Root to Rise Gardens

05/26/2026

Time has been flying with the spring routines of bed prep, planting, crop maintenance, harvest & delivery.

Few announcements:

Red Lodge Farmers' Market starts in less than two weeks! Come see us Saturday, June 6th 9-noon in Lions Park. We’ll have early season goodies (radishes, salad turnips and lots of greens & herbs) plus starter plants. Market runs every Saturday through the end of September. It’s shaping up to be a great season with lots of new vendors, music & kids activities each week, plus wellness offerings like yoga, massage & Zumba. Can’t wait to see you at market soon 😘

In the meantime, find our microgreens, baby greens & radishes at Beartooth Market. We deliver every Thursday. Plus, find a seasonal selection of our veg on the menus at Samurai Sue's Everyday Foods One Legged Magpie Carbon County Steakhouse Babcock & Miles . Thanks for shopping local & supporting small businesses 💕

If you’re signed up for our weekly (during the growing season) e-newsletter, those will be starting next week. If you’re not signed up, but want to be, head on over to our website (https://www.root2risegardens.com/contact). The weekly newsletters will keep you informed on what veggies we’ll have at market as well as let you know about drop-in volunteer opportunities on the farm. We’re waiting until the end of June to begin the drop-in workdays so stay tuned for more info.

Finally, if you’re wondering what George is doing in that last pic, it’s our routine foliar feeding of the garlic. We spray a fish/kelp mixture every 10-14 days until garlic scapes form to provide these heavy feeders with the nutrients they need. No gross chemicals around here… we follow organic/beyond organic practices to foster soil health and keep our plants & the broader ecosystem happy 🌱

05/21/2026

More erratic spring weather with rain turning to snow overnight. But, we harvested our first of the season baby lettuce and arugula from out in the field on a sunny morning yesterday!

Today’s Beartooth Market restock: baby lettuce, spinach, spring mix, radishes & microgreens. Grab the fixings of a tasty local salad for your Memorial Day festivities 🥗

Arugula is going out to a few of our restaurant accounts. Per chef request we tried a new variety this year called Uber. Its leaves are more serrated than the smooth, lobed leaves of the Astro variety I’ve been growing for years. Had to laugh at myself yesterday… I’ve grown so used to the smooth leaf shape that harvesting those serrated leaves felt strange. Same lovely, nutty flavor though and I’ll be curious to get customer feedback on this change.

Countdown to market season is on with the first Red Lodge Farmers' Market on June 6th!

We’re rolling with the spring punches around here with pest pressure and rollercoaster weather that’s a bit different each year. Currently, voles have been the pest du jour 🙄 and we’re looking into adopting a working cat or two to help keep populations down. If any friend of the farm has a large dog crate to donate help with this venture, were looking for a crate and other supplies to get ready for some new feline friends 🐈.

Off to delivery and back to it 😘

05/19/2026

The tunnel is slowly switching to summer mode. George flail mowed our first baby greens plantings (now bolted) yesterday. These were seeded back in February and supplied us with spring mix and spinach for Beartooth Market since late March.

Now we have some beautiful baby greens ready out in the field. The tunnel greens serve one last purpose, adding organic matter back into the soil as the chopped & dropped residue from mowing breaks down. We’ll tarp these beds with silage tarps (black side up) to encourage faster breakdown. Then in two weeks or so we’ll prep the beds and transplant tomatoes.

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05/15/2026

First Friday field walk of the season! These will happen weekly throughout the growing season so we can assess crop development, make a list of what’s ready for next week’s harvest, spot pest or plant health issues, and determine weeding priorities.

Right now, lots of greens out there with spring mix, spinach, arugula & baby lettuce plantings that will be ready to go to Beartooth Market & our restaurant accounts next week. Garlic and Napa cabbage growing away. We planted chard, kale & collards into landscape fabric for the first time this season in an attempt to reduce our weeding labor. Perennial herbs (oregano, mint, chives & sage) that we planted last year are establishing nicely.

Bare ground to be prepped and planted next week. Tarped ground to be uncovered, prepped & planted in two weeks. Tunnel soon to be in transition from spring greens to summer tomatoes and cucumbers. The season is ramping up 🌱

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05/14/2026

Photo drop from the week (mostly yesterday)… it’s been a busy one on and off the farm juggling the planting season tasks with personal family responsibilities. Being the tiniest of businesses has it’s pluses in that I can make my own schedule more or less, but the downside is that stepping away often means things just don’t get done. Grateful to George for jumping in and banging out the rest of last week’s transplanting while I was away and to my seed starting crew for keeping transplant & microgreen production on track!

My schedule is calming back down a bit and I’m hoping for a smooth summer. Enjoying the spring season of rebirth with singing and nesting birds in abundance around the property and leaves showing their vibrant flush of early green. And, thinking about the seasons of life and the changing responsibilities that come with them as I find myself squarely in midlife.

But, back to the farm news! Garlic is growing away and our first field plantings of greens seeded late March/early April have matured. Spinach and spring mix heading to Beartooth Market this morning are the first harvests from out in the field. Ready just in time as the tunnel greens are bolting. We’ll get one more harvest from them for braising mix and let their blooms hang around a bit longer for the pollinators… but soon it will be time to flail mow those tunnel greens and plant tomatoes! Succession planting continues… in two more weeks all of the garden beds will be planted and we’ll be in to the season of bed flipping as plantings mature, are harvested and then replanted with something new. It’s been feeling like summer with some unusually warm temps (pic of temps yesterday afternoon in our tunnel, outside, shipping container/seed starting & cold storage). We’re gearing up for actual summer with the rest of our work trade help returning over the next few weeks. And, save the date… Red Lodge Farmers' Market kicks off June 6th 🌱🥗💕

05/07/2026

It’s delivery day! Beartooth Market will be getting restocked with spinach, spring mix & microgreens by midday. We have a gap in radishes this week, but they should return next week with our first spring harvest from out in the field 🥗🥗🥗

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