ADMIN
Keep your family in farm goodness...Check your Harvie profile (or ask me to check it for you) for your auto-renew setting. Auto-renewals will happen in October with plenty of notice, so it’s time to start setting up your profile to renew or not, and choose a payment plan that suits you.
Farm Cards for sale! Blank greeting cards with beautiful House in the Woods Farm photos and stories on the back. Share your farm love with your greetings to friends and family. ORDER THEM in the Extras and also for sale this week at the farm on the table.
SWEET POTATOES: What makes them sweet?
Are your sweet potatoes sweet? Many years ago, the first year we grew sweet potatoes, we dug some up and brought them home to bake. Our very first homegrown sweet potatoes! They were…not so great. Starchy and zero sweetness. At a total loss, we checked the internet. Little did we know, you have to cure sweet potatoes to turn their starches into sugar. Read the story of how to cure sweet potatoes on my Mother Earth News blog:
https://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/cure-sweet-potatoes-zbcz1310
UPICK
Cherry tomatoes--they are coming in slowly with the cooler weather, but keep enjoying them.
The Bean Hut--so much fun! Pick just a snack, a handful or two, of these purple pole beans (so there's enough for others).
Flowers--Glorious Zinnias and the beautiful Cockscomb to accent them, growing right after the zinnias.
Herbs--oregano, thyme, sage, and the lemony sorrel patch is up with delicate fresh leaves. enjoy!
Kiwi Arbor--the arbor over the Veggie Shed is heavy with ripening fruit! Find a wrinkly soft one and it will be sweet and delicious! You can pick a handful of firm ones to take home and see if they ripen on your counter.
Digging Potatoes
We hope to dig some potatoes, white or sweet, on Friday between 10-1. You are welcome to join us! Come check out what we are up to and join in if you like, all ages. The soil is currently still too wet to run the plow through the soil, so we are digging what we need with pitchforks for now. When things dry out, we'll be able to use the tractor plow and really collect lots of tater treasure.
The Kiwi Arbor
I’ve been showing many of you the fruit growing over your heads as you duck into the Veggie Shed. This arbor is Northern Hardy Kiwi. Try a wrinkly squishy one and you will be surprised by how kiwi-esque it is!
Read more about it here. https://www.motherearthnews.com/organic-gardening/grow-a-kiwi-arbor-for-shade-and-fruit-zbcz2006
Note: an update to the kiwi gender identities. Our very own biology professor volunteer, Tracey, was able to confirm for us what we suspected--that the additional females we planted were actually male plants. She showed us the different flowers for the male and female plants. We may attempt to graft female branches onto the extra male plant for more fruit production.
