First frost?

Tonight just may bring our first frost of the season. While this would kill the tomatoes and peppers (most of which are still alive even if they are producing very, very slowly at this point in the season) all of the other crops growing on the farm now don't mind a little bit of cold. In fact many of the crops that we have out in the field won't grow very well in warmer weather so we welcome the cold. In addition to cool weather crops the spiders are thriving right now on the farm. There are many of them in the tomato field and this one has scored the ultimate prize, a big tomato hornworm.


This broccoli is one of the crops that doesn't grow well in the summer heat. In fact it is just now getting cool enough for us to have nice broccoli. Here is broccoli that is just about ready to harvest...






and here's our best-looking broccoli crop so far which won't be ready for another two or three weeks.










This is a plant that is closely related to broccoli. It is broccoli raab (or rabe or rapini, etc.), and is spicier than traditional broccoli with smaller florets and more tender green leaves. The broccoli raab is closer and is a brighter green while the broccoli is behind.


Another green that we are growing is this rainbow kale. This is a new variety of kale that we found in one of our seed catalogs that was the result of crossing Tuscan kale with red kale. We really like it because it has a nice color to it with big leaves. Not to mention that it tastes great too!


Finally, we've always been amazed that we haven't had problems with deer eating our crops. Well, unfortunately they have found the lettuce. Since we didn't have a very large planting of it, we've just covered it all with remay which will deter the deer for this year, but we may have to come up with a different fix next season.