Senposai, a delicious leafy green that grows fast and is fairly cold-hardy
This week has gone by in a flash. The weather has been conveniently dry, so we have been able to make progress on some of the weedy crops. We’ve uncovered turnips, senposai, kale, Chinese cabbage, Yukina Savoy, winter radishes, and a whole new sowing of beans that already have big fat beans on them! I noticed them a few days ago, but we ran out of time on Tuesday and didn’t harvest them.
The nights have been so chilly (one was 45F!) , and the mornings so dewy that it has been impossible to get everything harvested before lunch. So many of the crops at this time of year are best not touched while the leaves are wet, to minimize the spread of fungal diseases. Our crew only works in the mornings in summer, although some of us still have garden work during the rest of the day too. Today was our last morning shift, and tomorrow we start afternoon shifts, until next May. Not everyone relishes gardening in the afternoons, but it makes the most sense in terms of harvesting and also transplanting.
This year’s fall kale doesn’t look as good as this yet.
Photo credit Kathryn Simmons
We had to resow all of our beets and some of our kale – I think they were eaten by baby grasshoppers or crickets. Possible because our lack of timely mowing around the edges of the plots this summer led to tall grass which is good habitat for grasshoppers. or possibly we over-watered in our effort not to under-water! The new kale is up and I’m keeping an eye on it in case it disappears. Some of our spinach seedlings have also disappeared, I fear. But there is still time to resow spinach. We reckon if we sow it before 9/20, we’ll get some to eat in late fall and during the winter. if we miss that date anmd sow 9/20-9/30, the plants will over-winter small, and we can start harvesting from them in the spring. Spinach makes some growth whenever the temperature rises above 40F in winter, and in our climate (and under the rowcover), it will get plenty of sunny days during the winter.
We started harvesting our broccoli last weekend – it’s over a week earlier than usual, this year. That’s good news, but it caught us hopping, because we are participating in the NOVIC variety trials, and need to record data each time we harvest. A comical event was that when I printed the rating sheet on our only color printer, it ran out of blue ink, and the broccoli colors came out in sunset shades! Luckily, I’d asked for some printed copies in the mail and those arrived later that day. Our color printer is in our Tofu office, and those who know our tofu know that blue features prominently in our tofu packaging and marketing – take a look at the webpage here. I guess that’s where the blue ink went!
Sustainable Market Farming 