Off Kilter

Summer seems a bit out of sorts these days. We’ve had a lot of hot days, enough to cancel the Kenton Farmers Market once and the Bethel Farm Stand once. We had a total solar eclipse. And now there are forest fires spreading smoke far and wide, giving the days a hazy, humid, erie glow. We are waiting to hear if the Kenton Farmers Market will be canceled for a second time tomorrow, due to the poor air quality from the smoke. (Just got word that the market is on.) Maybe these things aren’t really that unusual, but they are leaving me feeling a little off kilter.

As we have been harvesting and taking care of summer vegetables, we work on the fall/winter vegetables, too. We’ve been planting things out in our fall field since June, with a big push in August to get most things in, and most are in now, working on growing into our future harvests. We had a big disappointment when a crush of flea beetles descended on our cabbage and Brussels sprouts starts. Some flea beetles were already on the starts before I put them out. Once in the field, they invited all their friends over. They have a lot of friends and they were all hungry. We made some interventions, but, alas, to no avail. The flea beetles ate our cabbage and Brussels sprouts until nothing was left. I have never seen so many flea beetles. The kale is out there now, holding down the fort. The flea beetle numbers are down, and I am keeping my fingers crossed the kale will outgrow their appetites.

With the help of Saffron Supply Company in Salem, we have a new way to irrigate our fields. Cover crops are an important part of our soil improvement plan. We have only planted them in the fall, when the rain waters them. Now, we can provide overhead irrigation to half of a field at once with an impact sprayer. It is a bit late for summer cover crops this year, but we don’t have to wait for fall rains to put in our winter cover crops and we are set to go for next year. This will be a big help in building our soil quality.

The pole barn keeps making progress. This week, the crew is off again, but Steven has work to do, to get some plumbing in place before they pour the concrete floor.