Life on an organic farm is... being dug up!

Just like Ireland in the 1840’s, a potato blight has struck on the field of Maplewood. Fortunately though, unlike the Guinness drinkers, we caught the blight before it ruined the crop. For a greater part of the afternoon, all six rows of the potatoes had their dying above ground plant chopped off with the help of some machinery run by Eric; then Ellyn, Susie and I cut the outside rows by hand. All the leaves and stems were then raked up. Reminding me of an old gold mining town after the rush, I racked up the remaining potato beetles, trying to survive off of the dying leaves, through the dirt. The mounds of blight infected potato plants will be burned, in order to completely get rid of the blight. The potatoes in the ground will be fine, the longer we waited before cutting off the plants however, would have increased the chances of the blight traveling down the stem into the ground, infecting the potatoes. Eric the intern has already proven that the potatoes aren’t infected, as he ate one raw off his pitchfork today; yeah... needless to say he’s defiantly embracing the farming life and we’re a bit nervous about his release back to his “normal life.” We’ll wait awhile before digging up the rest of the potatoes, so that the skin grows thicker!

As the potato duties called us to the field, Ellyn and I left Eric to pulling out the rest of the garlic bulbs this afternoon. All hundreds of them it seems (though I may be exaggerating a bit...) are out now, beginning their process of curing in the greenhouse. The garlic grown in the garden this season is hard neck garlic, which means, unlike soft neck garlic, it won’t be braided, so we began cutting the necks off, since they aren’t needed. The aroma of garlic overwhelmingly takes over the senses when you walk through that section of the greenhouse!