Today in the orchard
I began the task of moving the chipped-up brush to the trees. Alyssa Gavlik helped me spread several loads around the base of the young trees in the BRC orchard. The light rain felt good after the intense heat of the past two days. Meanwhile Cammy planted peppers in one of the hoop houses. Maintaining soil moisture in the hoops is an annual challenge. Taking off the plastic for the winter to let in moisture is a good solution except that we hate having to purchase new plastic in the spring. Maybe it’s time to build a glass greenhouse with a retractable roof...
Nettles in the news
The spinach and lettuce in the larger hoop house will soon be pulled out so we can plant the tomatoes in their place. In the orchard the nettles are now going to flower. There appears to be some consensus that you should harvest leaves for tea before the plants flower. Once they flower the tea will supposedly be stronger and more bitter. We’ve been harvesting nettles for the past month. We rinse the leaves in a large bowl, dry them in a salad spinner and lay them out on newspaper or on our herb-drying screen above the wood stove. Once they’re rinsed, I find them easy to handle without gloves.
