Hey Folks:

A lot of food is growing in the ground!  Fennel, brussels sprouts, potatoes and beans are putting up small sprouts.  Transplants like tomatoes, peppers, and celery are taking root.  As well, we’ve planted the next round of spinach, coriander, and planted our first round (ever) of corn.

The potential for a lot of food is there.  Will it grow as expected?  Is the celery going to go to seed early due to the cold it experienced earlier this year?  Did the precision seeder plant the spinach too deep to germinate?  Is it too hot for the coriander to germinate?  Were the tomatoes too stressed by the transplanting to set a good flush of fruit?  Did I plant enough snow peas for everyone?

During my internship at Elm Tree Farm, I learned that two factors determine the success of a small farm.  Finding and using small efficiencies in time management and land use is one of these factors.  The other is the ability to keep a cool head while making tough decisions under pressure.

I started the new beds for corn production earlier this month.  For the past couple of weeks, they have been a low priority.  As the corn planting deadline approached, it became clear that the beds were going to take an extraordinary effort to build and prepare for the planting.   By the time I got to them, the beds had a healthy turf of switch grass and the soil was so dry that forking was going to be very slow going.  What to do?

My rent includes a few hours of custom tractor work from Dick, so I decided that some of these hours would be wisely spent getting the beds into shape.

Dick was busy, and as it turned out, Friday morning (harvest day) was the only day that he was available.  He rolled into the farm about the same time as Erica, while I was getting the harvest cleaning area prepared.  I soon found myself in three places at once – trotting from the prep station or leaf beds (instructing Erica and overseeing the produce cleaning), to the other end of the field, where Dick was dragging the grass off of the soil surface with the cultivator.   In between, I was picking spinach as fast as I could.  It would have been much easier to curl up between the rows of garlic and hide.  That was Friday.

Saturday marked the weekend for the corn planting.   I walked out to my new beds and looked at them with dismay.  The switch grass was mostly pulled up, but there was still a lot of residue in the ground to clean off.  Julia and I got to work – picking up the loose clumps of grass, shaking the soil out of them, and tossing the grass into the cart.  We progressed over 40 feet of bed (out of the 300) in just less than half an hour.  Then we tried different methods.  Finally, we found that raking the residue seemed to accomplish 80 per cent of the work.  I kept telling myself that it would have to do.  After we finished raking, I turned on the tiller, Julia got the buckets, and we worked in tandem – me driving the tiller through the beds, and Julia collecting the rocks kicked out by the tines.  After half a day’s work, the beds were as good as they were going to get.  We turned our attention to other priorities, and I kept telling myself I still had twenty-four hours to hit my deadline.

On Sunday I faced the corn beds again.  There was noticeable improvement, but still a lot of partially broken down organic matter – which corn does not like to germinate in.  It was going to take too much time to clean it out.  I returned to the barn and filled a bucket full of seedling mix.  This soil is very clean (and expensive), but I decided that it was a worthwhile investment given the situation. 

I marked out the beds in a grid and dibbled a small hole into each seed site.  I put a small scoop of mix into each hole, then the seed, then a second scoop of mix.  With the corn now sandwiched in between two layers of clean soil and watered in, I was able to take a breath and head on to the myriad other tasks requiring attention.

All these decisions required consideration.  Having chosen my course, all I can do now is not worry too much if I have taken the right one.  There is not enough time to worry and no room for second thoughts.

So the corn is in.  “Fisher’s Earliest” is an heirloom variety known for having a true corn flavor. Many modern hybrids focus on the sweet quality of corn, but I believe there is more to corn’s taste than just sugar.  One of my textbooks suggests that modern sweet hybrids are not as nutritious as the heirloom varieties.  I am looking forward to trying some Whitsend corn on the cob in about 70 days – presuming of course, that I made all the right decisions on the weekend!

Talk to you soon,

Bob

PS:  One other bit of news.  We have new tenants at the farm.  A pair of Tree Swallows have moved into the birdhouse.   These birds have an interesting song and a brilliant flash to their plumage.  However, what I most appreciate is their extreme agility  in flight.  This species feeds "on the wing".  In other words, they eat bugs while flying.  I have no doubt they will find plenty of deer flies, horse flies, mosquitos, gnats...

Beans stewed with arugula

We found this tasty, unusual recipe in The Greek Vegetarian by Diane Kochilas.  Arugula becomes milder when you cook it.  When we made this dish, we added radish greens and used a mixture of canned chickpeas and black-eyed peas instead of dried navy beans.  The recipe below is our adaptation of the original. 

