Internship Conclusion

After about a month and a half of working with the Seattle Urban Farm Company, I have to say I've fallen in love with Seattle, from its inhabitants to its quaint neighborhoods to its dazzling mountain landscapes... but the thing I learned that I would most love to experience is the year-round fresh local produce. New York of course lacks this in its rotation of the four seasons and harsh winters. These urban farmers can enjoy a blossoming garden all year, something I hadn't been able to imagine besides down in the tropic regions that I got to experience last winter/spring while studying abroad. Instead of the heat and humidity of down there though, Seattle enjoys some warm days, some borderline hot days, and some periods of crisp, moist weather to keep things interesting (some call it gloomy but I can't say that until I've experienced it).

Enough about the weather though. I've gained a lot through the days working in the sun and rain with Brad, Colin, and Hilary. My last day yesterday was spent with all three of them doing the Mercer Island run, which I can imagine being cumbersome for just one or two people as there are six gardens, most of which require quite a bit of training. It was a warm day, up in the 80s I would guess, and we hustled through all of them. Hilary has been working tirelessly on the photos for the book that Brad and Colin just finished another revision stage for. It will be all about the ins and outs of urban farming and should be ready sometime around the end of this year. She took a bunch of pictures while we harvested, pulled, weeded, planted, munched on, fought with, tousled, teased, and fell into rhythm with each garden. It's becomes kind of meditative, kind of therapeutic when we work together, weeding especially. And it feels healthy just being surrounded by growth and urging on productivity with our hands and some tools, sweating and using muscles that lie dormant otherwise. I enjoyed going from working in a fast paced restaurant environment to doing maintenance runs with the company, discussing plans and memories, observing and working together. It was incredible to observe the differences in the attitudes and pace just from the difference in context, and it helped to reaffirm why I want to go into agriculture as opposed to corporate business.

I think I achieved most of my goals, from plant identification to learning about the organization of the company. There is a lot of planning that goes into it. I'm glad that I got to attend one of their staff meetings and a consultation to see exactly what those would entail. Having as many clients as they do requires a lot of record-keeping, from hours to produce, and it is improving all the time as they gain more experience. Future plans include having a storefront to sell seedlings and such, adding a whole other aspect to the company. I can't wait to go back whenever I get a chance and see how they progress.

If you need a list, I learned...
1. how to seed
2. how to fertilize- hydrolyzed fish, dry fertilizer, side-dressing
3. determinant vs. indeterminant; dwarf and compact varieties
4. how to direct seed beans: inoculating with microbes using spit!
5. germination and propagation
6. when to harvest a lot of things- e.g. garlic, potatoes, radishes, beets, lettuce, broccoli, and more...
7. when to pull things- e.g. bolted lettuce, bolted chard, peas, tomatoes with late blight
8. about some pests/diseases, e.g. late blight, cabbage loopers, slugs, etc.
9. needs and benefits of a rooftop garden
10. how to do a consultation
11. planning for an installation
12. how the company stays organized: seeding schedule, client folders, maintenance runs by location, planting for successional harvest, emailing clients for reminders and tips
13. importance of observation and upkeep
14. how to effectively communicate with clients
15. why farmers are some of the happiest people on earth

... among many other things, of course.

But onto the next adventure I suppose, with more skills and tools to bring to whatever other situation I am put into. Thank you so so SO much Seattle Urban Farm Company and all the great people I met there! I'll be back to visit soon I hope....

Keep on growing, Seattle!

When Bad Things Happen To Good Plants

The other day, in the on-and-off pouring rain, I learned how very essential it is to stay on top of maintenance. Clients have the option of taking on the responsibility of maintaining their urban farms themselves for the most part with only monthly maintenance or however often they prefer. The time saved by not coming each week saves money but if the garden is not looked after by someone... issues can and do arise, costing more time and energy later on. Pest problems get out of control, weeds get out of control, produce goes past its prime and time, effort, and plants put into it go to waste. Here are just a couple of the things we saw that can be avoided just by spending a healthy serving of time each week in the garden:

This is a bolted lettuce plant, meaning that it has developed one large stem and is growing up instead of producing tasty salad green leaves. After they bolt, they turn bitter and much less appetizing so they should be harvested before this point. 

Peas are also all ready to harvest and some that we saw had turned inedible from being left on the vine too long. These become bulky and leathery, also making them unfortunately bitter. 

We ended up spending over double the time we would normally spend in a garden and had to pull and replant a lot of things which was unfortunate. Gardening is good exercise for the body, rest for the mind, and nourishment for the soul. I feel lucky to get to spend that much time in a garden (even in the rain) and I don't even get to enjoy all the goodies that come from it with a little encouragement and support. When we work for the garden, it works for us!  

