Reinbeck farmer Holly Robertson kneels in her high tunnel on Saturday, March 12, while checking on a spinach bed she seeded last fall. Photo by Soren M. Peterson

While folks across Iowa were springing their clocks ahead last weekend, rural Reinbeck farmer Holly Roberston was springing into action in her high tunnel – getting a jump start on the season’s early plantings.

Robertson and her husband Ben Robertson own and operate Five R Farm – a no-till, organic vegetable and flower farm just south of Reinbeck.

Despite the biting winds outside and a wood stove burning brightly in the house, Robertson was comfortable and content on Saturday, March 12, while working in her farm’s high tunnel.

“I’m trying to grow things in here that like coolish weather,” Robertson said as she buzzed around completing various early season tasks from checking for tulip buds to monitoring the progress of a spinach bed seeded last fall to listing off all the flowers her high tunnel has allowed her to start already this season.

In addition to several new varieties being added to the cut-flower side of her business, Robertson is also trying some new farming techniques this year including going no-till.

Early spring spinach seedlings pictured in Holly Robertson’s Five R Farm high tunnel on Saturday, March 12, in rural Reinbeck. Photo by Soren M. Peterson

“I’m going to stop digging as much as I possibly can,” Robertson said.

With warming temperatures set for much of the [past] week – the National Weather Service (NWS) in Des Moines was calling for daytime highs in the 50s and 60s leading to rapidly diminishing snow swaths – it’s quite likely daffodils, those trustworthy harbingers of spring, will soon begin to pop across Tama and Grundy counties, no digging required.

Although it’s not spring yet as winter doesn’t officially end until 10:33 a.m. CDT on Sunday, March 20, according to the National Weather Service, it’s hopefully full spring ahead.

Farmer Holly Robertson talks about sowing tulip bulbs last fall as she stands in her farm’s high tunnel in rural Reinbeck on Saturday, March 12. Photo by Soren M. Peterson

White garden markers indicate where different varieties of tulip bulbs have been planted in Holly Robertson’s Five R Farm high tunnel on Saturday, March 12, in rural Reinbeck. Photo by Soren M. Peterson

Holly Robertson of Five R Farms in rural Reinbeck checks the soil in her high tunnel on Saturday, March 12. Photo by Soren M. Peterson

Spring blooms await: A pink dahlia blooms on Holly and Ben Robertson's Five R Farm last summer in rural Reinbeck. Photo by Soren M. Peterson