Recipes page revision

We'll post recipes here on the main page now.  Go to the Recipes page for a clickable archive of recipe posts!  There's a lot of recipes we want to try this year - we'll let you know how the renaissance spinach cookies turn out ....

Indian-style radishes and peas

This is a scaled-down version of a recipe from Yamuna Devi’s The Vegetarian Table: India.  If you don’t like the pungent flavour of fennel seeds, just leave them out.

1 tsp. ghee or oil

½ tsp. fennel seeds

½ tsp. grated fresh ginger

A bit of bad, a bit of good, and a lot of average

Hello Folks:

Added Note May 14 2012:

I checked the plants yesterday and found that some Arugula, Radish, Spinach, and Shinginku are ready for harvest this Friday.  Not quite enough for everyone, so I will split the harvest up over two weeks.  I will deliver these on Friday.  Customers west of Westboro will receive their harvest on Friday May 18th ; customers east of Westboro on Friday May 25th. 

Please note that this is the May harvest, and so you will be billed directly.  I will tally the numbers and contact you by Thursday evening at the latest.

Please keep an eye on this site for additional information - I have updated the Recipes page.

Talk to you very soon,

Bob

Now back to the post…

First of all – a big welcome to the final two customers who signed on for the year’s harvest.  I look forward to a year of growing and eating good food together.

My apologies for the extended radio silence.   A lot has been happening at the farm – preparing beds, planting and transplanting, barn improvements, planting, and more planting.  There have been some good events, some disappointments, and much of what one would expect.

I will start with the bad.  Recall the post a month ago, that referred to the hope for cool weather?  Well, we had enough of it to get the Cress up and running, but some plants (Carrots and Mache) have been very slow to germinate.  The Snow Peas and Green Onions are coming along, though these seem to be a little slow to grow as well.  

On the other hand, the Arugula, Spinach and Radish are going quite well – I expect these will be the first to harvest.  The Garlic is growing very well, though still some time away from harvest.

The first round of Celery may have been exposed to a bit too cool weather.  They were mulched and covered during the frosty nights but I am not counting on them.  Celery tends to go to seed quickly if it is exposed to cool weather shortly after transplanting.  I have planted some more as insurance, so worst case scenario is a bit of a wait.  Who knows, maybe they will all do just fine? 

The Shingiku is coming along, a very interesting looking leaf it is.  I sampled a small bite and found that it does not taste quite like anything else I have experienced.  I’ll set my opinions aside for now and ask for your impressions when the time comes.

As for the nursery, the Basil, Rosemary, Peppers, and Chard are doing well, though the Tomato plants are getting very impatient and trying to crawl outside to better sunlight.

This weekend will see a lot of planting, including the flowers, leeks, and more potatoes. 

Speaking of Potatoes, I was at the Ellenberger Farm in Coe Hill last week to pick up my order.  Henry is a wealth of knowledge and I have the impression that my knowledge of these tubers doubled in the hour or so we were there.  An extraordinary amount of growing takes place before a generation of seeds offers up a tuber large enough to call a seed potatoe.

Have you ever seen Draft Horses up close?  What powerful beasts they are, they just seem to radiate strength while standing still. 

If you are ever driving up that way (somewhere south-west of Bancroft), try the scenic Old Hastings Road.  We found a canopy forest that was a marvelous place for a picnic.  Watch out for the potholes…

While building up workspace around the barn, Dick and I uncovered the remains of my nemesis from last year...the Groundhog.  I guess I never will get those beans back.  That made me realize - not for the first time - how far I have come since I first broke ground on this acreage last year.  I have not yet lost anything – produce or sleep – to our four-legged friends.  I expect at least once this year something will evade my defenses and get in, but thus far, I feel fortunate to have that much less to worry about.  As for the “little devil”, well, it does not have much to worry about either.

Keep an eye on this site over the two weeks.  I will probably decide very soon, when the harvesting will start.  My notes from last year have an important reminder.  “Not this week, but next…”  When next week came around, I had way too much growing to manage.  This harvest will be limited to Radish, Spinach and Arugula.  I expect the Snow Peas will follow shortly thereafter.

One final note – Thanks to Erica  for taking a few snapshots of the progress this spring.  Expect to see a few more pix from her on the site over the next few weeks.

Talk to you all soon,

Bob