Theme: summer

News from the Farm | August 25, 2025

As mentioned last week, this is the time of year to plant our fall crops. So far, we’ve direct seeded beets, carrots, and spinach (more about that process here), and have transplanted broccoli and leeks, with many more to come. These cool weather crops don’t like the heat, but we have to start them now. By the end of September, summer crops will be done or winding down and we need a new supply of produce to harvest for you, so we’ll be planting and transplanting a LOT over the coming two months. 

August is always hot, and September too. So how do we start growing cool-season crops during triple-digit summer days? It’s all about moisture management.

Seeds need a moist and warm (but not too warm) environment to germinate. They also need moisture. Too much water will rot the seeds, but they’ll fry if there’s too little. Water also helps with temperature control. Optimal carrot germination temperature is in the mid-70s, but if it’s over 100 degrees, as it’s been the past few days, the soil is far above that optimal temperature for all but a few hours. We also use floating row cover, the white, lightweight fabric in the photo above. Row cover is most often used in colder months to trap in heat and protect plants from frost, but a lightweight summer version reduces the intensity of the sun, similar to what the shade cloth does for our peppers. The particularly finicky carrots get the row cover, but the other direct seeded crops just get water.

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News from the Farm | August 18, 2025

While keeping incredibly busy harvesting summer produce, we’ve also got fall on our minds and lots of fall prep on our To Do lists!

We’re starting to cut and cure winter squash. The first samples showed up in the office last week. It happens every year around this time, but still feels like a surprise. And it also feels a little early to start cooking with winter squash, but regardless how we feel, they’re here!

Paul started planting potatoes (top left photo), the first brassicas (broccoli) were transplanted last week, along with a field of leeks (top right), and Andrew planted the first carrots on Saturday (lower photo)! The planting and transplanting will continue in earnest over the next few weeks. In addition to finding the time to plant, the trick is keeping these cool weather crops happy in non-cool weather. The carrots especially need a bit more tending to than some crops to germinate and thrive. They’ll get about an hour of water per day to keep the soil moist enough to germinate the seeds and we cover them with row cover to help keep in the moisture.

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News from the Farm | August 11, 2025

It’s estimated that there are 50,000 pepper varieties grown worldwide. We grow only a small portion of that diverse world. What we grow changes every year – I’ve conducted a pepper census and here’s the 2025 list: 

Sweet

  • Corno de Toro
  • Lunchbox
  • Jimmy Nardello
  • Sheepnose pimento
  • Shishito

Hot

  • Cayenne
  • Chilaca
  • Espelette
  • Jalapeño
  • Pepperoncini
  • Poblano
  • Serrano
[Read more…]

News from the Farm | August 4, 2025

Hello from the tomato field! It’s more of a sea of tomatoes, or perhaps a jungle. If we didn’t use a hedge trimmer to keep things tidy, the vines would grow so wild that the rows would be impassable. The air smells like tomatoes, and many happy and industrious spiders have strung webs between the rows. 

The spiders aren’t the only happy ones. The tomatoes are too; they’ve benefited from one of the mildest summers we’ve had in a long time. Tomatoes like some heat but they stop growing when it gets warmer than 95℉ and drop flowers if it gets too hot, especially if nighttime temperatures exceed 72℉. We’ve been much closer to the ideal growing range this year and the plants are vigorous and healthy and the tomatoes taste great. And you’ve been letting us know how much you’re enjoying the tomatoes in your boxes:

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News from the Farm | June 16, 2025

This Friday is the first day of summer and we’re (almost) ready. The gang’s all here (almost). Last week, right on cue, several of the summer classics were ready to start harvesting. Too many to document but it gives a glimpse of what you can find this week at one of our Farmers Markets and hopefully soon, we’ll have enough to put in our CSA boxes!

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News from the Farm | September 9, 2024

Whew – another week in the summer sprint done!

Some notable moments from last week included:

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News from the Farm | August 26, 2024

Somehow, we have reached the end of August. The mornings last week were brisk; it only hit 87 degrees on Friday, and we all scratched our heads on Saturday as a light rain sprinkled down on our valley and left the fields and trees slightly less dusty than they were before. 

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News from the Farm | August 19, 2024

Farming requires being very aware of the current conditions (weather, crops ready for harvest, etc.) all while thinking about the next day, week, month, season, and year. In August, we start pivoting to fall. We’re undeniably still in summer, even with cooler temperatures over the weekend and continuing into this week, but autumnal elements are starting to creep in. Here’re a few examples from the past week:

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News from the Farm | July 29, 2024

July is always a very busy month, when seemingly everything is ready to harvest. Plus there’s the heat. Last week and the week before have included many long, hot days.

