I'm a MOFGA Journeyperson

Now official, I'm a MOFGA's Journeyperson!  This is a great program run by the Maine Organic Farm and Garden Association that helps aspiring farmers get access to resources needed to make their farm enterprise a success.  MOFGA hosts excellent workshops and seminars on a million different aspects of growing food organically, is active in farming and food policies, generates publications, and is chock full of plant and soil experts.  Oh, they also host the Commonground Fair.  (Is there anything they can't do?)  For Journeypersons, they facilitate a mentorship between some experienced farmers, and me, the newbie.  My mentors this year are Austin and Mary Ellen Chadd of Green Spark Farm!  I call up these guys and bug them with questions like: "When do you plant your peppers?" or "Where can I get dolomitic limestone by the ton?" or "How many pickled peppers are in a peck?"  It's absolutely vital for me to be able to chat with folks that really knows how to grow lots of excellent organic produce.
  
If you're not a member of my CSA, you can instead get great veggies from Green Spark at the Wednesday and Saturday Portland Farmers Market, and at their farmstand at 316 Fowler Rd in Cape Elizabeth starting at the end of May.  Hopefully I'll have some eggs at the Fowler Rd. farmstand too!

So, big big thanks to MOFGA and Green Spark for making this season happen!

Mary Ellen, Austin and Dave

Mary Ellen: "It's that crazy guy Dave again.
Austin: Mmm hmm, the answer is 42.
Dave: Got it, 24 pickled peppers.

So, after consulting with the aforementioned experts, I got some lime for my field.  For the geology/chem nerds out there, limestone is mostly Calcium Carbonate (CaCO3).  It's a sedimentary rock formed by the accumulation of millions of  years of marine life.  (think, lots of clam shells, and coral)  When limestone is pulverized and spread on a farm field, it helps raise the pH of acidic soil.  

My soil is acidic (on the left side of this diagram).  If I can raise the pH of my soil, more nutrients will become available to the plants I'm growing.  More nutrients = happy plants = tasty food.

 How do you get 2000lbs of lime on an acre of soil?

-You can spend days shoveling it out of bags and throwing it across the beds.
or
-You hire a big truck to do it in 15 min.

Until it gets stuck...

We got the truck out alright, and the lime is doing it's job on the field.  A soil test later in the season will hopefully confirm that my pH is up.

Nope, that's not snow, it's a hefty dose of lime.

Meanwhile, I've been clearing up space in the hoophouse by moving some flats of seedlings outside.  The metal hoops support the blankets I pull over them at night to keep the frost off.

After the lime got spread, Austin tilled up the field for me, and we got a nice row of peas seeded!

Whew!  Busy week.

And...

Note posting date, of the farm name change...

We run from the raptors...

So you don't have to.

As you may have guessed, April fools!

The sign is real though.  Real awesome!  Thank's Justin.

Farm Name Change

Big news!  The jury is and we're going to change the farm name!

Welcome to Velociraptor Hollow Produce.  Everybody thought it better reflected our ravenous hunger for fresh produce and the ferocious speed and service you've come to expect.  New labels will be coming out shortly, in the mean time, here's sneak peak at our new sign on the shed!

In honor of this momentous occasion, Justin came over for day and helped me move the main coop.  It's not as portable as the conestoga style hoop coops, so it had to go on skids and get towed.

Man, in Velociraptor Hollow, you go have lunch, come back and find your chicken coop up on blocks.  It's a pretty sketchy neighborhood...

Actually, it was a handy hydraulic jack lets us get to the soft underbelly of the coop, and put it on some logs lashed together.

The rest of the movement of the coop went completely great, but was so exciting, we forgot to take pictures of it.  Rest assured, the chickies have some excellent new leaves to scratch in and go hunting for bugs.  Beware the raptors!

Happy Equinox!

 Hey, we're at that neat point in the year when the sun is right over the equator.  I made a nerdy graph to visualize what's going on from our perspective.

So, at the equinox, the sun is climbing in the sky at the fastest rate (on a daily scale).  Then it starts to slow down as we approach the summer solstice and the longest day.  Look at those funny blips from daylight savings!  The sun doesn't care, it just keeps doing it's thing.

Uh, anyway.  I made more chicken coops.  Looks like they are ready to race!

Is this really March?  

After germinating seeds at home, they go into the truck

And are brought out to the hoophouse.

I expanded the chicken run to the margins of the field so the chickies can really get into that low brush with tasty bugs.

More transplants and the water is flowing again

More seedlings have moved out to the hoophouse, so I needed some water to make sure they were happy during the potentially traumatic transplant experience.  It's been mostly above freezing, so I got the ram pump out of the shed and set it up in the creek again.  This time, I extended the drive pipe length by about 50ft, to increase the pump pressure, and improve the flow coming out of the pump.  Hooray!  It works again.  And now no more lugging or dog-sledding water up the road.  That's a pretty good flow considering it's free energy!

 From the bulk tanks I had to get this special goofy fitting, and a series of other pipe bits to connect to a garden hose.

 Gravity fed water to the greenhouse...

 ...to water some herb seedlings

And then transplant to pots!  They'll live in those until the weather is settled enough for them to go outside.

First Transplants

This past week I got some fun varieties of kale into the hoophouse.  They're under the row cover to protect from frost, but it really has not been that cold.

There's no more snow in the chicken run!  And the ground has softened up enough that the chickies can really dig around and take a good dust bath.

This weekend I got some scallions into the ground.  Yum, they'll go great with the eggs!

Friends were visiting, so here's a rare shot of Meredith and myself out at the farm, in front of the camera.  That trailer back there is holding my 2 ton stash of chicken feed.  Well, less than that now.  Chickies keep on eating!  I've been keeping a close track of how much food is going out to them, so I hope to see that level decrease as more vegetation becomes available to them.

 Over the weekend I was up at MOFGA for a conference on tomatoes.  Excellent discussions on all matters concerning the fantastic fruit.  In the meantime, can you believe I left these jokers in charge of the farm?!

Just kidding, this is Meredith and some wonderful friends that were kind enough to water and collect eggs.  Looks like they had a fun time out there too!

Greenhouse Effect

I headed out to the farm today, and it was sunny and 35F.  Nice and pleasant to work outside.  Then I opened up the hoophouse.  Whoa!  90 degrees!  Maybe I'll grow bananas this year.

But, by the end of the day it was down to 40 inside again.  Not bad, just needs to stay a touch above freezing to keep the seedlings happy.

I pulled up some brush on the ground, exposing the soil and the chickens came out to investigate.

Ruthie at her usual post, surveying the field.

But why does she have that backpack on?  Well, this past weekend we got a pretty good bit of snow, and I could not really drive down the road to the farm.  Generally not a big deal, but I'm hauling water for the chickens from home every day.  5 gallons x 8lbs/gallon = 40 pounds of water to carry.  Or sled!

So, I've put the dog to work the past few days pulling the sled.  We do a bit of skijouring with her when the snow is good, so she's pretty keen to pull things.  She also understands the stop and go commands.  Not so much on the "left" or "right" though...

The loaded trip in...

Faster and more motivated on the way out...

Back home on the light table, the chives, kale and onions are coming up!  I'll see if I can get these out to the hoop house soon.  I don't think I'll trust these on the dog sled though...

White onions sown now = summer tacos!