On-Farm Brunch!

Hello!  We are partnering up with Sugarsnap Farm and Vermont Fresh Network to offer to you a great Sunday morning experience at our farm as a part of the VFN Farmers Dinner series!  Mornings at the farm are particularly beautiful - great light, perfect temperature, and bug-free - we can't wait to share both Half Pint Farm and Sugarsnap Farm with you!  This Sunday, July 19th at 10:30 am we are planning an amazing spread with Chef Anthony from Sugarsnap replete with pork and herbs from their farm, and a wide variety of early summer produce from our farm.  We will also be offering a tour of the farms, which are adjacent to each other down here in the Intervale.  The price is $35 per person.  Contact Sugarsnap to reserve your spot (652-5922), or email them at contact@sugarsnap.biz.  We look forward to seeing you at the farm!!!

Slow Food Tastings!

Just wanted to remind everyone that this Thursday is the kick-off event at the Intervale for the 8-week series of Thursday events that we're calling the SUMMER OF TASTE!  These Thursday events not only include some fun music, flatbread and educational happenings, it also includes Slow Food tastings that I have organized for each week!  This week we have a special kick-off panel that brings together some local food-enthusiasts (chefs, farmers, etc.) to help answer the question, "Why is Taste Important?"  This week the featured tasting is on carrots, and we have several stations to help you create a new food vocabulary, and help you to answer the question, "Why is Taste Important?" for yourself!  We hope to see you every Thursday from July 9th to August 27th, starting at 5:30 pm each day!  The tastings schedule is below, and the Intervale events calendar is HERE:

• July 9th: Carrots and Panel on Why Taste is Important.
• July 16th: VT Cheese
• July 23rd: VT wines and ciders, plus Kid's Day
July 30th: VT beer and root beer
• August 6th: VT Maple
• August 13th: Heritage Chickens and Heritage Pork
• August 20th: Heritage Apples
• August 27th: Heirloom Tomatoes!

Summer's Here!

Finally!  June 21st came, and so did the sun, the storms, the rain, and the growth of everything around us!  It truly feels like the Earth has tilted on its axis to align in the much-anticipated summer configuration.  Now we can enjoy late sunsets, early sunrises, nice overnight temperatures (can sleep with windows open again!), and the rapid maturation of everything at the farm!  The major transplanting period is officially over, the plants have all spread their rooty toes deep into the soil and have established themselves.  So, that means that everything can commence growing in their new places.  And, commence growing they are!  Everything is busting out all over the farm, and so far we've been able to keep all the weeds in check.  Having the Haygrove has really made us realize how crucial keeping rain off the crops and the paths really is.  The rain never reaches the paths to germinate weed seeds, so we can keep ahead of them with hoeing.  What a relief!  What a change!  It's been really fun looking at past journal entries of this time of year to find that we're usually up to our eyeballs in weeds.  Not this year!  All of our Haygrove crops look so much better than they ever have - the squash blossoms are HUGE, the favas are heading for the stars, the tomatoes have a million flowers and tons of clusters of small fruit, the cukes are flowering, the peppers are fruiting, the carrots are maturing faster than expected, and the head lettuces are virtually rot-free!  Outside the Haygrove, we've finished harvesting all the garlic scapes, which means that fresh amazing garlic is just around the corner - perhaps next week?  Also - the potatoes are in full flower - always a delicious smell 

in the air, as well as promise of baby potatoes to come - perhaps next week?  We are sitting in hopeful anticipation!  The animals are doing well, though we had to put down one of the ducks last week due to an apparent dog hassling that happened over a weekend.  I guess this is one of the major drawbacks (as well as an unbelievable asset) to farming in the city - lots of foot traffic and curious onlookers.  At any rate, the duck was limping and then quickly deteriorated over the week, the other birds were not supportive and we had to end it.  Such is life.  On other, more happy news - the quail are feathering out nicely, the chickens have moved to the field and are loving life out there, busily gobbling up weeds and bugs!  Our farmers' markets have been very successful business days and so far we're happy with the 2009 season in general.  We even

 found some time to enjoy a 2-day canoeing trip for our 12th wedding anniversary!  Felt pretty luxurious and we got to know our little state of Vermont a little better.  We came back to find our farm in need of a mow, a haying, a little weeding, and some tomato trellising.  We're taking good care of everyone's future tomato salads, you'll be happy to know!  We know everyone's just biding time until tomatoes come in - we know!  Well, so are we!  Some pictures for your viewing pleasure, and recipes to tickle your early summer culinary kitchen skills - buon apetito!  Addendum: just got back from putting the geese and ducks to bed, and thought I'd try and do a little commemorative attempt at the moonwalk.  Not recommended that you try this on uneven farm soils.  Let's leave it at that!

