Garlic should be worshipped by some cult

One of the signs of Spring.

This photo is from last year. In the background you can see, from right to left, the old corn crib we used as a packing shed, the 77 RV I lived in for several months, and the machine shed that featured, among other things, a fairly large half-pipe that attracted skaters from all over.

Bees leaving the hive

Just a couple pics from last season. It kind of freaked me out a little, even though I know better on a rational level.

They swarmed, found a spot to hang out for a moment, sent out some scouts, and a few minutes later the whole pile took off in a giant cloud toward the creek. Pretty amazing to see up close.

You thought I was gone!

Ha! And so did I. For a little bit.

But. I'm back. For maybe a little bit. Or a while. Who knows. But I'll try.

Quick summary for any stragglers: farmed again, just south of Chicago, with great folks (updated links coming soon). Lived in an RV with no water, no stove, and some electricity. Learned more about building, composting, manure management. Cut and planted and dug sooooo many potatoes, but I still love them. Summer squash can kiss my ass. I'm a new fan of the wheel hoe. Bees are fuckin crazy (when they swarm like three times in a single season, and they're right by the packing shed, right?). The Earthway "precision" seeder can still kiss my ass (but I can empathize with it a little more). I like soil blocks for seed starting. Kale might be my favorite crop to grow for sale (but come on America, when will you learn to love the kale?). Maybe this coming summer won't be as hot. This past fall and winter were something I might need about 12 beers and a half a pack of cigarettes to write about. Maybe I'll just skip the blog and go right to the novel for that one.

So guess what? I'm farming again this year. In the outskirts of the western Chicago suburbs. My long journey away from the suburban wasteland has brought me full circle. I still don't know how I feel about this situation, but I'm trying to embrace it. This is life. Or a life.

More later. 

The closing of another season

You see, for us, it's too easy. The past couple of years (and this one is playing out the same) we have finished up with the main tasks on the farm and have gone on with our lives. We've left behind many of the odds and ends that get done in the less busy times--all those chores you put off for one reason or another.

We take a few bagfuls of food and find other employment. Winter passes. Then spring comes and, voila! we're at the farm, and it's ready to go, all the little things taken care of. It's not how I want it to go down, but that's how life has played out so far. We're hoping that next year will end differently.

Yeah, it's hard leaving the farm. I need to be there to change the oil, care for the animals, chop more wood, start new projects. I need to be there to come up with next season's plan, buy seed, work around all the little obstacles that arise. But our country doesn't seem to really care about having small farmers (and stopped caring a long time ago), so we're learning the best we can.

All in all, it was a helluva season. So much rain, so many pests and plant pathogens. It really was educational.

The autumn colors were spectacular as they made their way down to our cove. Now it's mostly muted reds, browns, and yellows out there, which have their own beauty.

This week we pack up and move on out. We'll head up to the northeast where we'll work with trees and enjoy a little downtime with some family.

I'm going to miss these mountains while I'm away. And Asheville, too, because it's a great little city to visit a couple times a month. And there's the music, and all the trails, and the great food, and wonderful people. Shit, whatever happens, at least I got to live here and enjoy it all for awhile.

We hope to find some land--to own (somehow), lease long-term, as part of a partnership, or whatever, we're open to anything really--for next year. So, if you know anybody who wants to help out a couple of poor wannabe farmers/homesteaders with a place to settle, we'd love to hear from you (preference for southern Appalachia). If we can't make that happen, we'll be searching again for another apprenticeship opportunity, with an eye toward learning more about farming with animals, seed saving, and basic construction.

So, it's transition time. I'll be posting again soon, probably from a different location--with more random rambles though, less farm talk (for a couple months at least).

Handling your hoe (rural version, ch. 1)

A couple days ago I was out weeding our two remaining beds of leeks. It was an odd weeding job because the deer had been grazing on the weeds they like to eat, leaving shortish weeds with fairly stout roots (hard to hoe and pull because of the deep-set roots, hard to pull, also, because of the lack of grip space to yank 'em up). Deer don't like to eat leeks (at least these don't), and most of the rest of the field has just recently been put into a cover crop of rye, vetch, and clover (all of which are mere seedlings), leaving the nightly congregation of deer in that field to munch on nothing but weeds. The main weed was a yellow-flowering fast grower (whose name escapes me) that just absolutely dominates our farm throughout most of the year; deer seem to love it, but they left others, like dock (deep, stubborn roots), to grow unabated. So, hoeing was rough. And the inevitable hand weeding that left many broken roots in the ground was discouraging . It was slow going.

