Riverbend Farm Newsletter Week 12 September 5

The weather continues to be interesting. Yesterday was very pleasant until a little cold front came through. We were just done picking peppers and the wind picked up out of the north. The temperature dropped about 20° on 5 minutes. Then it started to rain.

The wind pulled all the grommets out of the south end of the tarp over the packing area. That lets the tarp flap and when it does that it beats the structure until it bends or breaks. This time it broke all the threads off the pipes that make up the cantilever part of the structure. Some of the PVC piping was broken somewhere in the process. Overall, it held up pretty well. Some early versions of that structure have landed in the middle of the yard.

Gabe has been disking with the 350. It has much better hydraulics than the H. Bri cultivated the second to last planting of greens and radishes today. And I seeded the last planting of greens and radishes for the year. As part of that I seeded some kale that we will dig up and relocate to the root cellar. They will be set out in the spring to produce seeds.

With the slower pace of field work it has been time to catch up on auto repair. A few of the projects included replacing the front hubs and reshimming the air conditioner clutch on Mary’s car. Next up for that car is a new timing belt and camshaft oil seals. Jennifer’s Subaru needed a lower ball joint. Some of them are easy and some are not. The ball joint sits in a socket in the front spindle. A pinch bolt holds it in place. Once I figured out how to make a puller it was not bad.

We had postponed the crop mob due to rain so they all showed up on last Saturday to help out the a variety of tasks. It went really well giving them a choice of things to do. Some people worked on shelling corn. Others searched for onions. Even with the holes in the weed block, the onions were terrible. A few of us investigated why there was a sinkhole forming over the drain tile. It looks like the soil was flowing into the old tile line with the heavy rain. Usually it is not that simple. Everyone was interested to see the fanning mill work but there may have been too many moving parts for anyone to get to involved with cleaning rye.
45° feels a lot warmer in March than it does in September.

Greg
This week’s CSA share contains: Arugula, radishes, broccoli, potatoes, scallions, beans, beets, peppers, garlic, corn meal, sweet corn, basil and a muskmelon.