May on the farm is a time to observe and reflect on decisions made, plans for the upcoming harvest, and the planting season ahead. After a long and unusually cold winter our rye fields are a dense canopy bright green, growing vigorously having shrugged off January’s minus-fifteen-degree lows, and the near-constant grazing of a herd of deer throughout a snow-covered February.

A field of Danko rye thriving in early Spring.

Our barley fields are more mixed in status. Our Violeta barley did surprisingly well, surviving the winter with minimal damage, and largely untouched by the deer (which, for reasons unknown favored the rye above all else this winter). Uneven establishment however – patchy coverage with bare spots in the field– has made room for numerous weeds that now permeate the Violeta fields. Aside from the aesthetic drawbacks, weeds suppress yields, and some weeds can be hard to separate from the barley grain at harvest. In organic farming we have limited options for weed control once they’ve established, and thoughts are now on weed prevention in next year’s crop.

A field of Violeta barley competing with annual weeds wintercress and shepard’s purse.

Which is where our field of Lake Effect barley provides an enlightening contrast. Like the Violeta, the Lake Effect did well to survive the winter lows and was not affected by grazing. But unlike the Violeta, the Lake Effect field is virtually weed-free. The Lake Effect was planted later in the fall and avoided a severe thunderstorm that damaged the Violeta seedbed. As a result, it established a uniform, dense canopy, shading the ground below and smothering out weeds entirely.

Annual harvests dictate an annual learning cycle, a slow way to accumulate knowledge. But we are learning nonetheless, and seed-density-as weed-control is a valuable insight. When planting barley this fall we plan to increase our seed per acre count by 25% to 30% to help promote a carpet-like cover of green. We’ll report on results this time next year.