This past week or so has seen some good news and bad news, The worst news was the frost that occurred over Mother’s Day weekend. Freeze warnings were issued and of course, because everything got an early start this year, lots of stuff was at risk. Some fruits and vegetables were affected; see the details below.

We have also been busy planting, plowing and planning this year’s planting scheme for the farm. So let’s just cut to the chase and tell you the good, the bad and the just plain ugly news from Magicland Farms.

The Good

• The strawberries survived the frost on Mother’s Day weekend due to the use of sprinklers. So it looks promising that we will have a strawberry crop this year.
• The peas, onions and garlic also survived the frost due to the fact that these crops are cold hardy. They can take a lot of cold and still keep on going.
• The tomatoes in the high tunnel sustained no damage.
• Most of the sweet corn plantings are okay because the early plantings were small and the growing point was still beneath the soil.
• The green beans were just coming up so they sustained no damage. Tom was amazed the other day with how well they are growing. At the rate they are going, it looks like a super early bean year for us.
• We have planted three different varieties of sweet potatoes: Beauregard, Carolina Ruby and Vardaman.  Here is a photo of our sweet potato planting: The row at the right is a row of tomatoes; the rows to the left are the sweet potatoes.

The Bad

• The potatoes sustained some minor damage. On Sunday, Tom and I went to look at things at the farm and you could see new green growth coming from the potatoes so while they might have suffered a setback, the plants are starting to make a comeback.
• The tomato plants we had in the low tunnels out in the field were about half damaged. Interestingly, the side of the low tunnel that received some of the sprinkler water meant for the strawberries survived; the side that didn’t was a loss. Those tomatoes that died have been replaced with new transplants.

The Ugly

• The pawpaws sustained heavy damage from the frost.
• The apples sustained moderate to heavy damage depending on the variety and the location in the orchard.
• Tom looked at the peaches the other day and thinks that there might be moderate damage to the crop. However, we should still have some peaches.

Overall things are looking good. We all wish the frost hadn’t happened but we know that everything happens for a reason. Planting is continuing, we still have lots more to go. Keep on checking back for updates. You can see some more photos at my previous post: Sunday Stroll Around The Farm.

I apologize for my lack of postings lately but that doesn’t mean that things have been quiet around here. Over the last couple of weeks, we have been able to start planting at the farm. We  even put in some sweet corn, hoping that the warmer than normal weather will provide us with early sweet corn. Here is what has been happening at the farm.

• The orchard got pruned and the brush hauled away.
• The first planting of beets went in.
• Our garlic crop is about six inches tall and looking good.
• All of the broccoli (early, midseason and late) has been planted. Also we have planted most of the cabbage.
• The sugar snap peas have been planted.
• The high tunnel is in use with the first planting of tomatoes.
• Norland, Yukon Gold and Kennebec potatoes are in the ground.
• New strawberry plants were purchased. They are in the ground being grown on plastic.
• Our famous Newaygo Newaygo onions were transplanted in the field. Hopefully they will do well this year.

There is much more to  come and we will keep you posted as things happen around here. Also, I have been working on the blog behind the scenes and hope to start posting regularly next week.

The harvest season is in full swing now at Magicland Farms.

Some of the items we have available now are:

Sweet Corn – BiColor and Yellow are in now. We do have white sweet corn coming a bit later in the season.

Snap Beans – We have both yellow and green varieties, picked at the peak of tenderness and flavor

Tomatoes – Sun Sugar Cherry Tomatoes and our Little Red tomatoes are in and as always delicious. We just started picking slicing tomatoes and hope to be regularly harvesting them soon.

Apples – Quinte and Vista Bella are the two summer apples available now. We also have 1/2 bushels of utility apples for $3.

Peaches – Candor and Early Red Haven are the varieties available now – however not by the bushel.

Potatoes – Our delicious red potatoes and Yukon Gold potatoes are available now in quart, 1/4 peck and 1/2 peck quantities.

Kohlrabi – Try this unusual vegetable in cole slaw; it makes a great one!

Cabbage – Just started picking this today.

