You know it's fall when...

So, kids have gone back to school, Tata has flaunted her annual Labour Day parade, we celebrated my birthday, nights have turned cool and we've had to hunt out where on earth we put our socks for the last few months, so it feels like fall is definitely on it's way. Oh yes and sunflowers....lots of them, looking wonderful despite the winds and heavy rain brought along by hurricane what's her name down south.(The first of many I fear).

Plants are loving the rain and we are hoping this will give the farm it's final florish before we throw in the trowel at Thanks Giving. Or maybe I should re-phrase that, the only tools we might be giving up in October are the secateurs, we will still have garlic to plant and lots of farmy stuff to do...no rest for the humble land steward.

Pocket sized cantaloupe and over-sized aubergine

Not sure what we've let ourselves in for, this Sunday the farm will be officially open for visitors for the annual provinicial Open Farm Day, an opportunity for everyone to meet their farmer and in our case, stare at weedy fields where flowers once grew. We have a feeling that our crazy purple van from Berlin and pocket-sized Massey Ferguson will be the focus of attention for most people. Wish us luck!

Summer flying by

The fact that it's been a month since our last post surely reflects the general state of play for us and all farmers at this time of year...busy? - doesn't even come close to describing the frenzy of flower picking and selling. We are fortunate that despite the desperate drought, we still have a harvest, albeit slightly stunted and perhaps less abundant than last year. There are some disappointments but it's all ticking along as well as can be expected.

We've had a few volunteers staying, by far the most helpful and hard-working was Zophia, who produced home-made soups and bread while still managing to assist with harvesting, weeding and farm projects. She was particularly fond of the dogs who are now nicknamed Bertuska and Edzio and she did an incredible paint-job on our (very rusty) yard art. We will miss her!

Rain, rain come again

So the rain dance worked (well actually it was a drumming and we only got a sprinkle) but at least it has perked our flowers up a little and we are at last seeing more blooms. The lilies were lovely while they lasted, we have received a beautiful thank you note from a very happy bride who was delighted with last week's flowers, so some things are going well. Don't be fooled, Jamie is putting on a very brave face but battling with all sorts as per usual. We are so very annoyed that some of this year's glads seem to be infested with thrips so armed with insecticidal soap we begin the defence strategy but many are ruined. No sooner are we done with scaping our garlic, are we now beginning the harvest, cleaning and curing process of all the bulbs. Kind of ironic that when we need dry weather to leave the garlic in the field to cure, we get rain, but we are not complaining! Anyway this year's garlic rocks,Yahoo!
(Forgot to mention last time that we now have a Facebook page for Oliver Farm Botanicals to help us easily post piccies of flowers...so check us out if you haven't already.)