Spencer happily paddling the Lamoille

Pointing out the covered bridge we paddled under - how Vermonty!

Happy to make it to the portage at the end of the 26 miles - we did it all in one day instead of two!  The day was just too beautiful to stop the fun!

The root wall fringed with green - nice to have so much color these days to add to the spectrum of green!

Ahhh.  Beets - such a nice addition to the fare.

In one week, the tomatoes went from this to...

...this!  What an amazing difference!  You can tell that they are clearly out of the transplant shock stage and into the active growing stage.  Such a nice place to be!

In one week, these three little Paul Robeson tomatoes went from this to....

...this!  I know it's hard to believe - but those are seriously the same tomatoes!  Very promising, no?  Can't wait to taste these babies!

Garlic scape fun!  Not sure what to do with them?  Recipe at the end...

So stately, the favas - they look like miniature olive trees... kinda.

Fava-liciousness!

Not sure what to do with them?  Not interested in doing the fava bean two-step dance of blanch peel, blanch peel?  Recipe at the end...

Cleaning up the goods for your eating pleasure!

Potatoes in full bloom!

A close up of the beautiful blossoms of a Satina potato.

Our stand of rye ready for mowin'

Spence getting ready to mow...

...mowed!  Now we let it dry and the bale it - we'll see how many we get.  Any guesses?  On farm guesses range from 2.5 bales to 32 bales.  Clearly we are new at this!

And, in 3 weeks, the quail have gone from this to...

...this!  Chubbin' up, as promised.  

OK!  Some recipes, also as promised!

Garlic Scape Pesto

by: Dorie Greenspan

• Makes about 1 cup
  
• 10 garlic scapes, finely chopped
  
• 1/3 to 1/2 cup finely grated Parmesan (to taste and texture)
  
• 1/3 cup slivered almonds or any nut you like (you could toast them lightly, if you'd like)
  
• sea salt
  

1. Put the scapes, 1/3 cup of the cheese, nuts and half the olive oil in the bowl of a food processor (or use a blender or a mortar and pestle).  Whir to chop and blend all the ingredients and then add the remainder of the oil and, if you want, more cheese.  If you like the texture, stop; if you'd like it a little thinner, add some more oil.  Season with salt.
   
2. If you're not going to use the pesto immediately, press a piece of plastic against the surface to keep it from oxidizing.  The pesto can be stored in the refrigerator for a couple of days or packed airtight and frozen for a couple of months, by  which time tomatoes should be at their juciest!

Grilled Fava Beans

as suggested by: Aaron Josinsky

• young fava beans, still in pod
  
• olive oil
  
• salt
  
• pepper
  

1. Set grill or broiler on high heat - at least 350 degrees.
   
2. Toss favas with olive oil, salt and pepper.
   
3. Place directly on grill or on a pan under the broiler.
   
4. Cook until browned, roll around to brown other sides, cook until brown all over.
   
5. Put on a plate, sprinkle with a little more salt.  Eat pod and all, great as an appetizer with beer, or as a perfect side dish.  Enjoy!
   

New arrivals, new market, new smells!

We have just received 100 bobwhite quail in the mail to grow out for meat!  This was a super-fun box to receive, they have such a neat chirping sound!  They are so tiny, and really made us think that we had just received a box of bumblebees!  They are round and fuzzy and move about in a mass.  So cute!!!  This is going to be quite an adventure - we know so little about them (experiment #2009 for HPF this year!), it will be really neat to learn as we go.  So far we have noticed that they love heat - their brooder is being kept at 95 degrees.  A little research reminded me that these are desert prairie creatures - of course they like it hot!  As they mature, we'll be able to tell males from females because of their chest coloring - females have white chest feathers, and males' chest feathers are darker.  They will be growing fairly slowly, but here they are and we'll be keeping you updated on their growth.  Fun!

