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| Photo from Oct 4th, a week after the hurricane. Soggy, but intact. |
Last I recall, we were waiting out the season, watching for longer lengths and fuller growth. There was a bit of rain early in Sept., but not enough to spare us the trip out to the farm every couple of days. My expectation was that a freeze would come in late September so this would be the last few weeks of active growth before the willows dropped leaves and go dormant for the winter.
Then came Helene. We couldn't get out there for several days, Old Fort was devastated as well as the up-mountain areas. We made a quick text to one of the neighbors to confirm that the farm did not wash away and that neighborhood was without power and water but otherwise ok.
Good, and maybe the willow will be twice as tall with all the rain!
Not really, but the property was in fine shape. We were then back to drought and slowly the willow leaves started looking dry and falling off and the whole bed was looking very thin! There have been no catkins on any of the varieties yet, even on the 2 year plants. We are supposed to have warm weather through November, so I'm not sure what the schedule will be.
I just hope the rods set buds!
We had our friend with the tractor come and do a last mow and a first till of the new field. We are laying down compost on half and ryegrass as a cover crop on the other half. Then we'll lay out new landscape fabric for the new rows. Hopefully we can get to that next week, while the weather is still nice.
