Archive of Past News of the Farm:
Giveth and Taketh March 22, 2010 |
Giveth and Taketh
(A blooming redbud means spring....)
Greetings
Friends of the Farm,
“The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away”....I remember that sentence -- perhaps paraphrased -- from childhood. I'm not a Bible scholar by any means, and I usually forget my sources, even for something that strikes me as a "truism," so maybe it is from the Bible and maybe it is not. I’ll find out when I’m really old, in case I read the Bible again, as Little Dove hopes.
It does occur to me that Nature, too, giveths and takeths. Even the government (especially the government) giveths (sometimes) and takeths (usually). Whew. It kinda makes my head spin, for whoever is doing the gives and takes has been busy on this farm, and likely on all Texas farms this past year.
In the taketh away column we can post losing a third of the potato crop to last year's April 6 hard freeze, last year's failed strawberries (80% loss due to failing aquifer, horrendous heat and no rain), short okra (ditto), no summer cucumbers and squash, challenged tomato crops, not one single Smoke-dried Tomato, and days spent rationing what little well water there was to a farm full of thirsty plants.
In the giveth column: Great late-summer green beans and fall greens. The return of rain, September 11, 2009, and the somewhat dreary continuance of rain, twice weekly usually, all winter long -- this gets the dual classification as both giveth and taketh, as soggy soil cannot be worked, so planting is continually delayed, but the aquifer gains.
More taketh examples: Three winter months with approximately eight days of sun. What can grow in that darkness? Plants depend on the sun. Then the weekend of January 9th, with a nine-degree freeze and three days constantly under freezing. That wiped out the long-anticipated cauliflower crop.
And giveth to us: A carrot year, and currently, a lot of good lettuce (not much of that over the winter), and possibly a good last broccoli/cauliflower crop (depending on the coming heat), and most importantly, a potentially-stellar strawberry year -- unless we have another hail storm of course. And fava beans, snow peas, rhubarb, parsnips, snapdragons, more chicories, all of it growing well and optimistically! And then, the summer crops....
(Blooming strawberries, emerging from the row cover....)
It pays to be diverse. We have so many different crops in the ground most of the year, that something always works. Originally as we envisioned our farm, we planned to grow such a variety that folks coming to market could get all the vegetables they needed. There is a low time in September, when we clear out the hot-weather crops and plant the cool-weather crops. Our tables are not exactly bare of produce, but reflect bare soil in the fields. Coincidentally, many people are busy getting kids back in the school mode and dealing with sports and all, and they are just too busy to come over here and see how simplified we are....That's kind of a good thing; not so much disappointment on their part.
The one time we received a monumental taketh moment - when we wound up with nothing, except a surviving cabbage crop -- was November 2001, when the tornado, with its 110 mph wind, hail, and twelve inches of rain, destroyed every thing in the field, plus 25 trees, and a fourth of the farm house. Oh, but was that cabbage good!! Maybe a stick through some of them here and there, but delicious none the less...a real gift. And the ultimate giveth moment was the kindness of other farmers and the community.
We are so hopeful that this year will turn out better than the last. Farmers always hope this, if the past year was hard. One thing for certain we do know is that rarely does a season repeat itself. That is a truism, if not a gift in itself.
Carol Ann
“The Lord giveth and the Lord taketh away”....I remember that sentence -- perhaps paraphrased -- from childhood. I'm not a Bible scholar by any means, and I usually forget my sources, even for something that strikes me as a "truism," so maybe it is from the Bible and maybe it is not. I’ll find out when I’m really old, in case I read the Bible again, as Little Dove hopes.
It does occur to me that Nature, too, giveths and takeths. Even the government (especially the government) giveths (sometimes) and takeths (usually). Whew. It kinda makes my head spin, for whoever is doing the gives and takes has been busy on this farm, and likely on all Texas farms this past year.
In the taketh away column we can post losing a third of the potato crop to last year's April 6 hard freeze, last year's failed strawberries (80% loss due to failing aquifer, horrendous heat and no rain), short okra (ditto), no summer cucumbers and squash, challenged tomato crops, not one single Smoke-dried Tomato, and days spent rationing what little well water there was to a farm full of thirsty plants.
In the giveth column: Great late-summer green beans and fall greens. The return of rain, September 11, 2009, and the somewhat dreary continuance of rain, twice weekly usually, all winter long -- this gets the dual classification as both giveth and taketh, as soggy soil cannot be worked, so planting is continually delayed, but the aquifer gains.
More taketh examples: Three winter months with approximately eight days of sun. What can grow in that darkness? Plants depend on the sun. Then the weekend of January 9th, with a nine-degree freeze and three days constantly under freezing. That wiped out the long-anticipated cauliflower crop.
(Above, Tootie J. Tootums is
as tall as the Brussels sprouts plants; right, miniature broccoli.)
The coldest, darkest and wettest winter in decades. A book-end
record winter to match the summer's hottest-since-1854 record. And the
result of that? Teeny tiny crops; lesser yields. Brussels sprout plants
half their normal height, "Bonsai Kale" (too short to bunch? Just cut
the top off the stalk and present it in that format), personal cabbages,
miniature broccoli heads, marble-size Brussels sprouts, few beets
(after last year's beet abundance). Not once all winter, since
September, have we turned on a drip tape. But there they are, like flat,
black noodles, strung out everywhere, waiting for a new drought.And giveth to us: A carrot year, and currently, a lot of good lettuce (not much of that over the winter), and possibly a good last broccoli/cauliflower crop (depending on the coming heat), and most importantly, a potentially-stellar strawberry year -- unless we have another hail storm of course. And fava beans, snow peas, rhubarb, parsnips, snapdragons, more chicories, all of it growing well and optimistically! And then, the summer crops....
(Blooming strawberries, emerging from the row cover....)
It pays to be diverse. We have so many different crops in the ground most of the year, that something always works. Originally as we envisioned our farm, we planned to grow such a variety that folks coming to market could get all the vegetables they needed. There is a low time in September, when we clear out the hot-weather crops and plant the cool-weather crops. Our tables are not exactly bare of produce, but reflect bare soil in the fields. Coincidentally, many people are busy getting kids back in the school mode and dealing with sports and all, and they are just too busy to come over here and see how simplified we are....That's kind of a good thing; not so much disappointment on their part.
The one time we received a monumental taketh moment - when we wound up with nothing, except a surviving cabbage crop -- was November 2001, when the tornado, with its 110 mph wind, hail, and twelve inches of rain, destroyed every thing in the field, plus 25 trees, and a fourth of the farm house. Oh, but was that cabbage good!! Maybe a stick through some of them here and there, but delicious none the less...a real gift. And the ultimate giveth moment was the kindness of other farmers and the community.
We are so hopeful that this year will turn out better than the last. Farmers always hope this, if the past year was hard. One thing for certain we do know is that rarely does a season repeat itself. That is a truism, if not a gift in itself.
Carol Ann
(The hens, enjoying themselves, on a beautiful spring day!)
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