What the Squash Field Wouldn’t Say
The spaghetti squash rotted on the vine. A birthing-class checklist for a fussy baby turned out to be the same list I run on a failing field.
She Picked Up the Worm
A teenager screamed at an earthworm. The next session she held one out in her hand. A Roots Rising story from Red Shirt Farm in Lanesborough, MA.
The September Slump
Two cars in the lot on a Tuesday, and what it takes to keep a year-round farm store in Lanesborough, MA open after the tourists leave.
Nobody Ordered These Bees
Both hives died over winter and we didn’t order new bees. Wild ones moved in anyway. A look at what goes on inside the hive.
Racing the Daylight
We pulled the tomatoes out of a greenhouse and put the winter greens in behind them. Here’s why, and what’s next.
A Helping Hand from Nature: The Wasp That Does Our Dirty Work
A hornworm in the garden looks like a goner. Look at its back before you squish it. The tiny wasp that kills it is the reason we don’t spray.
Why Your Cucumber Has Scars
Pale scars on a cucumber are healed beetle bites. They don’t change the taste.
The Hungry Gap
Early June looks like peak summer, but the crops that make it are weeks off. Why kale takes three months, and what is ready now.
Seven Pigs, Two Acres, and One Cottonwood Tree
Seven piglets, a two-acre wagon wheel of pasture, and the one tree that anchors it. What a pig gets here that most never do.
The Threshold
A Roots Rising crew moved sandbags and raked hay for two hours the day before May Day. They left different than they arrived.
Matters of the Heart
I proposed to Sarah while we were planting ginger at twilight. A Valentine’s week piece about love, work and tending what you’ve committed to.
Tomatoes in February
The ground is frozen and we just planted tomatoes. Why a June tomato starts in February, and what grafting does.
It Takes a Village to Feed a Village
A few weeks after my retina detached, I walked back into the farm store. It was running fine without me.
A Shared Harvest: Why CSA Still Matters
The CSA idea was born in the Berkshires in 1985. What it was for, how it got blurred, and how ours works.
The Good Life of a Pig
Today is the pigs’ last day. They came as 25-pound piglets in May and weigh about 250 now. How they lived, and why we do it this way.
The Farm Never Sleeps
People ask when we close for the season. We don’t. How a buried heat battery and a blanket of row cover keep spinach growing in January.
This Store Belongs to You
After a lifetime in the fields, I’m working the counter. What I got wrong, what’s on the shelves, and what we’d like to hear from you.
This Climate Week, Look Closer to Home
A flash flood in the chicken house, three dry months, then two inches of rain in a day. What a changing climate looks like on a Berkshire farm.