Spring is here
It's not sunny and warm, yet, but cool and filled with gentle rain. My walk through the woods from the corn crib to the farm is misty and quiet. The rotting leaf smell reminds me of Pacific rain forests, although the the types of trees are different, and when I asked Heinz whether there were any big slugs around here, he said yes, and pointed to one that was 3/4 of an inch long. The birdsong gets louder every day, peaking around 9:30 (I think--since I don't carry a watch with me when I work). The bees buzz around us as we harvest spinach, landing on the flowering ground ivy that is a weed, but that Heinz likes to leave so that they have something to eat until the strawberries bloom. There is a weed called Sweet Annie, which was actually planted by the previous farmer to harvest as cut flowers, but it's impossible to get rid of. I haven't seen its bloom yet, but when you cut the plant or pull it out by the roots, it releases a heady, spicy-sweet smell that is so tempting that I tasted the leaves before deciding that it's best appreciated for the aroma.
When I visited the farm in October, they had just acquired a black duck named Bo. He had been raised by a suburban family and was very friendly, but when he started hanging out on the neighbors' porches and leaving poop everywhere, there were complaints, so the family brought him to this farm. (An interesting side note--Kaitlin tells me that ducks don't have sphincters, to there's no hope for training them. They just have no control at all). G worried that Bo would be lonely without any duck friends, so she set out to find a girl duck to bring home. But she could only find a nesting pair of large white meat ducks at a nearby Amish farm, so she bought both of them. The new ducks saw Bo as a threat and chased him away from the tiny duck pond every time he tried to get in the water. So Bo spent more time with humans than with ducks, following us around the farm and allowing himself to be picked up and held.
When I came back to the farm in January, the female white duck had died, and the remaining white duck had become best buds with Bo. Since the white duck shies away from humans, I guess giving him a name had never seemed that urgent, so he is currently called Joe, Gus, Polly, or "white duck" when he's called at all. I favor Gus. Bo can fly so he often roosts in a tree or on the roof at night, while Gus gets herded into the chicken coop. As Heinz has pointed out, it obviously burns him up that he can't fly. Other than at night, Bo and Gus are inseparable. They're fascinating to watch as they slowly make their waddling circuit of the farm, checking out all the mud puddles. Gus is chatty, and always has his mouth open. I've never heard Bo make a sound, but his head is always in motion, in sort of a combination of a nod and a chin-jut. He also shakes his tail feathers vigorously when he's perturbed.
Yesterday, Bo did something very unexpected, for a boy duck. He made a nest in the chicken coop, and laid an egg. I think it's too late to change his name and pronoun at this point in his life, so I'm going to stick with what he's always had. Heinz told us about the egg in the morning, and when I went to peek at the egg before lunch, I saw not one, but three eggs (I checked again this morning and there are four). Once there are a few more eggs, Bo will presumably start sitting on his nest.
The arrival of Spring also means that the work will increase around here. Through the winter, Heinz goes to market every other week, but with the beginning of April, he reverts to going every week, and the market goes back to starting at 9 instead of 10. So there will be no more "easy" Saturdays around here--my weekend will always be kicked off with the exhaustion that follows a long day of harvesting, washing, and bagging. G usually helps with washing and bagging, and handles all of the local special orders, but she's gone to Canada for a month with the girls, so her normal duties also fall to us. Luckily, it takes some time for the vegetables to really get into full swing. Heinz is still taking a half-size tent to market, and he won't start taking the double tent until the strawberries come in, which I believe will happen in April.
Since G is gone to Canada, that means someone has to open and water the greenhouses on Sundays when Heinz is at market. Today, I said I would do it, and since it's a beautiful day, I took my camera along and walked around the farm. Here's what spring looks like for us:
This is where life starts for many of the vegetables on the farm. The flats sit on a bed of wet sand that is heated. This way, the air in the greenhouse doesn't have to be heated.
This is the rest of the big greenhouse. In addition to the sand beds, there are leafy greens grown in here during the winter (mustard greens, arugula, baby lettuce, cress, Italian dandelion greens, and dill). The baby lettuce has all bolted by now, so we covered those beds with black tarps and set up wire tables to hold more seedlings once they're moved off the sand beds.
The little greenhouse is also full of wire tables holding flats of seedlings.
When Heinz saw that I had started seeds for my garden and was struggling to keep them warm in the corn crib, he said I could put them in the greenhouse. They appear to be thriving. This is my corn, and behind the corn is my edamame.
