It’s been a busy few months around the farm, including for the gardeners, and I took some time off from writing.
Cassie’s sage and bunching onions are quite happy.
Some of our crops are done for the season and we have started our last rounds of plantings. Mentor Deborah Winicki of Mon Soliel Farm was with us this past Saturday to show us what we could still plant more of to keep harvesting, also known as succession planting. She mentioned beets, radishes, lettuces, and spinach among others.
Our tomatoes are going strong, and Cassie’s sage and bunching onions have been looking beautiful. But this hasn’t been a great year for cucumbers, new SFF gardener Sherrie has had the best luck while most of the rest of us have been struggling.
Swallowtail butterfly that had just emerged from its chrysalis.
Veggies and herbs weren’t the only things growing in our beds, we also had some swallowtail butterflies! The caterpillars loved our dill, and two of them formed chrysalises on my bed. One of them emerged while we were there on Saturday after our meeting and we got to see it stretch its wings for the first time.
It took hours of weeding and some sturdy boots, but the compost bins are cleaned up.
This year we have also taken over responsibility for the compost bins that Master Gardener Dan Gallagher and his brother had built two years ago. We used some of the lovely compost that was made last year to fill our two new garden beds in the spring, and have a good amount left to put on all the beds in the fall when we close up for the season.
Next meeting we’ll scout for pests and disease and do some more harvesting.
If you have any questions about the Raised Bed Gardening program you can reach out to us at info@strongfarm.org.
-Erika