Photo: Courtesy of Powisset Farm

Today’s post features Meryl LaTronica, Farm Manager at Powisset Farm, who checks in with PRK each month to give us a taste of what’s she’s working on. Or, in this instance, what she’s getting into…

Let the season begin!

On your mark, get set, grow! OK, I know that sounds really cheesy, but that’s how it always feels to me this time of year. It’s late February, so right about now I am getting busy crossing things off of that long winter list of things To Do. Do crop plan, check. Make a greenhouse and field planting schedule, check. Order seeds, check. Order potting soil, check. Hire farm crew, check. Mourn the end of vacation and celebrate the beginning of a new farm season, check and check.

The beginning of March is a very exciting time on the farm; to me it’s like the warm-up before a very long race. The first week of March, our assistant farm manager is back to work on the farm. Together, we open up the greenhouse, clear the winter cobwebs off dormant seed trays, open that first bag of potting soil and get to work. First, we mix our potting soil into a special Powisset Farm homemade soil table. Taking one bag of heavy soil and one bag of light soil, we slice open the first bags with the swift move of a small, red-handled harvest knife. We plunge our hands deep into the soil, turning the soft, dark, moist soil until the two weights are evenly distributed. The smell of it fills our nostrils with as much force as the grains of earth fill the dry cracks in our winter hands. It smells of spring time. It smells of hope and excitement and joy for what this new season will bring. We grab the dust covered plastic seed trays and fill them with this hope, this soil, and put them on the table, ready to be planted.

We start with the onions. This year at Powisset we plan to grow seven different varieties. We have some for storage, some for bunching and some specialty onions, like Ailsa Craig, a giant yellow onion exceptional for making the largest, thickest onion rings. We take the soil-filled trays and carefully dimple each plug with our finger tips. In each plug we drop three seeds, until the tray is filled. Then, we cover each plug with additional soil, tucking the seeds in conscientiously and bidding them goodbye until we see their little green spouts breaking through that very soil, many days later.

And now it has begun. Once that first tray of onions has been planted, we are officially farming. Another season, another tray of onions to care for and watch grow from seed to field to harvest to dinner. I can’t wait!