Rats!

According to a report today on CNN a couple in Michigan found a dead mouse or rat in a package of Dole salad.  Whether or not it is true, (a friend who works for Dole told me it is highly unlikely) it will probably be another hit on the industry.  Most people who find a "foreign object", in their salad immediately think it is an epidemic.  The actual ratio of objects is on the order of one per 100,000 packed salads.  This includes weeds, sticks, insects and the occasional rubber glove or rubber gasket.   I understand the average consumer's feelings when encountering these items in their salad.  However, it is virtually impossible to guarantee you will never find them.  You also cannot put a disclaimer on the bag, as that will convince a large number of shoppers to skip salads altogether.  In the meantime, this story will certainly impact Dole's sales for several weeks and maybe convince some chains to stop carrying their salads.  But it is not good for any company which repacks vegetables.  Just another excuse to ignore your mother's injunction to "eat your vegetables".

Holidays

The produce business hates holidays.  July 4 is a wonderful holiday, reminding us of the mostly wonderful country we live in and which many people around the world aspire to.  However, if you make a living by growing, selling and trucking produce, July 4 is a nightmare.  By the middle of the week before the 4th people are already thinking about it.  They switch from their normal diet to one which seemingly consists of hot dogs, hamburgers, beer and an occasional ear of corn and a slice of watermelon.  So, healthy eating is the first casualty.  Then truckers have some internal calender which, like the swallows of Capistrano demands they return home, unless enticed by large amounts of money.  Finally, there always seems to be a glut of salad items which are not in demand dietwise (see above).   So desparate shippers consign lettuce which leads to low prices which leads to more consignment.  This cycle repeats until the shipper starts receiving bills instead of returns.  Meanwhile, half the receivers change their hours for the holidays which leads to complaints from the trucks, if there are any.  You get the picture.   Fortunately we won' t have to go throught this again until Labor Day.

late blight

My Long Island brother tells me late blight has been spotted in Southampton.  There goes the tomato season.  We have had ideal weather for blight.  Cool and wet with heavy dews at night and cloudy weather impeding drying of the leaves.  The late blight spores land on the wet leaves and multiply exponentially.  Of course there is no real organic controls, so I whistle past the graveyard and hope that 5 years of soil improvement will empower my tomatoes to fight off infection.  Also, I did plant one variety which is supposedly resistant to late blight.  I guess time will tell.  How about some hot dry weather!

Economics of veggies

I don't know of any corroborating evidence, but anecdotally, many people in the business are blaming the current economic situation on the lack of demand for veggies.  I tend to agree, partly because so many people I know treat vegetables as an afterthought as far as dinner is concerned.  So, if the cash flow situation is tough, they will use it as a excuse to cut the vegetable.   It is so disheartening to see the grocery carts at the local supermarkets.  The thin, granola eating hippie types load up on healthy, minimally processed food, while the redneck, county music radio types throw an amazing variety of processed foods on the belt with a bunch of bananas as the concession to healthy eating.  Mom and dad weigh a combined 600 lbs, and the kids look like miniatures of the parents.  It's sad, but instructive.

Monday, Monday

We seem to be falling into the lousy weekend, beautiful Monday syndrome.  Off and on showers all weekend resulting in another inch of rain effectively curtailed most planting and caused the ripening strawberries to decay within hours.  Spent time on the tractor bush hogging the front pasture, much to the delight of the neighborhood crows and seagulls who had a fine time hunting displaced field mice.  I hope the dry weather continues through tomorrow so I can try to  catch up in the garden.

economics and border crossings

I crossed the border into Canada this morning and it took 30 seconds.  The wait to get into the US at 7 a.m. was 60 minutes and rising.  Why are Canadians flocking to the US?  Of course the St. John Baptiste holiday has something to do with the situation, but there is no corresponding exodus into Canada on US holidays.  Even when the US dollar made a trip to Montreal, a world class city, cheaper than a fling in Syracuse for instance, there seemed to be little taste to cross the border.  Are Americans more provincal than Canadians?   Possibly, but perhaps comparing cosmopolitan Montrealers with Plattsburghers is not fair.  I'm sure if the denizens of New York City could cross the border into Canada within an hour's drive, there would be a rollicking cultural exchange going on every weekend.  For my part, I can't wait to get in line later today to spend an hour or two of precious time to return home. 

