This week’s update after these brief announcements.
Thank you to everyone who didn’t show up to the postponed potato planting party. The lack of attendance at this non-event shows the astuteness of the 2022 membership! And for those who still want to participate in planting potatoes — and I hope there are a lot of you so we can get it done quickly — we have rescheduled the planting for Saturday May 7th from 1:00 until done. Could you ask for a better pre-Mother’s Day activity? The forecast calls for sunny weather and good times! As mentioned before, this is a great event for people of all ages and abilities. There are some tasks that require stooping but there are a lot more that require standing, sitting or for those really athletic types, walking. So grab the whole family and come on out to see where your potatoes come from! Let me know if you can make it! The more the merrier!
We have about nine EggShares left. Feel free to order them as soon as possible. We have unlimited CoffeeShares and ‘ShroomShares. There are a few FlowerShares left. And if you order soon we can still plant enough winter squash to supply more WinterShares.
VeggieShares are close to being sold out. Please order soon if you plan to rejoin.
Still looking for the elusive last crew member for this season. Check around to see if there are any potential candidates in your sphere of influence and send them our way.
Farm News
I think it is officially the latest start we’ve had to the outdoor farming season. This April has not lived up to its global warming potential. I saw on the TV news this weekend that the last 10 years have brought down the 30 year average April temperature a whole degree. And that “early Spring” in Minnesota has become far cooler and wetter than in the past. And finally, the weather over the last ten year or so goes from cold and wet to hot and dry with no wonderful spring weather in between. I wish I could find this report on the inter-tubes but alas I have to go only by my feeble memory. Anyway, we no longer have the wonderful spring weather for farming anymore. Sigh.
One big project again this Spring is the annual repairing of the irrigation lines. You long time members I’m sure are quite familiar with this rite of passage. Though the tale is long, I will try to summarize it in a few brief sentences for our newest members. The (*^&)^$*& gophers keep chewing holes in our underground irrigation pipe! Ok, just one brief sentence. Here is the longer version: Way back in the early 2010s our across the street neighbors decided that mowing their 5 acres lawns had become more of a chore than earlier in their life when they thought how fun it would be to drive a small tractor around their property and cut a bunch of grass for four hours every weekend. They decided as a collective to reestablish native prairie and enlisted the helpful Washington Country government and their endless supply of taxpayer funded cash to accomplish this task. So the county set out to kill then burn the existing lawn prior to planting the new prairie plants. Now typically I wouldn’t care so much what my neighbors do with their property but what seems to have occurred is that all the rodents who previously made their domiciles in the turf of our neighbors estates decided it was a bit too hot with the fire and all and fled to the country, otherwise known as Fresh Earth Farms. Ever since this prairie restoration project we have been battling the mice, voles and gophers — each with its own predilection for farm related resources.
Last season we tried valiantly to — in the parlance of the mafia — whack the gophers. We had one of our workers set and check gopher traps almost daily and successfully took out double digits worth of gophers. But one of two things seems to have since occurred. Either neighboring gophers moved into our neighborhood establishing their residence in the empty homesteads left behind by the prior inhabitants or we missed at least two gophers from 2021. Most likely both. So it is back to finding and fixing the destruction done by these nasty rodents. On the bright side, I’m getting better at finding the leaks, or more likely there are fewer and fewer locations that haven’t been already dug up and repaired. What was once a 1 1/4″ pipe has now shrunk to a series of 1″ diameter pipe couplings.
It occurs to me that if the University of Wisconsin changed their mascot to the Irrigation Pipes the University of Minnesota would be far more successful in their head-to-head athletic events.
Anyway, we are hoping this week will finally be warm and sunny enough to start planting. If the forecast is correct it could be a series of very long days to try to catch up to where we expected to be by this time. So I should probably end this newsletter now and rest up. As always, do not hesitate to contact me with questions, comments, jokes, suggestions, etc. And don’t forget to bring your mom out to the farm on Saturday to plant potatoes!
What do you call cuboid potatoes?
Square roots!