I found myself asking this question several times the past couple weeks, and to be honest, I’m not sure anymore what ‘normal’ weather entails. I usually equate August with hot sunny days, but that hasn’t been the reality this year.
Prolonged wetness, especially when combined with heat and humidity, is the key cause of disease on organic farms, and unfortunately, we’ve had a lot of it. The flipside is that I’m always seeding succession plantings, and so even though our current planting of cucumbers is headed downhill fast, we have another planting in another field (so as to limit the spread of disease from one planting to another), which should be ready to soon.
Despite the difficult weather conditions, the vegetable plants continue to produce remarkably. Vegetable plants, after all, are on the farmer’s side – they want to grow for the sake of reproduction, and this desire is evident during difficult times like these.
The weather’s also been a bit challenging on Saturdays – tomorrow marks the 3rd week in a row which forecasts rain, and we are all incredibly grateful that you’ve been undeterred by the showers to support our farm. Our hard work culminates on Saturdays from 9am-1pm at the farmers’ market, and your support keeps us going during the week. Thank you so much for your support and we’ll keep the tomatoes and other vegetables coming!
Best,
Adam
PS – We’ve hit peak season for tomato production, and so if you’re interested in canning or sauce tomatoes, now’s the best time to get them! We sell canning tomatoes for $2/lb at our markets, and if you’re interested in at least 25lb we can drop the price to $1.50/lb.
We'll have our Red Long of Tropea Onions on Saturday - very similar in taste to a shallot!