Here at my farm, it's been hot and humid with temperatures in the high 80s and 90s. Earlier this week, we got a brief respite with slightly cooler weather but unfortunately, no significant rain and the next couple of days are expected to be uncomfortably warm once again.
Supporting a working farm is a huge job. In order for it to thrive, the animals and gardens need constant tender loving care. I keep a running list of all the chores that need to be done at any given time, so it always looks and functions at its best.
Here are some photos, enjoy.
It’s important to check the orchard and garden every day to make sure fruits and vegetables are picked as soon as they’re ready. Here is my first big bounty of fresh, organic peaches – so sweet and delicious!
Enma picks the ripest peaches she can find. Peaches are ready when they are orange-red in color, when the flesh gives slightly to gentle pressure, and when they smell sweet.
This is my outdoor grounds crew resident mower, Adan, on our Kubota SZ22 Stand On Mower. He mows every day during the summer. He is excellent at keeping up with the growth and knows exactly when to mow what area next. Here he is in the orchard, carefully mowing in between the trees…
… from one end to the other. This stand on mower can do open areas as well as narrower spaces.
We’ve been using STIHL’s backpack blowers for years here at my farm. These blowers are powerful and fuel-efficient. The gasoline-powered engines provide enough rugged power to tackle heavy debris while delivering low emissions. Fernando blows the debris along the garden bed under my allée of lindens.
When living with horses, regular grooming is essential to their care and wellness. Grooming not only keeps horses clean, but also stimulates good circulation, encourages healthy bonding with handlers, and allows them to be checked closely for any signs of illness or injury. My stable manager, Helen, grooms the horses every day. Bond doesn’t seem to mind.
Another regular stable chore involves keeping the building’s interior clean. Here, Juan wipes down the stable bars and doors.
Up in the compost yard, my outdoor grounds crew foreman, Chhiring, continues the tedious job of mulching all the beds around the farm. Thankfully, I am able to make good, nutrient-rich mulch right here. Chhiring is moving a load into the dump truck, so it can be transported to the next area on the list for top dressing – the pinetum.
Chhiring is using my Kubota M62 Tractor Loader Backhoe. It has a 63 horsepower engine, a front loader with a lift capacity of 3,960 pounds, and a powerful Kubota backhoe with 169.8 inch digging depth. Chhiring controls everything from the safety of the tractor’s cab. He can turn and sit facing either direction to maneuver the backhoe or the loader.
With no rain at all this week, the crew is also busy watering. I use Gilmour garden hoses and sprinklers and I personally show every member how to use them, so they can water properly and efficiently. Fernando positions this sprinkler to water the plantings outside my stable.
Ryan takes all the newly picked garlic to one area of my carport where it can cure for several weeks in a cool, shady, and dry location. Curing is a process of letting the garlic dry in preparation for long-term storage.
Soon, the garlic will also be cleaned and trimmed. Once the garlic is cured, the most beautiful heads with the biggest cloves will be set aside to use as garlic seeds next season. The rest will be enjoyed by me and my family.
Weeds in the garden are inevitable – left alone, so many of them quickly overtake healthy flowers, plants, and vegetables, stealing their sunlight, water, and soil nutrients. Every summer, my gardeners and crew try try hard to keep up with their rapid growth. Here’s Matthew weeding my long pergola before all the bright, beautiful tiger lilies bloom.
And, right by his side is my Multi-Purpose Reusable Heavy Duty Tote Bag – it’s so useful for carrying weeds, but also for organizing, and storing so many things indoors and out.
In the long Boxwood Allée, Phurba works on pruning and grooming the shrubs. Phurba is my resident boxwood pruning expert and has been with me for many years.
I prefer all the boxwood be trimmed by hand. Phurba uses Japanese Okatsune shears. These shears allow him to sculpt and groom as well as prune the foliage. Phurba also uses an orchard ladder that is light enough to carry as he moves from one shrub to the next.
