, but then watched the pea seedlings sit and shiver for most of March and April. I hope you got to enjoy them while they were around...but honestly, we are a little relieved to see them go. Why? The green beans are ready, and no one around here was jumping at the idea of picking peas and beans twice a week every week.
New potatoes and cucumbers this week, too! We grow three different varieties of cucumbers: your garden variety slicing cucumber, long thin sweet English cucumbers, and Diva cucumbers. The Divas aren't quite ready yet (probably next week, Diva fans - they're divas, they're like that, always late to the party), but we've already picked bushels of the other two varieties since the weekend. The pricing on our cukes can look a little odd, as each variety runs to a different size, but it all works out to about $3 per pound. We snuck a few new potatoes out of the ground late last week - yum! Right now we're just harvesting the earliest "Red Pontiac' potatoes - other varieties will follow later in the season. New potatoes aren't necessarily tiny. They can be large or small, what makes them 'new' is the fact that they were pulled within a day or two of selling, which means they are very sweet and tender, with tissue-paper thin skins.
All this means we're now settling into our summer schedule on the farm: pick Monday and Tuesday, sell Wednesday, pick Thursday and Friday, sell Saturday, catch up and/or collapse on Sunday. (At least it's an easy schedule to keep track of!) Many summer crops have to be picked over two or three times a week, some have to be picked daily, and it often takes us most of the workday to get everything harvested, cleaned, and packed. Everything else - planting, weeding, maintenance jobs, animals - has to get squeezed in at the beginning or end of the day. Ah, summer!
New potatoes and cucumbers this week, too! We grow three different varieties of cucumbers: your garden variety slicing cucumber, long thin sweet English cucumbers, and Diva cucumbers. The Divas aren't quite ready yet (probably next week, Diva fans - they're divas, they're like that, always late to the party), but we've already picked bushels of the other two varieties since the weekend. The pricing on our cukes can look a little odd, as each variety runs to a different size, but it all works out to about $3 per pound. We snuck a few new potatoes out of the ground late last week - yum! Right now we're just harvesting the earliest "Red Pontiac' potatoes - other varieties will follow later in the season. New potatoes aren't necessarily tiny. They can be large or small, what makes them 'new' is the fact that they were pulled within a day or two of selling, which means they are very sweet and tender, with tissue-paper thin skins.
All this means we're now settling into our summer schedule on the farm: pick Monday and Tuesday, sell Wednesday, pick Thursday and Friday, sell Saturday, catch up and/or collapse on Sunday. (At least it's an easy schedule to keep track of!) Many summer crops have to be picked over two or three times a week, some have to be picked daily, and it often takes us most of the workday to get everything harvested, cleaned, and packed. Everything else - planting, weeding, maintenance jobs, animals - has to get squeezed in at the beginning or end of the day. Ah, summer!
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