Aloe Plants, Garden Fertilizers, & Tips for Battling Japanese Beetles!
🌿 This week we are excited to be bringing in the green beans! Our Jade green beans were a big hit last year and we’re excited to be sharing them with you again this year.

🐓 This week our plant feature is on the aloe plant… Perhaps the easiest to use medicinal plant around!

🌳 Looking for organic ways to battle the Japanese beetles? Read on…

🦆 It’s also time for fertilizing your fruit trees and during your fall garden prep! We have organic fertilizers that make growing even better!

🥬 You can also find garlic, potatoes, and greens at our table tomorrow at the Corner Farmers Market, plus chicken eggs, duck eggs, goose eggs, chicken, duck, berry bushes, fruit trees, herbs, and more!

Aloe—The Savior of Summer!

If you’re planning on any outdoor summer fun this season, we recommend growing your own aloe plant. Long used for sunburn and burn relief, the gel inside aloe is widely regarded as an anti-inflammatory and moisturizer.

It’s a great house plant, and super easy to grow. It’s one of the easiest medicinal plants to use–simply snap off a piece and apply!

We’ll have aloe in tow this Saturday at The Corner Farmers Market … Catch us there!

Time to Fertilize!

Now is a great time to add fertilizer to your vegetable and fruiting plants! Plants that are producing right now would benefit from the extra nutrients and it’s also not a bad idea to start thinking about prepping your fall garden beds!

Come find us at The Corner Farmers Market to grab your organic garden fertilizers and special supplements for animal and plant health. Here are a couple of this year’s offerings:

🪴 Garden Mix—all-purpose, balanced, organic fertilizer for vegetables, fruit trees, berry bushes, and house plants
🪴 Bio-Char Mix—compost, bio-char, and mycorrhizal fungi, used as a soil health and fertility booster

Organic Bug Prevention

Japanese beetles can some major damage to fruit trees—they can make beautiful, frustrating, lacy holes in the leaves, sometimes defoliate the entire tree, and even eat the fruits. So frustrating!

But, since we’re working with “beyond organic” standards, a chemical pesticide is not for us! If you’re gardening or farming with this same consideration, here are a few tips to help you battle the crazy Japanese beetle infestation that we’ve been battling lately…

🪲 Apply neem oil to both the foliage and beetles, making sure to apply it at the right time of day. Doing it midday can scorch the leaves, so right before dark is a good time. Neem also can also harm beneficial insects, so being selective about application is important!
🪲 Beetle traps available for purchase may be somewhat effective but they should be placed somewhat away from your plants, plus, finding traps can sometimes be difficult during infestation season!
🪲 Good old fashioned bug squishing is certainly an option! A little gross and also time consuming, but also effective! This is best done in the morning when the bugs are a bit sluggish.
🪲 Soapy water! Spraying soapy water on the bugs can be effective, or you can head out to your trees in the early morning to shake the bugs off of the trees in mass into a bucket filled with soapy water. Why soapy water, you ask? A little bit of soap breaks the surface tension of the water, ensuring that the bugs are pulled under the water.

Hardneck Garlic

We have gourmet garlic! Hardneck garlic has gourmet flavor and a different flavor profile than the usual softneck garlic you find in stores! Come on by and try some for yourself.