Now, to the fields. We've put up four of these greenhouses out in the fields since I arrived. They're more permanent than a field tunnel (which is just hoops of PVC spanning three beds, covered with fabric), but not as advanced as the greenhouses up by the house (which have plumbing and some amount of heating in the winter). Each of these greenhouses spans three 220' beds. One entire house is designated for ginger (though it hasn't been planted yet).
Some rows of baby lettuce that we've been harvesting all winter. It's looking scraggly now, and we didn't harvest from this bed this week. Not many weeds though (except in the pathways). Each bed is five feet wide. This is not a farm standard--it varies based on how you plan to harvest your crop, and how tall the farmer is. Heinz is at least 6' tall, so he does not find it difficult to lean over and harvest the middle row, while for the rest of us it's more of a stretch. Another farmer who sells at the market has narrower rows, because he's fairly short, and because he likes to harvest while straddling the bed, whereas we harvest while kneeling.
There are several beds of carrots that were seeded in the fall and never got weeded or thinned. Heinz is not sure whether they'll ever get big enough to take to market, but for now, it's a nice place to stop for a snack.
X and I spent several days pruning and training the massive tangle of kiwi vines into something more orderly. I always thought of kiwis as a tropical fruit, but apparently they don't mind a cold winter (several varieties have been developed in Russia).
An electric fence protects the strawberries from deer. The voltage is low enough that it doesn't hurt; it just makes your finger jump away from the wire when the pulse goes through it. I've spent a lot of time sewing up rips in the fence (see the white stitches?). There was one day early on when G mistakenly told me she had unplugged the fence, and I got shocked several times because I kept touching it in disbelief. Call me a slow learner.
We haven't harvested leeks in several months, because the winter was hard on them. They definitely looked more magnificent in the fall, but they're looking good enough now that we'll probably harvest them again soon, if there's time.
I drove the tractor as Heinz and X planted potato sets in these two beds. And then we planted fava beans in the three beds to the right of the potato beds. Here's a sprouting potato. Why am I having so much trouble uploading to Flickr? Sorry, no photo of potato and fava bean beds.
There's a beekeeper who comes periodically to tend to these bees. So far I've had a peaceful relationship with them.
A peek under the row cover at some sweet onions. When we transplanted these, it was my first time driving the tractor while pulling the transplanter.
Walking up the path from the farm, you can see the corn crib through the trees.
There is poison ivy everywhere. I've never been exposed to it before, so I'm nervous for when it starts to put out leaves. Heinz doesn't react to it, so he doesn't pay much attention to it.
It seems there is a cherry tree in my yard.
This is the ramshackle fence about which I blogged last weekend.
The farm, in all its Spring glory.
When I visited the farm in October, they had just acquired a black duck named Bo. He had been raised by a suburban family and was very friendly, but when he started hanging out on the neighbors' porches and leaving poop everywhere, there were complaints, so the family brought him to this farm. (An interesting side note--Kaitlin tells me that ducks don't have sphincters, to there's no hope for training them. They just have no control at all). G worried that Bo would be lonely without any duck friends, so she set out to find a girl duck to bring home. But she could only find a nesting pair of large white meat ducks at a nearby Amish farm, so she bought both of them. The new ducks saw Bo as a threat and chased him away from the tiny duck pond every time he tried to get in the water. So Bo spent more time with humans than with ducks, following us around the farm and allowing himself to be picked up and held.
When I came back to the farm in January, the female white duck had died, and the remaining white duck had become best buds with Bo. Since the white duck shies away from humans, I guess giving him a name had never seemed that urgent, so he is currently called Joe, Gus, Polly, or "white duck" when he's called at all. I favor Gus. Bo can fly so he often roosts in a tree or on the roof at night, while Gus gets herded into the chicken coop. As Heinz has pointed out, it obviously burns him up that he can't fly. Other than at night, Bo and Gus are inseparable. They're fascinating to watch as they slowly make their waddling circuit of the farm, checking out all the mud puddles. Gus is chatty, and always has his mouth open. I've never heard Bo make a sound, but his head is always in motion, in sort of a combination of a nod and a chin-jut. He also shakes his tail feathers vigorously when he's perturbed.
Yesterday, Bo did something very unexpected, for a boy duck. He made a nest in the chicken coop, and laid an egg. I think it's too late to change his name and pronoun at this point in his life, so I'm going to stick with what he's always had. Heinz told us about the egg in the morning, and when I went to peek at the egg before lunch, I saw not one, but three eggs (I checked again this morning and there are four). Once there are a few more eggs, Bo will presumably start sitting on his nest.
