Farm Dirt - February 2025 Edition
Hi all!
It’s the “off season”, but we have been busy working on quite a few things behind the scenes. Let me catch you up!
The Early Season Crop Report
The early spring crops are coming along very well, though they are coming on a little slower than they have in the past few years. We had a long stretch of cold days in January that kept things dormant longer than usual. Then last week, temps hit 80F, even breaking a weather record one day. This definitely jumpstarted everything in the field! All the frost blankets had to come off so the plants could soak up the sun. Next week, we’re back to more normal weather for this time of year, including a couple of nights below freezing. So, blankets back on and slower growth again. February and March in Columbia, anything is possible when it comes to the weather!
For those who will be receiving an early spring bouquet subscription, this may mean that we are starting a little later than the first week of March. We will see how the next couple of weeks play out. The good news is that all the cold weather is great for the crops that need cold to grow their best, like tulips and peonies. We will be contacting each of you when we can get started.
Anemone
Poppies
Ranunculus
Tulips
The Mum Project
During the off season I participated in a proposal competition and was awarded a grant from the state of South Carolina to add a new high tunnel, which will be used to grow heirloom chrysanthemums. These flowers bloom in the fall, and we are going to have blooms from October – early December!
We have been growing smaller amounts of mums over the past couple of years to make sure our growing conditions are suitable. Now, we will take the next step and grow larger quantities of them. Chrysanthemums are tolerant of light frosts and can bloom when the daylength is short, give us a few more weeks of beautiful flowers in the year!
Heirloom Chrysanthemums
Specialty Chrysanthemum Saga No Yuki
Website Updates
We’ve upgraded our website so some of the issues people have experienced with their cell phone access should be eliminated now. We will continue to make a few more refinements over the year, but most of the work is complete. If you are having any trouble or concerns, please reach out and we will be happy to help you. You can send us a message from our Instagram account or use the Contact Us page to send us an email, or just email us a purpletuteur@gmail.com
Here is the new menu as shown from a laptop or personal computer. The categories of information on the menu may or may not have sub-categories. For example, if you are looking for information about our bouquet subscriptions, put your cursor on the “cut flowers” category, and a list of the various ways we provide cut flowers will be listed. You can select from those and see the page you are looking for.
Here is the view of the home page from a mobile phone. The shopping cart, that was not always visible on your cell phone before, will be visible now.
That about wraps it up from here.
We have just a few openings for Early Spring subscriptions remaining, so sign up soon at https://www.purpletuteur.com/subscription-information . Thanks so much to those of you who are already signed up.
Spring blooms are just around the corner! Happy Valentine’s Day,
Linda