Some Good News
Lechuga y mas
Let’s have some good news. Let’s celebrate you are reading this, you are alive, and experiencing the remarkable abundance of life. At times it seems so abundant it could simply swallow itself up, a great explosion of life and decay. Yet, somehow, a constant ebb and flow remains carrying away the old and bring in the new.
This season has been one of salad. Our goal is continuously grow the ever popular Hearts and Souls mix. While the season is far from over I am impressed our “Salad Bowl”.
Every two weeks our nursery manager sows 2,400 lettuce seeds into trays. Done by hand with homegrown raw seed or pelleted seed from commercial companies. The mix, ratio, and varieties change throughout the season depending on predicted weather. Cooler season lettuces for spring and fall, bolt resistant batavian heads for summer, aiming for stunning color and texture along the way.
Trays spend 6 weeks under protected culture, getting watered daily, growing from sprouts into plugs. When they can be comfortably pulled from the tray without the roots breaking they are ready for the field.
Tuesday mornings have been the planting mornings. We have a steady crew of volunteers and employees who jump in. With 4 rows of plants spaced 6” apart we use about 250 bed feet. We have been planting into white plastic mulch with drip lines running beneath. The white reflects sunlight and keeps the soil cooler, crucial for summer lettuce production. The bed is watered heavily after planting which usually takes 2 hours.
Not all the babies survive, a sad fact. Even with plenty of water a 90 degree day can zap plants invisible. Uneven ground conditions, and different planting styles have an effect too. Regardless, it is now our 12th week in a row of salad.
The plants will grow for 50-60 days before reaching full maturity. We do not apply fertilizer, spray pesticides, or cover. They simply grow, under the sun, in the soil.
We average 150 pounds of salad per week. Cutting the heads just above the apical meristem. This allows us the option to get a second cut. However, during the summer heat we have been cutting once. Like a game of snake, our crew empties beds and weaves rounds of lettuce through the salad bowl. At a certain point we were ripping up old plants only to fill the beds back with lettuce in the same morning.
The success of this crop has come down to several factors. The first being our nurseryman. Hiring out the task of sowing trays keeps the momentum going insuring a fresh round is ready on deck. In years past, when I was in that role, I would neglect the duty and miss plantings. Not this year.
We have had good weather overall. Lettuce is delicious because of its tender leaves. Those same leaves can be torn apart even by heavy rain let alone hail. I want to shout out our friends at Well Fed Farmstead and Switch Gears Farm who both suffered tough losses in the hail department this year. I would greatly appreciate your support of both of these farms either through shopping at Wellfed’s Farm Stand or market booth in downtown Fort Collins on Saturday. You can reach Switch Gear’s venmo here or find them at the Saturday City Park Market in Denver.
The magic of our salad mix comes down to the wash. After cutting loose leaves of varying shapes, colors, textures, and flavors they are mixed in galvanized steel tanks. The cold water releases the bittering agent and ratio of color creates a work of art. One dunk to mix, a second to bubble away debris and insects. Then an old washing machine turned salad spinner revs 10 pounds at a time, drying the leaves for storage. They don’t sit long as either wholesale accounts snatch up cases or retail customers buy individual bags.
As we grow, we learn what we do well and where we struggle. Ever since learning the art of saladery my passion has grown. A regular lechuga loca, I am always trying new varieties for the mix. It is growing more clear to continue our journey of focus, becoming the best at what we do. Just because we can grow everything under the sun does not mean we should. As the years have go on, I have leaned into removing crops from our rotation. It is remarkably noble to grow a diverse crop plant and it can be fun as a grower. It can also be a complete headache and management nightmare. Maybe I am getting old, but quite simply I would rather knock one crop out of the park than limp along many.
As insect pressure, environmental factors, and rising costs make small-scale ag more difficult, specializing starts to make sense. Diversity can still be found. Last week I planted a fall cover crop in our lettuce aisles. A mixture of 10+ species of crops will grow into the cold months of fall offering the soil protection, diverse roots, and eventually a load of carbon. After the lettuce beds are pulled further plantings of winter rye will establish on the beds, remaining green into 2025. Utilizing the otherwise dormant space will encourage greater future production and grow our soil.
Here’s to keeping up the momentum as we enter late summer. This week’s salad crop looks good, next week’s is coming along. By the end of August we might be without our fabled Hearts and Souls. Either way, I am proud of our crew, our farm, and our customers for supporting the humble mission of growing food where we live.
Farm News
Lots of new crops coming as we round the corner into August. The first shishito peppers, eggplant, and beefsteak tomatoes hit the shelves this week. Heirlooms and cherry tomatoes are pumping and best enjoyed with basil.
We are participating in a Farm Tour Event in partnership with the Colorado Fruit and Vegetable Growers Association and Larimer County Extension. More info can be found below.
Farm Stand Hours: 10-6pm Wed-Friday, 10-4pm Saturday and Sunday
Hopefully stocked this week:
Colorado Fruit: Rainier Cherries, Organic Peaches, Rocky Ford Cantaloupe
Greens: Hearts and Souls Salad Mix, gem lettuce heads, summer head lettuce, chard
Roots: Grilling onions, beets, carrots, and garlic
Veggies: Cherry Tomatoes, heirloom tomatoes, summer squash, cucumbers, shishito peppers
Herbs: Oregano, mint, thyme, sage, parsley, basil
Plant Starts: Annual flowers now $4 each. We also have a full rack of herbs ready for the garden or kitchen counter.
Perennials: Gallons are now $10 each. We currently have columbine, foxglove, sedum, elderberry, elecampane, daisy, goldenrod, gaillardia, lavender, mint, thyme, sage, mountain mint, lemon balm, and echinacea. We also have 4.5” perennials for $5 each! Now is truly the perfect time to plant.
Lehi Ranch, High Point Bison, KREAM Kimchi, Jodar Farms Eggs, Rey Atelier Home Goods, Bread Chic Sourdough, Fox Den Coffee, Owl Tree Farm Worm Compost, Bee Squared Apiaries Honey, Abuelita’s Hot Sauce, Christie Leighton Jewelry, Life’s A Buch Kombucha