August 2024 Newsletter: Summer produce hitting its stride

August is here, and with it summer’s favorite crops have arrived! As I write this, the humidity is back with a vengeance after a brief two-day respite from a very hot summer. Having barely survived last year’s constant deluges and this early spring’s flooding, I had sworn off complaining about dry weather—if I found myself beginning to wax wistful about a deficit of natural precipitation, I would quickly shut that down, summoning nightmare images of geese swimming in our production fields, and harvest crew up to their knees in muck attempting to navigate the sodden vegetable beds. My commitment to such stoicism has been tested this year, which has turned out to be everything last year was not—dry, dusty and hot. In many ways, dry weather is far preferable to constant rain—more of our low-lying acreage is available to use for cash crops, disease pressure tends to be much lower, weeds are easier to control without intermittent showers bringing them back to life. On the other hand, hot and dry can be a challenging combination for a farm that is seeding and planting new crops almost on a daily basis—even hardened plants that were well hydrated before planting can only survive a few hours of 90+ degrees and bright sunshine before they start to crisp up and die—only timely and sufficient irrigation will keep them alive, so that has been a constant chore. Even heat-loving crops such as tomatoes and eggplant have a hard time with very high temperatures, which can interfere with pollination and cause uneven ripening, and the extreme heat and humidity wreaks havoc on the equanimity and amiability of our usually unflappable field crew. Thankfully, we appear to have avoided most of these heat-related pitfalls—some of our crops have “failed to thrive” in the last few scorching weeks, but generally we have been able to nurse them along and have had some excellent crops. Corn came early and abundant and has continued to provide plentiful yields each day. Despite some unusual insect damage (primarily from Colorado Potato Beetles who are trying a new faddish tomato diet), our tomatoes have been prolific with excellent flavor and are just now hitting their stride—and their foliage still looks green and healthy, meaning we hope to pick good fruit well into the late season. Apples present a special challenge for the organic grower in the Northeast—ours have tended to biennial bearing for many years now, the pattern being big crop on odd numbered years, virtually no crop on even numbered years. Last year was “supposed” to be a bumper crop, but briefly plummeting temperatures first in February and then again in April, along with unrelenting rain, foiled our expectations, and we had a slim crop in 2023. The good news is that the apples rebounded quite well this year, and for the first time in more than a decade, we appear to have a very good crop in an even numbered year. We’re hoping we have reversed the curse, and will have a more consistent annual apple harvest going forward (but who knows?). Peppers are just starting to come into the stand, green beans have been plentiful and beautiful, while some of our watermelons were taken out by coyotes, we still have more coming in. The onions have begun to make appearances in the stand, as well as a beautiful brassica crop – broccoli, cabbage, and more! Plenty of scallions, leeks, celery, beets, and carrots too. You can find a listing of what’s available at any time on our website by clicking on the “what’s at the stand” tab which is updated throughout the day, as we try to give you the most up to date listing. Similarly, the “what’s at the farmers market” tab tells you each morning of our farmers market what was loaded on the truck. We hope to see you soon, either at the farmstand in Concord, or at the farmers markets to enjoy all that summer in New England can provide! -Brian Cramer, Liza Bemis, and the Hutchins Farm Crew PS: as our summer crew abandons us in September for their higher education endeavors, we are hiring for both farmstand/markets and on the field crew. Please see our website for a brief job description and requirements if you know anyone interested in fall work!