Winter Pickin': How sunlight affects flavor

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With the winter nearing its end, many changes have taken place on the farm.  The fields and terrace gardens have thawed and been plowed, the greenhouse reemay has finally been taken down and new life is starting to emerge all around us.  Spring is near or should I say, spring is here.  As we take our last cuts of this beautiful rainbow...

Pic of the Week

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Ho-Mi-Z

Blurriness to Clarity: Take another look

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Why is it that when we are introduced to something new we may struggle to see its individuality?  When I first came to the greenhouse all the plants looked the same, all the weeds looked the same.  It was difficult to do anything but generalize them all as plants and not go any further simply because their individual identities were not yet a part of my reality.  As I have spent countless hours learning, working and caring for them while respectfully battling weeds fighting for their fair share of sun and soil nutrients, I have come to see them all as individuals.  All unique in their own right, fighting communally, but wielding their specific strengths in an attempt to thrive.  It's funny to me because I can think back and apply this to many situations I have entered when at first everything looked like a blur, but by continuing to dig deeper and learn more, the uniqueness, individuality and originality always seems to shine through over time.  They say that first impressions are most important, but so many relationships whether plant, human, career etc all evolve over time.  Perception is a funny thing.

Pic of the Week

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Salad spinning all through the winter in the Greenhouse.

I Think We Need A Little Space

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As discussed earlier in the week, our goal was to use the slower growing turnip roots to our advantage by inter-seeding 6 rows of the quicker growing and stunning Ruby Streaks mustard green.  In slightly over a month, as expected, both mustard varieties began to display their true leaves and we were ready to harvest and provide space to the mini turnips that were just getting underway.  Our beautiful plan was executed to perfection and in a matter of minutes we had harvested out the rows of deep purple whole plants leaving only strips of green and brown behind.  Not only was this a great way to get more growth from a potentially empty space, but...

You Scratch My Back, I'll Scratch Yours: Cultivation tools

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On the farm, as in life, sometimes it is the simplest solutions or most subtle changes that make all the difference, but in order to get to a level of understanding that allows for this type of creative thinking, we must first understand the basics of whatever it is we are trying to accomplish.  Air, sun and water are the most quintessential elements required for plants to survive.  Although there are many other factors that contribute to the life of a plant, without these three basic needs, there is no life.  One of the main functions of a greenhouse is to reduce the variables involved in growing.  While we can control much of the quantities and qualities of air, light and water, we are still left to contend with some of the inevitable issues that abound when attempting to create such a controlled growing environment, especially in the winter when the greenhouse creates a cool, moist environment.   One of the biggest challenges that we face by creating this cool, moist environment is the development of moss and fungal pathogens.  As we discussed last week, herbal tea remedies such as chamomile sprays can truly help reduce the spread of these issues, but this is only one piece to the equation.  In addition to the tea spray, we can offer more assistance in this fight by simply cultivating the top layer of soil both in the beds and pathways.  This scratching of the soil surface is a tiny adjustment, but can offer huge benefits such as

Now the Fun Begins: Practicality meet Creativity

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The decrease in sunlight and heat during the winter season creates some interesting relationships in the greenhouse.  Although all growth slows down, some plants are much more sensitive to these climatic changes than others.  By observing these growing patterns over time, we must adjust our seeding patterns to increase the ecological and economic efficiency of the greenhouse.  Each week The Captain and I get together and sort through a list of all the open soil beds that were prepped and rested for at least a week; these are beds that are ready to be seeded.  In order to keep a lively and healthy soil system we maintain a rigorous crop rotation that ensures we never seed the same plant family in the same soil bed twice in a row.  Once a plant family like a lettuce (Compositae) has its final harvest, we move on to a new plant family which may include a carrot (Umbelliferae) or a spinach (Chenopod) for example.   To be doubly sure that no pests or pathogens can multiply or develop colonies in the soil, we make sure to rotate in at least 3 other plant families before we go back to a lettuce.  One complete cycle may look like this:  1st a carrot, 2nd a spinach, 3rd arugula and once all three of those crops have been seeded and harvested respectively we can start thinking about planting another bed of lettuce.  With 7 different plant families and plenty of diversity, this rotation offers a lot of options.  In winter the amount of weekly open beds is somewhere in the 4 to 6 range, in summer it's generally up in the 12+ range, so a major difference here.  When deciding what to plant, we take many factors and people into consideration.  The amount of sunlight, the phase of the moon we are in and the phase of the moon we are approaching, the rate of the seed's germination and growth, the plant family, the restaurants that we want to sell to and the market we want to be prepared for.  Each of these factors help us determine what and when we should seed.  After many years of observing and experiencing, The Captain has a great understanding of how we can proseed (too easy) most efficiently.  So here in January and February we know that certain vegetables such as...

From the Garden to the Garden: Chamomile tea an all-natural, chemical-free solution to prevent fungal development

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One of the beautiful things about working on a farm focused on sustainable, regenerative agriculture is the emphasis on the living system.  The plants we grow are only as strong as the soil they grow in and in-turn depend on the thriving ecosystem of microbiology found in the soil as well as the added nutrients used to increase soil vitality.  This provides a strong base from which plants thrive and produce healthy, delicious food.  Understanding that, we are focused first and foremost on buildling the strongest and healthiest soil possible.  During Fall, Winter and Spring transitions, many people become more susceptible to disease and I've noticed that the soil also faces these same challenges.  Unlike my ENT who likes to just hand me a bunch of antibiotics and walk out the door, The Captain uses some very effective old school methods of boosting the soil's immune system and this way there is no need to toss relatively new chemical solutions at an age old problem that has already created it's own solutions long ago.  The best part is so many of these all-natural solutions are found right in our own backyard.  Although the soil we are working in at Stone Barns has a healthy base of organic matter through compost and other natural soil amendments like Kelp, every fall and winter season there seems to be an onset of fungal and moss issues as the humidity and cool weather combine to be a haven for these infestations.  In order to counteract this, we use a number of all natural solutions, one of which is chamomile which can be found growing all summer in the terrace garden.  This comes in handy, not only for hot tea on cold winter nights, but as a great...