Greetings all and happy Dog Days!  Thought I'd take a moment to post a quick blog since there were quite a few photo worthy items in the harvest today.  I've started harvesting a few cucumbers per week.  If we get some rain and I then get a chance to mulch the beds we might even get enough to include them on our CSA lists.  Right now everything is just sitting in the garden not producing as it should.  But they say rain is on the way for this weekend so keep your fingers crossed.  These are a Maine-bred heirloom cucumber called Boothby's Blonde.  They are delicious and interesting!

 Carrots, carrots, carrots!  I got our new bed-lifter this week and I've been trying it out on everything I can.  I can say that it doesn't work on our carrots simply because I didn't set-up the beds to fit the tractor.  So I'll be digging the carrots by hand going forward as I have been.  Perhaps next year I'll put in a few feet with the bed-lifter in mind.  But, as a side benefit for you all, I'll be offering 'seconds' next week in the Member's Choice Email.  These are the carrots from about 6 feet of garden where I tried the bed-lifter and it simply sheered off the bottoms of the carrots.  Oh well!!!

Sunburst Patty-pan Summer Squash.  These little ones can be cooked the same way as any other summer squash.  We use the larger ones to stuff and roast.  I've had a number of folks at market try our recipe and come back with alternative suggestions for stuffing which I hope to try.  I also hope to get a chance to include some of the recipes on our recipes page but we'll see what time allows.

This rare French Heirloom is called 'Lemon' summer squash.  Nope, it doesn't taste like a lemon at all.  That comes from the aesthetic match.  Rather, it is a delicate, tiny summer squash offered in many French markets.  They are very difficult to harvest in time.  Much bigger than a golf ball and they are tough and worthless.  I've been experimenting with them the last couple years and may try to grow them more in the future for markets.  We'll see!

The large, slicing hybrid tomatoes in the hoop houses are starting to come in in greater numbers.  I was able to include 2 lbs in each of the Farmer's Choice Shares today!  Wahoo!

The ever dependable Swiss Chard plants are still kicking!  Drought tolerant too!  I love Chard for it's beauty, taste, diversity and ability to grow in the harshest conditions and swings in weather.

Royal Burgandy Beans.  They've finally arrived!  These are wonderful eaten raw as a snack.  When cooked they are ok but I eat them raw because I like the flavor, they are a crisp yet moist snack and the color fades to green when cooked (like most colorful veggies).

Sun Gold Cherry Tomatoes.  The one and only.  We had 20 orders for these today.  Very popular!  Very understandable.  Greenhouse candy!

Raven Zucchini.  Impressive for its ability to continue to produce prodigious amounts of food even in this weather!

I've started offering these delicious Detroit Dark Red Beets.  So sweet and flavorful I can't imagine not growing these beauties.  I love them as an eater and a grower.   

I couldn't resist.  This is what keeps me going even when I wake up at 4, 3 or even 2 am to harvest fresh for all of our members and customers each day.  Farmer Fuel.

Along with the beets, we are also offering a new item this summer.  Rather than discard the leaves, we are taking the time to sort and clean them and offer them to our members as prepared beet greens.  This is perfect for those of us who love beet greens but don't like the fact that we have to float them in our sink to remove the garden soil and then have a sink full of soil to clean up.  We've done all the work for you.  No beets or other roots to worry about, simply remove them from the bag, rinse them with your faucet spray nozzle and toss into the steaming water as normal.

Here is our new bed-lifter courtesy of Leighton's Fabrication Shop in Stetson.  These guys are really, really good and willing to work with people on designs of things they've never even heard of.  They do great work and so does this wonderful item.  This is making our garlic harvest so much faster I can't even quantify the difference.

Speaking of Garlic, here is the beginnings of this year's project.  Ben and I harvested about 1.5 rows on Wednesday and I'll be doing some more this weekend once the bees nest we (ok it was Ben but he didn't get stung) overturned has cleared out.  Then it's up to hang in the barn for curing, then sorting and then we can begin offering it to our members.

Finally, we love basil pesto at our house.  I mean LOVE.  Last year we froze about 60 batches worth.  At this time of year I like to add other fresh items from the garden as well.  Here is what I had for dinner.  Basil and carrot pesto.  I simply make regular pesto but throw some roughly chopped carrots in the processor with everything else.  The carrots add a wonderful je ne sais qua.  I hope you'll try it!

Some things coming along in the garden.  We only had a few of our cucumber plants make it through the wet, buggy, then dry as a bone summer we've had up to this point.  But now, the ones that made it this far are beginning to produce some cukes!

