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There are no guarantees in farming. As hard as we may try to plan and meet predeter-
mined deadlines, we will always be at the whim of the weather.
We were reminded of this concept many times this year. Back in early Spring, we decided that we would grow decorative gourds and pumpkins for the CSA event.
We planted several rows of quirky and colorful gourds, and Jack O’ Lanterns. We knew the event was scheduled for Mid-October, we also knew the average days to maturity for our pumpkins was 120 days, so we planted our transplants accordingly.
Long story short, our extra hot and dry Spring and Summer sent our pumpkins into
production early. We found our field spotted with mature, bright orange pumpkins by the end of August! Oh my, we thought, no one wants a Jack O Lantern in August. Will these keep until October 18? We learned that while the average time to mature a pumpkin is 120 days, they can produce in as little as 70 days. This made me wonder, what are all of the other pumpkin farmers doing? We are lucky to have a controlled environment cooler where we are carefully preserving our pumpkins
so in turns out they will be just fine for the event, but many farms do not have this luxury. Our society operates in accordance with deadlines, but when the weather has something else in mind, farmers have no choice but to cope. Often, a farmer’s livelihood depends on providing a certain product by a certain date. With our ever changing climate, these expectations become increasingly difficult.