Winter Gardening

I am always fascinated by seed catalogs from the west coast arriving this time of year touting the joys of winter gardening.  Buy our seeds they say and plant them in Sept. and Oct. then step back and wait til spring when you can harvest lettuce, cauliflower, broccoli, green onions and other tasty veggies.  They don't mention, or don't realize that in the vast majority of the country, you might as well throw the seeds in your freezer as plant them outside.  But wait, in your freezer at least they will be available to plant outside next spring.  If you plant lettuce or broccoli seeds outside in Sept. in the north country, they may sprout, but the first blast of Old Man Winter in Late October will shrivel them in no time.  By spring, when the last of the snow has melted, you would be hard pressed to identify the remnants.  I have accidentally wintered over kale and spinach, but that is about it. 

Recalls

Looks like Dole is facing a recall of some packaged salads it distributes in Canada due to fears of listeria contamination.  Listeria is a bacteria associated with the moist conditions found in most salad packing plants.  It is nearly unavoidable, even with the most stringent sanitation standards, and the recall probably is the result of testing on salads that have passed their best before date.  That means there is nothing left to recall and consumers will be left with the feeling the government is shutting the door after the horse has gotten out.  A better system would involve testing finished product before distribution.  But of course that would require much more government involvement in the food distribution network.  Not going to happen.  Instead we will get these recall scares until we have a killer German sprout type of disaster and the same people who hamstring efforts at food safety will be shouting the government must do more... as long as there is no cost.

Back to the wet

Little bit of rainy weather this afternoon and evening, but it's not enough to wet the top 2 inches where it is dry.  There is excellent subsoil moisture, so all we need is one good rain and then back to sunny weather.  Instead, we will get 3 days of drizzle which will lead to disease and halt growth.  On top of that I found out this week that we are either already there or will soon be under siege by the leek moth.  What is a leek moth you say.  It is an alien invader from the south of England which has an appetite for the allium family.  In other words, it will munch on leeks, onions, garlic and any other member of the family and for us organic types, there is very little to do except cover the beds with  spun bonded polyester or trap the males before they mate.  The female will then lay a couple of hundred eggs on the nearest onion plant and the offspring will reproduce two more generations before frost.  Oh joy!

The long slow slide

Well, we've passed the summer solstice, and the slow death of light begins.  Not that anyone will notice for several weeks, as we will only lose a few seconds of light each day, but plants will begin to acclimate themselves and grow slower.  In order to keep successive plantings on schedule, I'll have to plant sooner, and it's too late to plant some longer season crops now.  Even the transplanted tomatoes and peppers which I only got in last week will be hard pressed to fill their potential before frost.  But enough pessimism.  It's summertime!

Summertime and the living is hectic

For the gardener and farmer summer is the illusion of time.  The sun comes up at 4:30 a.m. here in the north country, and stays in the sky until 9:30 p.m.  That should be plenty of time to get everything done....not!  The extra time just tempts you to try more things and expand committments to unrelated pursuits.  18 holes of golf, no problem, paint the back porch, I'm on it.  Plant the fall crops before it's too late, hey I've got a long weekend coming up.  It's  been the downfall of many a summer.  As a kid, I had to work on the farm all summer, 7 days a week until school started.  I guess that trained me into thinking summer was all about how much work you could squeeze into however many daylight hours were available.  I doubt I will change much when retirement beckons.  I'll still plan for more than I can possibly accomplish.

vagaries of weather

Amazingly enough, we have had nearly a week of absolutely beautiful weather.  Why then are all the vegetables now starting to develop problems.  While we were being deluged, everything looked good.  Of course as an old gardening hand, I know the root systems of the crops migrated as close to the surface as possible during the storms..  Now, as the top few inches of the soil dry out, the roots can't migrate down fast enough to maintain the health of the plants.  It still seems unfair that the problems show up when the weather straightens out.  With a little luck, the plants will send new roots down to the plentiful moisture below and in the next couple of weeks the crops will reflect the newly clement weather.