More and more zucchini!  I am now just trying to stay ahead of it and keep it reasonably small but for the few that I let go for the purpose of getting larger for breads, soups, frying, etc.  Staying ahead of zucchini is no small feat!  This is our Raven Zucchini.

And here is a Golden Glory Summer Squash.  Like our cucumbers, we didn't have many transplants make it but enough to get one every day or so.  I mix them in with the zucchini at market for color and interest.

Green Tiger Zucchini

Another Raven

Golden Butterwax Bush Bean.  My favorite bush bean for fresh eating.

This was the scene above me last night while I was snapping photos, digging walking paths and being outsmarted by a groundhog.  Quite nice actually.  (The moon, not the groundhog).)

One of my favorite 'firsts' in the garden each year is the Sun Gold crop.  First one always goes to Lizzie but I'm not far behind.  They are coming along nicely and we included them in our Member's Choice Email this week and hope to have them in the Farmer's Choice Bags as soon as we can harvest a good quantity.

Fordhook Giant Chard

Bright Lights Chard

Ailsa Craig Onion - Hard to believe it's almost time to harvest the onions and garlic and begin curing them all!

Green King Broccoli.

These are flowers for our Royal Burgandy Bush Beans.  Beans forthcoming hopefully but I love the way these look in the field.

Boothby Blonde Cucumber.  A Maine bred heirloom.

Lemon Cucumber.  Another 'weird' variety I saw in a catalog and fell in love with after giving it a try.

Well, that's all for now.  Back into the fray.

Hi all:  Sorry I've been a little lax in the blog department lately.  I've been so busy growing the plants we want and trying to stop the ones we don't that I haven't had much time to take photos or type up a blog post.  Today, Lizzie went for a day trip with Grammy and her cousins and I spent the day with Martin.  We had a great time on the farm and made a delivery to Barrels Community Market in Waterville.  

 Here is Mars watching the pigs just after I fed them.  We sold 4 piglets this weekend to a family in Newburgh.  The remaining 7 are ours to raise for ourselves, our family and our members.  We have 4 half pig shares left to sell but for now Martin is enjoying learning about the 'iggies'.

 Just on the other side of the pig paddock you can see that haying season is upon us.  John is on the tractor in the distance.  As Dave Mallet sings, 'You have to make hay when the sun shines...'.

And now for some shots of some of the wonderful items available from our gardens at this time of year.

 Red Saladbowl Lettuce

 Provider Bush Beans

 Costata Romanesco Zucchini

 Sunburst Patty Pan Squash

 Raven Zucchini

 This is one of the trial zucchini we're growing for Fedco Seeds.  Green Tiger.  It's really cool!

Blue Wind Broccoli

 Red Russian Kale

 White Russian Kale

And here are the honeybees hard at work.  If you look closely you can see them flying in with their finds.  It is so fun to watch them.  On the other side is a window.  I hope to get a photo of the inside of the hive for you before they swarm!

Other than that I've been weeding in the evenings and trying to keep ahead of cultivating with the stir-up hoe in the afternoons when it's hot and the weeds don't stand a chance.  Things are looking good in the garden.  Keep your eye out for our email about this year's Parker Family Farm Annual Member Picnic.  Details coming soon!

One week until Farmer's Choice

Greetings all:

Only one week from today will see the first harvest of our Farmer's Choice Shares so I figured I would start practicing our regular blog updates.  Here are a few of the items we'll have available at markets this week.  Many, if not all of these will also be in the Farmer's Choice Share next week and be on the list of available items for our Member's Choice Members.

 Baby Red Pac Choi

All new!  This is our newest experiment.  A wonderful lettuce mix from High Mowing Seeds, an organic seed company based in Vermont.  We're proud to purchase seed from High Mowing and grateful for all of the company's work to protect our food supply.  This lettuce mix is stunning!

Australe Head Lettuce

Dancine Head Lettuce - A wonderful, dense, green bibb type lettuce.

Here we are at the Brewer Market where we set-up on Thursdays and Saturdays

If you're reading this blog, you probably already know...

Today was the first harvest of our radish mix.  Beautiful way to fill out a market display box don't you think?

And finally, the earliest snap peas around.  MOFGA's organic price report doesn't even list peas as an option at the time we have these available.  Many a late night dash around the garden to cover a huge area with a massive tarp or two, coupled with some other season extension techniques allows me to plant these gems in late February or early March.  Worth it!!!

See you soon.