Month: July 2025

Farewell to Camila

July 28, 2025

I set my alarm for 3:30 am this morning. A cup of coffee, threw in a couple suitcases, and we at Hector Airport by 5 am. Early morning, but necessary to transport such important cargo.

Camila is the same age as my daughter and certainly received the Mexican gene for working hard. As soon as we finished one task, she was asking about the next, only stopping every so often to fill her Minerva University water bottle. Together we planted, weeded, and harvested, sometimes for 10+ hours in a day. She put up with my bad humor and ramblings about everything from the internet ruining our brains to details about growing tomatoes. In return, she taught me about Mexican geography and culture and rekindled my spirit for the everyday joy of farm work. It takes a novice to show the veteran just how much farming is a miracle, growing abundance from some tiny seeds.

By dinner she’ll be eating pozole in Mexico City and I’ll be back to flying (mostly) solo. Still, I know that she left some of her upbeat and can-do spirit at the farm to help me through the season. Camila – we miss you and wish you the best. Thank you for your efforts this summer!

In the box:

  • Broccoli
  • Carrots
  • Red Potatoes
  • A couple onions
  • A couple regular cucumbers
  • Dino Kale
  • A Baby Bok Choy

Veggie Timing

July 21, 2025

In the world of vegetable growing, there are three distinct seasons: early season, high season, and fall. I suppose it could be early, middle, and late, but I like the term high season.

Early season is all radishes and greens and things out of the high tunnel. It’s the time of the year when we appreciate anything coming out of the garden and excited to have something fresh. But we’re now transitioning into high season, which brings the more exciting crops that we all look forward to – sweet corn, tomatoes, peppers, and melons.

Now, don’t get too excited. It’ll still be a bit before I put a melon in the box, but that corn has tassels, so the ears are growing. I think for a lot of middle-aged customers that the build up and anticipation of sweet corn season has replaced the magic of Christmas after the luster wore off. I start getting questions about when the sweet corn is ready sometime in June, which makes me question their reality. Haven’t they looked out their car window and seen a corn field in June? But, if you’ve spent any time with an 8 year-old talking about their Christmas list in September, you know the power of anticipation, so I can’t really blame them for jumping the gun.

Anyway, we’re edging into high season and the proof is the appearance of the red potatoes in the box. Only a matter of time until the other high season crops fall in line.

In the box

  • Broccoli
  • A Couple Onions: One red, one sweet
  • Red Potatoes
  • Parsley
  • Cucumber
  • Zucchini
  • A Head of Lettuce
  • Curly Kale

Heart of Darkness

July 14, 2025

My farm mentor, Paul Burkhouse, had a term for vegetable farming in July – The Heart of Darkness. Like in the book where things got worse and worse the further you traversed down the river, that’s July!

About 7-8 days ago after some rain, heat, and humidity, we found ourselves engulfed in a weed explosion, foxtail and pigweeds jumping up feet in a matter of days. The only way out is like in an action movie where you have to fight your way out, hand-to-hand combat. You lose some of your crew along the way, just like our second plantings of beans. Too far gone. I made the call – mow them down.

July also gets hairy because it isn’t just weeding. This is the one time of year when we still planting while harvesting and also keeping weeds in check. Throw in the tomato trellis, which is a beast of task, and you can get this “how are we going to get this done” kind of panic.

But in most action movies, the team does get out. I’m no SEAL team commander, but, at this point in my life, I am like a grizzled sergeant on his 20th tour of duty. I’ve engaged this enemy before and I know we will break through to August.

In the box:

  • Cilantro
  • Parsley
  • Green Onions: Friday people, we’ll transition you to spring onion bunches.
  • Green Cabbage
  • Kohlrabi
  • Cucumber
  • Zucchini
  • Romaine Lettuce
  • Daikon Radish or Two
  • Fresh Basil
  • Red Butterhead or Red Oakleaf Lettuce

Involving Others

July 7, 2025

When I started this farm in 2004, I had all intentions of pushing the whole thing along with just my back and good pair of Red Wing Boots. A typical ambitious dude in his 20’s who has energy to burn. I had no intention of working with others or needing the help of others. But, this work being what it is-lots of detailed labor that takes a lot of time-that’s a near impossibility. I certainly never saw myself as ‘the boss’ or ‘the supervisor’ of anyone.

But we age and our energy and ambition wane. Without fresh troops the army just slowly falls apart. But I’ve been blessed these last 20 years with a lot of people in my life who do jump in and take on some effort. We’ve hosted an apprentice each year since 2014 and I’ve done my best to get my own kids engaged in the farm – some days are more successful than others. And when multiple tracks of work are running with multiple people at once, it’s an incredible feeling.

Yesterday I had this feeling like the farm was hitting on a cylinders. Camila was working the pack house to prepare the green onions and cukes for today’s box, Willem was building the lean-to roof, and Graham was pushing stakes in the ground for the tomato trellis. My role was to bounce between them all to help start them and move each project along. Now let’s see if we can finish what we started and hopefully repeat some all-hands-on-deck days this month as it’s clear that the number of tasks is outstripping the capacity of me and Camila to take them all on. Typical for this time of year.

In the box:

  • Green Cabbage
  • Kohlrabi: Weird bulb thing – peel, cut, eat, simple.
  • A Couple Cucumbers: We have both varieties now ready in the high tunnel. The really wrinkly one is an English-type cucumber called Tyria. The other is a long variety called Tasty Jade.
  • A Couple Zucchini
  • A Couple Lettuces: One is a beautiful green butterhead lettuce and the other is a red lollo variety for some color.
  • Green Onions
  • A Bunch of Arugula: Bunch of greens with a red band. You can mix in with the lettuce and cukes in a salad or have on its own like in https://www.loveandlemons.com/arugula-salad/ People also top pizzas with arugula and add to pasta.
  • Daikon Radish: This is pretty mild radish which you can peel and eat just as you would any old red radish. But it’s also very common in Asian cooking like in this pickled Korean recipe: https://urbanfarmie.com/korean-pickled-radish/