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Currently bears are doing well in close proximity to people - there are bird feeders and garbage cans and such. Many sows have more cubs. Often we see a yearling in spring that has been pushed from the den and is looking for a home. We do our best to discourage them from moving close to our farm. Ken and I put feed in coops at night and make sure pigs eat what they are given each day.
Oscar, our working dog, takes the night shift and barks and makes it an undesirable place to stay. For a few nights last week Ken has gotten up to join Oscar in discouraging them. Ken found these prints and told me about them. This appears to be a sow with a cub. Ken thinks the cub is climbing a tree when Oscar barks and the sow is circling. It seems they have decided to keep moving. We hope they find somewhere else to live!
Greetings from the Garden! This week's CSA box contains salad and braising greens, kale or cabbage, broccoli, carrots, basil, cucumbers, snap peas, green onions, garlic scapes, and new potatoes.
Field Notes. Ken has been busy as a beaver. In addition to the usual planting and cultivating, he adds summer tasks of tying up tomatoes and cucumbers weekly, picking some crops every other day like cucumbers and zucchini, along with once a season jobs like mulching. It is good he has long days to get all this done! Actually he enjoys it and the crops look good, so it is quite satisfying.
I have added picking duties. The third crop of strawberries has crested. I looked back and the strawberries started May 17th and with three different varieties that has meant a month and a half of strawberries. Now the snap peas are producing in full force. Next will be shell peas and green beans. It is an exciting time of year as the food choices increase so dramatically.
From the Kitchen. One day I added up the fruits and vegetables Ken and I ate that day - seven! I had a couple of curved cukes. Here is one of our favorite ways to prepare cucumbers. After rinsing the cucumber run a fork lengthwise along the cuke to make grooves - it not only looks nice, it cuts the skin to smaller, more digestible pieces. Slice and place in a bowl with salt for about a half hour. Drain the liquid and save for stock or add to something you would add salt - sauces and gravies for example. Then add to a bowl of a creamy dressing. I use a bit of vinegar, pepper, sliced green onion tops, and any of the following: yogurt, cream, kefir. Add herbs if you like - dill or parsley. Voila!
It is also snap pea season! Snap peas are an edible pod pea; just snap the little "cap" at the stem end and pull down toward the blossom end to remove any "strings." I would also use the above dressing. for cooked snap peas. I also like to combine peas with carrots The carrots take about 8 - 10 minutes to cook and snap peas take about 3 - 4 so I add them after the carrot slices have cooked about 4 minutes.
'Til Next Week, Judith and Ken
The days are long,
Ken works long hours, and all plants and weeds are growing!
The garden and field are mulched
Ken plants more crops
The sunflowers are already high
The garlic looks good
The corn is taller than knee high on the 4th of July
Ken succeeded in getting many crops earlier than usual - this year we have peas, potatoes, carrots and cabbage on July 4th
and Ken is happy
Each year in June Ken makes a decision. He either plants green manures or mulches most of the spaces between crops. His goal is no naked soil. Green manure is usually the decision if it looks like it will be a wet year with enough rain to grow the crop of rye, peas and oats, buckwheat, barley or clover. Other years especially dry years, Ken mulches.
Both green manure and mulch add organic matter to the soil. Both provide shade to moderate heat so microbial life can thrive during the summer months. Both suppress weeds.
This year Ken got some straw and has been faithfully spreading it as space opens up and time allows. I love how the garden and field look. Thank you, Ken
Greetings from the Garden! This week's CSA box has salad and braising greens like lettuce and Romaine lettuce, kale or cabbage, carrots, radishes, green onions, garlic scapes, strawberries, and the start of cucumber, zucchini, and snap peas, basil, and probably the last of the asparagus.
Field Notes. Although Ken is still planting and transplanting, he has also started mulching. Mulch accomplishes many things: it reduces weed pressure, keeps the soil cool for microbial life, and as it breaks down, it adds organic to the soil.
This is the time of year when Ken starts talking about canopy. What he means by canopy is that the crops have enough size to shade the soil. This also reduces weed pressure and keeps the soil cooler.
And speaking of weed pressure, Ken is wrapping up the bulk of weeding perennial crops like asparagus. He usually stops picking asparagus about the end of June and lets the plants grow and store energy for the next season. He has weeded strawberries, raspberries, asparagus, and some annual crops like the onions.
Weekly he ties up tomatoes, and on the way back from the field today I spied these first tomatoes. Soon they will be red and Ken will be harvesting. The great, comfortable cool sleeping nights slow down the heat loving plants ripening, but the cool loving plants like the early cabbage is sweet and beautiful!
From the Kitchen. I love to mix color, flavor, and texture in vegetable medleys. Today I sliced green onions at an angle, cut carrots in ovals and had finely sliced cabbage. I sauteed the onion, added the carrots and a bit of stock, then the cabbage. I added some umeboshi vinegar and sesame oil. Umeboshi is a Japanese pickled plum that adds three different flavors - salty, sweet and sour. Another variation is to add turmeric to the saute oil and maybe a pinch of curry or cumin, and top with angle cut snap peas for a bright green color, OR an Asian variation with sesame oil, a sweet wine, miso or tamari, and some toasted sesame seeds.
These early summer cabbage are so sweet! I like them in salads, or just cut in wedges and lightly steamed. Sometimes I top with butter, salt and pepper. Other times umeboshi paste. Or cream and herbs. It all depends on what else is in the meal. I am always trying to mix and balance color and flavors - Beans with hot sauce and smoky paprika, rice with turmeric and green onions, cabbage and cream. With a creamy venison Stroganoff I would serve sour and spicy.
Summer is here! Basil is one the smells of summer - fresh and pungent. Yest I add basil to tomato sauces, but also vegetables just before serving or grilled meat.
The best way to store basil it to bag it and leave it out on the counter in the sealed bag.
'Til Next Week, Judith
Ken plants green manures. They are crops grown to keep the soil covered and cool, they often add nutrients - like peas add nitrogen, and once tilled they add organic matter to the soil. Organic matter is key! For each percentage of organic matter in the soil the crops have the equivalent of 1" of rainfall. So, if you have five percent organic matter you could withstand a five week drought with minimum crop damage!
Like all gardening and farming, it is ongoing. Here is an example of Ken's process. He planted and grew peas and oats out in the field
A few weeks before he wanted to plant in that space, he mowed the peas and oats. In some situations he pastures animals like chickens or pigs where the green manure is planted and grown to size.
He tilled the space where the peas and oats had been. Next he prepares the bed for the crop - raking or trenching - it depends on what will be planted. Here he planted a late potato crop.
Summer has begun. There is always a shift at this time of year. Spring crops include many foods that like cool and damp - spinach, lettuce, greens, radishes, asparagus. Several summer crops like growing in cooler weather - like peas.
Summer comes, and many of summer crops move forward rapidly - Peas are ready to pick.
Tomatoes and eggplant, and peppers grow dramatically
The curcurbit family - squash, cucumbers, melons loves heat and Ken has started picking the first of the cucumbers and zucchini
And we have moved from the early radishes and salad turnips to carrots and beets.
The spring bok choy and napa are done and we have moved to small sweet European salad cabbage - a treat raw or cooked.
Yes, we love growing and eating with the seasons
Each year in June Ken makes a decision. He either plants green manures or mulches most of the spaces between crops. His goal is no naked soil. Green manure is usually the decision if it looks like it will be a wet year with enough rain to grow the crop of rye, peas and oats, buckwheat, barley or clover. Other years especially dry years, Ken mulches.
'Til Next Week, Judith 
