Hello there fellow camper!👋
This is the Spira Farms newsletter. Were your digital version of a campfire story. Grab some hot dogs and smores we’ve got some farm stories to share. 🔥🌭
Today we are going to talk about 👇
- Bad beets don’t have a heart…beat.. 💓
Bad Beets Don’t Have a Heart…Beat..💓
Want to see what its like growing beet? Check out this video we made.
We’ve been growing beet for almost the entirety of Spira Farms. It’s something tried and true, and something I think is something more for advanced growers but we’ve got it down to a science.
Then things took a turn in 2022. 😭
Let me tell you about a stress point that wouldn’t beet it. 🙃
In January, we received a new batch of beet seed from our supplier. Not going to name who we use to avoid witch hunting 🔥
It was clear about 5 days into growing the first batch, something was different. When there are hundreds of seeds growing in a container, and yet only 60% of the plants are actually growing, you’ve got a problem. 😱
Seeds can be finnicky, so we initially blamed our techniques. Seeds are challenging, they are different every single time in some way. Which means the environment and techniques we have to use also need adjusting. 🔬
After a few weeks, the problem started becoming very clear. Many of the seeds were bad, and wouldn’t grow. The bad seeds would then rot, and over the course of 7-8 days of growing the microgreens, the rot would spread killing everything. ☠️
Sometimes it was obvious, other times it took a long time for the problems to appear. This makes diagnosing and troubleshooting take longer.
The problem is figured out, so it was clear we needed new seed. We reach out to the supplier, let them know about our experience, and we get a new batch of beet seed from another farm source.
Same. Exact. Problem. 🥲
Working with a live product is incredibly challenging. You better like science, because it is a never ending science experiment.
From the seed mutating, to the soil, to the environment there is constant opportunity for problems to arise. We’ve had some smaller problems with seeds in the past, but nothing quite like this. We finally received our first batch of good seed from a brand new vendor. Plants are looking pretty healthy…until their not!
Microgreens farming is challenging, but at least the weather is beautiful right now! Going to go destress with more…farming.