It sure is good crop-growing weather. Getting the first cutting of hay done has been tough in a lot of areas. The summer heat and recent rains also HAVE helped gardens and produce farms, my garden included!

Gardens and homegrown produce remind me of my childhood. My mom would always plant a big garden — tomatoes, potatoes, green beans, peas, lima beans, beets, cucumbers, cabbage, melons and more. I hated pulling weeds, but I sure enjoyed eating the fresh produce (except the lima beans). Mom was a master of canning and freezing, so the bounty of the garden lasted long past the killing frost of the fall.

My dad would plant sweet corn on the edge of one of the fields of corn he planted for the cows. There was plenty of sweet corn, but with only one planting, the sweet corn season didn’t last as long as we wished.

When the corn was at its peak ripeness, Grandma, Aunt Alma, Mom, my siblings, cousins and I would all head to the field with a tractor and wagon. The adults and older kids would pick the corn and toss it out to the adjacent hay field so that the rest could pick it up and put it on the wagon. When we had enough for the three households, the wagon was pulled up near the pasture fence. We would tackle the mound of corn together, throwing the husks over the pasture fence for the cows to enjoy. The corn was then divided, and we went back home to cook and cut it off the cobs in preparation for freezing. Sweet corn all winter long!

Eating what was in season was just what you did back then. I remember Dad coming home from the Bloomfield Auction, where he had taken a bull calf or a cow, returning with a big box of peaches. We would eat what we could, but mom would start canning them right away. Pears we got from the trees by my grandparents’ house. Apples, too, were preserved as applesauce, and there was an orchard that my mom still goes to that had large refrigerated coolers that would get us some bonus months. Citrus came around Christmas, and when it was gone, it was gone.

Today, we can walk into the grocery store and buy pretty much whatever fruit or vegetable we want. The U.S. imports about one-third of our fruits and vegetables, which plays an important role in year-round availability.

But efforts are being made to help U.S. farmers keep up with the increasing demand for fresh fruit and vegetables through the use of greenhouses. The Controlled Environment Agriculture Research Complex at The Ohio State University opened in 2022, where industry partners and scientists are working together to develop sustainable, year-round indoor food production.

There are many ways to grow the food we need. Utilizing greenhouses just makes sense. With continued research and innovation, U.S. farmers will continue to produce healthy food for the consumers of this country.

Smallsreed is a member of the Trumbull County Farm Bureau and grew up on a family dairy farm in Northeast Ohio.