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News from the Farm | July 22, 2024

There’s a regular rhythm to each day, though every day here is different, largely influenced by the time of year, and the day of the week. During the summer, everything is taken up a notch, not just the temperature. There is a lot of produce to water and harvest and only so many hours in the day to get it done. However those two Herculean tasks, tending to crops in the field and harvesting, are just part of what keeps us busy. A huge part of what we do is packing the produce, flowers, and other goods and then figuring out logistics to get everything on the correct truck so that everything arrives to its intended recipient. There’s no point in carefully growing great produce, and harvesting it at prime condition if it won’t get to you, or doesn’t arrive in good condition. 

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News from the Farm | July 8, 2024

Full Belly watermelon (orchid, yellow doll, and sugar baby) at the Guinda Fourth of July potluck

I think there’s only one word to describe last week: HOT. The coolest high temperature was Monday when it still got above 100, and it only got hotter as the week went on. Being outside when it’s 110 or above feels similar to the blast of hot, dry air you get when you open the door of an oven. Except that you can’t close the oven door, and you still have to work and get things done at home (including cooking), and for us, our work is outside. 100 is a standard summer temperature for us, and it’s also fairly normal that we’ll have heat waves for a week or two (here’s a chronicle of a few past heat waves), but that doesn’t mean that it’s comfortable or easy.

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News from the Farm | June 24, 2024

The solstice was last Thursday so now it’s officially summer. But even without looking at a calendar, we knew it – it tastes, looks, feels, and sounds, and smells like summer. 

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News from the Farm | September 11, 2023

It’s getting to the time of the summer when everything looks a little dusty and tired, the people included, but that doesn’t mean there’s a shortage of neat things to see. Need some examples? [Read more…]

News from the Farm | August 28, 2023

August is the busiest month on the farm with a never-ending list of things to do. What was keeping us busy last week?

LOTS of harvesting, packing, sorting: 

It’s been nonstop, especially for our biggest crops of the summer: melons, tomatoes, and flowers. Our heirloom tomatoes are starting to slow down, but the heirloom harvesting crew still has been hard at work harvesting, and the work won’t be winding down for a while for the crews that harvest “regular” (Early Girls, Romas, and slicers) and cherry tomatoes.  [Read more…]

News from the Farm | August 21, 2023

Among the seemingly endless fields of melons, tomatoes, winter squash, and other warm-weather crops, we currently have several fields of cover crops going strong. Yes – that photo of the lush green above was taken this morning (August 21, 2023) on an unseasonably cool, cloudy, and drizzly day; it’s not a photo from earlier this year. Cover crops aren’t just for the cooler seasons, even though that’s when we tend to talk about them most (like this deep dive into cover crops last November)! The work of feeding and caring for the soil and “growing” healthy soil never ends, so when we have the water and field space to grow summer cover crops, we do. It seems counterintuitive to take land out of production during our peak harvest time to grow a non-sellable crop, but it’s an excellent opportunity to grow a fast-growing, healthy cover crop and invest in our soil and bountiful future harvests. [Read more…]

News from the Farm | July 24, 2023

I love looking through the years of archived Beet newsletters. They document wet years, dry years, the experiences of many interns who’ve long left the farm, important milestones (like our transition to the plastic boxes, as well as weddings, births, trips, deaths), and events that have come and gone, and bigger issues that we still deal with today (water, labor availability, organic regulations). This isn’t just a resources I have at my disposal; the archives going back to October 2012 are all available online! Not the entire Beet, but the News from the Farm portion. 

For those, like me, who are relatively newer to the farm, it’s a great window into what has and hasn’t changed, and puts everything in context. Often, when I think I have an original idea for the Beet, a quick search in archives shows that someone probably has talked about that topic before, albeit in a slightly different way, probably even on that same date, just years (or decades) before. [Read more…]

News from the Farm | June 26, 2023

With the solstice this past Wednesday, it’s officially summer. But without the calendar reminder, you’d be forgiven for not realizing. We’re due for some classic June Yolo County heat later this week, but so far, it’s been remarkably temperate and cool, only in the 80s, and slightly brisk in the morning, chilly enough to wear a sweatshirt or vest.

But if you look a little closer, the signs are there that we’re in summer mode, or at least gearing up for summer, even if it’s been a slow start. [Read more…]

News from the Farm | September 5, 2022

What’s the news from the farm?

We are working this Labor Day Monday, as we do every Monday (we’ve got Tuesday CSA deliveries, store deliveries, and a farmers market) though we did take Saturday off. This week is going to be a series of scorchers – 110 and above every day. We’re prioritizing everyone’s health and will likely try and wrap up as early as possible to get folks out of the heat, which means limiting orders. [Read more…]

News from the Farm | August 15, 2022

It’s August, which means it’s time to start prepping for fall. It can be difficult to think about the next season and its crops when it’s so hot and we’re so busy harvesting and packing summer produce. However, all of those peppers, tomatoes, and melons will eventually wind down and we need to have the cooler season crops ready to take over at that point. [Read more…]

News from the Farm | June 27, 2022

What’s the news from the last week (or so)? [Read more…]