Covering green beans for frost

 Unsettling Nights

At this time of year, we are often just a degree away from the end of the season for our frost-sensitive crops.  At 32 degrees, the water in the cell walls of some crops will burst, thus ending the life of those crops.  Corn, tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, beans and squash all fall into this category.  Many other crops such as broccoli, lettuce, carrots and peas have stronger cell walls that will withstand the freezing temperatures.

In the past ten years, I can recall the earliest frost around September 26 and the latest around October 27.  This is a whole month's spread.  Years ago, we would plant the frost-sensitive crops so that they were all harvested by the end of September, ensuring that little could be lost to a frosty night.  Now, wanting to maintain as much variety in our diets for as many weeks of the year as possible, we push past the limits and keep seeding crops like beans longer than our fore-bearers ever considered (global warming also seems to be lengthening the growing season).   While the last beans were always planted by the Fourth of July, we will often seed beans every ten days until the tenth of August -- re-seeding the fields of early corn. The added bonus of the late-seeded beans is that, besides offering us great tasting protein, they also help to add nutrients to the soil for the next year's corn.  So, if the last beans do not make it to maturity before frost and did not provide us with some food, I know that we at least fed the soil, making next year's crop richer.

We have learned over the years which of our fields, and which sections of those fields, frost first.  There can often be as much as a five degree difference in the same night.  This is just one more consideration when we are planning what crops to plant where and when.

The nail biter gets to be when you are in October and there is a predicted chance of frost.  Do we pick it all, pick half and try to cover the rest with large "blankets", or take our chances.  The difference can be just one degree.  If we pick it all but then don't get a frost, we might not have enough beans or peppers for another few weeks, when we could have.  Unless the prediction is for temperatures in the mid-20s, we typically harvest enough for a few days ahead and then try to protect the rest.  Our large blankets almost every spring and fall.  If the night is calm, the temperature under the blanket is often five degrees warmer.  If the night is windy, there can be little difference.  Yet, a light wind at night will often prevent a frost from "settling" on the crops.  Warm air rises, so if there is a wind a night, the frostier spots will be in the hollows.  

Though we try to stretch our growing season as much as possible, in the end, Mother Nature ultimately decides what we will eat and when.

Farmer Dave

This week is the second to last CSA delivery of the regular season vegetable and fruit shares.   

The Late Fall Share begins the week of October 29th. 

First, we are very excited to be offering the Spring Share in two additional locations next year. You can now pick up a Spring Share in Burlington and Lawrence in addition to our existing Spring locations in Dracut, Union Square-Somerville, Tewksbury and Metro Pedal Power home delivery. The Spring Share is for greens lovers who don't want to wait until June to start their CSA shares. It runs for 12 weeks from mid-March and ends in mid-June. Each week will consist of 3-4 varieties of greens, root vegetables (potatoes, carrots, etc.) that were stored over the winter and "something extra" like radishes, herbs or cucumbers beginning in April and tomatoes beginning in May from our greenhouses.

Secondly, we will be extending our fruit share from 13 weeks to 15 weeks of nature's sweet treats! The past few seasons we've had excellent berry harvests that occur just prior to the official start of the fruit share leaving us scratching our heads about how to distribute our berry bounty. After much deliberation, we've decided that extending the fruit share to capture the early berry harvests, even if they're on the small side, is best for our members. You can expect the first few weeks of the fruit shares to be smaller and feature sweet July berries. The volume and variety of the fruit share will increase as we get into August and September and then taper off again as we get into the October apple season.

Thank you for helping to make the 2012 CSA season one of our best yet.  We look forward to growing for you in 2013 and beyond! 

To learn more about the program, click here.

Thank you all for helping us keep this program going in 2012!