It is a little chilly this morning, the temperature as I write this is 58 degrees. It is starting to feel like we are easing into fall; another summer is winding down.
The Rillito farmers’ market will be having a chile festival this weekend and we will be selling sinahuisa, jalapeño, poblano and Aleppo chiles.
As mentioned last week, we will be selling CSA shares for our fall & winter CSA season that will start on November 12 and continue until mid-March. The forms will be available at the Sunday market, and in the CSA box on the right sidebar of this website, and here.
We will see you at the market!
baby patty pan squashfreshly picked shishito peppers
The Great Ripening is upon us! We are harvesting loads of plum tomatoes now. Yesterday we harvested about 80 pounds from about 2/3 of the row. We have the tomatoes at the market this Sunday and should have them until early December.
Also, the corno di toro Italian sweet peppers are finally ripening en masse, as are the jalapeños and lunchbox peppers. All of these plants should continue to produce for a couple months at least.
We have had a few volunteers this week and have been able to get a bit more done on controlling the massive volume of weeds in our field. Little by little we are getting a handle on the weeds.
We will soon be selling CSA shares for our fall & winter CSA season that will start in early November and continue until mid-February. Please let us know if you want us to reserve a share for you.
Thank you for supporting local, organic, sustainable farming in southern AZ !
garlic, california early whiteverona plum tomatoes
This week we finally transplanted the butternut squash seedlings. This is the latest we have ever transplanted winter squash. There should be just enough time for them to ripen before the first freeze. I am hoping for a warm fall and a late first freeze!
As can be seen in the images below, our sweet peppers are finally starting to ripen. This is much later than last year even though they were transplanted at the same time of the year. I think it may have to do with them being under 40% shadecloth in the high tunnel. One of the plants on the south end of the row that gets direct sunlight most of the day has corno di toro peppers that started ripening much earlier than the rest of the row, which is now catching up.
We will have a few of both varieties of sweet peppers at the market this week.
As mentioned last week SouthWinds Farm has been invited to participate in the Hacienda del Sol Heritage Foods Festival. This event will be held in the evening on Sunday, September 3. If you are interested in more information about this event, stop by our farm stand and pick up a flyer or visit HaciendaDelSol.com.
We will see you at the market!
lunchbox peppercorno di toro, Italian sweet peppers
It has been raining everywhere around us, but not at the farm. Since July 28 we have had only about 0.4″ of rain – less than a half-inch. It has been frustrating to watch it pour down in all directions, but just barely hit us. This is a good example of the spatially discontinuous nature of the monsoon rains. Maybe today.
Despite the lack of precipitation, it has been nice and humid; plus we have had several cloudy and cool days. These conditions are great for our crops, so they have been growing well.
The farm dinner at Agustín Kitchen has been postponed again, probably until sometime in late September or October. Please pardon the changing dates as we work with the restaurant to find a date that works for all parties involved. We will keep you informed as the planning proceeds.
In the meantime, we will be getting ready for the fall planting. Samantha, our summer intern, has finished her internship and returned to Las Cruces for the fall semester. We thank her for her help this summer! Steve is hanging in and putting in a lot of hours with me as we take up the slack. We have commitments from one person to start the first week of September, a wwoofer who says he will probably be here the last week of August, and a several applicants for fall internships. Bear with us as we bear down. (As Wildcat who spent 15 years studying at the UofA, I just couldn’t resist that reference 😉
As you can see from the images, some of our summer crops are finally starting to come in. And it’s about time !! We got a bit behind in the late spring planting due to a shortage of help on the farm – familiar theme.
We are still looking for help on harvest days (Tuesday, Friday and Saturday) or other days, if you are interested. If you know anyone who might want to work with us, please send them to see us at the markets or pass along my email address joe@southwindsfarm.org. Anyone who helps us out will go home with a share of delicious, fresh, organic produce. Thank you in advance for passing along this request for assistance.
We survived the heatwave and so did the crops. It has been mostly cloudy for days out here, which makes for pleasant working conditions. The monsoon is trying to start up, teasing us with virga and sprinkles as it does for weeks every summer before the full monsoon kicks in to gear.
We are excited to be hosting a farm visit from most of the chefs, servers and other staff of The Coronet and Agustín Kitchen this upcoming Monday morning. It looks like we will have a group of 20 or so people checking out the source of some of their ingredients. Should be a fun morning !
Agustín Kitchen will be hosting a special event in early August featuring SouthWinds Farm produce. As the planning for this dinner proceeds, we will provide more details.
As a reminder, we will be taking a short Independence Day break and we will not be delivering CSA shares, nor will we be attending the markets on July 3 (Rillito) and July 6 (Green Valley).
Corno di toro sweet peppersPurple bush beansPlum tomatoes
SouthWinds Farm 