Each week this summer, we offer a selected perennial for sale.  Most of our perennials cost $8.98 — already a reasonable price for a healthy plant — and on sale they are only $4.98 each!  Our sale items have included dianthus, delphinium, blanket flower, shasta daisy, and a whole lot more.  We usually display them at the front gate, so you can’t miss them when you walk in.  Stop by and let us help your garden grow — year after year.

On sale through Memorial Day!

Each week this spring, we will feature a perennial flower for sale.  This week’s sale item are Columbine Flowers, one of the prettiest flowers available for partly shady settings.   On sale for only $4.98 each — this a fantastic price for a healthy perennial!

Click here to read more:   How to Grow Columbine Flowers

 

Vegetable Plants and More!

If you haven’t done so already, stop in for a wide variety of healthy vegetable plants and herbs for your garden.   We have many varieties of tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, cucumbers, basil — a long list of healthy, inexpensive garden options.  We have been selling these since April and are working hard to keep up with your demands.  Don’t wait too long — it is now time for planting.

It is that time of year in New England when you can begin to feel safe about planting your tomatoes outside.  No promises, but it looks as though there won’t be a frost anytime soon…

We have some of the best tomatoes in the region, grown from seed and then transplanted to six packs, all on our own premise, and almost all of it done by hand.  There is no disease on our tomatoes - blight in particular - because we are careful about growing, and  all of our seed is new.

Choose from lots of  tomato varieties:  large beef masters, several smaller hybrids, sweet cherries, grapes that produce A LOT of tomato, all kinds of heirlooms, yellow tomatoes with less acid, tasty orange, and many more.  We also have single tomato plants, and porch tomatoes in larger pots.  We will likely have them through June, but the busy season for tomatoes and other vegetables begins now…

If you need or want to grow in planters, we can tell you what varieties work best.  A quick tip for tomatoes in pots — add a bit of lime to the soil; this will help prevent blossom end rot, those destructive black blotches that appear on the bottom of the tomato.

We also have all kinds of peppers, eggplant, squash, cucumbers, okra, tons of basil — the vegetable and herb list goes on.  Stop in and let us help you plan a fall harvest.

Want to learn more about the late blight that damaged the crops last year?  Read here, from UMass Amherst:    Late Blight Alert

 

Spring has fully arrived here at Griggs Farm. We have been working hard all winter growing beautiful flowers for your yards and gardens. With the weather getting warmer, we can look forward to planting our 50+acres for all that local, fresh summer and fall produce.

Right now — come see our greenhouses bursting with pansies, geraniums, gerbera daisies, petunias, and many other annual flowers. Outside, you will find our perennial section loaded with plants that will create lasting beauty for your yard, year after year.

For those who can’t wait to get their vegetable gardens growing, we have many plants to choose from, including the cooler spring choices and some of the later summer produce.  Early spring options include lettuce, broccoli, cabbage, onion, leeks, swiss chard, strawberries, and more.   Soon, it will be safe for outdoor planting of our wide selection of tomatoes, including cherry, grape, heirloom, and various huge, juicy slicing tomatoes.   Beginning this week, we will display our usual full collection of vegetable plants, such as peppers, eggplants, squash, cucumbers — you name it.  And,  just because it is for sale at at various shops doesn’t mean it is ready to be planted outdoors in our unpredictable New England spring; ask and we can help you with what to plant, when.   Don’t forget to check out our full herb section where you can find, basil, parsley, rosemary, mints, sage, and lots more to add to your culinary creations.

Thanks for supporting your local farm.   See you soon!

As you may or may not know, the northeast was devastated last year by Late Blight on tomatoes. Late blight is an air borne water mold.  The good news is that it needs green tissue to survive. So we should not have a problem again unless plants are brought in from southern United States.

The bad news is that it also lives on potatoes. This means if someone tries to save potatoes and replant them, the infected potato tubers could cause a re-infestation. So please plant only certified seed potatoes.  Potatoes that freeze or are fully composted will not carry late blight.  Be careful of renegade potatoes that are left in the garden or compost pile.  Your tomato cages, stakes, etc. will not carry the mold over winter.

 Click either image below for helpful information from the UMass Amherst Vegetable Program.

 

 

 

 

It is time to remember our mothers, god mothers, step mothers, aunts…  We offer beautiful, colorful, healthy hanging baskets, potted plants, perennials, herbs, vegetable plants — hundreds of choices for those special women.  If you don’t know what to get, just ask any staff member and we will help you choose a perfect gift.

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Griggs Farm opened on April 1, offering a world of spring color.  Stop in for pansies, tulips, daffodils, and other spring bulbs or cold weather annuals.  We also have hundreds of perennials for those who want to get an early start.

Good perennials for April: Flox, in several colors; Bleeding Hearts, in white or pink.

While we at Griggs’ Farm are cleaning and getting ready for spring, we would like to thank you for your patronage this past year.  Believe it or not, Easter flowers have already been planted and the pansies have sprouted.  Can spring be that far away?  We plan on having plenty of vegetables plants for your needs and flowers for your enjoyment.  Hopefully the weather will cooperate this year and not be too cold, too wet, or too dry.  So get out those seed catalogs, journals, magazines, ect.  and collect your ideas and plans for your garden this spring.  We will help you implement them.  We hope to see you in the spring, and we open April 1st.

Your Friends at Griggs Farm

It will be on Saturday June 27th from 10-3 at Griggs Farm. We have done this event now for 3 years and it is always a great time. We will be having Judy Forty from Alpine Angels goat farm bringing some goats and showing how she makes goat soap out of the goats milk. And our beekeeper Rick Reault from Bee-cause Apiaries with his bees in a glass hive showing us how bees make honey. We also will be having tractor rides and tours of the farm, face painting and plant a plant. Its all free for you and your family. Hope you can make it!!

