Planting Has Begun!

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baby escarole

What a cold wet spring we are having thus far! The red buds aren’t showing color yet and the trees very much look like they are still in winter mode. But the greenhouse is full of plants, just like every spring, so the show must go on! We had a chance to do our first round of planting last week. We planted 25,000 onions of all kinds- cipollini, sweet, yellow, red and shallots! It’s becoming a favorite crop of ours to grow and we excited to try some new varieties this year!

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Trailer full of onions and the beds that they are destined for
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Field of Onions
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The weekend’s rain served to water in the plants

That took all day Thursday. The fields were still fairly wet and in an effort to not work soil when it is too wet we held off making our beds till the last minute. We made beds and planted the same day. Then we did the same thing on Friday in a different field and planted out our first round of spinach, lettuce, beets and sugar snap peas. We even had time to begin training one of our returning crew members, Audrey, to operate the tractor and she drove for the final 3 beds of the day.

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Making beds with a bed pan
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Planting beets on our 2 row finger planter
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Audrey training in the driver’s seat

All in all we planted 24 beds and over three trailers worth of flats. These vegetables will make up some of the first CSA boxes! We were glad to have mother nature take care of the watering and welcomed this weekend’s rain. However, we do need the ground to dry out again for the next round of planting! Potatoes, herbs and salad mix are next with a whole lot of brassicas on deck!

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After hardening off for a day or 2, these plants are now all in the ground
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freshly planted and watered snap peas