The Dreaded Late Blight

These above are signs of late blight in tomato plants - dark splotches on the stem and leaves, death of an entire stem. This disease is hard to prevent and hard to control but can cause the death of the entire plant before it comes to fruition. We were careful to not touch the plant with our gloves that would touch plants at other locations so as not to spread it, and washed our bare hands thoroughly after tying these up. Sometimes the plants can survive through the disease but if there are other plants that are not yet infected, it is best to pull the infected ones to prevent spread. Keep an eye out for these ominous splotches! 

Goody Goody Garlic

Garlic harvesting time is upon us! SUFCo just harvested their garlic patch and they are looking mighty tasty hanging up in the shed. The right time for harvesting is a little bit ambiguous to many people as can be seen by a quick google search which results in a wide variety of techniques. Harvested too soon, they haven't grown to their full potential; too late and they don't seem to store as well. A great reference for garlic farmers is an unambiguous book called Growing Great Garlic, which I deem trustworthy- if the man can write a whole book on garlic, he must be pretty knowledgeable on the topic.

About a month ago, we started telling people to harvest their garlic scapes, which many people (myself included!) didn't know were edible. The scape is the thick green stalk in the middle of the garlic plant that grows up and curls with a white segment that would become the flower. Once they start to curl, they can be harvested. "Because of their substantial heft as opposed to garlic cloves, they are vegetable, aromatic, and even herb all in one,"says one writer who goes on to rave about garlic scape pesto and provides other ways of using the scapes, including grilling them or throwing them into a "double-garlic soup" (http://www.seriouseats.com/recipes/2010/06/the-crisper-whisperer-what-to-do-with-garlic-scapes-recipe.html). Here is one fast and favored recipe for garlic scape pesto. 

Definitely ready to harvest

Garlic scapes are just the preview to the real feast of flavor, but timing is key. The whole growing underground thing makes it rather more difficult to tell when garlic is ready as compared to say a squash that you can watch size up. It also depends on the variety, especially between soft- and hard-neck garlic which can be harvested a few days to a week apart. But according to the expert garlic growers, soft-neck  should be harvested when there are still 5 green leaves on (6 if it is a large harvest) that serve as protection during storage. The green leaves are important because they indicate sturdy protection as opposed to decaying or decayed wrappers for the garlic bulbs, and the number is important because some are lost sometime between harvesting, cleaning, and curing. For hard-neck (or "ophio") garlic, harvest time is even more critical because there is more potential for decay if left too long, and also the cloves are more likely to split or break, therefore needing more protection. For this, the expert says to harvest when there are six leaves left and the sixth leaf has browned at the tip. He mentions that other growers harvest "when plants are about 40% browned and 60% green" but also thinks it is better to harvest a little earlier rather than later. 

Harvested hard- and soft-neck garlic

If that isn't enough detail for you, there are quite a few books entirely devoted to garlic, some of which can be found here: http://www.filareefarm.com/book.html. 

Potato Passion

Potatoes are one of the most fun things to harvest in my humble opinion. Last week, we visited a garden where one woman harvested her own and so I had the delightful duty of digging for some buried treasures she might have missed... found some lovely little gems too. Maybe not everyone finds this as exciting for me but I never really grew out of that childhood love of dirt. Having dug for worms with my dad and uncle every time they wanted to go fishing instilled an attachment to dirt under my fingernails and the joy of flinging it around until it's in my hair, smeared on my face, and coating my hands....

All nostalgia aside, potatoes harvest time is another one that might be a little difficult to discern. If you are looking for "new potatoes," or those little sweeties that are still full of sugar not yet turned to starch, then you have to dig them up while the plant is still happy and green. When the plants have started to die back you can find starchy, mature potatoes. If you want to wait a bit longer, they can still be harvested when the plants are falling over, and you can be sure the potatoes will be big and heavy with starchy goodness. Sometimes you might see them poking their faces out of the soil but it is best to cover them to protect them from the sun which turns them a greenish color, making that part bitter and possibly harmful. Green in this case does not mean go- it is a warning of the presence of solanine, a toxic substance most concentrated in the skin, so cutting away the green part will remove enough of the toxicity to make it fine for eating.

Ready to harvest potato plants

Someday I will definitely be growing my own potatoes; they are relatively easy to maintain and produce quite a bit (one plant = 3-4 pounds of potatoes!) and there are so many beautiful varieties to explore. Not only do I enjoy harvesting them most, but I enjoy buying them most of anything at the farmers market as well... the potato man has blue ones, purple ones, yellow ones, pink ones, roasters, mashers, long ones, fat ones, anything I could ever desire in a potato. All this passionate talk of potatoes is making me want some... or maybe that's just the Irish in me.