We're in the process of planting summer gardens, but we're still getting a few final winter harvests. This harvest in Pasadena has a nice variety of winter veggies, ranging from root crops and brassicas to peas and spinach. 

Our farmers face a challenge as they switch our gardens from winter to summer seasons. During the month of March, our farmers must constantly ask themselves difficult questions. "Should I leave in that pea plant and wait for one last harvest, or should I clear trellis space to make way for beans? How many more side shoots will that broccoli produce--is it worth a bit of extra broccoli or should I give my tomatoes a head start?"

Harvests such as these are a testament to the thoughtfulness with which our farmers approach weekly farming. They've honed this skill over the course of numerous season switches, and it's a unique benefit our service provides over first-time gardeners, who often lack the knowledge about what should stay and what should go. Nothing about the season switch is chaotic or random--it's a meticulously planned process, with every plant receiving careful consideration.

Ask any Farmscape farmer--this process can be frustrating, and is far from easy. As this picture makes clear, however, the benefits easily justify the extra work.

At Farmscape we're proud to grow food in what an academic might call the “interstitial spaces” of the city. The nooks, and the crannies, the parkways, the vacant lots, the parks, and side yards between buildings, but most especially the residential landscapes. Places that more often tend to be under the dominion of turf grass, weeds, ivy, and trees.

What’s exciting about farming in the Space Between? We take land that agriculture has forsaken, surrendered to urban development. But we turn it into intensive urban gardens, and then we can harvest a quality of produce fresher than any distant farm field ever could. Meanwhile, we don't have to leave the city to do our work.

Based upon this photo, I might might have to declare our 2011 summer harvests the prettiest we've had since the start of the business. This is the first year we've grown lemon cucumbers, and they are an excellent accent color in pictures like this.