The sun is shining every day. That is a good thing. Things need sun to grow. But, they also need water to grow. With little more than a half an inch of rain in the past three weeks and a dry spell running back to the beginning of the year, we simply need a good rain.
We have invested heavily in irrigation systems over the past ten years and because of that the crops are not yet suffering. But the farm team is beginning to suffer from irrigation fatigue. When things get dry we set up irrigation systems in the afternoons once everything is harvested for the day. Now we have a team of four that begins irrigation at 6AM and does not stop moving pipes, fixing leaks and repairing pumps until late in the afternoon. This takes work from other tasks on the farm and we did not budget for so much irrigation labor so early in the season. We are able to get it done and the crops continue to grow. Yet, I am a little concerned as the ground water levels that can be seen in our ponds are very low for so early in the season. If we do not get some much needed rain in the coming weeks, we will need to consider measures that we have used in summers of drought. Until then we will keep moving pipes and pumping water.
The installation of drip irrigation on many of our crops has reduced our water needs significantly and will allow more water for more crops in drought situations. Drip irrigation reduces water needs typically by more than 50%. The other beauty of drip irrigation is that it puts water directly to the roots and not on the leaves of the plant. Moisture on the leaves leads to more plant diseases and more rotten fruits and vegetables. So, the lack of rain and drip irrigation is actually leading to more abundant and healthier harvests. As long as we have irrigation water to give, we will have better harvests than ever; even though the farm team may be more weary than ever.
The warmer than normal June is pushing the strawberry harvest to an earlier than normal end. Though there will still be a trickle of strawberries, the vast bulk of the harvest is now behind us. Soon the raspberry harvest will begin in earnest and within three weeks we will be harvesting what looks like a beautiful blueberry crop. The weather has a massive effect on the crops. Sometimes the effects are positive and sometimes they can be negative. One weather event that we are now seeing the full effect of is the minus 10 degree temperatures of mid-February. Such low temperatures froze all the fruit buds off of the stone fruits so there will be no peaches, plums or nectarines. The oldest fruit growers in New England have never seen such a non-existent stone fruit year. The weather never ceases to amaze us. Knowing that the stone fruit crop this year would at best be "light" we seeded the first melons earlier and purchased a new "low tunnel layer" to ensure the earliest crop possible of melons. This machine creates a mini greenhouse in the field in May to entice the plants to grow that much faster and bring an earlier than normal harvest.
A video of the machine can be seen here. If all goes well we will be harvesting the first melons at least two weeks earlier than under normal conditions. Cantaloupe filled with blueberries sounds very appealing.
Wishing for rain,
Farmer Dave
