Plenty of rain, now we need some sun

It is raining as I write this on Tuesday, and people are asking about the rain. It will help the established plants, but the rain last week–over 7 inches in 36 hours–appears to have washed out, buried, and/or rotted some beets, parsnips, dill, and possibly cucumbers. We may not have had enough heat yet for the cucumbers to come up. I hope they germinate where we placed the seed and not somewhere else.

The rain also made the ground very hard, so I hope today’s shower softens things up. Yesterday, we weeded between potato plants, took the rototiller through the rows, hilled the potatoes, seeded some beets, and got most of the onions weeded.

We need sunshine! The peppers and eggplant in our remote garden were in standing water for some time, and they need sunshine to recover and for us to get in and deal with weeds. We are looking forward to planting all types of squash as soon as the ground is workable. We also need to turn in the cover crop in the west garden.

Today we are harvesting, and this morning I brought chickens to the butcher, a week later than we had hoped. Our processor has been having a hard time getting USDA inspectors to allow them to reopen this year. We need them to be open for us to be able to continue to do chickens. If you know anyone who might be interested in a full-time seasonal job processing chickens, they should contact Ed Hansen of B and B Poultry Processing in Hospers at 712-756-4380 or 712-230-0479 (cell).

— John Wesselius