November 27^th

Wow November has been a really cold month. Much colder than the November we had last year. We have even had one night below 20 degrees.  That means almost everything, under cover or not, is dead, and my record of harvesting until Christmas is now blemished. Luckily I harvested all of vegetables before they actually died.

slug eggs hiding under a beet

spinach

The only things left in the garden now are beets, carrots and spinach. The beets and carrots will be harvested next week, as will the last cutting of spinach for this season.  After I cut the spinach, (carefully, so as to not damage the growth tip) I’ll cover it with straw for the winter.  I can pull the straw off in March and we will have a nice early crop.

I have spent most of my time this month cleaning up the garden and organizing the shed and greenhouse for the winter. I’m still producing micro greens, and we have bumped up production for the busy holiday season, so they are keeping me pretty busy as well. I planted the garlic last week and covered it with straw.

garlic clove waiting to be planted

And finally, we have been holding our end of the season meetings.  We use this time to sit down, farmer, cooks and Chef Patrick, and discuss both the failures and the successes from the past season. We also discuss potential new crops to try for next season.  There are quite a few interesting varieties coming out for next year.  I saw a daikon radish yesterday that was purple all the way through and a green when ripe cherry tomato covered in pink stripes.

I finished all of the harvest records and we were well over last year’s numbers with a whopping 8000 pounds of produce pulled out of the garden this year.  I was surprised as a lot of the heavy vegetables such as eggplant and peppers didn’t produce so well, but I guess we made up for it in cucumbers and sweet potatoes.  Over the next couple of weeks I will be spending my time still cleaning, organizing and getting the crop plan ready for next year.

Romanesco

November 1^st

Butter Lettuce

Well, we have had our first official hard frost.  That means that all of the summer vegetables are truly finished and almost everything else needs to be covered. So far our lowest night was 28 degrees.  Vegetables such as beans, peppers, and tomatoes die at 32, but many other vegetables can survive in lower temperatures.  They can freeze and thaw many times during the fall and early winter, and reserve their growth periods for when the weather is favorable.  

This makes growing really slow, but it can work in your favor, a garden that has been planted well can have tons of vegetables “hanging out” and waiting to be harvested. For example we planted 5 beds of carrots in early September; they have pretty much stopped growing by now, but can wait in the soil for another few months before they need to be picked. I’ll harvest a few at a time until Christmas.

Andrew with a cardoon plant

As the frost loomed, we harvested the last of the beans, peppers, eggplant and tomatoes.  With the tomatoes I pulled off all of the green ones as well as the red, and will ripen them in the shed over the next few weeks. I also dug up all of the sweet potatoes to cure, and cut down the giant cardoon plants. I harvested most of the lemongrass and potted up the rest in the greenhouse to plant in the garden again next year. We also lost the cucumber plants, which was a little sad. I was hoping to hold on to them for a little longer.

chickens enjoying a mountain of beet greens

Right now in the garden we still have lettuce, French radishes, Japanese fresh turnips and Pac choi under cover.  Kale, swiss chard, brussel sprouts, purple top turnips, celeriac, mustard greens, spinach, carrots, beets, cauliflower and romanesco are all exposed to the elements and happy to be so, though most of those will need to be covered or harvested soon.