The new screen table was this year’s big addition to the washing up section of our little post-harvest processing area. Building it earlier this year was quick work: some 2×6 and 1×2 lumber, screwed together, with 1/2″ hardware cloth sandwiched in as tight as I could get it. Hardware cloth is the mesh of choice because it’s welded where the wires cross, so leaves and the like don’t get snagged the way they would in plain woven screen, like chicken wire. Positioned on sawhorses close to the washing machine and tubs makes it easy to pluck crops out of the water and onto the rack to drain. Simple, inexpensive, and one of my favorite bits of harvest gear… The last couple of harvest Fridays have been more work for fewer people, as part of the summer crew left at the beginning of September. With the days getting shorter as well, it’s the first time this year we’ve been finishing up the sorting and packing after dark! This week: mesclun, beet, carrot, spinach, radish, kale, tomato, potato, a few cauliflower and broccoli, squash, hot and sweet peppers, and onions and garlic from storage…
Building & Fixing
Roofing the stand
Finally got around to putting the roof on the farm stand. We recycled the old galvanized steel roofing that was replaced during the Milkhouse extension last fall. In the end, a quick job, three hours or so of matching pieces, handing them up one by one (watch the wind), and screwing ’em down. Luckily, there was very little cutting to do, sheets of old metal can be a real nightmare for slicing and gashing (working without gloves, I nicked a finger only once—every so often, it’s good to see a little bit of your own blood running red and true :). In the pic, I’m screwing things down while Bob selects sections. The farm stand is definitely not on course for the ambitious plans of earlier this season, but in good tiny farming fashion, it’s moving along! (Guest photo by Mami.)
Making stakes
In the building and fixing department, there’s always a queue. Jobs are usually one of three degrees of urgency: Right Away (fix it or we can’t go on!), It Would Be Really Good To Have This Done Soon, and When There’s A Little Extra Time (and that’s often, all the way to Fall). Today, it’s finishing a Right Away job: making up more wooden stakes for the tomatoes. Last year, I bought for very cheap a pile of scrap wood, 10-12′ lengths, rough cut to around 2″ square, from a local sawmill. This year, we found pounding stakes made from this stuff a foot or so into the ground took an insane amount of sledgehammer effort, especially when driving into dry soil. Cutting them down just a bit made a HUGE difference. Using a table saw out in the barn yard, we shaved about 1/2″ lengthwise off each width, winding up with maybe 80 1-1/2″ square stakes. It took a couple of hours overall to save many more in the field, not to mention energy, sweat, frustration. The little things do indeed make all the difference! (Also in the pic, painted white, an old door scrapped during the Milkhouse Extension, and a nice, solid pallet (probably from the seed potato delivery), both to be reused in the composting toilet enclosure, an IWBRGTHTDS project.)
Outpost
Today, I assembled this rather simple mini-stand to sell veggies at a local coffee shop. The trays were put together on the farm, then we drove over with the cut pieces and screw-nailed it together on site. It’s part of the bit of expansion this year, a completely new side to this tiny farm—we’ll see how it plays out! The shop is about 12 miles (19km) away, in a small village that swells in summer with cottage and boat traffic (it’s on a busy recreational waterway; we’re in lake as well as farm country around here). It serves salads, baked-on-premises pastries, fair trade coffee… I’ve known the owner, from the farm, for four years. She wanted to add veggies this year, and the overall…karmic vibe (!) seemed right, so here we are! The shop is actually buying all the veggies upfront at our regular price, and maintaining the stand themselves, so it’s not a BIG change, all in all. Still, a very cooperative, new thing to do. The stand itself is a work-in-progress, for one, it has to be bolted to the concrete pad, and it needs some sort of backboard built in. More as it happens! :)
Farm stand to go…
Just on the other side of the greenhouse and the spring planting action, there’s the Farm Stand. A work in progress. It’s been a frame without a roof for some time now, extra lumber lying around gets in the way of mowing the grass, a bit of a picture of neglect, enhanced by rampant dandelions. There’s lots of work to do in the next couple of weeks to have it ready by the time the first field crops start coming in.
Sorting
Tiny farming requires lots of bits and pieces, gear inevitably gets jumbled and misplaced, and the whole show can start to slow down as things get in your way and you spend time searching for this or that. Sorting things out is an on ongoing, neverending process. Last year, it seemed like a fine idea to stick all the hand tools in a 55-gallon barrel, so that nothing would be leaning against the hoophouse plastic. What a bad idea. Everything got tangled up, I began leaning my most used stuff against the barrel, and this year, when other people also started using the tools, it got completely out of control. Today, I screwed a couple of boards across the studs in the end wall—instant (if temporary) relief, and it got the barrel out of there, making it easier to move around the seedling tables. A place for everything and everything in its place—here, that often annoying recommendation does make sense!
Fixed it
The riding mower finally got a new transmission belt, putting it back in commission. It had been sorely missed all spring. This little workhorse, designed to sedately trim suburban lawns, has over the last three years done some serious small-farming duty. It’s used to mow the garden paths, chop up big crop residue like corn, and haul everything around the field: gear, compost, rocks, building materials, harvest bins and baskets. Elsewhere, more gray drizzle and lots of potting up and moving seedlings to the greenhouse. The rain’s been great. Sun, please.