Winter growing is catching on in central New York. The Ithaca Journal recently ran a story about several local farms that have begun offering winter "shares" of root vegetables and hardy greens grown in unheated "hoop houses" (or "high tunnels"). And the Greenstar Cooperative Market newsletter noted that they will be carrying the first-ever crop of winter braising greens from the newly established Good life Farm in nearby Interlaken (just north of Ithaca).
In the mid-west, Driftless Farm and Forest reports on their "Log Blog" that they are experimenting with a winter "Greens Share" for the first time, using a passive solar greenhouse. And in Maine, the pioneering farmers at the Four Season Farm have been bringing vegetables to market year-round for years.
The growing experimentation with cold weather growing -- commercially and on the home scale -- makes me happy. So does a freshly picked salad (above) and the tubful of Jerusalem artichokes that I dug from beneath the snow last week.
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