What's New?

A little snowy today. Nothing major, Just a dusting. Thanks to Rufus at the Weather Cafe we saw this one coming for days. His forecast was spot on. All of the other guys (you too Cliff) did'nt see it until it was upon us. I was hoping to direct sow some of our outdoor beds but decided to hold off until this system passes through. Because of the Weather Cafe forecast I was able to get some beds made. Now that it has rained it will be awhile before we can get equipment back in the field. This happens almost every year. It's a good time to be watching the weather so you can hit these micro windows of opportunity. This year they were few and far between and were "one day" opportunities. We are fortunate to have about 20 beds ready to roll.

So days will be spent in the greenhouse starting flats to be transplanted later. Check out the calendar on the web site and you can see what is being sown. I've made a deciscion to hold off on sowing tomatoes until at least March 1st. I normally go a little earlier but it seems to work out all the same in the end. Start them too early and there is not enough light and you wind up with a spindly albeit sometimes big plant. I'll take a shorter, stockier, healthier plant any day over a big ol spindly thing. Most important, it all gets down to the varieties that do well here. The pacific Northwest is not an easy place to grow toms. Trust your farmer when buying your plants. We have alot of experience with varieties that perform as well as ones that don't.

Hopefully more people will be having home gardens. You might think this is an odd thing for me to say since I make my living selling vegetables. The bottom line for me is I think it's a big part of the overall solution to begin to turn the tide from decades of dissconection of our food sources. Overall it's good for us if there are more home gardeners. People get enthused about eating better and eating local. That want to buy starts from local growers who know the ropes and lets face it. You can't grow everything, so people will still buy from us. I'm a perfect example. I buy stuff that I don't grow from my fellow farmers all the time.

We are still taking CSA memberships. We seem to be down to a trickle. Happens every year at this time. Late February and March always seem to fall off. Unfortunately It's our toughest time of the year. This year will be hard going into April since we lost our overwinter crops.

That'll do for now.

Keep well,

John