For very narrow spaces such as in between the rows of my dwarf apple espalier, Adan uses a STIHL RM 655 VS gas push mower. While I have replaced many grassy areas with mulch to reduce the amount of mowing around my farm, there is still a lot of mowing to do.
Later in the day, Helen, power washes the stable floor in preparation for a photo shoot. It’s also important to keep various areas clean and tidy for production use.
This week, my outdoor grounds crew is also giving the four miles of carriage road around my farm some attention. The Land Pride PR1690 Power Rake is secured to the back of our tractor in order to rake and grade the carriage roads.
When the rake is lowered onto the road surface and tilted to the proper angle, the attachment moves the gravel and road dust to the center, creating a crown. On less used roads, the power rake freshens up the existing gravel as it turns and brings any compacted gravel to the surface. Pete just finished this section of road leading to my pastures.
It’s always busy at my farm. My crew works hard to get all the chores checked off the list every day. I hope you’re getting lots of your summer tasks checked off too!
It's garlic picking time when the bottom leaves of the plants start to die back and turn brown, the top leaves are still green, and the soil in the bed is completely dry.
Knowing when garlic is ready to pick can be tricky. If it’s harvested too soon, the cloves are small and underdeveloped. If done too late, the clove heads begin to separate, making them more vulnerable to decay. Yesterday was just right. My gardeners harvested our entire crop - the softnecks, which produce long-lasting bulbs with many cloves around a soft center stem, and the hardnecks, which are noted for their stiff central stalk, fewer cloves, relatively short shelf life, and intriguingly complex flavors. And all from our friends at Keene Garlic, a family-owned farm in Wisconsin.
Enjoy these photos.
Once the top of the garlic plant begins to die back, it’s ready to pick. My gardeners waited for a dry day to harvest – this allows the soil to dry out, helps to prevent rot, and makes it much easier to pull the stalks and bulbs from the ground. The main harvest time is usually late July through mid-August.
Garlic is planted in the fall. I’ve been planting Keene Garlic for quite some time and am always pleased with their growth and taste. The next several photos are from a sunny, mild early November day of last year.
Here, Ryan prepares the bed for planting. The majority of garlic in the US is planted from mid-October through November before the ground freezes. When planting multiple rows of garlic, the rows are at least one-foot apart.
It is also important to give each clove enough room to grow and develop. These are at least two to three inches from each other.
And then the garlic is left to grow. Garlic loves a rich fertile loam soil or a silty loam soil. It also grows best in an area that drains well – the cloves can rot if they sit in water or mud.
In June, one can see the scapes beginning to form. Garlic scapes are the flower buds of the garlic plants. They’re ready about a month before the actual garlic bulbs. Scapes are delicious and can be used just like garlic.
Scapes can be cut when the center stalks are completely formed and the ends are curled.
Yesterday was a beautiful day to harvest garlic. Matthew uses a pitch fork to gently loosen the soil in between the garlic stems.
Each garlic is pulled out from the base of the leaves so that the head comes out completely.
Here’s Ryan with one of the first garlic heads of the season.
As Matthew continues to loosen the soil, Ryan picks the garlic – it’s a very systematic process.
The whole garlic is called a ‘head’, a ‘bulb’, or a ‘knob.‘ Each small, individual segment of a garlic head is a clove. Garlic is both delicious and nutritious. It is known to lower cholesterol, decrease the risk of coronary artery disease, and is an excellent source of minerals and vitamins, such as vitamins B6 and C.
Ryan shows two bunches of freshly picked Elephant garlic. Elephant garlic is actually a leek that resembles garlic in growing and in appearance. It has a very mild flavor. It is most commonly found in grocery stores. Jumbo sized Elephant garlic will have about eight to 11 cloves depending on the size.
It isn’t long before the entire bed is picked.
The next step is to prepare the garlic for curing. Ryan cuts off the top of each garlic leaving about a three to four-inch stalk.
Trimming the stalks makes it easier to store and keeps them neat and uniform.
No bed is ever left empty during the garden season. After the garlic is harvested, the bed is cleaned and prepped for the next crop.
