Haven't posted in a long time!   

It has been a very busy summer, perhaps because the pandemic pushes one to bring in a bit more hay (now all sold) and expand the vegetable gardens.

Bed #1, on 7/1/2020 (photo to right).   The gardens went in  ahead of schedule, due to a dry and early spring.

We hayed in June, as the hayfields were not their usual boggy spring selves.   Some early baler issues were resolved satisfactorily.   July usually brings most of the hay volume, but rains prevented any July haying.   We necessarily hayed the first two weeks in August, for feed hay.   For whatever reason, the Augusta cut was pretty good. 

After having slightly reduced the size of the vegetable gardens in recent years, the pandemic urged a move in the other direction, and we planted more winter squash that usual.   We filled two hay beds, two large in-ground beds, and six raised beds.

I always try to "plan" that something will not thrive.   That seems a reasonable prediction with organic vegetables.   This year, it was more than one thing, but still not bad given the strange weather.   

There are the summer only eating items, like greens, lettuce, and cucumbers.  We always want to put a lot of brocolli and green beans in the freezers for the winter, along with freezing smaller amounts snap peas, cauliflower, kale, and sliced carrots.   Most of the tomatoes were eaten fresh, but a few were boiled down into sauce.  The Brussels sprouts didn't make it, but made a newly arrived pest happy.

More carrots went whole into the root cellar, along with potatoes and celeriac.   

Dried sage and oregano are in the kitchen cupboards.

The regular cellar now has more than the usual amount of acorn squash, butternut squash, and pie pumpkins.

The other thing that did less well than usual was the onions.   We usually put lots of onions into the cellar, and enjoy them all winter.   The wild turkeys, who normally do no harm, decided to wander and scratch in the small onion seedlings this year.  Oh well.

On plan for next year:   extend fence around the onions. 

Thanks to everyone who bought hay or vegetables this year!