Sprouts

Plants are popping up all over the garden. We may have had a hard time getting the garden in the ground. We feel like everything is in really late, but it's all in now and sprouting like mad. The top pic is bean seedlings stretching for the sun and the bottom one is watermelon seedlings. Now it's mulch, mulch, mulch!

The good and the bad and the ugly

While walking through the garden I caught this butterfly with my camera. Butterfly - both good and pretty.

Then I checked my rose bushes only to find these little monsters munching away. YUCK!  Time to get out the Neem-Py and spray at sunset.

Stocking up as a way of life

This book is going to be my near constant companion this year. January 2010 begins a year long experiment in not only eating "locally" but in producing most of what we eat. I spent more than a little time trying to calculate how much food we need to put by.
104 quarts of greenbeans (that's green beans twice a week or less if we have company over for dinner)
52 quarts of corn, about the same amount of peas. Brian's not fond of peas but mom and I are.
200 pounds of potatoes
50 quarts of whole tomatoes
50 quarts of tomato juice
As many cherry tomatoes as we can dry... I love to eat them like raisins. Yummy snack.
24 pints of pickled beets
18 quarts of saurkraut
A batch of my Grandfather Chili sauce- this recipe is huge. I only need to make it every other year.
32 quarts of greens-kale, swiss chard, mustard greens, spinach
24 quarts of broccoli
As much cauliflower as we can manage. Cauliflower is sooo finicky. Some years we get some and some years we don't. We'll see.
Brussel sprouts - yes we are trying again. This year I think we'll grow them throughout the season under row covers. Maybe then we'll get some sprouts!
Carrots- this year we'll experiment with keeping carrots either in the ground or in the root cellar to eat fresh through the winter.
Several bushels of winter squash including pie pumpkins, butternuts, spaghetti squash and banana squash.
Onions - I'm planning on curing them in the garage then braiding them up and hanging them from the rafters in our dry basement.
Garlic
A bushel or more of Sweet potatoes.
12 + quarts of pickled okra and about the same frozen. One of Brian's favorite foods.
Relish: corn relish, chowchow, zuchini relish, pepper relish at least 48 pints.
Pickles whatever comes out well. I am pickle making challenged. Surely this year I can make some that are crispy.
We'll be hanging whole cabbages upside down from the rafters this year to see how long they will keep.
Turnips and parsnips - like the carrots this will be an experiment to see  how long they will keep.
If the melons do well this year I want to try to make some syrup. If they don't do so well, then we'll just eat them all fresh! or made into sherbet.
Elderberries will be made into syrup. Elderberry syrup is one of my favorites on pancakes and waffles.
We should have a few apples and some pears. The pruning continues on our  much neglected fruit trees. For now we'll go up to "Apple Works" for their yummy apples.
Blackberries- yes I am going to brave the chiggers and go out for the wild ones. :)
In the meat department we plan on butchering a steer after Christmas, at least one hog during the year, 2 lambs and about 100 chickens. We will possibly have a few juicy ducklings to add to the larder. And in the fall Brian insists he is going deer hunting. That  means venison loins and lots of deer jerky.
Miss Hazel will supply us with milk, cream, cheese and kefir.
We aren't set up yet to grow our own grain, but my son has a grain mill so we will settle for milling our own grain. Maybe we'll try grain growing next year.

Wow! I just looked over my list.... we'd better get busy!

The Tour

WOW! An unbelievable number of folks braved the rain on Saturday to join us for a walk around the farm during the "Secret Garden Tour". They showed up with their umbrellas and raincoats ready.
It was a really soggy day with showers off and on. I think I went through 5 pairs of socks and 3 pairs of jeans in the course of the day. Rain or no rain all but the last tour of the day went as planned. Just as we were going to set out, it started to rain, then it started to thunder then the lightning showed up. I didn't think it would be a good idea to walk around toting portable lightning rods (umbrellas) in the fields, so I invited folks to come back in the morning and take the tour.
During the night the storm clouds blew away and took the humidity and most of the heat with them. Sunday dawned clean and crisp with blue skies. Lots of folks came out and met the animals and learned about our CSA and why we do what we do.
It was a lot of work and a lot of fun. Now we are making plans for next year. We will be installing a "spring", waterfall and garden pool soon. And we're hoping to have Bonnie and Clyde working well pulling the wagon so that we can tour the farm via horsedrawn wagon. That will save my shoes!



In the mean time, if you would like to tour the farm, give us a call at 812-521-1063 to arrange a time or drop us an email at kissmygrassfarm@hotmail.com.



See you at the farm!



