Cold Spell This Week

We had a lot of visitors this week. First we had a school group of 31 third graders from S.F. and camped out for four days. Then on Saturday we had a CSA member potluck. CSA members from Mendocino County and from S.F. came and camped out till Sunday. They toured, asked questions, helped with chores, and ate really good food!

            An Alaskan storm blew by this week, threatening frost. We had just transplanted the rest of the tomatoes, some eggplants and peppers. These are summer crops that will not survive a frost. So we franticly got to work creating these small temporary hoop houses for all these crops; ten beds of 90 feet each so about 900 feet of hoop houses. The wind was blowing hard icy gusts at us, picking the remay fabric out of our fingers and threatening to tear the sheets in half. We entered the kitchen later that evening cold, chapped, and worried. Would our warm weather loving plants live? Would they survive the night? But we had done all we could and we had done our best, now is the time to put trust in something Higher. For me my trust will always be in the Lord Jesus Christ, that He would answer our please, and reward our efforts. The next morning was bitter cold as we went out to check our heat loving crops. And there they stood snug in their little hoop houses. We were so relieved that they had survived! The storm has passed and the air is warm again, the garden is thriving. The hay is being cut and bailed, and things seem to be balancing out once more.

Time Flies When Your in the Sun!

Well my tan is officially on? I also spend more time awake then I do sleeping and 99% of these hours are in the sun. Our C.S.A. is in full swing now. We are supporting about 100 families in Mendocino and in San Francisco total and the number keeps climbing. Every Tuesday and Friday morning we are harvesting, cleaning, and boxing produce. I’m in charge of the pac-choy, which are getting so big now that I have to use a small cart to harvest them.

            We have now transplanted the tomatoes. We have planter corn, beans, cucumbers, and squash. There is one bed of squash and cucumbers that I started in the green house then transplanted into the garden to have a head start. So there is a whole bed in the garden that was planted by me!

            I’ve been barrowing Gabe’s bike lately to round up the animals! I was nervous the first time, I wasn’t sure I could maneuver the bike properly. It was amazing, how after two years of not riding a bike, that my body still remembered. Like a flashback into Peace Corps I was whizzing down the dirt paths! My body remembered how to twist and lean as I chased the cows and the seep down the path. Dust filled my grinning mouth; the sun beat on my shoulders and gleamed off everything, giving a golden lining. It seemed so familiar, so comforting, such a joyful moment.

            Today we had a lunar eclipse! We all drove up the mountain and had solar viewers and watched the moon pass over the sun in a glowing ring of fire.

PVC Princess

Sorry I’m so far behind in my updates, but my weekends have been a little busy and crazy lately.

            The weather has improved. The sun is out and warming the plants. The mountains are just speckled with snow and in the valley bottom we bask in the brilliant sunlight and warmth. The lambs and calves are growing. The pea tendrils are stretching out and climbing up the trellises. We continue to plant, sow, weed, hoe, and cultivate.

            We had our first CSA harvest. It was successful, though many of the plants were still small. Everyone was so excited and thankful for these wonderful vegetables. Each of us apprentices were assigned a plant or two to harvest, wash, and divide for Covelo CSA members, Willits, and Ukiah. There was a lot of counting. But I enjoyed learning how to harvest veggies I’ve never harvested before.

            So since we have all these new and growing plants in the field, they need lots of water, which means irrigation! Because of the field rotations the irrigation has to be very portable. So we had to bring out a lot of PVC piping connect it, flush water through it, and find all the breaks or cracks and fix them. These pipes are pretty old so there were quite a few repairs to do. I learned quickly: cut, sand, primer, pvc-cement, press, twist, hold for 30sec, then move on to the next repair. I am a PVC-pipe pro!

            Some new local farmers came to have an irrigation tour. I said, if you want to really learn how it works, you need to help fix it first. There isn’t a better way to get to know the quick and dirty of how portable irrigation works.

            After inspecting over 2,340 feet of pvc pipe we have the garden irrigated! But it’s not over yet; we only have half the field yet to garden!

“Working of the Land”

April 15,2012

This week started off okay, a little soggy, then it got a lot soggy, then the week ended with a spectacular workshop in the sparkling sunshine.

First we started off with a great sneezing task of mulching the garlic rows, then more hoeing. Funny thing hoeing, it’s a rather steady task as you watch the hoe move up-down, up-down, as your arms ache your mind slips into empty thoughts, or too many thoughts off in the distance and yet your arms still move up-down, up-down. Your breath quickens, though your mind is far your eyes are keen to finding all the unwanted grass clumps and your fingertips feel the slightest unwanted muddy dirt clod as though the hoe is an extension of your person. Still up-down, up-down. The aching passes into a kind of trance and before you know it the field bed is completed your task is done and you are waking as if from a dream.

After our hoeing task we started transplanting broccoli and cabbage. we had to beat the rain that was promised so we transplanted 11rows in just a few hours. We walked away with soar backs and blistered fingers, but we finished.

The next day we received the promised rain. we were able to squeeze in a transplanting of a bed of lettuce before it got too muddy, then we cut potato starts.

