Dealing with Deer

From SHF CSA

This spring our biggest challenge seemed to be digging beds fast enough to plant. As we moved into the summer months germinating seeds turned into our challenge. Now it's deer. For the most part it's not been a huge issue, just a little nibbling around the edges. As a short term fix for this year we've been using salvaged row cover and simply covering the crops when we're not at the farm. Occasionally we come to the farm after a bit of wind to find that the wind has removed the cover and the deer are taking advantage. About 1/3 of the kale was eaten last week. The deer are kind enough to leave the growing tips so the plants will regrow, but they do an effective job of removing all of the leaves, as is apparent in the photo above.

From SHF CSA

Chicories seem to be their favorites. Unfortunately these don't really grow back, especially when they tear them out of the soft ground. How to solve deer issues is not clear cut for me. They live on the island too, and it's a bit arbitrary that we claim a certain little chunk of space for ourselves and ask the deer, mice and slugs not to eat from it. Fencing is the surefire approach but there are a number of drawbacks with fences. A proper deer fence needs to be about 8' to really be effective and fences are expensive, especially if you care what they look like and how long they'll last. The floating row cover is inexpensive but not particularly reliable and it also makes takes time to put on and take off all week. Nita suggested laying plastic deer fencing directly on top of the crops, and we'll be experimenting with that (thanks for that suggestion, Nita). This would have a few advantages over row cover, it probably doesn't blow off, and you can actually see what's happening underneath, but we'd still have to take it on and off so I'm not completely sold. I've got a handful of other ideas and techniques that will bounce around for a while, things like dogs, blood meal, fishing line. Some day we might even settle on one. Meanwhile I'm ok with a little damage if it means we can leave the space open and still have enough to go in the shares for the next five weeks.

PS Danny is harvesting solo tomorrow, and hoping to put out a slightly oversized share to carry folks through Thanksgiving week. All of this to allow me to head down to a meeting on small grain production. This also means there probably won't be a blog post on the share until Friday - you'll just have to wait for the bags to see what's in them.

Carrots and Greens

We cleared about half the remaining carrots in the field today. We also found that it's a little tough to know what's underground until you start digging. We dug from three different plantings. The first one, fortunately a small one, had lots of yellowing carrot tops sticking out of the ground but as soon as we started digging it became obvious that there were no roots attached to the tops, thus the yellowing. Some rodent had eaten all but two or three carrots, right up to the base of the stems.

The escarole was also very ready so we cut most of the remaining heads, and usually chard succumbs to frost before this point in the fall so we picked the remaining leaves. We've only had a couple of light frosts to date so many of the marginal fall crops are still alive and growing. We pulled the remaining cilantro, also usually dead by this point, and that rounds out the shares.

Fall seeded favas are just starting to poke up. We're worried about deer browsing so I hoed between the rows to loosen the rain packed soil and set back any weeds and then we covered the bed with floating row cover. I also hoed the fall planted onions, and raked the tops of the garlic beds, a quick job when the weeds are small, and beneficial for letting more moisture into the beds. Next spring there should be some good early crops.

Riccia!

We went ahead and harvested more chicory today, it looks so beautiful right now. Today's selection is a riccia frisse. Like the escarole the most prized parts are the thick, sweet ribs and blanched hearts, but it's all good in the end, especially if you like the slightly bitter tones of the green parts. Frisse is frequently paired with fruit, like apples or pears, and maybe a little fresh goat cheese. There's more celery in the share, as well as beets and some rainbow lacinato which has been growing huge with all this warm weather. We'll see how much longer that lasts but I'm actually looking forward to the possibility of a little freeze at some point which would sweeten some of the greens and roots.

We had originally planned on the CSA going for six more weeks, until the week before Christmas. As Thanksgiving falls on a Thursday this year (I suppose it does every year really) we're planning on not harvesting that week, but giving a double large share the week before (if we can fit is all in the bags). The produce should keep well this time of year so as long as you have room in the refrigerator (or a cool cupboard) the produce should last two weeks. Depending on the weather we should have enough produce to get us through December but we may combine the final two weeks as well. We'll keep you informed here, as well as with e-mails.

Around the farm

From SHF CSA

I stopped at one point during the harvest day last week and looked around me. It was raining and cold. I didn't realize how cold my hands were until I got in the car and couldn't turn the key in the ignition. But this season is really, really beautiful and I had this overwhelming feeling of gratitude that the work of the day had gotten me out in the weather. Like I said, once I was out in it, I didn't really notice the wet and cold, just how beautiful all of the little scenes were.

From SHF CSA

Even with the beautiful scenery, Danny and I harvested the shares, packed the bags and then moved indoors to start planning for next season.

The Greens

Our first rainy day harvest. It was cold and dark and wet this morning when I left the house, but by the time Danny showed up at the farm it was quite a bit warmer, the rain had slowed to a drizzle and there was plenty of light. We pulled some beautiful Hakurei turnips for the share. These are sweet enough to eat raw, although they are also good cooked and they aren't quite as sweet as spring plantings. We harvested chard leaves heavy today. We'll probably get another harvest if it doesn't frost, but frost will make the stems soft and leaves slimy so we pulled most of the good sized leaves today. The fennel is another one that doesn't like frost, and even though there's none in the forecast its growth has slowed way down and the tips of the leaves are starting to yellow from too much water and cold and wind so we cut every last one of them for the shares, no more until next year. Finally, we've started in on the cool season heads with escarole. The variety is bionda cuore pieno, a full hearted light green escarole. If you're not familiar, escaroles are similar to a very hardy lettuce. Some people find them slightly bitter, but this time of year they can also be very sweet. My favorite thing to do with escarole is to slice it into thin ribbons (across the ribs), soak it in ice water for fifteen minutes to a half hour to crisp it up and leach any bitterness, and then toss it with a nice olive oil, lemon and salt dressing, and maybe some anchovies. It can also be cooked with olive oil and salt, but I save that for pan di zucchero, which we'll be giving out later in the season.

Farewell to lettuce

Lettuce has been a solid staple for us in the shares this year. This time of year, with the cold, damp conditions the lettuce starts to complain so we cut the last of it today, a bit of red iceberg. We do have a variety of chicories, close relatives of lettuce, and more cold hardy, that will show up in shares over the next eight weeks. Also finishing up are the shell beans. Most of them are pignas, same as last week, but a few shares will get tolosakas, a black bean also brought back from my trip to Italy. The yellowstone carrots and tango celery stalks would cook up nicely with the beans. There's a bit of noorman spinach in the share which would round out a salad or be nice sauteed next to the beans.

Post frost

Here we are with our first post frost harvest. Danny came out to the farm on Sunday to salvage peppers before it froze a little harder that night. All the summer crops are done now, which is bittersweet for us. We're excited for fall but it's hard to leave behind tomatoes and peppers sometimes. There's one special item in your share this week, shelling beans. These need to be pulled out of the pods and then gently boiled in salted water until they're tender. Use just enough water to cover the beans and not boil down below the beans while you're cooking them. This usually takes about 15 minutes but it varies a little depending on the moisture in the beans. The variety is called Pigna and is something I picked up at a food show in Italy during the Terra Madre conference three years ago. I've been growing these out ever since then and hoped to have them for you dry but the timing didn't work this season.

There are also the last salvaged peppers. Unless the ones you get already have a little red they will not color more so eat them green. There is lettuce in this week's share and we'll have the last of the lettuce next week before switching into more cold hardy greens. The last of the dill is in small bunches, just enough to make a little dressing or flavor some raita. The leafy greens are raab which is a little like mustard greens without the bite. These should be cooked before eating.