(CSA Newsletter: Summer Week 13)
Meet this week’s vegetables:
Even though it happens every year, we always find ourselves amazed by each new season’s progression. Last week I mentioned all the events that signaled fall’s arrival on the farm — the trend continued this week, manifold. Not surprising, since fall will continue to be ‘fall-like’ (more so every day) until we find ourselves suddenly in winter. But after an intense summer, the shift is still delightful and most welcome.
We’ve been especially enjoying the perfect work weather late September has brought to the fields. The days are warm with a touch of coolness, ideal for working long days without feeling over-exhausted (as we often feel after hot days in July). We were especially glad for the weather, since we put in a few extra long days this week to work on our previously mentioned ‘Things-To-Do-Before-Nov.-1’ list.
This week’s ‘to do’ list included our final big transplanting and sowing session on Friday. We planted a half-acre total with various winter-hardy vegetables: lettuce, chard, kale, chicories, carrots, mustard greens, beets, fava beans, radishes, arugula, collards, peas, onions, green onions, spinach, tatsoi, and more. We already have succession plantings of most of these veggies in the fields — this was our final winter push. And since it’s so late in the year for many of these veggies, we fully expect that some won’t make it … this year, at least. Some, such as the carrots and fava beans, are intended to ‘over-winter’ and then grow again in the early spring. So, at this point, we’re planting for March and April! Kind of crazy, to always be working so many months ahead.
We also continued preparing for first frost and rain by bringing in the winter squash harvest. It took us the better part of two days, but Casey and I both enjoyed the harvest, since the weather was so pleasant and the Gator again proved itself useful (the bed is the perfect size for hauling in winter squash!). As with our onions, we found that we definitely have enough winter squash for fall and early winter. You’ll get to taste several different varieties this year, including Butternut, Delicata, Honey Boat (similar to Delicata), Buttercup, Sunshine, and pie pumpkins.
The squash are all piled neatly in bins in our greenhouse now, where they should stay dry and protected for most of the season. Our biggest concern at this point is mice, because we know from last winter that we have a big rodent population on the island (there’s lots for them to eat!). But today we watched our kitten Mokum catch at least one mouse in the greenhouse, and both cats have taken to playing in there, so we have hope for secure squash storage.
Although the cooler days made our work pleasant this week, we were also happy to have a excuse to get away from the farm for an entire day mid-week. Last Wednesday, we attended an Organic Seed Alliance field day at Ayers Creek Farm in Gaston. The field day was well attended by other farmers in the area, so once again we had the opportunity to visit with our farm friends and check in on the season.
Visiting Ayers Creek Farm itself was fun as well. Anthony and Carol Boutard have a great set-up, and we were both inspired by the level of professionalism demonstrated on every part of the farm: equipment, field organization, worker housing, infrastructure, and more. As part of the official field day activities, they shared two of their farm projects with the group. This year they trialed sweet potatoes as well, except that they grew tons of different varieties to see which would perform best in our Oregon climate. We dug a few of their sweet potato hills to check out the results and observed a wide range of colors, sizes, and textures among the different plants.
(We were inspired to harvest our own that very night when we arrived back at the farm, and we were pleased to find our sweet potatoes looking quite good! We cooked some that night as well and found that they tasted great too! Hoorah!)
In the afternoon, the Boutards and Carol Miles of WSU shared a different kind of project with the group as each demonstrated their own differing methods of shelling beans. This might not immediately sound revolutionary to you, but shelling and winnowing dry beans is currently a ‘bottleneck’ in local bean production. The vast majority of dry beans are currently produced on a very large scale, primarily because of the equipment and processing required — rarely do home growers or market gardeners venture into the bean market, even though they are relatively easy to grow and add a significant food value to local-based diet.
Casey and I have contemplating this limitation before, as last year we grew two kinds of dry beans for ourselves. The beans themselves were delicious, but we were immediately stymied by how to efficiently shell and clean the beans for eating. Even on a small scale, the process was daunting without any kind of mechanization.
So, it was exciting to see two different small-scale solutions, both of which somewhat resembled mad-genius-in-the-basement sort of solutions. The Boutards’ version was my favorite, simply because it was the craziest-looking contraption I’ve ever seen: the Roto-Fingers Pea – Bean Sheller, made in Laurel, MS (maybe even in a basement!). It was basically a large cylinder, into which you dump bean pods. The cylinder contains a series of ‘fingers’ inside, and when you flip the switch, the whole thing turns, threshes the beans, and then winnows them on their way out the bottom with a series of fans and screens. And it works! Amazing.
Carol Miles’s version was a two-step series of contraptions. The first was a chipper/shredder adapted to thresh the beans. Very simple and effective. The second was a home-built seed cleaner specifically designed for beans.
All of which begs the question: will we be growing dry beans next year? That’s still up for debate. We love the idea of expanding the availability of locally grown foods, but we’re not sure that our farm needs to keep diversifying to meet that goal. Instead, we’d love to see another farmer tackle dry beans as perhaps a large part of their farm. Even though we love hearing about new innovations that could help us expand in the future, we still like growing vegetables best. And there’s certainly enough variety with fresh vegetables to keep us busy and continually challenged for now.
And speaking of challenges, as fall continues to progress, the vegetables in the shares will shift as well. We’re approaching a time of year when the seasonal produce shifts again away from the mainstream American diet. We know that many people can be daunted by things like large cabbages or winter squash, so over the next few weeks, we’ll focus our newsletter on ways to incorporate more of these items into your daily diet.
But for now enjoy the fact that summer continues to linger in the fields. Yes, we love the pleasant days, the excuses to hang out with other farmers, the changing landscape … but perhaps our favorite part of September is that ripe tomatoes co-exist with onions, winter squash, and kale. Almost everything is at its prime this month and the beginning of next. Enjoy, enjoy, enjoy this week’s vegetables!
Your farmers,
Katie & Casey Kulla
Oakhill Organics
