A Chill in the Air

What a beautiful stretch of weather! Except for a very few brief showers we have had nothing but clear sunny and cool days for all of September. The last day with significant rainfall was August 29 when we received 1.75 inches. This dry spell will no doubt counter balance all the rain earlier in the summer and the record books will list 2009 as an average year for rain. But don't be fooled, the recorded rain for June, July, and August in Albany was the third wettest on record and the two wetter years were both in the 1800's. So... we did have good reason to complain about all the rain.

The clear weather has also brought cool temperatures in the past few nights. We woke on Saturday morning to go to market and found heavy frost on the truck windshield. There were only scattered patches of frost on the lawn and temperatures were not low enough to kill any plants, but it was downright chilly. Out came the long underwear, wool hats, and gloves to go to market. It warmed up fast, but stayed cool under the pavilions when we weren't moving around too much. The threat of frost has also brought out all the row cover to protect the crops and try to keep them growing a little longer. Sometimes I feel more like a chamber maid than a farmer... put on the sheets, take off the sheets, day after day. The photos this week give a good idea of the state of the farm this time of year. Just a few sections of field with crops left on them, field tunnels and greenhouses closed up for warmth, and lots of row cover. Note: we were on the roof cleaning the wood stove chimney - I'm always impressed by what a great view it is up there.

Activities on the farm start to shift this time of year from seeding and planting to clean-up and putting fields to bed. The last planting for the season went in this past week - a late patch of boc choi and stir-fry greens. There are two more weeks of greenhouse baby greens to seed, but all the outside crops are finally in. This next week we will start to get our winter cover crops seeded on all the open sections of field. We usually seed a mixture of oats, peas and vetch at this time of year and shift to rye and vetch on the sections we don't get to until October. The season marches on.