Opening Day

Welcome to the 2010 fresh vegetable season, as Rock Spring Farm begins its eleventh year providing great, certified organic vegetables in the Upper Midwest. Everybody here hopes that all of you will enjoy the coming bounty of the seasons!

The spring has, once again, proved interesting. Next spring, I want a boring season, where we get good rains on a consistent basis, frost at the right times, and everything falling into place. With a lack of significant rainfall over a very long period of time, I had begun to expect a drought, but last weekend finally brought some relief. We’ve used the dry weather to get some tillage done, and have appreciated the cover crops we seeded late last summer and into the fall. The dry weather and odd weather patterns made me a little nervous about putting crops into the field, and has resulted in some unexpected twists, such as our overwintered spinach bolting to seed last week, and our asparagus running oddly behind what we would expect given the stretch of warm weather.

Sarah and Ben stayed with farm all winter, and we are fortunate to have their growing expertise in the farm operation. Jana has continued to work with the herb side of the operation, and August joined us last week as an enthusiastic member of the farm team, with loads of can-do attitude and knowledge.

Now that spring training has gone by, the heart of the season will soon be here. We are looking forward to abundant harvests of asparagus and greens in the coming weeks, and a great year in the coming months. Like any opening day, this one is full of the promise of good things to come.