foxlinecityfarm

Another week of fast productive activity in the garden!  Big changes.  Many new crops went in.  Scott was cutting the pea vines down as fast as I could pick the last of them off the vine.  The trellis came down, the ground prepped, irrigation line placed and another round of green beans took their place along with a second planting of summer squash transplants.  24 hours and this whole area of the garden is transformed.  We planted all the summer broccoli transplants where the cauliflower grew and storage cabbage transplants where the fennel grew.  Another long row of lettuces went in with a shade cloth on top to keep them a bit cooler in this July heat.  Scott has the footings set for the new greenhouse and we again had a bit of time to weed.  We were reminded this week that much of our time now needs to shift to harvesting.  It takes FOREVER! to pick 2 60″ long double rows of beans every other day…..and every day visit the summer squash patch so the tasty zucchini don’t turn into baseball bats and crawl down the cucumber trellis rows carefully looking under all the foliage for the perfect cucumber.

Itty bitty watermelon on the vine.

Our wonderful garden helper Malachi Perche arrived this morning to start digging the garlic.  Our crop looks wonderful this year.  We have heard reports from many fellow gardeners that they have terrible garlic this year or even total crop failure due to the odd, cold, wet Spring.  We are grateful our crop is fantastic.  Garlic is planted in the Fall for the next year harvest.  It takes a long time to develop and lots of time to worry and fret.  By next week this area too will look completely different with all new plants.

Malachi digging the garlic.

Garlic sitting in the shade ready to be dried.

With prolonged higher temperatures here it is nice to see that the tomatoes are finally happy and really taking off!  We are seeing a blush of color on some of the vines and the eggplants offered up a few early fruits that will be in the extra box this week.  The plants look robust and lots of flowers.  The pepper plants are not as big as last year yet but they too are loaded with blooms and fruit is developing.

Tomatoes! The blue coloring you see on the tomatoes and ground is a organic copper compound to fight off Late Blight. Late blight has been documented early this year in Sauk County. We are well protected.

No lettuce in the boxes this week.  Next week it should reappear.  The crop loss we had the week of all that rain and heat left a bit of a bubble in our rotation.

The lettuce beds.

WHAT IS IN YOUR BOX

Another great harvest this week!

Green Beans-A pound for everyone.  Fabulous harvest.  Snappy and delicious.

Cauliflower-This was the final harvest of the Spring planted cauliflower.  It will revisit again this Fall.

Cabbage-The last harvest from the bed with these wonderful little beauties.  We love these!  Perfectly sized and crunchy.  Great raw in salads or sandwiches or sautéed.

Swiss Chard-An amazing crop this year.  It is the prettiest I have every seen it and oh so tender.  We will pull this crop this week and start up new in the greenhouse for Autumn harvest.  Swiss Chard tastes much better in Autumn from newly seeded transplants rather than the plants that had to weather through the summer heat.

Cucumbers-A nice assortment again this week.  Expect these little gems to be a staple in the box for many weeks to come.

Zucchini-The plants are just starting to really kick into gear….We pick the fruit small so they are tender and just the right size for a meal.

Cutting Celery-just like “regular” celery but grows bushy and leafy.  Perfect for salads and seasoning.

Chives-A tasty and mildly flavor.

Shelling Peas-The end of the harvest of our BEST! pea crop every…..What a run.  Enjoy!

Turnips-The end of this crop until the cold weather returns.

BEST GUESS FOR NEXT WEEK!

HOLY COW!  Get ready for this…..potatoes, beets, carrots, lettuce, fresh garlic, rosemary, parsley, zucchini, cucumbers……

Next week’s carrot harvest.