Father's Day

Although Father's Day was never a big deal when I was growing up, I've come to appreciate it more since my own daughters have matured into the delightful young ladies I am proud to own up to.  My own father died when I was 18 and I never really got the chance to tell him how much I loved him as I was growing up.  Overt displays of affection were never a big thing in my family.  But I find it easier to express my feelings to my daughters.  Overall it was a beautiful day.  Played golf early with one of my best  friends, got a lot of gardening done, and then dinner with the girls and their beautiful mother.  Who could ask for anything more.  Maybe another 24 hours like the last 24.....

employment anyone?

With unemployment stuck at over 9%, there are a lot of people out there who need something to do.  It may be a little late here in the north country and indeed anywhere north of the mason dixon line, but what about establishing community gardens throughout the country.  The federal government could provide the seed money to lease the land and hire management to set up the gardens.  Local governments could establish the infrastructure.  The unemployed would have first crack at the new gardens.  With a little training and some seed and fertilizer this new generation of back to the landers could provide healthy food for themselves and possibly sell some surplus through a CSA or farmer's market.  Not to mention they would cultivate a taste for vegetables that should carry over when this crisis is over and they gain employment in the traditional economy.   Or perhaps we could generate a new cohort of farmers closer to the centers of population than is now the case. 

Fitting in the important stuff

Going into the heart of the local produce deal here in Quebec and northern New York, it is important to keep the blinders off.  Sometimes the exigencies of the day to day business blots out the rest of your life.  Get up at dawn, go to bed after dark and the weekends blur together.  You begin to feel like an interloper in your family's life.  This year I have promised the love of my life I will try hard not to let the tyranny of business and the garden stop me from enjoying the multitude of pleasures available here in one of the most beautiful areas in the world.  The mountains, lakes and dare I say, the golf courses are at their peak this time of year.  We'll see, I hope.

Quiet before the storm

Weather is beautiful, crops are doing well, but where are the customers?  Calling to various locations up and down the east coast this morning and everyone telling me business is slow.  So the old excuses about the weather don't work.  I think part of it is the economy, and part exhaustion.  The people with time to prepare fresh veg don't have the money, or the expertise.  The people who may have the money from the two or three jobs they are working don't have the time, so are opting for fast food or prepared meals.  Of course, both groups would save money by eating fresh, but education at point of purchase is woefully lacking.  The generation coming of age now has a high proportion of people who never learned how to cook, and are looking for cheap and fast alternatives to the traditional sit down dinner with family.  This is a trend which either needs to be fought by the fresh veg industry or embraced and channeled by fresh, easy to prepare offerings.  Simple foods, prepared simply.

soccer bandit

Walking through the barn this morning on the way to the back garden I heard a loud caterwauling in one of the horse stalls.  Since we don' t have horses,  and it was pretty loud, I was a little hesitant to stick my head in the stall.  Curiosity won out, and what did I find but a baby raccoon playing with an old soccer ball.  He was really enjoying himself as he waits for the corn to mature enough for him to pick.  The babies are always so cute, but as I have told my three lovely daughters, the problems start when they grow up.

weather gods are smiling

It looks like summer in the north country.  Cool nights, warm days and at least a brief respite from the deluges that have plagued farmers and gardeners all season.  It remains to be seen if there is still time to have a decent season, as many planting deadlines have slipped away, but there are still many crops which can mature before fall.  Unfortunately, for row crop farms which specialize in corn and beans it is probably too late if they are not planted already.  Combined with the many other areas of the US where these two crops are predominant, it looks like there won't be any bumper crops this year.  This will lead to more food inflation down the road.  So much for optimism about the weather.  Time to throw another shrimp on the barbie.

