This was a very busy Friday for Romaine Calm! After a week with no scheduled workdays, our garden needed some serious damage control. Luckily, most of our plants are growing great, but so are the weeds. Today was dedicated to weeding, pest control, fertilizing, and harvesting!
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| Bryce mowing |
Bryce mowed all the alleyways in between our planting rows to suppress the weeds growing there. After mowing, we put down a thick layer of hay to block light from the developing weeds. Using the push lawnmower was very convenient, compared to the hand-weeding that had to be done around the crops.
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| Mily weeding in low tunnel |
The protected environment and the low height of leafy greens makes the low tunnel especially inviting for weeds. Most of the open row plants are tall enough to shade out weeds, but a few of the weeds in the low tunnel were actually bigger than our cilantro. The cilantro needs a little more time, but the cabbage, arugula, and pac choi are all huge!
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| Arugula and pac choi harvest |
Our pac choi and arugula were so large that we were able to harvest our first vegetables! To make sure the plants keep growing, we only took the bottom leaves and left the meristem intact. We harvested .1 lbs of arugula and .5 lbs of pac choi. The harvest was split among the group members to enjoy at home.
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| Leaf roller on bean leaf |
We love our beans, but so do leaf roller caterpillars. When they're not eating, these pesky critters use silk to fold over bits of leaf for protection. They prefer beans, but they also use cucumber leaves. Luckily, they are easy to spot once you know what to look for. Each bean and cucumber plant had to be thoroughly inspected, and the leaf rollers squished by hand. Despite the pests, the beans and cucumbers look very healthy.
The cucumber plants have made a few baby cucumbers! We can't wait to harvest these guys when they get a big bigger.
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| Red cabbage row |
Romaine Calm's pride and joy--our big red cabbages. For a cool season crop, these plants have been thriving surprisingly well in the Florida heat. That's probably due to our use of conventional Diamond R fertilizer. Consistent, small fertilizer applications have kept our plants looking beautiful throughout the season.
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| Brassicas and basil |
Compared to the cabbage, our broccoli, cauliflower, and basil all look a little small. To address this, Colton added 2 lbs of Diamond R fertilizer to the cauliflower and broccoli today. We then put compost on top to help retain the nutrients in the soil, making sure to surround each plant with compost.
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| Trellises |
We've had a lot of success with our trellised plants so far [excepting the cucumbers, which like to grab onto each other or the beans more than the trellis]. Our pea plants just recently got tall enough to need one. If you look closely, you can see the short trellis in the front supporting the peas and the tall trellis in the back supporting the tomatoes. The bushy broad-leaved plants are eggplant, which is thriving. The tomatoes and peppers also got 3.5 lbs of fertilizer today, with compost on top.
Overall, we're thrilled with how good our plot looks. Hopefully many more crops will soon join our first harvest!
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