It's week 21! One more week after this and it's a wrap on the 2020 Main season.
You will be auto renewed into the 28 week long Main season 2021 CSA (with your add-ons) in November. Please remember to check your auto renew settings! If you do not want to auto renew PLEASE turn off auto renew in your Harvie settings. Go to My Profile, hover over the My Profile at the top of the page and choose Auto Renew settings from the menu. One button turns auto renew off. I prefer you use the 25%25%50% payment plan with auto renew and I will attempt to renew everyone at that setting before auto renew takes place. Please let me know if you have any questions concerning this. Thank you!
The photo above shows Alex and Greg prepping beds in the lower tunnel. Tis the season to finish flipping the high tunnels, taking out the last of the summer crops and getting in crops for overwintering. Crops for November fall share are both in the field and in the tunnels already. Growth rates slow way down past the fall equinox so most everything for the fall season is planted by September. Now we are putting in carrots and beets that will take root and stay mostly dormant for the winter. In January we get trapped in what we call “The Persephone Period” for a little less than a month. During this time, daylight dips below 10 hours and plants (and sometimes people) have difficulty thriving. Thus, January is a difficult time to grow in a hoophouse/high tunnel or greenhouse, especially without supplemental lighting. Plants need cues from not only heat and water but daylight and even the quality of light impacts the plants ability to turn on and off certain functions.
Thank you for all your support, patience, compliments, helpful feedback and gratitude! WE feel honored to grow for you.
*Explanation of the Persephone period by Eliott Coleman-Humans have long had their own way of understanding the changes in day length and its effect on agriculture. Early Greek farmers, whose practical experience added mythical stories to astronomical fact, knew intimately that the power of the sun and the length of the day are the principal influences on agriculture. They created the myth of Persephone to explain the effect of winter conditions.
As the story goes, the earth goddess Demeter had a daughter, Persephone, who was abducted by Hades to live with him as his wife in the netherworld. Demeter would have nothing to do with this and threatened to shut down all plant growth. Zeus intervened and brokered a deal whereby Persephone would spend only the winter months with her husband, Hades. Demeter, saddened by her daughter’s absence, made the earth barren during that time.