One more time

Stopped at the local Hannafords on the way home and decided to give the "southern peaches" one more try.  Every year, I am seduced by the thought of  juicy fragrant peaches, so I buy the small, rock hard imposters on the shelf, put them in a paper bag for several days and remove the wizened result, of which 90% is either mealy or inedible.  But try as I might, I can't stop buying them, because about one time in ten, the promise is actually fulfilled and you bite into a meltingly sweet fruit which transports you back to the first good peach you ever ate.  That almost makes up for the $25.00 you squandered on the dreck that you put up with in your search for that transcendent moment.

political ironies of the veg business

One of the reasons I chose to get into the veg brokerage business 27 years ago was the inherent altruism (or so I thought) of the endeavor.  What could be more socially enlightened than providing health giving veggies to the masses.  My first boss and patron saint of this eponymous blog was a living, breathing role model.  Jerry Shulman was interested in making a profit, but he also felt that he was providing a necessary service with a health benefit.  He was proud of what he did every day.  I still am, but I now see what eventually drove him to retire.  Too many people we deal with every day could just as easily be manufacturing or selling nuts and bolts or Veg-a-matics.   We try to project our product as a healthy choice, but sometimes it seems like a cynical marketing ploy.  I guess I'm just a granola eating hippie wannabe lost in a Republican wilderness of moral ambiguity.

Heartbeats

Listening to NPR on the way to work and they hyped an upcoming story about how life can go on without a heartbeat.  Obviously the reporter had never covered the produce business.  I routinely deal with people totally devoid of heart, let alone a heartbeat.

Another Rainy weekend

You have to love the frequency with which a rainy weekend concludes with the sun coming out at 5 pm.  Got about one tenth of what I wanted to get done.  Another three quarters of an inch of rain on already soggy ground and we can forget about doing anything productive in the garden til Wednesday if we're lucky.  Did harvest the first leaf lettuce of the season and had a lovely dinner with a couple of the offspring. 

Getting started

The Canadian lettuce deal is always slow starting, since most receivers are still suffering from Stockholm syndrome with their California suppliers.  Although most west coast shippers are good people, they don't hesitate to hold customers hostage when they are ready to transition to local suppliers.  They will offer sales, whine about "relationships" or even play the weather card and threaten (albeit very nicely) to short them if the weather damages the local deal.  Some even drink the year round Kool-Aid and exclusively handle western product.  But east coast growers get better every year and in most cases can keep their product flowing even in a bad year.  Here, for instance we have had a long, cold and wet spring, but we have very nice romaine and iceberg being harvested earlier than usual.  It is frustrating when you know your produce is better than the competition and you still cannot sell unless you are willing to take much less than they are getting.  But as transportation makes up more and more of the cost of produce, the local deals will expand and the season will get longer and longer.  I can hear the squeals from Salinas already.

Food Safety Follies

Well, now it's the bean sprouts again.  After waffling for a couple of days, whichever German agency responsible for the e-coli investigation now says even though all the sprouts they tested were clean.  This sounds like the investigation by the FDA after the US spinach disaster in 2006.  While they could trace the vector for the contamination, they could never pinpoint the exact cause.  In either case, it could be a simple one time contaminant, but with modern hygiene regimens at the processing plants in question, the evidence is destroyed every day.  The only way to ensure food safety is to test and hold each lot for 24-48 hours before shipping to retailers.  You can imagine the howls of protest if that sort of regulation is enacted.  Federal inspectors stationed at every plant producing food for US consumers? Maybe, but aside from a presence, they would add little to the equation.  Frankly, I don't know what would prevent all possible contamination events, but whatever it is, someone will be opposing it.

Freight and food cost

I think most people have no idea how the fruit and veggies and even the foodlike substances they pick up at the local grocery store get there.  If they thought about it, they would correctly assume it was transported by truck or rail, but I doubt most would have any idea of the cost.  Freight from producing areas on the west coast has skyrocketed in recent months.  One broker paid $9500.00 to send a truck from Salinas to New York.  The freight cost was greater than the cost of the produce.  To paraphrase the cartoon character, "We have seen the future, and it is local".  With $4.00/gallon diesel fuel and more federal regulation of long distance truckers, local foodstuffs will become more and more important in the future.  Maybe more kids will have the same opportunity I did, growing up on a working small farm.

relief

Some showers and thunderstorms have cut the heat and humidity in the north country overnight.  More thunderstorms on the way today.  Seed planted last Saturday is leaping out of the ground.  Spinach and basil are up and the lettuce transplants are taking off.  If we can avoid the severe storms, things will definitely be on track.  The farmers in Quebec are starting to harvest romaine in volume and the leaf lettuces, endive and escarole are moving also.  Iceberg should start next week.  Unfortuately for farmers in Ontario, the weather has continued to dump on them.  One sales agent said his growers lost 3000 cartons of romaine in a hailstorm last Friday.  They got another on Monday and it was over 100 degrees on Tuesday.  Not lettuce weather.