I find that when you have such a weeding job in front of you, it's nice to slap on a pair of earbuds and let music help you along. For instance, Modest Mouse assisted me in the leek-weeding endeavor. The schizophrenic vocals over a steady funk-like beat helped rhythmize and energize my hoe strokes to efficiently uproot (or at least chop off sufficiently until the first frost comes) those pesky bastards. Neko Case helped me slow it down a little--let me feel the cool, pleasant breeze under the completely blue and sunny Carolina sky, helping me find some odd grace in my hoeing technique. Because, what's weeding without a bit of contemplative, sensual pleasure? And then Paul Simon brought me back to the rhythm, giving me that final push of energy to get the job done. Plus, there's no not liking weeding when Simon inquires about the 50 ways.

Sometimes I don't need music to accompany me. Often just being outside, doing real, meaningful work to survive is enough. But there are days when you'd rather be doing nothing, or else something easy. Though it's tempting to just give in to laziness (which happens sometimes), certain things just have to get done. And I really wouldn't want it any other way.

*****

The trees are really coloring up now in the higher elevations. The reds are out. But yesterday our high temperature hit 80, which was, um, perfect. Meanwhile, back in Wisconsin, they're expecting snow and freezing temps. Love it here.

Chill

It has gotten a bit cold here. Smells like fall. One night we go from the fan sucking cool, sweet mountain air into our room, to the next night having the whole apartment closed down--us draped in sweaters, smothered nightly in a heavy comforter, me cursing my lack of a good pair of boots for farm work (thus relying on the old trusty sandals in the 40-degree dewy morning). But don't get me wrong, it feels good.

Basil and pepper plants are pissed. Basil hates the cold; sweet peppers also hate the deluge we've been getting of late. Even some of the lettuce, the cool-moisture lover that it is, is rotting in the field. But arugula is happy. Napas and bok choi are trying hard. Kale would probably be happy if not for the plague of harlequin bugs. But we can take heart that the flea beetles have seemingly left us for the year. And we haven't gotten flooded like some of our unfortunate WNC neighbors.

We've got a bit over a month left at this farm, where we'll keep tending our fall/winter crops for market and, most importantly, CSA members. It's a bit of an unwinding time, at least in my mind, despite all that's left to do.

In other news, the blueberries are still plentiful up on Max Patch, as of last weekend. We were picking amongst the roaring wind and the cries of the haint (or a flying kite; or a creaking tree--I'm not sure).

The near future brings visitors from afar and, maybe, if things fall right, a trip into the backcountry (our last camping excursion near Mt. Mitchell left us soaked, a couple additional inches of rain away from being devoured by a rising river, and within several hundred feet of being crushed by a toppled tree--which is what I call an adventure).

In the meantime I'll be happy to watch the trees slowly transform as the cold sets in and daylight contracts. Already we see the 4,000+ foot peaks that poke into the sky around our cove hueing toward orangish-yellow. The vegetation on the creek banks is thinning to the point where we can see the road again for the first time since May. The ragweed has pretty much done its thing (ahhhh... relief). Sumacs everywhere are blushing mightily.  They're calling for a less than stellar fall color show this year because of all the rain we've had. But I wouldn't heed what "they" say. Because, well, the spring leafing was beyond words, in it's spectacularly subtle green gradient, and hardly anyone even touches on how beautiful that is--ever.

How's fall on everyone else's land? Fruits and veggies still going by you?

It's August?

Time is certainly flying around here. You'll have to forgive me, friends, for not posting with any regularity. We've been busy. Those who farm and garden know that midsummer is about as hectic as it gets, with your heavy producers like tomatoes, squash and beans in full fruiting mode. And then there's the corn. Yeah, we're not in the greenhouse starting plants as much, or out in the fields putting in many new transplants, but we're picking like mad, and weeding, and dealing with the heavy harvests.

You'll be sad to know that our onions and garlic were devastated by all the spring rain, and we pretty much lost a good majority of the two crops. I mean, there's garlic and onions galore curing, but they look like little wrecked balls, most of which are unsuitable for selling. But it's a lesson learned. And hey, we're still providing plenty of other stuff for the CSA and making good sales at market. Gotta appreciate the crop diversity of small farms like ours.

