By Charley Falkenburg, Special to the Packet
Fifty-degree nights, swapping tanks for hoodies, barely touching the air conditioners — it hardly feels like the dog days of summer. In fact, the consistently cool temperatures have some wondering whether nature might have simply skipped to fall and called it a day.
And for the most part, it appears the farmers and their crops are loving it.
Local farmers weighed in on how this cool, dry summer weather has been impacting their summer veggies and the majority revealed they had fewer disease issues and were reaping just as many, if not more crops over last year’s summer harvest.
"This has been my best growing season yet," said Great Road Farm’s manager Steve Tomlinson, who has been farming for six years. "And the weather has been amazing to work in — the morale on the farm is really high right now."
The Skillman farm started seeing tomatoes three weeks early and has had success with them ever since as well as with its radishes, its new venture into cabbage and even with a few unexpected greens.
"Between the night lows and it not getting very hot during the day, it really makes some crops excel such as kale and swiss chard," added Mr. Tomlinson. "It’s been very nice as far as rainfall goes — it’s been on the drier side, which keeps down diseases."
However, just as the season started early, Mr. Tomlinson was concerned it might end early too with an early frost. After noticing less fruit on his tomato plants, he started planning out preparations to protect his summer crops should his predictions come true.
"But it could all change," he said with a laugh. "The next thing you know, you can have an Indian summer in September."
Over at Chickadee Creek Farm in Hopewell Township, the dryness combined with the coolness helped them dodge a bullet with the fungal diseases.
"If it was really wet above average, then we would see some issues with crop diseases — they love wet and cool weather, but it hasn’t been overwhelmingly wet," said farm manager Jess Niederer. "So the weather hasn’t been hurting us too much."
In fact, Ms. Niederer reported that Chickadee Creek’s watermelon, strawberry, tomato and cucumber crops have all done very well. Its summer squash was also doing well until a couple of disease issues kicked in recently.
"But that happens every year; we grow over 40 different crops so it’s sort of typical for something to do poorly," she added. "Weather will make it or break it, but there’s a lot of tricks you can learn along the way to do well no matter what."
Ms. Niederer stressed the importance of checking up on the latest scientific climate data and statistic reports, which is something she makes sure she does regularly. Thus far, she said they are calling for an average rainfall and possibly slightly above average temperatures for the fall — a prediction that could mean an extended summer season if it comes true.
Though she did say they had a good germination of fall crops, Ms. Niederer was leaving the rest of the predictions to the climatology pros.
"Unfortunately, I’m not one of those sage old farmers who can look at the way a bird flies and understand when the first crop is going to be," she said with a laugh. "And that’s fine."
Caroline Phinney of Orchard Farm Organics CSA in Princeton reported a plentiful crop season. The early summer months brought them an abundance of spinach, arugula, pea and lettuce while beans have been busting out all mid season.
Ms. Phinney also noted they have also had a lot of cucumbers, summer squash and tomatoes, which experienced no splitting since there hasn’t been too much rain.
However, the farm did notice the absence of one thing: the harlequin beetle.
"The harlequin beetle, which appeared the last several summers in the drier and warmer weather are hardly present this season," added Ms. Phinney. "We have been spared their damage to the crops."
Going into the fall, Orchard Farm Organics is predicting a good season — unless there’s a lot of rain, which could introduce mold, or an early frost, which is usually a death knell for plants such as basil, tomatoes and flowers.
Some local farms were having a little more difficulty with their summer yields.
"The days and nights are cool and while its nice for us, it’s a breeding ground for diseases, particularly with our tomatoes, peppers and eggplants," said Taylor Naughton, the farm manager of Lima Family Farms in Hillsborough. "We’re getting them, but there’s a lot of damaged fruit and it’s unfortunate."
Ms. Naughton estimated they yielded half the production of peppers and have a limited supply of heirloom tomatoes due to disease problems.
On the flip side, like Great Road Farm, Lima’s kale and swiss chard are doing quite well as compared to prior years. Their hybrid tomatoes, which are disease resistant, also did well. The cool weather has also been pleasant for the animals, which have been less stressed and have been generally disease free.
Despite the challenging summer, Ms. Naughton is hopeful for fall.
"The fall crops are in the ground already and I’m hoping they’re enjoying this cool weather and will come in healthy in the fall," said Ms. Naughton. "I can only hope, but it’s hard to say — we’ve had some very erratic weather."
As far as gardening goes, Susan Gange of Hopewell’s Stony Brook Orchids can attest that her orchids are doing quite nicely this summer. Since the temperatures have been more moderate, she noticed an increased growth in her orchids at an earlier time.
"This could translate to new flowers sooner in the cycle than normal, which is a good thing," added Ms. Gange. "Instead of new flowers starting to appear in October or November, I expect to see them in September."
Ms. Gange also experienced success with a small vegetable garden she used to have when she lived in West Windsor before moving to Hopewell. She intends to start one up again once she has the time, but knows it will be different from tending her flowers.
"They say horticulture is more triumph of hope than it is experience," she recalled with a laugh. "In a greenhouse, I can control environment, but farmers — they really are at the mercy of the weather."
