Robbins Farm Garden

A Cooperative Learning Project

Second Wind

by

The jerusalem artichokes are experiencing a second growth spurt of the summer with the flowers reaching 10 ft or higher! They might be responding to the rainy weather this summer or maybe the unusual height is a result of selectively planting only the biggest tubers when we relocated the bed this spring.

A Beautiful Visitor

by

Nicole (left) and Mike (right) captured these stunning photos of an American Copper Butterfly who visited the garden today on the winter savory and the stevia plants in the herb border. This beauty is quite small, only about an inch wide.

Fred

by

Tropical storm Fred hit New England on Thursday, causing flash floods all over the area. Our garden suffers from runoff coming down the hill, which moved loads of bark mulch from the playground and crushed stone from the path into the garden, leaving a serious rut outside the gate.

  • This is where the water came from, leaving trails of wood chips.
  • Inexplicably, wood chips flooded the beet bed, and totally bypassed the carrots.
  • The barrier of edging and stones seems to have mitigated much of the runoff. The main damage in the garden was from flow through the gate.

Knowing that Hurricane Henri is due to hit the region tomorrow, we are attempting to reduce the damage by filling the gully in the path with rocks, and placing a temporary barrier across the gate. The slurry of water and debris has to go somewhere, but we’re hoping to divert it away from the garden beds, or at least slow it down and spread it out to reduce the damage.