On the other hand, our greenhouse-grown tomatoes are so prolific that we are having a hard time keeping up with them. Summer squash, which started out terribly in the wet weather is producing well. And green beans, the pain in the ass that they are to pick, love to fill up several bushel bins with each harvest. Our first crop of sweet corn was pretty damn good, too, despite the corn ear worm invasion. Luckily the folks at market mostly understand what it means to grow and eat things organically.

Elsewhere, we've been entertaining lots of visitors from out of state, which has been a pleasant surprise during our time here. We attended the fun Bele Chere in Asheville, where I drank plenty of local brews and enjoyed several bands I had never heard before. Spent some time exploring the Smokies, including a grueling hike up to the top of Mt. Sterling in my crappy sandals. We've visited several farms in the area, which has been a great educational experience. Started taking yoga once a week. And in our downtime we've been kicking back with some beers, enjoying these amazing mountains that surround our cove, watching the occasional movie, and reading some good books.

Yep. It looks to be busy for the next several weeks as well, with more visitors expected and the final big push to get fall crops in the ground and tended to. However, I'll try to be better about updating this thing.

What happened inbetween rains?

Bushhogged some of our cover crop down. The rye was tall and the vetch was clingy. Mmmm.. taste the organic matter and soil nutrients.

Harvested some rainbow chard, among many other things.

 

Sold our goods at the market.

 

Watched frogs and toads do it in the puddles. A lot.

 From tadpoles to little hopping toadpoles with tails. 

 

The ghost of Max Patch.

 

We were eventually blessed with 10 minutes of spectacular views when the fog temporarily blew out.

 

Finally, a shot from the Blue Ridge Parkway, somewheres between Asheville and Waynesville. The laurels are in full bloom.

Did I mention it's raining?

Yep, it's still raining. We're approaching 10" for the month, which is nearly a third of our yearly average. In one month. And last month was rainy too. And so was the previous month. Standing water in some of the fields. Lots of slugs. Temps this month have fluctuated from lows around freezing to highs in the low 80s, which has caused a bunch of our field crops to bolt and try to go to seed early, thus shortening their lifespan and ruining their quality in some cases. Affected: broccoli, arugula, radishes, cilantro, tatsoi, and probably some others I'm forgetting. The lack of sun has really slowed down our second succession of crops and stunted early planted peas, beets, turnips, strawberries, and spinach. On the other hand, we're producing monster heads of lettuce, beautiful mixed greens, vibrant rainbow chard, mustard greens, and kale. These things are loving the rain.

All our greenhouse crops are doing pretty good. Cukes are huge sellers at market, but they've reached their peak and are starting a downward trend. Eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes look promising.

New crops in the field: summer squash, parsley, basil, sweet corn, and flowers. Fruits are forming on the squash already. So far so good.

Potatoes and onions are looking healthy. Pests are up. Now seeing potato beetles and cucumber beetles out and about. Boo those.

It's busy at this point in the season. More to come soon.

It really begins

Things are really gaining steam on the farm as all the potential energy built during the last two months jolts into the kinetic. This weekend is a huge plant sale down in Waynesville; we are preparing for that. Our direct-seeded greenhouse is cranking out the greens (and completely unmanageable weeds). Most of the field crops are doing good, aside from the few that got decimated by flea beetles. Cukes in the greenhouse are huge, but the fruits are getting chomped on by some mysterious burrowing creature. It's hard keeping up with all the flats of seedlings sitting in the propagation greenhouse. We've had the local TV news out of Asheville out here to take moving pictures of the quaint farm life and ask why in the world some young folks would willingly spend their time learning to farm. The cameraman irked me.

Aside from all that, it looks like morel season is done here. We got several decent harvests though. The recent weather has been rainy again (so much for the beginnings of that supposed drought, huh?), but it was preceded by several days of really warm, dry weather, which was perfect for outdoors fun. We also had our first visitor from back home, so the past weekend was spent cruising the area. We got to see some spectacular things at Max Patch and Cataloochee and out exploring our own holler, and spent some quality time in Asheville.

Lately it's been hard for me to sit back and reflect enough to write a decent post or unload pictures from the camera. Got lots of good shots to share.

How's everyone out there?

A respite from rain?

It's been busy. I can't even remember what happened at the beginning of the week. We did have another snow scare, but it never actually fell. It only dropped to 35 last night, and now we're looking at several days in the mid- to upper-70s. Crazy mountain weather.

