Author Archives: Russo Family Farm

Bolting Toward Summer

This is a baby bok choy that has sprinted toward setting seed, due to the recent warming days. Bolting causes a plant to become leggy, tough, and in certain vegetables, to become bitter. There wasn’t much to do, unless I … Continue reading

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Compounding the Work

When the row of beets finally started coming on strong, it needed to be thinned. Each beet seed is actually a compound seed, and can sprout multiple seedlings. Thinning helps to create enough room for the developing root. I didn’t … Continue reading

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Romancing the Radish

Spring has finally taken hold and radish seeds we started on Apr 26 are starting to show good growth. While weeding, I’ve been finding the seeds that strayed from the row have grown larger roots. I tried to replant these, … Continue reading

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A Bounty of Unintended Vegetation

Green sprouts everywhere, including a massive bounty of weeds. Too bad no one has “properly” marketed wild, organic microgreens at $20 per pound to the retail consumers. Some of the weeds that grow abundantly are edible, and is eaten in … Continue reading

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Oh Snap, Are You Chiving Me?

Farmers and weather, they either worry about too much rain or too little rain. There was a cold spell last week, but I hope from here on out we are solidly past the last frost date for the area. The … Continue reading

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A Slip Up

The sweet potato slips arrived this week, much to my surprise. They are a tropical plant and like temperatures above 70 deg F. They survived shipping from Maine, but within a day, started wilting. I put them in smaller containers … Continue reading

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Planted So Far

Sugar snap peas kale, chinese brocoli, baby bok choy turnips carrot, parsnip beets red cippolini onion, pearl drop onion, bulbing onion, shallot garlic chives, chinese leeks ground nut (apios americana) potato lettuce perennial flower: butterfly weed, bee balm, anise hyssop … Continue reading

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What About Irrigation

Irrigation was the first question I had about the farm. What you see is a cabin and a barn with a well in front, sans electricity, sewer, or water service.  It is the nostalgic, romantic notion of  farming, without the … Continue reading

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Insect Assistants

Ladybugs are great to have since they eat aphids.  In large enough numbers, aphids can do serious damage to vegetables. These orange ladybugs are actually called Asian Lady Beetles, as they were originally native to eastern asia.  They were introduced … Continue reading

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All In The Allium Family

Day-am that was fast! Last week’s spring-planted garlic is popping up unabashedly. This time there is proper spacing between the plants. I contemplated popping out every other garlic bulb and replanting, but another allium needed a new home. There were … Continue reading

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