We’ve had ten days of warmer temperatures and the crops are growing like they have a bus to catch. It’s amazing how they want to play catch-up. The corn has tassels. Silks soon to follow. Lately than last year but we’ll take it whenever it arrives. The cucumbers are pumping out; long, green and crisp. Melons and tomatoes are set and gaining weight like a hog at the trough. So hang on to your bibs. The crops are coming.

The average height for the state on corn today, July 1, is 20 inches. The average of all years data collected is 33 inches and the average height in 2007 was 50 inches. That pretty will sums it up. The plants are all short. Even my hollyhocks look funny as they are blooming at two feet. Normal is five or six.

It has really been too cold a plop in the pond it and since I am so far behind from my standing record of April 14th there was no point in jumping in until the pond was above freezing temps. A lot of farmers are feeling pretty frustrated with the late start from the cold spring. Went down to the farmers market and there wasn’t much besides lettuce for sale. I think heat is on the way and things will start growing soon.

We’re pushing hayracks covered with cabbage, broccoli, tomato and pepper transplants into sheds. The rain is coming down slantwise and hard and thick. It came in fast, no intermediary warm-up. Just straight to heavy walls of rain too heavy to do anything but plunge down as fast as possible. I feel a little bit like I’m standing under a waterfall. My rubber boots are full of water and my clothes cling to my body. Linda is steering the tongue, I’m pushing. There is no traction in the puddles. It’s hailing three miles west and four miles south. Got three wagons in and two to go. The rain makes it hard to hear so I shout short directions. One foot. Half inch. Two inches forward. Stop. Go. No conversation.

The fields are saturated no further water holding capacity. Any additional rain can only run off. We finish as the rain slows. We go into the house leaving our wet clothes, a puddle at the door. Martin is just off the phone with the Case dealer in Northfield. They had hail and high winds there.

I woke up thick and groggy this morning, my body a barometric reading. It feels like a it will be a day of storm cells moving in and out rapidly throughout the day. Unstable air. I check my log and see we had hail on June 7 in 2007 and 2005. IN 2006 all I could talk about was eating strawberries and peas, which are at least a week off yet this year.

Can you believe it!
All day long I just wanted to go in the house, turn on the heat and get in a hot tub!

Was it really May 27? We're holding off on pepper planting till this cold spell passes. Hopefully it is the end of it, though weather patterns tend to be just that...... patterns, and since we're in the pattern it's only reasonable to expect it to continue.

The row tunnels are proving valuable this year over the cucumbers and watermelons. We would not be able to plant until at least early June without them. Instead they have two weeks in, they are growing gangbusters in the thermal heat of the tunnels and should come in 2-3 weeks earlier than if we didn't have them.

They have been in the field only five days and already their roots are leaving the root ball and stretching with new white tips bringing moisture and nutrients into the plant. The kale is also doing well in its valley bed. We choose this field because it is dark, fertile soil with excellent moisture holding capacity. The kale is responding with vigor, green color and new leaf growth. A nice thick flush of weeds has germinated. We consider it a good sign of spring and warming soils when thick flushes of lambs quarters and pigweed cover fields. We’re always happy to flush a few weed crops before we plant a cash crop. We go in and cultivate laying the the white threads in the sun to dry.

Today Jared, a grad student from U of Madison planted a sweet corn seed trial plot here on the farm.

See all the brown seed packs on the ground?

Each one is a different stain of corn cultivar, over 200 of them.
Different crosses and strains, being bred specifically for the needs of organic production. Each strain will be evaluated for vigor, flavor, disease resistance, size.
It will be really fascinating to watch their development.

Ode to a Flea Beetle: Oh great connoisseur of all plants Brassica; with your hard shell and springing physique, your voracious appetitive as you munch leaf edges, gathering plant energy to lay your eggs.

You are the great participant, sharing the bounty of the kale patch, willing to graze in common with others. You show no disrespect to the cabbage loppers who share your plate. You do not attack or bite us humans as we work down the aisles picking and bunching leaves for market. Willingly you spring out of our path and resume consumption, on a different leaf, at a different table.