Bread and Circuses

According to an article in a Kansas newspaper, the winter wheat harvest is beginning early this year because of the drought and high temps in that part of the Midwest.  It's amazing that one corner of the heartland is drying up while other areas will remain underwater for the entire summer.  The gist of the article is the harvest will be poor, but the price will be up.  They interview a farmer who says she is hoping for 20-25 sixty pound bushels of wheat per acre.  At $9.00/bushel (4x the price of a few years ago)  that means they will gross from $180-225/acre before expenses.  If you calculate seed, fertilizer, fuel and machinery depreciation, custom harvesting, oh and rent or taxes, it's hard to believe there will be anything left for the farmer.  If she nets $20.00/acre on 2500 acres, that is $50,000.  After deducting some sort of wage, I doubt she would have enough profit to take the family to McDonalds to celebrate the harvest.  Meanwhile, Cargil, or whichever company buys the grain, will make a killing, as the world market is very tight.  Russia, China, and Australia are all experiencing varying degrees of crop failure, and most of the US is in similar shape.  And you thought I was pessimistic about veg crops!

The fun never ends

Looks like we are in for a couple of torrid days up and down the east coast.    Upper 90's are not too common this early in the season, and some areas have been drier than normal.  One grower in Virginia is trying to decide whether to irrigate his corn crop in the hope of getting some yield, or let nature take its course and collect on his crop insurance.  It is the classic farmer's dilemma.  Once you have planted a crop, the impulse is to try to get a harvest, even if it is not in your economic best interest.  The over 100 degree temps predicted for today may make the decision easier for him.

Optimism

I've been told many of my posts, especially concerning weather and growing  conditions are overly pessimistic.  Deal with it.  That 's part of farming and the veg sales business.  Having grown up on a farm and dealing with growers for the last 27 years, you learn that hard knocks and weather debacles are far more common than they should be.  The miracle is most people in this business get up daily with hope in their hearts believing against all evidence that it will be a good day.  Most people don't understand they get their food every day because of those eternal optimists on the tractor seat.

Ag jobs

According to an article in McClatchey online news, if tough new immigration policy reduce the number of farm workers available, we can expect more mechaniztion of the produce industry as increasing labor costs make machines more practical.  I don't know if I agree with that.  Unlike a lot of the people making these pronouncements, I actually picked strawberrries, harvested cauliflower and bunched carrots, and I have a hard time believing a machine can do those things with anywhere near the level of competence necessary.  I guess a combination of engineered plants and laser guided GPS machines will be able to replace humans, but at what cost.

into the pressure cooker

I spoke to a friend in Ontario today and he said they had an hellacious rainstorm early this morning (following several over the weekend) to be followed by 100 degree heat later today and tomorrow.  He said people who have been in the veg business for more than 50 years have never seen weather like this.  A grower in Ohio said virtually the same thing, saying some crops will be a month late this year.  That doesn't mean as much to a California grower growing year round, but for east coast growers, it means a 25% cut in volume in the heart of the growing season.  You can't make up for something like that.

Spinach shortage

Looks like spinach repackers are in for a rough ride for the next couple of weeks.  The supply on the east coast is exhausted due to the unseasonable weather we have experienced.  The next stable supply area in Colorado has had the coldest, windiest May in memory and will not be able to harvest before the end of the week.  Meanwhile, the spring supply in Ontario was wiped out for a couple of weeks in a rainstorm last Friday.  Some repackers will use California spinach as a stopgap, but the FOB plus freight will convince many to simply stop packing until traditional suppliers can once again harvest.  Not good for them or the farmers.