Cucumbers, pickles, beets, carrots, broccoli, zucchini and summer squash are available every day while supplies last.

We picked the first sweet corn of the season today. 11 bushels were picked and are available for sale at the stand. Hurry on down and get some!

(A picture of our garlic thriving in the field)

Today was spent planting a few different things. Our next patch of green and yellow beans was planted today. We already have one patch of beans (both green and yellow) planted that are growing very well. Hopefully they will keep on thriving and we will have early beans for sale.

Also we planted more of Bon Appetit sweet corn. Bon Appetit is a great flavored sweet corn with large ears. Can’t wait to have some!

More tomatoes were planted. The first patch we planned for the tomatoes is now full so our next planting work will be in the second patch in the near future.

The onions and the garlic were also fertilized today, along with some work on the electric fence.

We have been trying to take advantage of the weather to get some of the early crops planted. Last week, we got the ground ready for planting the cabbage, for example, but then the rains came and made it impossible to plant.

Well, today’s weather was much more cooperative so some planting got done today. The kohlrabi, broccoli, cabbage and beets were planted. I believe that we are going to try to get another patch of sweet corn planted this week, weather permitting.

Even though the weather wasn’t good for planting yesterday, the crew managed to clear out the rest of the brush from the orchard. Pruning the trees over the winter leaves quite a bit of brush to clear and it is not one of the favorite things to do in the orchard. So everyone was quite pleased that this task got completed fairly quickly.

This morning some tomatoes were transplanted from seed flats to peat pots. Among the varieties transplanted were Big Beef, Black Prince, Green Zebra, Cherokee, Mortgage Lifter, Martin, Sun Sugar and our secret variety that provides a lot of the delicious slicing tomatoes you find at Magicland Farms during the summer. If you haven’t tried any of our heirloom tomatoes yet, make sure to give them a try; they are a tasty treat!

Today was quite a busy day at Magicland Farms.

We planted the first sweet corn today. Two different types were planted: an extra early Bicolor and Spring Treat (a yellow variety.) About 1/2 an acre was planted.

Also the crew worked on getting the high tunnel fixed up so that it will be ready when we start to plant tomatoes in there. I think just the door is left to work on. Then we are good to go.

Meanwhile back at home, the girls transplanted some tomatoes from the seed flats into peat pots and put them in our outdoor greenhouse. Among the varieties transplanted were Big Beef, Paul Robeson (a great black heirloom), Kellogg’s Breakfast (a great pale orange heirloom) and Super Marzano (a paste tomato).

Things are moving right along.

Again, we are trying some new varieties of sweet corn at Magicland Farms this year. We do a lot of research into what varieties deliver the best flavor and yield so that we can continue to provide high quality sweet corn to our customers. This year we are adding Mirai sweet corn as well as Optimum sweet corn. We are excited to offer these two varieties as they promise to deliver extremely high quality sweet corn. Both have the supersweet gene but are not supposed to have any of the annoying supersweet tendencies toward toughness, super crispness (almost hard) and lack of flavor, but instead, it is claimed, have a creamy, tender texture with the luscious sweet corn flavor we demand in our corn.

One of the biggest problems with selling sweet corn is ensuring that we will have an adequate supply during sweet corn season. One of my husband’s biggest nightmares (literally, he has bad dreams about this!) is that he is without a steady supply of sweet corn during July, August and September. And one of his biggest headaches is figuring out when the first picking of sweet corn will be ready.

This year we are going to use growing degree days to help us calculate when each patch of sweet corn (we plant about 30 patches) will be ready. Simply put, a growing degree day is a number which is calculated based upon the ambient temperature or how warm it is during the day. The cumulative growing degree days from the time the corn is planted will let us know how fast a crop is ripening.

Normally in July, the average growing degree day is 22, during June it’s about 19 and the same for August. Our very early corn will ripen about 1350 gdd after planting and the later variety about 1750 gdd after planting.

Matthew is writing a Windows based computer program to help with calculating these growing degree days. We hope to test it out this year and perhaps sell the gdd software next year.