The bed is ready for planting. What do you think I’ll plant next?
Look at the bounty! But it is not ready to eat just yet. It must still dry. Curing is a process of letting the garlic dry in preparation for long-term storage. There’s no need to wash garlic – the point is to completely dry them out. Well-cured, well-wrapped garlic bulbs will keep six to eight months or longer. The best storage temperature for garlic is between 60 and 70 degrees Fahrenheit, with low humidity at about 60-percent – and never store garlic in the refrigerator. I will soon have lots of delicious garlic to use and share.
Beautiful, colorful dahlias continue to bloom at my farm.
Dahlias begin to bloom with great profusion just as other plants pass their prime and they last right up until the first frost. My all-dahlia garden is planted in a large bed behind my vegetable greenhouse. I have flowers ranging from small to giant dinner-plate size in all different colors and forms. And to keep them flourishing, I make sure to continuously deadhead spent blooms - it’s the key to keeping this garden bursting with flowers all season long.
Here are some photos, enjoy.
Every day I’m home, I make it a point to tour my farm several times to see how the gardens are doing. This time of year, when it’s hot and dry, it’s important to make sure everything gets watered, weeded, and maintained properly.
I often say my favorite flowers are those blooming at the time because I love them all. Right now, my dahlias are bursting with color. There are about 42 species of dahlia, with hybrids commonly grown as garden plants. A member of the Asteraceae family of dicotyledonous plants, some of its relatives include the sunflower, daisy, chrysanthemum, and zinnia.
The genus Dahlia is native to the high plains of Mexico. Some species can be found in Guatemala, Honduras, Nicaragua, El Salvador, and Costa Rica as well as parts of South America where it was introduced.
Dahlias were first recorded by Westerners in 1615, and were then called by their original Mexican name, acoctli. The first garden dahlias reached the United States in the early 1830s. Today, dahlias are grown all over the world.
It is named after the Swedish 18th century botanist Anders Dahl, who originally declared the flower a vegetable, as the tubers are edible.
Flowers come one head per stem. The blooms can be as small as two-inches in diameter or up to one foot across. They are divided into 10 groups: single, anemone, collarette, waterlily, decorative, fall, pompon, cactus, semi-cactus, and miscellaneous.
Dahlia leaves are typically dark green, lance-shaped, and have a slightly rough texture.
Dahlias can vary in height, leaf color, form, and shape. This is because dahlias are octoploids, meaning they have eight sets of homologous chromosomes, whereas most plants have only two.
They produce an abundance of wonderful flowers throughout early summer and again in late summer until the first frost.
Dahlias are popularly grown for their long-lasting cut flowers. From the side, many dahlia petals grow all around the flower head giving it a very full appearance.
And they thrive in rich, well-drained soil with a pH level of 6.5 to 7.0 and slightly acidic.
The majority of dahlia species do not produce scented flowers or cultivars, but they are brightly colored to attract pollinating insects.
Dahlias come in white, shades of pink, red, yellow, orange, shades of purple, and various combinations of these colors – every color but true blue. In the 19th century, a London newspaper offered a pound, or a little more than a dollar, to the first breeder to create a blue dahlia—the reward was never claimed, but there have been many attempts that are near-blue.
And as the flowers finish blooming, when petals have begun to wilt, fade, or turn brown around the edges, it’s time to deadhead, or remove spent flowers.
Deadheading through the season prevents the plants from redirecting their energy into seed production, allowing them to focus on producing more flowers instead. Ryan clips below the flower head just at the junction with the neighboring stem.
Deadheading also helps maintain the overall health of the plant, keeps the garden looking tidy and prevents the spread of pests and disease.
Ryan will check the dahlia garden once a week and trim any faded blooms.
After just a few minutes, Ryan has deadheaded the entire garden – it doesn’t take long at all.
And to prevent wilting, when cutting do so only in the early morning or late afternoon. And only cut them after they open to mature size – dahlias will not open after cutting.
So, go out and check your dahlias. Deadheading now and through the season will mean more to enjoy until the onset of winter.
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