Notes on Your Shares

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Scott Hertzberg

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Sep 15, 2009, 10:59:18 PM9/15/09

to 2009 CSA List, jug...@verizon.net

Your shares this week included acorn squash, leaf lettuce, kale, peppers, beans, egg plant, turnip greens, turnips themselves, okra and green tomatoes.

We grew the lettuce, turnip greens, beans, okra, egg plant, green tomatoes and green peppers. We took a gamble and started the leaf lettuce earlier than most years. Because of the frequent rains and mild second half of summer, it grew nicely. Sadly we will only get one cutting off the crop because it started to go to seed. I think I needed to cut it earlier to prevent this from happening. I let the plants get too big and crowded. A crowded plant often senses that they can’t grow any bigger and decides to go to seed. Next time, I’ll cut it more aggressively. And so it goes. We have some head lettuce planted for the fall and some other leaf lettuce so there should be more lettuce in a few weeks.

I grew the acorn squash on the field by us owned by Saint Thomas Episcopal Church. As I have mentioned before, that field, though plagued by way too many deer and groundhogs, is still blessed by divine powers. I planted the squash soon after July 4 and it was ready by the start of September, a mere sixty days after seeding when the packet says 92 days to maturity. Ok, it is true that many things planted in the heart of summer with the long days and heat will grow very fast but those squash rushed along so fast a greater force had to play a hand. Whatever the case, the acorn squash need a little more time to season. Give them a couple weeks and then see if you can press your finger nail into them. If you cannot leave a mark, they are ready.

Those nice big peppers were grown by Henry and Nathaniel Stauffer, two Mennonite brothers from Saint Mary’s who excel at growing peppers. Ronald Zimmerman, who grew some produce for us in the spring, grew the kale and turnips. Few other people start their kale and turnips as early as Ronald (August 1). He waters them with multiple sprinklers to get them thru the August heat. He sprayed the kale only once a couple weeks ago so you may find a few orange, black and white harlequin bugs crawling around but not too many as the dreaded harlequin bug has been not been as bad as usual this year. The turnips were never sprayed.

Next week, we plan to include in your shares some white turnips of our own, some Asian greens, beans, garlic and more acorn squash. We also plan to include kale from Ronald and a few other things from other local farmers.We will start digging sweet potatoes soon.

Happy Jewish New Year to everyone come sundown Friday night. Time to party like it is 5770.