New season

A local Quebec grower brought in some beautiful romaine lettuce he grew under polyester row covers.  Although there is relatively small volume of this kind of crop, it is a harbinger of the coming season.  Most of the early crops of lettuce and indeed any local veg go to the Montreal market, since the wholesalers will pay as much as it costs them to get the same crops from California.  US companies already have local produce and will not pay a premium for Canadian.  So until the Canadian wholesalers and Chain Stores are overwhelmed by local growers, only a few export oriented farmers will take the lower returns offered by US buyers.

the e-coli disaster

Over 20 people dead and hundreds with kidney shutdown.  Just another dagger in the heart of the produce business.  Although Spanish cucumbers were originally blamed, then lettuce and tomatoes, it seems now that the infection may have originated at a German organic farm which produces bean sprouts.  These may have been mixed with the salad items blamed for the outbreak.  While the short term damage to the produce industry is bad enough, the long range problem is the rise of antibiotic resistant strains of common bacteria such as e-coli, salmonella, etc.  The promiscious use of antibiotics in agriculture must be curtailed.  The implications to the food chain we all depend on are too enormous to treat with any less than international action.  Meanwhile, no sprouts for dinner!

tomatoe time

Got most of the tomatoes in today.  Not a moment too soon, according to the calendar.  However, with the weather we have been having they probably would have gone backward for the past couple of weeks.  Planted leeks, beets and beans also, so it was a pretty productive first week of June.  We have had a lot of drying time during the last week which helps, but many areas in my gardens are still too wet to till.  The strawberries look beautiful, and the drier warmer weather is coming in the nick of time for them.  Of course, if it stays dry all this week, I'll probably be looking for rain by the weekend.  That's the farmer in me coming out.

Planting madness

The garden is drying out reasonably well, so it is time to push the panic button and try to jam as much into the ground as my middle aged body can handle.  Not only that, but try to fertilize and weed all the beds that I did manage to get planted during the deluge.  It's not a pretty sight, but with a little luck, we may get back onto some sort of schedule.  Most of the older plantings look yellow and tired, but aerating the soil and fertilizing will bring most of it back.  Lake Champlain is still 2 feet over flood stage, so many people don't have these options.  Farmers near the lake will be making some difficult decisions over the next couple of weeks.  At least I'll get the tomatoes in this weekend, and the peppers next week.  Then at least it will feel like a real season.

e-coli blues

Over 1500 people in Germany are affected by a particularly virulent strain of e-coli and the authorities have not been able to figure out how it got into the distribution system.  However it happened, it is an ominous situation.  If people are not confident that vegetables are safe to eat, they will stop buying them.  Even veg that needs to be cooked before eating will be affected by the panic.  If this happened in the US, sales of veg would probably come to a complete halt.   I grew up on a truck farm which shipped most of its' produce to New York every night.  There were no food safety rules.  Most produce was hand picked by people who may or may not have washed their hands (or the rest of themselves) during the previous 24 hours.  There was no refrigeration and everything was consumed within 24-48 hours of harvest.  Did people get sick?  I don't know, but it was certainly never reported as such.  Today, produce is harvested and packed up to two weeks before it is consumed.  Although there are many food safety rules, and all processed produce is sanitized in some way, there are many reports of people being sickened by vegetables.  Is it the increasing presence of superbugs?  Or are people's immune systems compromised to the point they are incapable of resisting these bugs?  Or is it the whole system from farm to fork that needs to be revamped?

Gardening notes

the weekend will be dry enough to start catching up planting and weeding in the garden.  If the tomatoes and peppers get out now we may be starting to eat some in August..  The weeds are another issue.  Farmers and gardeners hate to replant fields that have become overgrown.  It's almost a test of wills with the land.  However, at some point, it becomes more damaging to the crop to remove the weeds and starting over is the prudent thing to do.  I guess it all comes down to the psychological investment we have in our handiwork. 

Tornadoes

Four people dead and millions in destruction....tornadoes in Massachusetts!  Things are getting more and more weird on the weather front.  This kind of stuff happens in the midwest and the south, not the northeast.  There were tornadoes in NY last year, so I guess we will have to get used to the possibility.  Hurricanes are bad enough.