May blows hot and cold

Sprout Farm Newsletter May 7 2023 sproutfarm.net open 9-5 daily Hello Everyone, May is blowing hot and cold. This is to be expected so savor those summer-like days. Jay has decided to mix it up a little. A little! Oh dear. The sale for this week which ends Saturday at 5:00: Six pack annuals are on sale for $3.25 and an unbroken, not mixed, tray of 36 annuals is $18.00. I am so glad I told many people that I did not know the details of the sale until Saturday evening, in this case Sunday morning. Thank you for reading this because my non-newsletter customers are in for a shock. It really is a good time to get those annuals into the ground. Mimi's Greens are back and we have them out in front. She has brought us the trays with the living microgreens that you cut as needed. These are the same products that she sells at Fancy's Market in Osterville. She is so enthusiastic about microgreens that in the first containers to be sold she has included a small container of seeds so that customers can refill the emptied out tray with soil and grow their own greens. She has an instruction sheet with all the directions in the back of the display. Here is a link to an article on micro-greens. I chose this one among many because of its beautiful pictures. Several other websites contained good information but fewer pictures. They also ended with links to various commercial advertisements for weight loss. I may have to try this out for my own kitchen. Jay has a setup for growing under lights that is sitting dark in the basement. I may as well put it to good use. On a local note. I have been following the construction of the sewer system in Mashpee. We are grateful the detour on Rte 28 was lifted early but there will still be some local construction as the smaller roads are fitted out with sewer lines. Homeowners are involved in the process of setting up the placement of their sewer line connection. This lateral placement research is one of the best ways for them to save money on the sewer installation, especially when it comes time to do the hook-up next year. The perfect placement of the sewer lateral from the home to the sewer line will always be less expensive than a less than perfect placement. I am including two links. One to the letter about the green stake and one for the list of licensed utility installers. https://www.mashpeema.gov/sites/g/files/vyhlif3426/f/uploads/luis_march2023.pdf and https://www.mashpeema.gov/sites/g/files/vyhlif3426/f/uploads/the_green_stake_on_the_lawn_ver._2_11-22-22.pdf. I will have some copies of these pages available at the farm stand if anyone needs them. Most of the herbs are out on the benches but we are holding off on the basil for just a few days. Basil loves hot weather and we aren't there yet. We don't expect a cold snap but why make plants sulk in cool soil? I will be replacing some beautiful rosemary plants that did not survive the cold snap. Speaking about cold snaps; we have yet to hear from our friends in Wrentham about peaches. A mild winter punctuated by a severe cold snap is usually bad for peach buds. The farmers are resigned about these periodic crop losses but it is hard on peach lovers. The kitten report. It turns out that Ziggie's kittens are being adopted by new families. They will all be going to new homes this week. So much for my planning. I will miss the pitter pat of tiny paws running across the ceiling of my bedroom at three AM. One of last year's adoptee families trained their kitten to sleep in a crate at night, complete with a cat hammock. That is what I call planning. No chaos or strange feathers or fur decorating the floor upon awakening. We have to put up with that or lose our best critter hunters. That's all for now. Come on down and see us soon, jay and Phyllis Sprout