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Herbs. Kale. Leeks. Lettuces. Onions.
Out Stafford Road in Lake Oswego, past the golf course and the dog park, the big white barn
of Luscher Farm is a scenic element in the high-priced views from the surrounding McMansions
on their five-acre lots. If they look closely, they might see Masterson walking behind her tiller,
or one of her three employees working the rows with a hand hoe.
Part of her acreage may be planted with a cover crop (intended to protect and feed the soil, suppress weeds, and provide habitat for desirable insects). Other sections of the field will have cash crops in varying stages of growth, harvest, or flower. One thing the field will almost never be is fallow.
"I don't like bare fields," Masterson says. "There's a lot of biomass in the soil that needs feeding, and rain will quickly compact that soil to mud."
As noted, the cover crops help to keep down the bane (along with bad weather) of any farmer's existence: weeds. It's almost biblical–every time a weed goes to seed in the field, those seeds can germinate at any time during the following seven years.
Beginning with the first spring planting in late February or early March, and continuing even through the winter months, several crops at once are growing in her fields. The rotation is usually determined by type of crop.
"My goal," Masterson explains, "is not to have the same family of crops in the same ground
for at least five years. I'll plant the brassica family (broccoli, cauliflower, kale, collards,
etc.), then I'll follow that with legumes, then alliums like onions, leeks, and garlic. It's
about six weeks until a crop is ready to harvest, then we might till that area to plant another
cash crop or a cover crop, or we might let what's there go to flower for insectiary habitat.
My goal is always to have something on the farm blooming for the many insects that are potential
predators for things like aphids, root maggots, and cabbage moths."
You'll note, observant reader, that Masterson prefaces most statements with, "My goal is…"
Like any good farmer, she knows that having a goal is good, while making a plan is the surest way to bring on the gods' laughter and the hard freeze.