Summer fun

The wet spring has led to a bumper crop of black raspberries, raspberries, and cherries this week. We shared some for ice cream toppings at a friend's birthday party last night, and Amelia from Felicia's picked up a few quarts of black caps for their mixed drinks. We'll have to head down for happy hour this afternoon to try their "Black Cap Yap".

The 3,000 row feet of potatoes for Westhaven are getting hilled with hay mulch. We had planned on using discs to just push dirt on them, but between the last start, and equipment issues, we just skidded a few round bales from the field and spread them around the plants. More hand labor than we'd like, but with the exception of the voles picking at some of the above soil potatoes, we get pretty good yields. I also wonder about the cover of the hay being good for beneficial insects. We've seen very little colorado potato beetle pressure in our hay mulched beds. We also plant buckwheat nearby to provide cover and flowers which attract beneficial insects. Squash beetles are another concern of ours, and I'm hoping our tests with various compost teas will work again with the larger sprayers (one 12v cart-mounted and one PTO driven) that we picked up with the Farmall this year.