You are not like me, wanting you completely out of the patch, ALL OF YOU, so that ALL of the leaves grow only for my commercial benefit. I view you as competitor. The archenemy: as you mark leaves with holes and brown spots and
cause the creation of phrases like economic threshold and IPM. You do not share my perfectionist attitude about market quality and unmarred leaves. For you kale is life force nutrient source for continuation of your species and in turn the species that feed off of you. You are the guru insect, who teaches me to think holistically. The insect, who, forces me out of my paradigm of perfection, where no leaf is marred and beneficial insects completely control pests species. Despite your tiny size and short life, you are far larger than I and your species will survive beyond the end of the world.

Dang, it didn’t work, I still hate flea beetles.

The corn seed is swollen and full, pregnant with moisture and new growth about to begin.  A tiny nub of a root protrudes, suggesting the possibility of an attempt being made to establish for itself a root-hold in the soil. It was planted over two weeks ago. It looked the same yesterday, and the day before and before and before. Due to the lack of warmth, measuring daily growth would require a microscope and micro ruler. Usually by now we have two plantings up and the third swelling.

We move down the row and uncover a few more, all in the same state of moving from dormancy – toward green and growing and reproduction. To supply the market with a steady consistent supply of corn we monitor the stage of growth carefully to determine the next planting. Planting is not done by the calendar, with strict adherence to days between plantings but by observing the last planting’s growth. In order to create a sequenced harvest with fields coming in one behind the next, producing a steady stream of fresh, perfect maturity sweet corn for the season we monitor the development of the seed. In this case, when it has been cold and growth is severely delayed we may have three-weeks between plantings. In mid summer with plenty of heat it may be four days.

All the kale, broccoli and cabbage that normally would be planted by now are in the field. The crew is doing a great job and are ready for action when the fields are dry enough to enter. The plants aren’t growing much though. Mostly just waiting for some sun and warmth.

It sounds like it is just as cold and wet in much of the region. A farmer from SE MN told me yesterday the only thing he has in are peas.

I looked at Mike this morning and thought: he must be feeling right now the way I always felt in spring.

He was aiming for having the transplants ready to plant April 24th and he did it! The transplants are gorgeous! . They will be ready and PERFECT. His focus is really a pleasure to observe. The field temperatures look good. Days 60-70°F. Nights mid-40s. Mostly sunny. But, nearly every day there is a 50% or more chance of rain. It will be probably be too wet until next week at the earliest. It’s an interesting position for me. I can look at him and remember the anxious feeling of, "Come-on, lets go!", but not feel it. I laugh as I hear myself offer advice from the other side. “Don’t rush it, it will happen when it happens.”

The first weeds germinated a week ago, spreading a green hue over fields and paths. If all living things were obliterated by an apocalypse of global proportion would weed seeds lay dormant ready to rebuild ecosystems again, when the sun and the soil say: okay, time to grow?

Accolades for Mike! The sun has returned and there is not a single plant with damp off in the greenhouse. Last week was tougher than any week I ever carried a greenhouse through and Mike came through with flying colors. All the plants look healthy and vigorous have good color and dynamic roots, a little leggy but that’s to be expected and he’ll be able to get them stockier now that sun and warmth have returned. 

I feel like the transplants look. Long narrow, leggy sprouts with necks craning looking for light, ANY LIGHT, we're equally unfussy and I feel just as competitive as they do about which of us will get it.  I’m not long and narrow, nor am I leggy but I am craning trying to get my head above the clouds and find a little sunshine. I however have access to the Internet  and the National Weather Service and know that growing long and tall won't get me any more sun.

It must be up there here somewhere! For days the clouds have been dense down blankets blocking all evidence of a sun above. If this keeps up we’ll have to bring lights into the greenhouse. 

