Thanks so much for sharing. I can never seem to harvest enough spinach to satisfy my customers. We almost finished our greenhouse last fall so I am looking forward to experimenting with winter crops next winter. Those are some crazy temperature swings you have-It's amazing what you can harvest there in the winter months. I have had 12 winter markets so far and am now running out of product. I wish I had more to offer now as the other farmers have mostly run out.

that looks great. how much irrigating do you do? do you cover it when the temps are very low?

I have watered it twice since November. Once last weekend and once in early January. I had the ground really wet in the November before the cold weather came.

I just lay the row cover over the top of the spinach. It is the Agribond-19. I don't put it up on wire or pipe low tunnels. Sometimes if the row cover gets wet, it can freeze the leaves and damage them. So if it is warm and sunny, I try to pull the row cover and shake it off and let it dry by not leaving it on the plants, if I have time and can remember.

Hi Jay,
It's strange that the variety "Carmel" isn't in the new catalog but it's available online.
It looks like a good winter producer which is what I'm on the hunt for. This year I've been harvesting weekly from 2 beds planted to Toucan, but I'm unhappy with the cold weather growth rate. I think I average about 15 lbs per week but it's increasing now that the weather is picking up. The variety I used to plant "Emu", produced better but was dropped by Osborne so now I'm trying to find a new one.
Great pics of the beds and tight spacing, looks hard to walk through!
-Mark

Mark,

It is funny you bring that up. I am guessing that Johnnys had a change after they dropped it. After I started to see how well this variety performed, I pulled it up on the website to see any other information or reviews and it said it had been dropped in favor of another variety. That was in early December. Then when I was ordering seeds in late January, I looked again and it was listed. I almost bought a bunch.

The beds are close, 15 to 18 inches between each 4 foot bed. It is wide enough for an 18 gallon tote to sit between the rows and one person on their knees. But wide aisles don't pay the bills, especially in the winter!

Jay