Thu, Jan 24, 2008 · Filed under Flowers, Indoors, Seed starting, Tools, Winter
Grow rack lights went on today for the first time this season. They’re only for the rescued houseplants (orchids, wintergreen, heather)—I guess every plant deserves a place in the sun—but, I’ll be starting super-early lettuce soon, a month earlier than ever, for an experiment in planting them out to the greenhouse at the beginning of March. Getting the grow racks ready is another familiar routine. In early summer, I remove the fluorescent light fixtures and the chains and dowels they hang from and store ‘em somewhere (last year, it was on the new Big Shelf). For spring, I dust them off, wipe them down, hang them, and a new seedling season begins!
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Wed, Jul 11, 2007 · Filed under Fieldwork, People, Summer, Tools, Veggies
Jo pounds in wooden stakes for a somewhat catch-up version of tomato staking. I think of it as the Modified Sprawl. There are about 600 plants, with maybe 250 in home-style tomato cages. The rest are so far on their own. The cages work great, until a mighty wind comes along and blows a bunch over—they’re not really rugged field gear. It’s too late for proper basket weaving support, so it’s on to my previously tried and OK version, pulling the plants up with twine on both sides, to stakes set every three plants apart, with a bit of pruning and suckering as we go…
This is the point in the season where we start playing catch-up as a million different things need handling. It can get a little frantic, depending greatly on how it went earlier in the year. To add to the…decision-making puzzle, it’s last call, and even very iffy last call, for planting many crops (60 day maturity and under), with day length shortening and frost risk building to a significant consideration just 6-8 weeks down the road. So, thin here, or weed or seed there, or water elsewhere, you can’t do everything at once! It’s all in the timing, with much of the schedule in the hands of Ma Nature (where’s that RAIN!?!). Gambling, yes! Still and all, quite FUN.
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Wed, May 30, 2007 · Filed under Fieldwork, People, Seed starting, Spring, Veggies
At work transplanting really tiny basil in the still-to-be-shaped-up herb patch, Andrea is doing her very first day of tiny farm gardening. It all worked out very well! After nearly a month of working with Conall, the all-new organic grower, almost every day, and having several other people out for a few part-time hours, it’s a different season for me compared to the previous four. Not less work (we’re planting way more than ever before), but the energy is different. Before, largely working alone, it was more of an against the odds thing as I faced the fairly massive task of each season’s start-up. I liked that solo mission adrenaline and challenge. Now, it’s more of a people puzzle, as this season’s small crew assembles. By the time it comes to more substantial harvests in three or four weeks, I’ll be totally reliant on teamwork to get it all done. No going back: it’s like, Tiny Farm II: People in the Field. :)
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Sat, May 19, 2007 · Filed under Fieldwork, Seed starting, Spring, Veggies
There are many particularly exciting points during the growing season, and this is one of ‘em! We’re on the third plantings for some crops, things are emerging everywhere, and some plantings are just getting ready to put on serious growth towards maturity and harvest. In other words, the field is getting ready to explode with veggies. This happens several times during the year, in different sections, with different plantings and crops, but the first time is right across the field and always a thrill. For me, it still seems like kind of a miracle when all those tiny seeds and plans and energy actually turn into…the new Veggie Garden! Here, green onions (in the faint furrows) and carrots under burlap are recent second plantings (yesterday), and the garlic is starting to shoot up on the way to tasty garlic scapes in June…
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Sat, Apr 21, 2007 · Filed under Fieldwork, People, Spring, Veggies
Conall, the all-new organic grower, starting from scratch as our first full-season, full-timer, waters in transplants. Today we set out three more beds of brassicas—so far, there’s cauliflower, broccoli, Brussels sprouts, bok choi—prepared beds for a dozen more crops, set up the irrigation pump for the season, cleaned out the winter storage area of the barn, turned the composting windrow….and more. Still, it’s the rush-to-get-it-in-get-it-done time of the year, and the days never seem long enough (although, they’re getting longer!!).
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Sat, Mar 17, 2007 · Filed under Farm lab (research!), Indoors, Seed starting, Tools, Veggies, Winter
Plant racks, light stands…I usually call ‘em grow racks. They’re filling up now.
Pushed to capacity, the three racks can hold a total of 36 trays, 12 each, or four trays per shelf. So, depending on the size of the plug sheet—I use 38s, 72s, 128s, 200s—I can start between 1,368 and 7,200 seedlings.
Sounds super-efficient. HOWEVER, it comes down to the light. With four trays per double fluorescent fixture, the light is pretty stretched, and a lot of rotating is in order.
Also, most of the fixtures are the old standard T-12 type, where the light is stronger towards the middle of the tube. You can clearly see the difference in growth if you leave trays in the same position for a few days. The newer T-8 type lights more evenly from end to end and uses less power, but I don’t feel like replacing all the fixtures (a couple in there are already T-8).
It’s an ongoing experiment to see which size plug sheet to best start in for each crop, given the light situation. That in turn determines if or how often I need to pot up to larger quarters before it’s time to transplant into the field.
All in all, I’ll get around 2,500 seedlings off the racks this year.
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