In other news, we had our first New North End Farmers' Market on Wednesday!  It was a great first market, well attended by both vendors and customers!  We really have everything available at this market - veggies, fruit, sweet baked goods, breads, root beer, pork and freshly barbecued pork skewers provided by Mike Betit, our neighborhood pork farmer!  Our new location at the North Avenue Alliance Church was perfect and really had great exposure - it will only get better each week!  Stop by and say hi if you're able - we'd love to see you!

In tandem with the NNE market's grand opening, we had our first Food Club pick-up!  What a wonderful thing to meet all of our new members, as well as our devoted 2nd year members!  Thank you so much for supporting our farm, and we hope you enjoy your weekly bag of goodies!  We have a terrific line-up of recipes and produce for you this season!  Welcome to the club!  FYI: we do still have a few shares left - if you are interested in joining our Food Club, click here.  

In other news, I have been riding my bike to and from the farm every nice day recently.  It has been a wonderful way to start each day and a perfect way to wrap up each day!  I have thoroughly enjoyed watching the Spring transform into Summer with each day and each new smell as rains come and go, and as the different trees and meadow flowers bloom!  Today was particularly wonderful because the locust trees are all in

 flower!  Their scent is better than any perfume and almost as amazing as the night-blooming jasmine that surrounded our leaf and stick house in the Solomon Islands during our Peace Corps days.  While I'm still enjoying the scent of the locusts on the last leg of my ride into the farm, I turn into the Haygrove and am greeted with the similarly intoxicating scent of the blooming fava beans!  I tell you - it is almost worth it just to grow these beans for the flowers!  Late Spring is such an incredible time of year - especially this year.  This year it has been much drier that recent years, which means the trees flower more heavily, the plants grow more vibrantly, and everything seems more intense, like a distilled essence.  On my twice-weekly trip to deliver to The Kitchen Table Bistro, I love dropping into that valley and seeing all of the mountains splayed out before me - they have just gotten so green over the past couple of weeks, you can almost feel the vibration of the Earth as it supplies all the trees with the proper ratio of nutrients to push out all of 

those leaves!  Where does all that energy come from?  It reminds me of the time our friend Cletus visited us from Nigeria.  It was December.  We drove him all over New England, and he kept wondering why all the trees were dead.  We had to keep explaining to him that in this part of the world, the Earth sleeps, loses energy, and rests until the Springtime, when the switch is turned back on, the energy starts flowing, and then everything gets beautiful and green again.  He simply couldn't imagine that it was possible for all these dead trees to come back to life.  Likewise, when the Earth is vibrating with it's greenness - it's photosynthesizing amazingness, smelling so good and so alive... I can't even remember what winter was like!  Thank goodness!  I am so happy to be here, now.  At the cusp of summer!  A series of photos for you and a recipe to enjoy the wonderfulness of escarole - my favorite all-time salad green!  Enjoy!

First baby carrots - look at this overachiever!

Okay - another baby quail shot - too cute!

So fuzzy!

Onions and potatoes looking soooooo good!  We grow these guys in the biodegradable mulch - what a life-saver!  We weeded the onions today, and knocked the potato beetles into a bucket that Spencer dumped onto the ground and then torched with the flame-weeder.  Now you know how we feel about them!

Tomatoes growing like crazy!  There are tons of little green tomatoes starting - I'd say we're 2 weeks away from the first cherry tomatoes! 

We spent some time on Monday doing the first round of tomato clipping and pruning - always a very satisfying activity!  Everything is neat and tidy now!

Neat rows of rapidly growing tomatoes!

Update on our house garden - everything is growing so well!  Things feel like they've just gotten established and will be really taking off now.  I like the wood chip design...

Our first successful globe alliums!   They are soooo pretty!

Escarole Salad (I feel like it needs a better name - it's just so incredibly delicious!)