The arrival of Spring also means that the work will increase around here. Through the winter, Heinz goes to market every other week, but with the beginning of April, he reverts to going every week, and the market goes back to starting at 9 instead of 10. So there will be no more "easy" Saturdays around here--my weekend will always be kicked off with the exhaustion that follows a long day of harvesting, washing, and bagging. G usually helps with washing and bagging, and handles all of the local special orders, but she's gone to Canada for a month with the girls, so her normal duties also fall to us. Luckily, it takes some time for the vegetables to really get into full swing. Heinz is still taking a half-size tent to market, and he won't start taking the double tent until the strawberries come in, which I believe will happen in April.
Since G is gone to Canada, that means someone has to open and water the greenhouses on Sundays when Heinz is at market. Today, I said I would do it, and since it's a beautiful day, I took my camera along and walked around the farm. Here's what spring looks like for us:
This is where life starts for many of the vegetables on the farm. The flats sit on a bed of wet sand that is heated. This way, the air in the greenhouse doesn't have to be heated.
This is the rest of the big greenhouse. In addition to the sand beds, there are leafy greens grown in here during the winter (mustard greens, arugula, baby lettuce, cress, Italian dandelion greens, and dill). The baby lettuce has all bolted by now, so we covered those beds with black tarps and set up wire tables to hold more seedlings once they're moved off the sand beds.
The little greenhouse is also full of wire tables holding flats of seedlings.
When Heinz saw that I had started seeds for my garden and was struggling to keep them warm in the corn crib, he said I could put them in the greenhouse. They appear to be thriving. This is my corn, and behind the corn is my edamame.
Now, to the fields. We've put up four of these greenhouses out in the fields since I arrived. They're more permanent than a field tunnel (which is just hoops of PVC spanning three beds, covered with fabric), but not as advanced as the greenhouses up by the house (which have plumbing and some amount of heating in the winter). Each of these greenhouses spans three 220' beds. One entire house is designated for ginger (though it hasn't been planted yet).
Some rows of baby lettuce that we've been harvesting all winter. It's looking scraggly now, and we didn't harvest from this bed this week. Not many weeds though (except in the pathways). Each bed is five feet wide. This is not a farm standard--it varies based on how you plan to harvest your crop, and how tall the farmer is. Heinz is at least 6' tall, so he does not find it difficult to lean over and harvest the middle row, while for the rest of us it's more of a stretch. Another farmer who sells at the market has narrower rows, because he's fairly short, and because he likes to harvest while straddling the bed, whereas we harvest while kneeling.
There are several beds of carrots that were seeded in the fall and never got weeded or thinned. Heinz is not sure whether they'll ever get big enough to take to market, but for now, it's a nice place to stop for a snack.
X and I spent several days pruning and training the massive tangle of kiwi vines into something more orderly. I always thought of kiwis as a tropical fruit, but apparently they don't mind a cold winter (several varieties have been developed in Russia).
An electric fence protects the strawberries from deer. The voltage is low enough that it doesn't hurt; it just makes your finger jump away from the wire when the pulse goes through it. I've spent a lot of time sewing up rips in the fence (see the white stitches?). There was one day early on when G mistakenly told me she had unplugged the fence, and I got shocked several times because I kept touching it in disbelief. Call me a slow learner.
We haven't harvested leeks in several months, because the winter was hard on them. They definitely looked more magnificent in the fall, but they're looking good enough now that we'll probably harvest them again soon, if there's time.
I drove the tractor as Heinz and X planted potato sets in these two beds. And then we planted fava beans in the three beds to the right of the potato beds. Here's a sprouting potato.
There's a beekeeper who comes periodically to tend to these bees. So far I've had a peaceful relationship with them.
A peek under the row cover at some sweet onions. When we transplanted these, it was my first time driving the tractor while pulling the transplanter.
Walking up the path from the farm, you can see the corn crib through the trees.
There is poison ivy everywhere. I've never been exposed to it before, so I'm nervous for when it starts to put out leaves. Heinz doesn't react to it, so he doesn't pay much attention to it.
It seems there is a cherry tree in my yard.
This is the ramshackle fence about which I blogged last weekend.
The farm, in all its Spring glory.
Comments
Your seedlings look magnificent. I'm still waiting for mine to germinate...I have them on top of the fridge, but I still don't think it's warm enough for them. I'd like to put them on one of the heating shafts, but I caught Roo sleeping there the other day and thought "hmmm...recipe for disaster."
Your garden fence is no taller than mine. Granted, your garden is much bigger, so it's a better lure...time to put that dog to work!