Peas and fava beans are germinating nicely. On these beds the two outside rows are fava beans. They will grow about 3 feet tall. The middle row is peas, which we will harvest in the new year as pea shoots. We will need the space they are in for walking through and picking the fava beans in the spring. There are other beds that just have three rows of peas. We will leave these to mature and pick as delicious sugar snap peas. All these beds needed hoeing with our finger weeder. Unfortunately on Saturday they were still too wet to cultivate, then it rained again. We are hoping to get another chance later this week. We like to get the weeds when they are small, it is much easier to remove them.
We have some beautiful beds of lettuce and spinach on the farm. About time I hear, yes. We had a hard time germinating the crop in September/October due to the above normal temperatures.
As you can see we have a red oak leaf in the center of the bed with romaine on the right and a green crips on the left. Our plan is to give you a mixed bag of all three. Please wash only what you are going to eat. The rest will keep so much better in the bag, unwashed in your crisper.
The oranges in your box today are from our orchard. The trees are growing and producing more each year. We need more citrus than we can grow, which is why our good friends Cassie and Nacho from Twin Girls Farm help us out with their organic citrus.
In past years we have fertilized the citrus with spent coffee grounds from Blue Bottle Coffee. Those were no longer available so the chicken tractors were sent down between the rows of citrus. The fertility left behind by the moving chickens has really greened up the leaves of the oranges. There are great crops of Pomelos and grapefruit for the New Year too. The Seville oranges are a little light than normal. We will let you know when they are ready so you can order them for marmalade making.