You may have noticed temperatures have begun to drop in recent days, just as some trees have already turned to shades of gold and amber. Yes, the summer is coming to a close, but that doesn’t mean you can’t still enjoy the abundance of fresh fruits and vegetables you did just a few weeks ago.

It’s harvest season in Maine, which means there are more varieties of fresh, local produce available now than most other times of the year.

The late summer-early fall season brings the beginning of thicker-skinned vegetables like cucumbers, squashes and potatoes, but it’s also still the time for corn, eggplant and onions.

It’s also still the season for tomatoes, and with the heat surging earlier this month, they’re ubiquitous at farms and farmers’ markets across the state.

“Tomatoes, cilantro, red peppers and hot peppers, all the things you’d make salsa with,” are what’s currently in season, said Amy Sprague, a farmer at Wolf Pine Farm in Alfred. “We’re not ready to say that it’s fall.”

And it certainly doesn’t look like fall at her farm, Sprague said, with watermelons and blueberries ripening just in time for the equinox. In the coming months, she said, her farm will be lined with winter greens like kale and hefty roots vegetables such as carrots, leeks and sweet potatoes.

It’s all well and good to know what’s in season right now, but where can you get it all?

There are more than a dozen farmers’ markets across York County, according to the Maine Department of Agriculture, Conservation and Forestry’s “Get real. Get Maine!” initiative. These include the Saco River Market, held on Saturdays and Sundays on Saco Island, behind Run of the Mill restaurant.

The Saco River Market comes with the added benefit of also being an artisan market, with several vendors selling jewelry, clothing and crafted materials.

“I know that the customers who come in here, one of the things they have commented on is they like the variety,” Sandy Katz, a volunteer at the market, said as she sold produce to customers. “I think it’s a tremendous resource.”

Saco also boasts a second farmers’ market, held on Saturdays and Wednesdays in the Saco Valley Shopping Center. The market shuts down Wednesday service after September, but remains open on Saturdays through October.

Local food seekers can also opt to invest in a community supported agriculture share program, for which they pay a flat fee at the beginning of the harvest season and receive weekly shares of produce, split between all shareholders.

Wolf Pine Farm offers CSA shares for both summer and winter seasons. Sprague said investing in a CSA ensures people always receive what’s fresh and in season. “Because of the style of CSA that we do, we harvest what’s in season and divide it up by all of our shareholders. Their food is always very seasonal, because they’re getting what’s ready to harvest,” she said.

The winter shares, which begin in November, feed more than 400 Maine families from Lewiston to Kittery, Sprague said.

When asked if she thought access to local food has been made easier through farmers’ markets and CSA programs, Sprague said she does think so, but it’s not enough to rely on them.

“I think we should still put a lot of attention on making the local food accessible,” she said. “Farmers are still having trouble selling their shares or at the farmers’ markets. It’s become more common for people to think about local food, (but) it’s so easy to go to the grocery store and it’s so easy for the grocery store to not connect with farmers.”

“We need to get more local products into the market where people shop on a regular basis,” she said.

If you’re interested in locating a farmers’ market or CSA program near you, visit getrealmaine.com to find a complete list of all farms and farmers’ markets in the state, searchable by farm name, town or county. Those who are interested in learning more about local, organic farming can find a multitude of resources from the Maine Organic Farmers and Gardeners Association, or MOFGA, online at mofga.org.

– Staff Writer Alan Bennett can be contacted at 282-1535, ext. 329 or [email protected].