The students harvested 288 kg (635 lbs) of produce from the campus terraces over the 17 weeks of summer classes. The harvest consisted mainly of brassicas and greens in May, potatoes in late June and early July, and cucurbits in July and August.
It was sometimes difficult to stay ahead of the summer squash. Some got too big between harvests. Cucumbers and squash accounted for almost half of the summer's yield.
Tomatoes were just coming on in earnest when the classes ended.
The sunflowers provided an impressive backdrop, but were not ready for harvest before the end of summer classes.
Bush beans kept us busy in late July, but petered out quickly due to water stress.
The carrot yield was disappointing, given the amount of space dedicated to the crop. Carrots happened to be in the area of the garden that received the second load of compost, where nothing grew well.
We have plenty of room for improvement as we build up the soil at the site in coming years.
We harvested three rows of Yukon Gold potatoes from the orchard site on August 13th. The potatoes sized up nicely and yielded well in the clay loam soil, despite having no fertilizer at all, and no irrigation until two weeks before harvest. The site's high organic matter content helped hold onto nutrients and water for the plants in a challenging year.
The corn is also looking much better at the orchard site than on the campus terraces.
