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Rooted cuttings prove more resilient than tubers

At my flower farm in St. Louis, Missouri, I grow more than 150 varieties of flowers exclusively from seed. I know that sounds strange in an era where many flower farmers get product to market faster by ordering plug plants, but I personally love the whole cycle of growing. It takes longer, but I really enjoy watching my plants grow, evaluating the strengths and weaknesses of different varieties or seed stock, and all the opportunities to learn something new in the entirety of the process. Also, because secretly I’m a science nerd. You’re about to see why.

Talking yourself into sacrificing a cash crop for a cover crop is a hard thing to do on a small-scale operation where every square foot counts. When done well, cover crops can have multiple benefits like improved soil, fewer weeds, and reduced pest pressure. But there are risks with cover crops when they don’t germinate, grow, or terminate as planned. When done poorly, they can be more troublesome than they’re worth.

On tiny farms, market gardeners might flip—or transition—beds from one crop to another several times per season to make the most of every square foot. With these rotations, you effectively double or triple your production area by planting the same beds two or three times each year. That is, a 1/3-acre plot literally becomes equal to a 2/3- or 1-acre farm growing one crop per year. This justifies applying a large amount of compost to keep fertility levels high for multicropped beds.

While the cold is certainly one factor limiting winter growing, it is not the only one nor is it the hardest to work around. For vegetable growers operating in a northern climate, one of the biggest hurdles to overcome is, in fact, the decrease in daylight hours and solar energy experienced in November, December, and January. For a successful winter vegetable production, anyone embarking on this adventure needs to understand the ins and outs of the season, and work differently than in summer.

I grew up on a small farm about 12 miles from where I now farm in the high desert of Oregon (zone 6b). That farm was in the middle of the Grande Ronde Valley where there are 200 feet of “topsoil.” If asked about our soil, my mom’s joke was always, “I found a rock — once.” It was a dream to garden in and to dig a post hole. I thought that’s just how soil was — friable, rich, and deep brown.

Back in the mid-1990s, I was at a SSAWG (Southern Sustainable Agriculture Working Group) conference in Austin, Texas. I’d been hired by Potomac Vegetable Farms (PVF) in Virginia to develop a satellite property with organic sweet corn as the main crop. That goal daunted me: 15 acres of organic sweet corn on ground that had not been improved. 

On a busy September harvest day in 2012, our farm’s two employees drove in and out of the fields with totes. Meanwhile, my husband, Casey, and I were shut up in our farmhouse, curtains drawn, focused on a different project: the birth of our second child. Giving birth during the day with farm activity all around us was very different from the serene, quiet winter birth of our first child described in an August GFM article about pregnancy and farming.

Three years after starting up our Oregon farm, my husband, Casey, and I decided it was time to grow our farm family. In April 2009, I found out I was pregnant with our first child. Looking at the pregnancy test double lines felt like the start of a whole new adventure in our farming life, one that would require me to carry almost all of the physical burden of the pregnancy while together we operated our farm.

Growing lettuce in the summer is a challenge almost anywhere. The heat stifles growth and kills germination rates. The sun scorches leaves and rapidly wilts the fresh harvest. Summer is just not lettuce’s season. But fresh, local lettuce is as in-demand in the summer months as any time of the year, maybe even more so.
So for advice on how to grow lettuce when the heat is high, I turned to the people growing where summertime is pretty much the norm: the South.

Some flowers are more difficult to deal with than others. They may be hard to hydrate, particular about the time of day for harvest, or have an ideal harvest stage.  We have eliminated some flowers that are overly difficult, such as basil and euphorbia, but there are some that we just can’t live without, so have learned to deal with their pickiness. We are also updating our post harvest care each year based on efficiencies and systems that are developed.

Ten years ago, a spot on my husband Casey’s neck grew darker and larger in a way that I noticed, my mother noticed, and even my best friend noticed. If you aren’t aware, changes in existing moles or birth marks are a big red flag and potential indicators of skin cancer. I’ll share that awareness with you, explain why sun-exposure matters, and provide guides for taking care of your skin (while still getting important farming work done). In addition to official sources, I also gathered tips from several farmers via social media and a listserv discussion. Some of my research surprised even me, so I encourage you to read to the end even if you think you’re already well-informed about sun and skin protection. 

There’s nothing sustainable about sustainable farming when it comes to personal maintenance. The hours are too long, demands too time-sensitive, and physical requirements exceed healthy levels — especially in the summer heat. 

I had been a farm manager for more than 10 years when I decided the lack of sustainability in my farm life needed an alternative management approach. I spent most of the previous 10 years wishing for more hours in the day and was convinced that everything was top priority and had to be done first. Ultimately, I felt I was not achieving or accomplishing anything. 

Part of our scaling up process was figuring out how to deal with weed control. We knew wheel hoeing the whole farm was not sustainable unless we hired a horde of college kids. We first tried laying black plastic (with and without a plastic layer), but ended up with too many weeds on the edges. Then we tried burning holes in black woven landscape fabric and planting into the holes. But it was challenging getting those little statice plants to grow up through the holes and keeping the holes weeded. So we looked to the cultivation practices of larger growers for inspiration to see what we could bring back to our farm. We were only planting 2-3 acres when we chose to go with mechanical cultivation.

Farming an acre of vegetables in Wilton, Ontario, Evan Quigley has always aimed to bring the highest quality and consistency to market with a keen eye on profitability. Evan has achieved high quality and yields with a combination of techniques and careful management at The Kitchen Garden farm. 

Knowing a few tricks can make a big difference in seed starting, and it saved our larkspur crop. We’ll give you a rundown on some of the basic seed starting concepts, and then tell you a few tricks we’ve learned.