The last couple of dry (finally) days have been reserved mostly for bed prep and transplanting. We got lots of onions out and some mustard greens. Some beets and snow peas didn't germinate well, and the direct-seeded arugula in the field was destroyed by flea beetles, so we tilled all those in and we'll reseed them probably tomorrow. Since some of these crops were in partial beds, I had the opportunity to hone my skills at precision tilling on the tractor. It went ok, aside from one solitary plant casualty.

Tomorrow will probably bring lots of direct seeding, which we're behind on, and more transplanting (scallions and who knows what else). It's nice to finally have some dry weather.

This weekend is Trailfest in Hot Springs. Many of the Appalachian Trail hikers who do the whole thing (from Georgia to Maine) in one season make it to Hot Springs around this time. And they have to pass through the downtown, which is the first real population center they hit on the trail, so many of them pause here to stock up on provisions or catch a breather. Anyway, Meagan is gonna try to sling some of her jewerly as a vendor at the fest, and I'll be there for moral support.

More photos up soon, hopefully.

Edited to add: Oh yeah, bagged a whole bunch of morels yesterday. They might be peaking in our holler right about now. Also, the farm tour down in Saluda was cool. Met lots of nice folks from nearby farms and then had dinner and a couple brews at Asheville Pizza and Brewing Co. Good pizza; pretty good beer.

The tractor dilemma

Sometimes I'm an insomniac. Like right now. I've been up for a few hours, and I really have no need to be up. In other words, more sleep would probably be good. But there's no use fighting what you can't fight, so here I am. At least I can be productive in some way.

We were transplanting yesterday using this transplanter (see right for a picture of the old single-seat setup) that attaches to the tractor. A description of the equipment is a topic for another post, but in a few words, it automates something I've been used to doing by hand. Transplanting by hand involves pulling seedlings out of the trays they were started in, dropping them in the field, and getting your hands (and usually many other parts of your body) dirty by securing the plant in the appropriate spot. The tractor transplanter does the actual spacing and planting for you.

It has its pluses and minuses. A big plus is the actual time to get the plants in the ground is fast: it took about 10 minutes for four people (one driver, two transplanters, one quality control person tailing the tractor--three people would suffice though) to do two rows in one 275 foot bed. That's blazing fast. A big minus is that it's a piece of equipment, and therefore it doesn't always work right, which leads to frustration, backtracking, and tinkering.

When we first used the recently improved transplanter (two seats now) yesterday, it went perfect, and I was truly impressed. If it could save that much time, then, I thought, it might be the thing that convinces me that a tractor is something really worth having. But further transplanting proved to me that the perfection was fleeting. And while the transplanter always saved time (compared to hand transplanting) no matter what, I'm not sure that the time savings itself is worth the money and effort to have and maintain the equipment.

Besides, I've been wanting to avoid machines, because, well, I'm not sure the infrastructure and resources are gonna exist for much longer to allow us to continue to use machines the way we do as a society. As oil becomes more scarce and prices go through the roof (and don't fret, it will go back up in the not-too-distant future), I'm not sure tractors are going to make sense.

And on principle I find many machines ridiculously wasteful when I can do the very same things with my own body (often better) and simultaneously reap the benefits of pushing myself physically. In that case, time is not a cost, it is a benefit. As the subhead of my blog attests, I'm trying to live a simpler life, because simpler is good for me and is the only way that we as a community are gonna even begin to get on track to healing the clear-as-day wounds inflicted by our longtime hyper-consumerist ways. So, usually it's a no-brainer: I'll take manual labor over machine labor when it makes the most sense, which is most of the time.

But there are fuzzy areas. Both organic CSA farms I've worked at use tractors, for good reason. Both are about the same size at around five acres, which is small, but big enough that it's easy to see why a tractor comes in handy. For instance, manually preparing the soil for planting five acres would probably kill you before summer's first harvest (someone tell me if my perspective is limited on this). So as I see it our options when we have our own farm are three: buy a tractor (a used one, obviously, and biodiesel powered), secure the services of an animal (horse, mule), or scale down to where manual labor and small machines suffice.

The last two options are most appealing to me, for many reasons I'm sure I'll get into in future posts. But they beg some questions: Can we farm an acre or two and still make a living? Can we make the transition from machine-based labor to animal-based labor (I prominently include myself in the animal category) in a season while knowing very little about how to work with draft animals? Or maybe we should make the bulk of our money other ways and just have a garden plot big enough to mainly feed ourselves for the whole year and therefore not worry at all about non-human labor?

