The Odds

Last Sunday, the trees started calling it. It wasn’t a loud call. This isn’t yet a four alarm fire. It’s a smolder. It’s an ember. The trees that line the roads and ways on the drive back from market that day were starting to make the change into autumn with a yellow hint here and an orange hue there. Summer is over, it just doesn’t know it. Maybe don’t tell it. Not yet anyway.

Regardless, that was our sign. On Tuesday, we planted one of the last plantings for this year. It’s bigger than usual, because it needs to carry us 2 weeks rather than 1. This is because when the other shoe drops and temps nosedive in late September, crops will stop growing, or almost stop growing. We need to front load Autumn to have the salad, arugula and spinach that we would want for you as far into October as Momma Nature will allow. One big one this Tuesday, and another the next.

These last plantings are a bigger gamble by effort than so many of the gambles that we take along the course of the season. If the temps drop too low, some of those crops will just not make it, or not be of good enough quality. On the other hand, if it stays warm, our little plan will backfire, and we’ll have too much produce all at once, with neither the hands nor the outlets to deal with it all. There is a lot of potential there to mostly waste our efforts. But that’s the game right? It’s just a gamble among gambles. After a whole summer of taking our chances, what’s one more? Even if we face plant, we can just say it was for all times sake.

Even with the trees tipping their hand, it really is feeling as summertime as it ever has out there. Sunny, 80’s. But for how long? Cast your wager.

As the betting/planting ends for 2022, we will turn our attention to projects and prep work for 2023. A hedge, for future gambling. We may have a problem, but let’s not admit it.