Farm News

Our drought finally broke two weeks ago with a full three inches one night, almost all of it soaking into the thirsty soil. And since then, it just hasn’t quit. Tuesday night brought over two inches of additional rain, most of which seemed to fall in the space of about an hour, replete with house-shaking thunder and lightning that made that fizz-pop sound when it gets so close. We managed not to lose any electronics, which seems like a miracle – our current fax machine is actually threatening to wear out after three years, instead of getting blown up after the first twelve months, which had been the former pattern. The rain continued much of the night and all morning on Wednesday, before we ventured back out to the fields to harvest the rest of the crops in the mud. We’ve had parts of three low-lying fields, including our storage carrots, under water for several days now, but elsewhere on the farm things are looking great. The broccoli and cabbage and whatnot up on the ridge look fantastic; this rain was timed perfectly for them to make their push to maturity.

Kim and Zane returned from a mid-summer vacation to the Crazy Mountains on Sunday. I take it as a sign of moderate success that either Kim or I could conceive of leaving the farm for a week in the summer and have some reasonable expectation of everything being okay. Which, by and large, it was. They had a good time with the group of ten former- and current homeschoolers they took with them, although Kim did take a nasty spill in a raging river and came back a little bit bruised and banged up (as did her digital camera).

We’ve taken the fact that the rain has kept us moderately out of the field to tackle some indoor projects, such as trimming and sorting the garlic, removing the clips that hold our tomatoes on their trellis strings, repairing some packing house equipment, and patching up the greenhouse irrigation system. This week’s harvest has been decidedly muddy, and the mud doesn’t make anything easy, weather we are talking about digging carrots with the tractor or carrying a crate of salad mix out of the fields.

Wednesday was Pippa’s last day, and we’ve decided to award her the title of Employee of the Month, even though she is leaving halfway through it. Pippa is heading back to St. John’s College, although this year she’s going to the Annapolis campus rather than Santa Fe. St. John’s emphasizes a “Great Books” approach to learning, so that Geometry is learned by reading Euclid instead of learning proofs (although Euclid does involve proofs). Pippa has obviously done well, and we have all enjoyed sharing her experience and intellect as she calmly moves through each day with competence, grace, and wit. We are going to miss her.