Well its time to get out there and garden!!  The world has really greened up lately and everything is blooming.  To me spring is such a celebration of life.  Its so nice to see the trees blooming and the bees out, and the baby ducks crossing the road!  I’m so glad that spring always comes around.  What a light at the end of winters tunnel.

At Griggs Farm we are really prepared for this years vegetable gardening season.  We have many varieties of tomatoes, peppers and eggplant.   I wanted to publish the list of our most popular veggies.  We do however have a lot more plants such as lettuce, broccoli and and so much more. I haven’t even started with the flowers.  In any case here is a sampling of our veggie varieties!

Eggplant

 

Galine –New last year! Very glossy black fruit with green calyx.
Classic Italian bell shape, 6″ x 3″. Early, firm fruit on strong plants.

 

Beatrice –classic shape violet color-

 

Epic –classic purple-tapered elegant shape. Sets well and early under various conditions for reliably good yields. Strong upright plant, usually around 36″.

 

Ghostbuster –white-Novel, shiny white skin. Tender skin and sweeter flesh than most.

 

Irene –classic purple-This traditional egg-shaped, purple black eggplant sets heavily,

Producing medium-sized firm fruit.

 

Mangan New last year! Tender, excellent quality Japanese type.
Glossy and very dark purple fruit, avg. 4″ x 1 1/2″. High yielding and early. Great for cooking and pickling. Purple calyx

 

Slim Purple Productive, early and beautiful long slender Asian eggplant with a light purple (not purple black) color. The stem/ calyx is purple with green shading.

 

Ichiban II

 

Dairyu (Japanese slender) Not only is it early, but it will produce over a long season. 7″ - 10″ long fruit is nearly black with matching sepals. Fruit shape is long and thin with a slight pot-belly.

 

Megal -Green calyx, long slender Italian type, 7 - 9″ long, 3″ diameter fruits.

 

Orient ExpressAttractive, slender, 8-10″, glossy black fruits in the long Oriental style. Ready up to 2 weeks before other early varieties, it features an ability to set fruit in cool weather as well as under heat stress.

Fairytale –Mini eggplant-

 

Hansel New! Solid purple mini eggplant.
2008 AAS winner! Start harvesting the abundant fruits when they are only 3-4″ long. The compact, 25-36″, plants produce the tender, dark purple fruit in clusters for easy harvesting. Hansel is non-bitter and perfect for grilling or slicing thin onto pizza

 

Gretel New! Solid white mini eggplant.
2009 AAS winner! Loads of mini, white-skinned eggplant drip from the branches of this compact plant. The tender, bitter-free fruits should be harvested beginning when they are 3-4″ long.

 

Raveena- New! Light green, cylindrical fruits.
Raveena is a heavy yielder on very vigorous plants. The fruit can be harvested anywhere from 3″ to 9″ and, as an added bonus, can be harvested in clusters.

 

Turkish Orange -A unique, brilliant orange fruit, sweet and fragrant when freshly cut. Best eaten once fruits are tennis ball-sized or when slightly orange with green striping. Also great when stuffed. Vigorous bush bears 15-25 fruits per plant.

Sweet Peppers 17

 

Bianca –white bell –

King Arthur –heat tolerant green bell-

Red night X3R

Early sensation –yellow bell-

Yellow Bell II

Yankee Bell

Mr. Bell

Lantern –Green Bell ripe to red-

Italia

Carmen

Round of Hungary -cheese pepper-

Super red pimento

Pimento Perfection

Topeporossa –Small red cherry cheese pepper-

Aruba –cubanelle type-

Cubanelle

Zavory –sweet chinenis-

 

Hot Peppers 20

 

Devil Serano

Portugal Hot

Jalapeno Tam Mild

Jalapeno el rey

Jalapano Santiago

Super Chili

Kung Pow (Thai Hot)

Cherry Bomb

KukuKlan Habanero

Habanero Red (Caribbean Red)

Jamaican Yellow (Scotch Bonnet)

Poblano Sanardo

Tiburon

Golden Heat –long thin cayenne-

Inferno -Hungarian wax, hot banana

Garden Salsa (Anaheim)

Mesilla (long fat Cayenne)

Black Pearl –ornamental hot-

Calico –ornamental hot-

Paprika Supreme

 

Total Peppers 37

Red Tomatoes 12

 

Mountain Fresh Plus

Mountain Spring

Sunbrite

JTO99197 Early Blight Resistant

SunCheif

Fabulous

Jetstar

Early Girl

New Girl

Big Beef

Beef Master

First Lady

 

Grape Tomatoes 7

Tami G

Sweet Olive

Juliet

Moby Grape

Golden Rave –yellow grape large-

Golden Sweet –yellow grape-

Golden Sunshine –yellow grape-

 

Cherry Tomatoes 5

Super Sweet 100

Sweet Baby Girl

Sun Cherry

Sun Gold

Amarillo –yellow cherry-

 

Plum Tomatoes 4

Mariana

San Marizano

Health kick

Speckled Roman

Heirloom Tomatoes 13

 

Big Rainbow

Black Prince

Piriform

Striped German

Green Zebra

Wonder light

Cherokee Purple

Rose

Brandywine

Pineapple

Persimmon

Grandmas Pick

Grandmas Garden

 

Yellow Tomato 1

 

Carolina Gold

 

 

Total Varieties 42