A Note From Layton | High Summer Approaches
July 19, 2024
By Layton Guenther
This update from the farm will be short. It will be sweet. An accidental poem is involved… reader, read on.
High Summer approaches. We’re hitting our proverbial stride, and the days are rote, sweaty, and very very long. Amidst the usual rigamarole of July (plant, weed, pick, repeat) the days are peppered with one-off projects like bulk harvesting (oats, garlic) and field crop care (cover cropping, tomato staking, flower trellising).
Every year we kick off the Julys with the same spiel: Madison and I sit down with the crew at some morning meeting in late June, sipping day-old coffee and slathering ourselves with sunscreen, and set out to convey fair warning of what’s to come. The Julys are both deeply subjective and objectively long. The Julys are surprise popsicles in the freezer and a tractor breaking down; heat waves and long harvest mornings. And just as we endeavor to take care of the land and the farm, we also try to take care of ourselves. This life close to land is truly a labor of love.
Last week we pulled our garlic out of the field and set about the onerous and aromatic task of hanging our crop. Like so much of farming, it’s partly poetry but mostly math. In this spirit, Esme (one of our amazing apprentices this season) sent around a readout of the garlic hanging work day. Check it out. (adapted from our Whatsapp group chat).
Garlic Math by Esmeralda Rodriguez22 wires full of 18 double bundles each 396 double bundles total 792 individual bundles of 15 heads11,880 heads of garlic up in the air.9 beds of garlic 3 row 4 inch spacing 9 cloves per bed foot300 ft beds6,075 heads of garlic needed to plant 9 fullbeds at 300 ft bed length55 shares x 8 heads x 8 pickups4,000 for winter share4,000 winter share + 6,075 seed garlic neededEquals 10,075 heads needed for our needs7 ppl x 7 hours for labor needed
Many thanks to all of the volunteers who showed up in the rain last Saturday to help us hang our garlic in the new barn. Special shout-out as well to Jonathan Rose for running wire across the loft and helping us figure out a system for hanging our stash of “the stinking rose.”
Take care, and see you in the fields,Layton
Layton Guenther
Director, Quail Hill Farm
LGuenther@PeconicLandTrust.org