Late season plantings

ON the way into the office this morning I passed a flatbed trailer loaded with lettuce transplants.  If they go into the ground today, they will be harvested in mid to late September.  I don't know how much longer the commercial growers will keep transplanting, but we are now getting close to the traditional end of the season for this activity.  In my own garden, I will continue for another 2-3 weeks and will still have lettuce in mid October if we dodge the frosts.  I think some commericial growers are thinking along the same lines and we will probably see iceberg and romaine fields planted far later than normal.  Partly to make up for earlier damage and partly because with the unseasonably warm weather this year, the feeling is it will continue through Sept. and into October.  The reality is the large possiblity of a freak frost in the middle of an abnormally warm month, leaving the plants crippled but perhaps salvageable.  This is the new farming paradigm as we grapple with the threats and potential opportunities of climate change.