Heaven on earth in the form of 58° and sun all day. But looking ahead via National Weather Service is dismal indeed with a forecast of seven days thick clouds, rain, rain and heavier rain, cold temps and possibility of twelve inches of snow. I am so ready for spring, digging in dirt and sun. I decide the best way through it is to stock up on sun, air and motion so Carrie and I go off for a five hour tromp. Out the door, through the fields, down the railroad tracks and dirt township roads. Executive decision no hat or sunscreen. I know I’d get burnt but hope it will carry me through the week ahead.

I’m coaching Mike, the GOE greenhouse man: keep the water really sparse in the greenhouse. Just spot water lightly plants that can’t stay alive without it. The week ahead will be prime for damp-off and if the plants go into it wet; with minimal sun or light and cold temps they won’t use much water and they will sit wet for days. Prime conditions for damp-off to establish  and take a greenhouse down.

Spring is just something awful in the way of distraction. If I actually wanted to get anything done at a desk I’d have to hide away in a windowless room, but of course that wouldn’t work either. Grade school was complete torture; chained to a desk with the spring wafting in, soil smells and birds calling. When it was time to go to college I knew I’d never make it to class until late November and wouldn’t last past March, so why bother. Instead I went to the college of hard knocks in a vegetable patch. PhD via soil and seed.

The chives are up, nothing showing above ground in the asparagus but I know the roots are stirring below. A favorite spring activity of mine, before much life is showing above ground: go outside and sit on the ground by a plant I love or want to have a better understanding of. Imagine the ROOTS. There is a complex and evolved world below the soil surface, Out of sight  there is much we don't know about it.    

• It’s helpful to know that many species have roots that are similar in length and branches as their tops.
• Most trees have roots systems equal in size or larger than their tops.
• Think of squash plants with their trailing vines. The roots often go 10 feet deep and sprawl in all directions.
• Another good way to study roots with out killing the plants you love is to dig up weeds with a shovel far from the plant so that you don’t cut the roots. Shake off the dirt and study the root structure in relation to the plant.

There’s a whole lot more going on down there than just bringing up water and nutrients.
 
Imagine the different kinds of roots.

I woke up this morning thinking; I am a creature of seasons. Up until this point of my life I have lived according to the seasons, winter being a time of rest and hibernation, a time of recouping, recovering, reorganizing, reprocessing, replacing. And in spring the mind comes to rebirth again and the body leaps up in energy as I too have the spring vitality to burst through the crust of winter. I wake with the birds, ready for another stab at the glory of life and spring birth.

I expect only to continue as a seasonal variant, the sun, it’s oscillating angles and intensities dictating my energy and creativity. My source of ingenuity and inventiveness. It’s a fascinating process, this transition from running the farm to…., the roots are down and the growing tip is moving up.

As you read this, Gardens of Eagan (GOE) greenhouses are full of miniature transplants at dark-green, four-leaf stage. Each plant stands upright in its bed of peat and compost; its cotyledon leaves fading from green to yellow. The cotyledons have completed their stored energy role of bursting out of seed and providing nutrient support until the plant’s roots and leaves are ready to photosynthesize their own food. Mission accomplished, they will drop off and decompose as the “true” leaves step up to the purpose of gathering sunlight and carbon dioxide, mixing with water and turning it into plant super food.

There are around 13,500 kale transplants smiling in the sun here, which is the same number of Wedge members who are now part of owning Gardens of Eagan Farm. Right now, these 13,500-miniature kale plants could be packed together, barely filing a five-gallon bucket. By the end of April, they will be six-inches tall and ready for transplanting. The beginning of exponential growth, by mid-June harvest should begin and last for five months until mid-November. By fall, if all goes well, these 13,500 kale plants will have produced 740,160 leaves, the equivalent of 7.71 semi loads of kale for Twin Cities consumption; from less than half a cup of seed.

The excitement of spring potential is everywhere on the farm in April, It is in the mud and the compost and the first spring weeds busting through the winter crust. Already the soil synergy is speeding up as bacteria break down last summer’s plant residue and fungi colonize roots, aggregating the soil and sourcing minerals for the plants. The excitement is in the water, moving free after a winter frozen; and the insects, beneficial and pest, as they crawl out from under their winter’s leaf litter shelter and return to their active roles in the farm’s ecosystem. Most of the farm’s crew has returned and they are as full of spring sass as all the other species here.