On Friday, us apprentices, took a journey to Grass Valley area for a BDANC quarterly meeting and workshop. (BDANC= Bio-Dynamic Association of Northern California) Where we met several other bio-dynamic (BD) farmers. We learned about something called ‘preparations’ which is a sort of food for your compost, or field soil. It’s a technique of using certain herbs to ‘heal’ or balance the soil or compost. This workshop was a fun weekend endevor, but I slipped into church right in time for the opening prayer!

I can’t wait to see what next week has to offer!

“It’s hot then it’s cold…”

“It’s hot then it’s cold…”

For April 8, 2012-04-15

So either the hay bails are getting Fighter or I’m getting stronger cuz they just don’t seem as difficult to lift anymore…

The weather has been weird. One day it will be bitter cold, the next a cozy warm, then it will hail and blast of blistering cold wind will come through, then it will drizzle then warm up again to the point where I was walking around shoeless. don’t know what to wear some days.

The days here are starting to meld together into a blur of feeling, herding, mucking, racking, hoeing, weeding, eating, wheel-barrowing, milking, and somewhere in there is sleeping. We’ve sowed bell peppers, eggplant, peas, tomatoes, carrots, choy, and lettuce. Some were sown in seedling flats for the green house, some straight into the field.

We hope that each little seed turns to a plant, and that each plant will give fruit (or root) that can be given to our supporting families as food!

… Community Supported Agriculture (farm) …

Rain, rain go away!

Rain, rain, go away!

So this week started off good, we had some sunshine so we sowed peas, tomatoes, parsnips, beets, and chard. Our fourth apprentice arrived as well, so now we are two girls and two boys (Sarah and I, Gabe and Josh). But then it started to rain. It rained for five days straight! I had to start doing evening chores, so I lift bails of hay, fill feeders the drive the animals group by group to the barn. So I often am trotting in mud after the animals.

Most of this week we dug a ditch, fixed seed flats, fixed sieves, wheeled barrows, cleaned out the out-house, built compost, fixed pvc irrigation pipes and lots of organizing of this and that.

Friday we sheared four and a half sheep by hand! We wrestled them down, used the hand-shears to clip down the middle (the belly) then slowly clip around to the back then to the front, it was great! One sheep was left as a half because it got dark on us.

On Saturday we studied more about bio-dynamics and the cycles of seasons and plants. It was great to have a nice discussion about it and study. I hate school but I love the farm and studying this work.

This week was a low-key week all in all not much going on because of the rain. I was wet and cold most of the week, then a church member friend here let me use her washer and dryer! So thankfully at the end of a wet, muddy week all my clothes are now clean, dry, and fresh!

Cheers to the invention of dryers!

Whose idea was it to run around in steel-toed muck boots!?!

So yes steel-toed mud boots are useful for working with cows, sheep, wheelbarrows, lumber, etc. but when Steve needs a tool right away from the tool room, or when Gloria needs the bucket from the cows to go to the chickens, or when a new calf is born in the far pasture, or when the little lamb, Dopey, gets out of the pen and you have to go chase her down, at these times heavy muck boots are not ideal to go dashing around. But the thick sticky mud all over is a matter that forces me to wear them constantly. My legs are so sore and heavy.
So this week started off with a good Monday Meeting, I got assigned evening animal chores for the next month or two, consisting of bringing them out of the pastures to the barn and feeding them, and milking the cows of chores. We the got busy working on our muscles and tans by hoeing 3 beds for vegetables to be transplanted in to, but then it rained…
We had a class of 25 kids came to stay for 3 days. We did activities with them, like milk the cows, herd the animals, split fire wood, feed animals, dig a ditch, and build compost piles. Somehow in-between all that, we still prepared potting soil for flats and sowed broccoli. I pulled my shoulder on Wednesday that really hurt! It was my right shoulder but Gloria gave me a cream called, Arnica Ointment, and it fixed me up pretty good!
We also sprayed micro-organisms on the soil to prepare it for the best production/transplanting success. We transplanted lettuce and choy, and sowed spinach and brassica greens (mustard, kale, and arugula) it got really windy while we were working out in the field and I got a little wind burned, so we were all rosy-cheeked and sore muscles.
Then Saturday after all our chores (milking 3 cows) we went to Willits to watch ‘Hunger Games’!!!! it felt weird going out to the city and to the theater. We are pretty isolated in Covelo and on the Farm, so this social interaction was a rare treat. (I loved the Hunger Games!!!! Must get the DVD!!!)
My travels to church was an adventure today… so, I hydroplaned and spun out into the mountain side. Miraculously I didn’t launch myself off the cliff, and didn’t flip my truck over but somehow I ended up the side of a soft muddy embankment, five feet from a turn-off. I waved dawn the next car. It was a nice man and his young son, who gave me a ride to the chapel in Willits. The Priesthood men quickly got a team together to pull my truck out of the mud and cart it away to Covelo to repair it. Luckily there was minimal damage to my truck and no damage to me at all. God has granted me another day, a humble reminder to depend on Him always, be grateful, and make everyday count. (No matter how much it pains me to run across the Farm in steel-toed mud boots!)