The post-snowpocalyptic farmscape

After some rain and warm wind, the snow is finally melting off of our fields. This morning Casey wandered out to assess the damage so we could plan our final Holiday Harvest (see next post) and start thinking about 2009. So, how do things look?

The good news: Most things are still ‘alive.’ Of course, ‘alive’ might not mean ready to pick, but it’s still hopeful for February. Many things that look damaged today (chard, arugula, collard greens) can still put on new growth between now and the first CSA pick-up. And many even hardier vegetables are ready to pick: carrots, potatoes, celery root, cabbages, leeks Brussels sprouts, etc. So, we’re ok, and you’ll be seeing these types of veggies on the new reduced Holiday Harvest availability list.

The bad news: While the cold and snow seems to have mostly spared us major damage, the world dealt us a related and unexpected sneak attack (always!). While we were worrying about crushed greenhouses (didn’t happen), frozen dead vegetables (didn’t happen), and flooding (hasn’t happened yet), the completely unexpected did happen. The deep snow covered all the nearby grass seed and wheat fields for many days, leaving our taller brassica plantings as the only exposed greenery. Not surprisingly, hungry Canada geese showed up and have all but decimated many of the crops farther from the house: some kale, collard greens, and our over-wintering cauliflower. The leaves look like they’ve been attacked by really big giant massively hungry slugs. Yuck. Casey is outside right now building makeshift scarecrows (or more appropriate: ‘scare goose’), and we hope that helps remind the geese that there’s other stuff to eat! It’s frustrating, but the geese damage is a reminder of several important farming principles: always plant more than you need; expect the unexpected; be prepared for losses; and, stay calm, because throwing tantrums doesn’t make anything better.

The good news again: Really, we feel like we’re doing great, even with the surprise geese attack. We are so glad that we row-covered as many vegetables as we did: they appear to have weathered the storm well aside from some crushed leaves. Plus, they were hidden from hungry geese! With all this snow melting and rain falling, we’re also grateful for our well-drained soil. It’s a little sloppy out there right now, but there’s no standing water anywhere. Our vegetables can breathe! Hoorah!

Finally, for your viewing displeasure, we thought we’d share some really ugly photos from our post-snowpocalpytic farmscape … ’tain’t alwayz purdy out here, folks!

Scare gooses & chomped on brassicas.

Chomp chomp chomp chomp. Canada geese = big flying slugs.

Another scare goose in our cover crop field of dead fava beans.

There used to be living chard plants here. Now there’s just rainbow-colored slime.

The field houses and very dead tomato plants.

And ugliest of all: post-snowpocalypse in town at a big box store parking lot. Yuck!!!!!