Notes from the Field, Week of August 30th

Ripe on the Farm this Week:

Tomatoes                   Salad Greens

Beans                          Summer Squash

Peppers                     Cucumbers

Eggplant                    Kohlrabi

Corn                      Basil

Notes From the Field:              It’s back to school time, and we wish all our students and teachers good luck for the upcoming school year!   We hope that you enjoyed the sweet corn last week.  Some of the ears did not develop kernels all the way up to their tips, but this does not affect the taste.  Some of the ears just did not get all the pollination that they needed.  The tomatoes are still looking awesome, and all the sunshine is helping them to ripen quickly.  Tobacco hornworms, Manduca sexta, (slightly different than tomato hornworms) have found a home eating some of the tomato plants.   The larvae feed on the foliage of various plants from the family Solanaceae.  The life cycle lasts 30 –50 days, and adults become Carolina Sphinx moths.  The chickens have been enjoying the hornworms as a juicy treat, though we are keeping one big one to observe its change into a moth.

Tobacco hornworm (image from beginner-gardening.com)

 *How to freeze fresh beans* - Rinse your beans in cool water. Drain. Cut the ends of the beans off. Cut the beans to whatever length you prefer. Put the green beans into rapidly boiling water, cover the pot and boil them for 3 minutes. Use a large slotted spoon to remove the green beans from the boiling water and immediately plunge them into a bowl of ice water to stop the cooking. Keep them in the ice water for 3 minutes. Drain them well. Put the green beans into ziplock freezer bags. Make sure you get as much air out of the ziplock bag as possible to help prevent freezer burn. Get ready to enjoy farm fresh beans whenever you want!