O, the luxury!

No sooner fixed than in the field! This combo of little riding mower and old snowmobile trailer is possibly my favorite tiny farming tool, a decadent* alternative to walking up and down the garden plot.

Around here, you can walk miles in a day, especially if you forget things and have to go back—although, walking around, taking different routes each time to check stuff out, is one of the big pleasures, too… What a simple life. :)

Anyhow, after trying a couple of different garden utility belts, overalls with 50 pockets, and a pull-along garden cart, nothing has come close to being able to toss all the stuff you need onto the trailer and go.

I use it whenever there’s too much to carry. Here, I’ve just finished the second seeding of mesclun and spinach, four beds each (on the trailer: Earthway seeders with plates in the coffee can, my most used rake, measuring tape and stakes for marking new beds, a pail for rocks, and seed in the green trug; the empty trays just happen to be there).

Up until I took this pic, it was a gloriously sunny day, after three days or so of cloud and drizzle (which added up to 20cm of rain). Little luxuries.

*The mower is actually pretty energy efficient: it uses maybe 30 gallons (114 l) of gas in an entire season, and that includes mowing paths and hauling harvests.

Carrot science

Welcome to my carrot lab! Carrots have been my biggest early spring headache. In cool weather, they take forever to germinate, 2 or 3 weeks, and by that time, the chance of weed competition is pretty good, and just about anything growing around the tiny seedlings makes excruciatingly time-consuming surgical hand weeding a necessity. What to do? Last year, I tried IRT (plastic) mulch over the bed. This worked great, heating up the soil, speeding germination to 7 days, and keeping weeds down. Problem was, miss the germination window (when a good number have emerged) by a few hours or a day, and the seedlings got toasted in the heat. Too delicate a balance. So, a new approach, something I’d read about. It involves a double layer of (untreated!) burlap. Simple. The burlap acts as a mulch to retain moisture and increase soil temperature, and it also allows in water and some light. What could be easier?!?! Now, all it has to do is WORK! (Update: it worked like a charm…)

The spreader

Last of the big machine work! Bob using the spreader to drop off a pile of compost for distribution by shovel (shot two days ago). There is something really satisfying in this crazy world about technology that is straightforward, like a giant fan-blade device for tossing manure far and wide! Today, I finished rototilling the new section, ending the main tractor work. From here, most of the fieldwork is done by hand—the biggest machine is the little Kubota. Later on in the day, it rained, only 5mm but enough to save hours of watering-in newly seeded beds. Time to start keeping track of the rain…

Garlic, now!

Garlic is shooting up once again. Although we’re only five days into a nice warm weather stretch, this year’s crop of Music seems to be at almost the same place as last year’s garlic in the all-mild April of 2006. You can see it growing by the day. Elsewhere in the field, things are moving ahead faster and with more on the go than ever before, with Conall (the all-new organic grower) picking up new field skills practically by the hour. Let’s see how things continue to shape up!

Get it in, get it done!

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!!).

First field transplant of the year

This little Jade Cross Brussels sprouts seedling, only four weeks old, is first into the open field. The weather remains pretty well perfect, warm and sunny, and we’re steadily chipping away at the list of crops waiting to be started right away. Today, besides the Brussels sprouts, the first three beds of mesclun, and a whole lot of bed preparation!