These are critical and difficult questions for a wannabe sustanainable farmer today. We hope to come up with some satisfactory answers in the next year or two.

scavenging and growing

The last couple days have been dry, warm, and sunny. Which means that our backlog of way-too-big greenhouse plants could get transplanted into the fields. Chard, choi, brocolli, lettuce, potatoes (seeded), kohlrabi, and cabbage all escaped their plastic prisons. It was a good feeling to get 'em all out. Here's a shot of the lettuces and some of the brassicas right before they got trucked out to the field.

How about the greenhouse cukes? Click to see the detail. Those tentacles are beautiful and strong. And notice the fruit in the first pic. Hopefully we defeated the soil disease problem.

The arugula and other greens we direct-seeded into the greenhouse our first day here? They're coming along, and some should be ready for next week's tailgate market.

Here's potatoes being planted. The implement is called a dragsetter. Two folks sit on the thing and drop potato pieces while one person pulls it with the tractor. A shoe digs a trench, and those wheels you see pack in dirt over the dropped potato. I was the driver. It was my first time doing potatoes like this. It was fast and easy. This dirt is plowed and disked, but there was really no need to till it up.

Then we found these yesterday admidst a stand of poplars on the ridge (thanks Molly!).

That's four yellows and three greys. They were all solitary; that fact combined with the mounds of deer shit and disturbed leaves make us think the deer are devouring all the morels. But it's just a theory. Oh, and we found that turtle shell that the morels are laying against. Not a bounty of morels, but it was so satisfying to finally find them ourselves and cook 'em up in some butter and eat 'em. They were yummy.

Also came across this spike morel that was too dried out to harvest or eat. Ugly mutha, right?

Beautiful tulip we saw during our foragings.

First market of the season is tomorrow, so we'll probably be heading down to Asheville to check it out. Then we get to tour a farm down in Saluda Saturday evening as part of our apprenticeship learning experience. And then we get a roommate on Sunday (the third apprentice). So, it's gonna be a busy weekend.

Most of the photos in this post were taken by Meagan. All the credit for the pretty pics should go to her. Plus she contributes about half of all the other photos on the blog.

If you're short on rocks...

we're thinking about instituting a u-pick. Nevermind those other leafy things.

April snows bring May...uh...?

Photos, as promised (kind of).

The snow begins. You may have to click on the pic to see the flakes.

Almost post-accumulation. From right to left: See how the cover crop (a mix of rye, vetch, clover, and field peas) doesn't get blanketed. You can also see the row cover over the strawberries. Finally, a field road, covered in snow. Also, we still think that's Bluff in the background (poor AT through-hikers must've had a couple miserable nights, because they got something like six inches up there, so I'm told).

Sunset before the storms.

This is the greenhouse we direct seeded on our first day here, photo taken about a week and a half ago.

Same greenhouse--a few days ago. Somewhere in the vicinity of when this photo was taken, we weeded (most of it)!

Preparing a different greenhouse for tomatoes, which, if everything goes right, we'll start harvesting in June! All the straw-colored stuff is dead rye and mustards, which we chopped up with a giant weedwacker. This here is a no-till operation. We just used shovels to loosen up the soil between the giant t-posts, where we'll transplant our ready-to-go tomato plants. The dead rye will be mulch, which will hopefully inhibit the growth of weeds. Not pictured are the cattle panels we installed. The tomatoes will have lots of opportunity to grow upwards.

Same greenhouse. We needed to replace the aged and holey plastic, and do some repairs on the baseboards (the difference in the clarity of the plastic is astounding). Oh, and scaffolds and front-end loaders are fun (if you're crazy). Don't try this at home.

Finally, today's glimpse from the top of Max Patch. Max Patch sits at about 4,600 feet on the TN/NC border, and the AT passes over it. 360 degree views let you see something like four states on a clear day. It is treeless thanks to years of cattle grazing. Now someone maintains its prairie-like setting. If you can handle the twisty, largely unpaved drive up to the trailhead, it's only a short, mildly strenuous walk to the summit. It was a hazy day today, but what I saw still made me thankful for being alive. (Also see my new profile pic for another shot from the top of Max Patch.)

