Frost tonight possibly

Today we kept hearing that we could get frost tonight so we covered much of the garden. Hard to imagine after all the heat we've had recently. So we decided to harvest our first grapes as well rather than risk losing our first ever grape crop.
So we went up with a large bowl and some scissors to snip the clusters off the vines. We saw that we had another small batch of strawberries ripe too so we picked those also.

We were pleased to find a couple cantaloupes also which were growing from a rouge vine. This is the year for rouge plants for us. We have tomato's coming up all over the place. We had lettuces growing all over the green house. Sunflowers popping up around the farm. And these two cantaloupes.

We are very happy with our grapes. We have "wine" grapes and "table" grapes. In the bowl you can see the two different varieties. The wine grapes are lighter and bigger and the table grapes are darker and smaller.
So far this Labor Day weekend is proving to be another good one for the road side stand. Last year it was our best weekend of the season and it seems it will be the same again this year. Although it does not look like we will top last years sales. Over all, the farm stand has been slower this year than it was in 2009. But, it isn't over yet and we shall see.

The CSA is going well. It seems that the share holders are getting the swing of things as far as picking up their produce in a timely fashion. It was a little confusing at first. Plus we had to change the pick up days a couple times as we got the kinks worked out.

I think it is good to have both the farm stand and the CSA. They seem to complement each other. We focus mainly on the CSA then what ever is left goes to the stand. We make a better profit on the stand also. We like to give the share holders as good a deal as we can so the money made per item or bunch is somewhat lower for us.

It was a good sweet corn year in the north woods. Paul, our corn grower up near Eagle River had one of his best years. He was able to plant early. Today, he told me that he's been growing sweet corn for 20 years and out of all of those years he only had 2 years that he didn't get any corn.

Last year wasn't good for corn but, he did get a harvest. It's just that alot of the corn didn't fill out to the top. This will be Pauls last weekend for corn though. He planted two rows later and they are finishing up right now. We'd hoped to have corn clear through Monday but, as it's going we might not. We have two other sources for a little bit of corn so those just might get us through. On the other hand our green house is now coming into it's own with tomato's so at least we have that. Tomato's and sweet corn are the top 2 draws for the farm stand. People come in looking for those and by other stuff as well. Not everyone comes looking for those two things but, I'd say the majority do. Probably the 3rd in line for popularity is cucumbers. Lots of people in these parts make pickles. One of our growing partners always has dill and that is a popular seller too. Goes with the cukes.

So far this has been one of the best growing season's we've had since 1998. I just wish we would have been geared up for it. I wanted to plant some more field corn this year but, I ran out of time and didn't get to it. And I would have planted alot more of everything if I could have made the time. But, then again the more you plant the more work in weeding and watering and so forth. A person has only so many hours in a day. We try hard to not get caught up in the rat race but, it always seems to find us. Just too many things we want to do.

Well, I hope everyone is having a good Labor Day weekend so far. Take care and God bless.

Until Next Time