Dot

Lessons learned

Important lessons we have learned this year:

1. Never wait until later to put the sides on your barn. We lost ours to straight line winds because it had no sides so it acted a bit like an umbrella in a windstorm.
2. Chickens should NOT be housed over winter in the high tunnel. It's disgusting to clean out in the spring.
3. Heifers don't always give you any sign that they are about to calf. Rosie never showed any of the classic signs: bagging up, loosening in the rear before she dropped her calf. By the way we named her calf "Surprise".
4. A porcine lesson: If there is a way to escape from the pen at all they will find it, but you won't until too late.
5. Pigs can and will climb stairs.
6. If the cows are out, it is a myth that they will go back into the pasture where they came out. The reality is they will wonder up and down the fence line, gallop across the neighbors alfalfa field and you will eventually give up and cut a hole in the fence to drive them through.
7. Sunrises are beautiful even on mornings when a phone call from the neighbors about your escaped animals is the reason you are up to see the sun rising.
8. No matter how much you plan, things move at their own pace.
9. There's always more that needs to be done than there are hours in the day.
10. Deer and rabbits will eat all of your strawberries if you don't protect them.
11.Learning new things and sharing what you know with others is fun and very gratifying.
Can't wait to see what we learn in the second half of the year! :)

Of Farm Tours and Ladies' Luncheon

This week we hosted the garden club at the farm. Eighten ladies came out to the farm to enjoy a tour and lunch.
While my daughter, Lydia, and my mom prepped the food, I took the ladies for a hike around the farm.
We started with the little chicks in the brooder that Brian and Kacie were loading up in the tractor bucket to haul out to pasture. Then we walked out through the tall grass to the 6 week old chicks and then stopped by to see the ten week old chickens that are ready to process this week. It was a nice way to show how the birds grow and change.
We hiked down through the woods, stepped over the little run in the bottom and headed up The hill with sheep scattering every which way. At the Egg Mobile I introduced the hens and the new puppy. Of course everyone fell in love with Peaches our little pyrennees puppy.
One of the ladies had her granddaughter with her. She wanted to touch a chicken. So I opened up the nestbox door and let her pet one of the hens. The hen wasn't too sure she liked the experience but she didn't want to get off of her eggs either. We also found 3 eggs out in the pasture. I had the little girl put them in her pocket. When we got up to the pig pens I let her feed the eggs to our Red Wattle hogs.
Then we had a little visit with the cows and their calves. Everyone laughed when they saw the "skunk" calf. We left the cows and headed back down the driveway. It was a little to wet to walk in the gardens but we talked about the wide beds we use, all the different varieties we are growing and our plans for the future.
After all the hiking, lunch sounded pretty good. Lydia served: Bloody Mary's, cucumber sandwiches, a lovey salad of our garden lettuces, goat cheese and pears with her homemade creamy dijon dressing. She followed the salad with gouda stuffed turkey burgers garnished with a roasted apple ring and arugula on a home made bun with a side of baked seasoned sweet potato chips.
For dessert there was a layered banana cream pie made with real made-from-scratch pudding and fresh whipped cream. Yummy!!
It made for a really busy day, but I think the ladies all had a good time and noone went away hungry.
Now we are gearing up for the Secret Garden tour in mid-July. This is a fundraiser for the garden club which allows folks to see gardens that normally are closed to the public. We will be giving tours of the farm on the hour. I'm really looking forward to it.

And after the rain comes the rainbow...

HURRAH! the weather report doesn't call for any significant rain for the next 4 days.
Hopefully that will dry things out enough to finish getting the first plantings into the garden. :)

Spring Planting

It's wet, muddy, wet, soggy Oh and did I mention it's wet?
This has been one of the wettest springs I can remember. Last week 2 of our CSA Workshareholders, Nate and Danny, came out and braved the rain with me to plant all the cabbage, broccoli and cauliflower that had been waiting in the greenhouse.
After a very soggy morning, we came inside to dry off and enjoy a lunch of homemade chicken and noodles. ( Both the chicken and the noodles were homemade! lol)
By this time it was truly pouring down, so we headed to the greenhouse. The guys rearranged flats , cleared weeds and tilled up about 1/3rd of the greenhouse so that we could tuck in 39 tomatoe plants. Why 39? Well that's just what would fit in the space we had to work with.
Now we are hoping the wind and some sun will dry things out so we can till more garden and get the strawberries, asparagus and bramble fruits weeded and mulched. Oh and maybe the sheep will finally dry out enough that we can shear them!

In the mean time, the blue herons and the geese are enjoying the ponds and I'm enjoying watching them and listening to the frogs. :)

Rain, rain go away come again another day...

It's raining again. The yard is a swamp the garden in a swamp. The animals have all moved to the highest points on the farm to get dry ground.

The only critters on our farm who are enjoying this weather are the fish and the frogs. The ponds are fuller than I've seen them in years and years. Don't get me wrong. I know April showers bring May flowers, but I really need to get out in the garden. I have tons of stuff that really should be in the ground by now.

Ahhh well, this is the day the lord hath made... so I'm going to do some reading, make some meatloaf, bake some bread, finish the laundry and clean the home office...

The sun will come out tomorrow....

I can smell it!!

This morning I got up at 4 am to get some computer work done for the Red Wattle Association. Around about seven, I looked at the thermometer- 27 degrees, that's good I thought. It's almost a heatwave! I stuffed myself into my coveralls, gloves, hat and coat and off I went to tend the animals.

The sun was just a suggestion on the horizon as I walked up the drive. A light breeze with a touch of warmth began to blow out of the south and that's when it happened. I could smell it- SPRING! That light smell of green that the south wind carries letting you know that spring is coming north, slowly maybe, but it's on its way. I can hardly wait.

Don't get me wrong I like snow... and we need snow to help buffer the cold winter weather, but now I am wishing for spring. Spring with baby lambs, and daffodils and baby chicks and seedlings sprouting and green grass. :) I want to see Spring and touch it.

I know it's coming.... I can smell it.