Indoor farming

It's been a week of mostly indoor farming, thanks to some schizophrenic weather. I wish I could post some pictures, but we're in the midst of some major storms, and our internet connection is super spotty.

Last Saturday we met the folks from the neighboring farm and another neighbor from over the mountain. All super nice, enjoyable people. We shared some homemade wood-fired pizzas with some local and not-so-local brews. Local being a variety of Highland beers, which are always delicious, as well as some homemade IPA that I find to be the tastiest IPA I've ever had; but I'm not really an IPA connoisseur, so I may not be an adequate judge. The not-so-local brew came straight outta the Midwest, representin' Wisconsin--the best cheap beer you can get here, in my opinion--PBR. Anyway, the beers, the pizzas, the company: great all.

Before the get together we spent Saturday exploring a bit of eastern TN. It's amazing how fast you leave the mountains once you get outside of Newport. And someone really has to explain to me the whole deal where people kind of just set up on the side of the state highway in TN and display and sell their wares. Right there on the shoulder. Is this a thing? Or are these people going rogue, kind of like moonshining, but more conspicuous and less tasty?


So Sunday, after a bit of recovery from Saturday, we had to put row cover over our strawberries in the field because the temps were supposed to drop into the 20s. Sunday was gorgeous, in the 70s. We went huntin for morels and came up empty. But we did find an awesome little waterfall lost way up the holler.

Monday saw temps dropping fast and wind picking up mightily. We wrestled with more row cover and were able to blanket about 1100 feet of transplanted veggies. It took us several hours to do that, and entailed gathering rocks that we had previously removed from the field and hauling them back in to hold the row cover down. Stupid rocks.

Then it snowed for a couple days. A lot. All snow globe-like. Only a little bit stuck to the ground, enough for me to make ultra-mini-snowmen, whose demise I delighted in with great pleasure. Needless to say, we did lots of seeding and greenhouse work over those couple days; I think we're nearly back on schedule in that department. And it looks like almost all our plants survived the freeze, so the tedious covering paid off for our CSA members and future market buyers.


Thursday brought nice weather back to our little cove. We worked on replasticizing one end of one of the greenhouses. I ended up hurting my back in some mysterious way (I didn't even know it was hurt until much later in the evening). Which meant that I would spend today (Friday) doing more seeding and such in the greenhouse. But I'm doin ok.


Today brought our first thunderstorms of the season. I love me some t-storms. It was thundering all wicked-like at various times today. We got lots of water from the sky, which I'm sure the plants outside are happy for.


Not sure what this weekend holds, but I'm going to try to get some recent pictures up here. Hope everyone has a good one.

Iffy cukes

Those cucumbers we transplanted in the greenhouse beds had mixed fates: some are starting to grow boldly up the fence, but several quickly keeled over all limp-like and died. A sample a couple years back from this greenhouse revealed pythium in the soil, a hard-to-get-rid-of fungus-like organism that destroys the roots of plants. Further tests will reveal if it's still pythium. In the meantime, we'll see if some biological controls will give us the edge, and we're rooting for the survivors to stay strong.

Elsewhere, we did lots of transplanting in the field; several beds are now growing little greens. We cut potatoes to plant next week. Applied some fish emulsion to the strawberries, which are flowering and even setting berries already. And we keep potting up in the greenhouse.

And I need to point out that the flat seeder (the wand thing with all the needles) is not all I thought it could be. It is useless when seeding eggplant, peppers, and tomatoes (nightshades), and extremely aggravating when seeding little tiny seeds (flowers). With the nightshades, it can't pick up the large seeds. With the flowers it either sucks the seeds up into the needles, picks up too many seeds, or can't pick the seeds up (depending on which needles you use). But my fingers almost always work when it comes to seeding. Lesson learned.

This morning we're heading to town to run some errands. Then we're gonna hunt some morels and cook up some pizzas from scratch in an outdoor wood-fired pizza oven for a little get together. Somewhere in the mix of activities we might plant some hops. Mmm... hops.

Rain and white lightning

It's been rainy here, but warm (to me at least). We've been doin lots of seeding and transplanting. But it ain't all business.

So, you know the greenhouse where we're propagating; well, half of it was planted in a cover crop of mustard greens, like so:

We tilled these mustards in as a green manure to add organic matter and help combat what we believe to be some sort of pathogen in this particular soil. After a few days of watering and waiting for the greens to break down, we transplanted these cukes:

So far, so good (we only lost one of the transplants). As you can see, the cukes are gonna be growing up those cattle panels we installed. And let me tell you, it took some major pounding, grunts, and sweat to get those t-posts in.

