The last of the June work parties

Best way to get people to come to work parties: offer them food. Two new people showed up because I promised lettuce in exchange for an hour or two of work. Some call it bribery, I say it's more like a barter system. Or an exchange economy. Or something.

Anyways, we also sold our first round of lettuce and greens to Dining Services at the Wednesday work party--23 Butterhead lettuce heads, 16 Red Romaine lettuce heads and a bundle of collard greens. We brought them directly to Lamont after picking them--it brings a whole new meaning to "sourcing locally."

And, in the process of harvesting, we learned a very basic rule: don't let your lettuce bolt. I thought I pretty much had that one down prior to this whole shindig, but I dropped the ball a bit on organizing harvesting with Dining Services, and like that all our tender baby lettuce was suddenly sending up flowers and wanting to go to seed before I had solidified plans with the people in charge. Which, of course, meant that some of it was way to bitter to do anything with, and was introduced to our brand new compost bins instead of the dining hall. Ah well...lesson learned. I mean, this is supposed to be an educational experience, right?

We also finally finished pounding in the last few stakes we're using to stake the tomatoes, which means significantly less sag-age and crookedness--always a plus. And we started putting down mulch too, which will hopefully cut down on some hoeing and weeding time, and seeded the next round of lettuce. Oh, the excitement of work parties!