And the excitement of spring is in the marrow of the new GOE/Wedge fusion. It’s not just: GOE: staff, soil and ecosystems + Wedge: bountiful wellspring of local organic food and its committed member/owners + Linda Halley: new GOE farm manager extraordinaire = new improved GOE/Wedge. It is so much bigger than a sum of the parts and wafts the promised potential of spring.

Here’s to toasting the inspiring dance of relationships between species and to all of us cotyledons contributing our stored energy to growth and education and human super food.

One flake, then waiting, minutes later another. The sky is dense, ashen grey. The air holds heavy expectancy that just won’t deliver. As if nature has become too anxious to relax and will need a stimulant to open up and let the snow out so we can move on to the next stage of spring. As if the flakes are frozen in aerial suspension, blocking spring from ever coming. The angle of the morning light, the little bit that is making it through the thick clouds, says spring is here!, but the sky and the air say winter will never leave.

There was a year in the 1880’s referred to as the year winter never left. There was frost every month and no crops. In the days before mass transit of food this meant a very hungry winter. What would happen today if the United States had broad crop failure? What would happen if the world had wide-ranging crop failure?

Farmers  are saying funny things to me like, “I like it, it gives me more time”, (nice idea but cramming timely spring work into less dry days is not my idea of more time) and “this is going to be a late spring”. (this is Minnesota, the switch can flip and we could go from today snow, tomorrow high temps and sun.)

Twenty minutes later and it’s starting to pick up; just a little. The flakes are regular now every ten seconds but still just a tentative beginning of the ten inches forecasted. We are all so. ready. for. spring. I remind myself to be mindful and notice the beauty and purity of a good spring snowstorm. But!, I live by the seasons!, and I’ve decided enough of this one!. I scream out for days of spring sun, and first leaves bursting through, strawberry blossoms and waking insects and bird songs of delight. I ache to sink my hands into cool, fragrant soil, plant the first beets, parsnips, radishes and peas. 

Linda is creating systems and order, setting up the structure that will be the frame board, which keeps it all moving in the right direction when it is time to run. Mike and Dave have been sorting and cleaning, writing field plans and taking care of equipment. Crop sequences are planned and field maps made. All fears and concerns I had as to how this would work have dissolved in the bright light of structure and I am full of complete optimism for the success of this project.

By Sunday the first cotyledon will be breaking the surface in the greenhouse and the growing season official starts again.

Nothing like a good cold winter for a healthy, spiritual hibernation. For the last two weeks I have been standing at a south window most every morning watching the sunrise and sensing spring at the edge of awareness. It looked like winter and the temperature and ice said winter. But spring slipping in was subtly perceivable in faint smells and the texture and hue of light-shadow relationship as the sun’s slant slipped gradually north. When I suggested Mike begin seeding today, I knew in my spirit that spring would be here today and YES it is.

It woke me at sunrise this morning screaming; – OPEN THE WINDOWS - LET ME IN – COME OUT AND SMELL ME – LET GO OF YOUR WINTER DREAMS – LIFE IS RETURNING

It never fails to reach me. Spring is like being born all over again. Like a giant vessel of life and light pour into my being and energize me with joy, strength and energy.

Night after night has been below zero which made for frequent cooler temperature checks. It feels fantastic to have it all shipped to town and the trucks washed and stored for the winter. Thanks to Co-op Partners Warehouse for being willing to take all 149 remaining cases to their warehouse so that we can shut down here. In the past we used to ship cabbage until March or April out of storage. Having a steady winter income helped keep us on the farm and out of winter jobs. We still grow as much cabbage but since the market has grown so much we run out much earlier.

With the 2007 crop all packed and sold, its time for winter work: equipment repair, planning, research, books, buying seed and other inputs. And……….. two-hour cross country ski sessions followed by a delectable mid-day, winter nap. Of I go.