Our first seedlings have germinated well. Not sure if this is a picture of the kohlrabi or one of the other brassicas. This is a shot taken three days after seeding:

And here's a pic of one of the other greenhouses, where we planted those greens I talked about in a previous post. I think that's arugula poking out (you might also see that we have lots of weeding to do already). Photo was taken on 3/27, 10 days after seeding.

Here are lots of flats of potted up flowers, herbs, and veggies sitting on pallets next to the beds of cukes. We're running out of table space.

And then some extra-curriculars. We caught these trout:

In these ponds:

Then we cleaned 'em and ate 'em immediately. Best fish I've ever had.

And then there was happy hour. All I'll say is that it was so smooth and would be one hell of a drink on a cold night.

Seeding "precisely"

Yesterday we spent most of our day out in the field direct seeding various greens and roots using what our neighbor over the mountain calls the "stupid fucking plastic thing." Yes, it is stupid, and plastic, and makes you want to fucking swear at it. And we enjoy it so much we had to add "piece of shit" to its name. This ain't an exact replica of our model, but here's what it pretty much looks like, courtesy of Tiny Farm Blog.

It seems it worked for Let It Grow this year, and Tiny Farm Blog finds it to be a good tool for the price, but here in our rocky soil, the Earthway was anything but precise. While I was fighting with it up the rows I multiple times mumbled angrily, "I"ll show you precision!" along with some random expletives. Beet and spinach seeds didn't really work with the provided plates for beet and spinach seeding. Any lingering cover crop or vegetative matter laying in the soil would get caught by the shoe and hinder the "precision" of my seeding. Sometimes seeds would drop out sporadically or in bunches. The thing has no heft, so it isn't really drivable in less than Plato's ideal of soil. I could go on.

But hey, it apparently worked well at the farm I was at last year (though I never got the opportunity to use it there). And really, it is in a price range all its own (less than $100 compared with $300). And I'm just a rookie with it, so I may not know what I'm talking about. Nonetheless, we're looking to find a different seeder.

In other news:

• you should see the rocks out here 
  
• put trellis up for the peas (seeding today)
• mid-60s here all this week
• the eggs are delicious and plentiful
• the brassicas we seeded in flats in the greenhouse are germinating nicely
• the greenhouse direct-seeded greens are germinating as well
  

We're rural

It takes a long time to get anywhere from where we live. Twenty minutes gets you to the closest population center (about 900 people). Then it's another 20 minutes or so to find a regular grocery store. Another 20 minutes gets you to Asheville.

We went to Asheville for the first time yesterday to pick up some odds and ends. Spent a little time downtown and ate lunch at the Early Girl Eatery. For a small- to medium-sized city, Asheville sure has lots going on. The food we ate was delicious (and mostly locally sourced and/or naturally raised), the streets seemed full of energy (not in the New Age sense--just the energy of activity and purpose), and the scenery was about as good as it gets inside a city (Asheville is surrounded by the Blue Ridge Mountains). People were playing chess on the sidewalks and musicians were strumming on the corner with their cases open for donation. I wouldn't want to live in the city proper, but it seems like a great place to visit.

Other than that trip, we've spent almost all our time on the farm. It was a great first week, aside from the death of the dog who guarded the goats. We seeded lots of flats and a whole greenhouse. We started direct seeding in the field, but the rain stopped us. Now I look forward to seeing what we've planted germinate.

We also spent some time hiking the 130 acres that we live on. It was a nice vigorous hike up the ridge overlooking our cove. The land around us has lots of remnants of previous lives, including a cabin originally built in the late 1700s and an old springhouse (both of which are on the neighbors property, but you can glimpse them from our trails). The views of the surrounding mountains are breathtaking at this time of year because of the relatively bare tree canopy. But even when the leaves spring, beauty will still remain. I can't wait to see the rhododendrons pop.

Next week brings the building of a greenhouse, more seeding, maybe some repair work, and who knows what else. One of the neighbors brought us down a bag of frozen ramps and morels from last year's foraging, which we plan on eating this week for lunch. I really can't wait to try 'em. Ramp and morel season is close upon us here, and I hope to go out and gather my own.

So, it's never dull.