I've often said that my favorite part of living in northwestern North Dakota is the amount of summer daylight. I see it every year but I continue to marvel at being able to see and work without artificial light until almost 11 o'clock at night.

This season is no exception and after the horrendous spring flooding we've had, the long, Yukon to southern Alaska days we're having are beginning to have a huge impact on a lot of plants that suffered early primarily because they were under water.

Now that we are going into the second week of July and have had a good soaking rain, I can actually see day-to-day growth and it is wonderful. 

Not even a month ago, Ilene and I were completely sick as we walked the fields and noted the shaggy, yellowed look of most of the crops. Now, most of them are blooming, developing thick stems and are getting some height. 

Granted, some of them, most notably Anaheim peppers, don't look so good. But everything else that survived is doing well. Onions, celery, beets, carrots, eggplant, squash, leeks, cucumbers, cantaloupe and even peanuts are all looking like they should this time of year.

The caveat to consider is that this cropland succumbed to flooding five times since Easter Sunday (April 14) and on May 31, the Des Lacs River saw its highest crest in recorded history. Honestly, we didn't think we were going to get a crop of anything and we are already seeing tomatoes, squash and eggplant. We've already picked radishes and spinach and mescclum are ready to pick because they are beginning to pop too.

It's just a blessing to see the difference the sun and a little rain has done. The bad news is, we've lost the garlic and some potatoes. But the good news is, North Star Farms is beginning to look like an organic vegetable farm and we couldn't be happier. 

The next step is to get everything cleaned of weeds and start the harvest that should take us into the middle of November. 

Thank you Mother Nature for balancing out what otherwise might have been a disaster had we had another month like the last three have been. I can stick my neck out tonight and say the crop is coming to our shareholders, the farmers' market will open and I plan to be exhausted but happy from harvesting a bumper crop.