• 1 head of escarole
• 1/2 red onion, cut into rings
• 2 Tbs. balsamic vinegar
• 4 Tbs. olive oil
• 1 tsp. salt
• 1 tsp. black pepper, freshly ground
• 2 tsp. fresh thyme leaves
• 2 oz. crumbled blue cheese (we love Boucher Blue or Gore Dawn Zola)
• 1/2 cup toasted walnut pieces (optional)

1. Make the dressing.  Combine the balsamic, olive oil, salt, pepper, and thyme leaves.  Blend until smooth.  Chop or crumble cheese, and add to dressing - stir to combine, and let sit while you prepare the escarole.
2. Chop whole head of escarole, wash and spin.  Place escarole in large bowl.  Pour dressing over leaves, toss with tongs to coat.  
3. Add onions, and walnuts, if using.  
4. Plate up and eat.  Enjoy!!!!
5. This should serve 4, but the two of us always finish it off - it's sooooooo good!

Rhythm of the Season, Weather, Feasting!

Well, here we are!  We are at that point in the season where we have planted all major crops.  The only things left to plant are the successional beds every two weeks.  We have been busy planting, which means I have NOT been busy blogging.  Apologies!  At any rate, it feels amazing to be at that point in our season!  We have learned a lot over the last 7 years of scratching at the dirt and plunking seeds in the ground, which is essentially how this all happens.  There is a lot of management in between the scratching at the dirt, and that is what makes every farm different.  How you have chosen to lay out your beds, do your weed management, trellis your crops, irrigate - all of these major decisions separate one farm's style from another.  This year we are much more aware of other farms and their rhythms than ever before.  Mostly this has to do with us spending time on a field we've never farmed before - when we built the Haygrove, we had to locate it on a 1/2 acre

 parcel adjacent to our land.  It is not far from our other main field.  However, it is in a different area which is closer to Arethusa Collective Farm's new field, Adam's Berry Farm and the road that Fat Mitchell's Pumpkin Patch, Open Heart Farm, Straycat Farm, and Intervale Community Farm use.  We find ourselves taking note of who is driving by on what tractor and with what implement everyday - this always tells us what the other farms are up to for that day, and it is a reminder of how little we actually use the big tractors here at the Intervale.  It really is an issue of temperament/willingness to fiddle with machinery/planning style of crop rotations, etc.

Weather.  It's been windy!  Totally freaky weather for new owners of a Haygrove hoophouse!  However, my tactic with the last windstorm was to simply ignore - since I could do nothing but vent my house appropriately and hope.  It worked!  I slept well, and awoke to no catastrophic damage, though I will admit to having a dream a la Oz that involved a tornado ripping up one bay of our Haygrove and plunking it down in a neighboring farm's property - who happened to be in the hobby business of breeding really miniature goats.  Don't ask - they were sure cute, though - and the size of large toads.  Strange.  But then, it WAS a dream, and I awoke to find that none of it was true - tornado OR mini goats.  Phew!  I have come to grips that there is really no weather forecasting website/newschannel that I am satisfied with, I am convinced that they are all based on someone's comfortability with serial conjecture.  It could drive a person mad trying to hold too much stock in weather forecasting, so I have officially decided that I am done trying.  Sure, I'll take a glance at Weather.com, but I'm still packing a change of clothes, shoes, additional layers, sunscreen, hat, water bottle, reflective blanket (just checking to see if you're paying attention), and emergency chocolate.  Tom Messner from Channel 5 - you and I are on the outs.  Officially.

More importantly, the eatin's gettin' good around here lately!  More and more food from the farm

is available, which sets our creative cooking fires a'blazin'!  A sample from some recent weekly menus (yes, we create menus for our household of 2 every Sunday to ensure that we're eating well every day of every week.  You know - there are so few eating opportunities in a lifetime, each should be as good as you can make it!); larb gai, quinoa tabbouleh, broccoli rabe with homemade pappardelle pasta and pine nuts, ricotta gnocchi sauteed in rendered duck fat, Boucher Farm Hot Italian Sausage sandwiches BBQ'd with a HUGE arugula salad with fresh from the garden lemon balm dressing.... etc.  You see, we are farmers because we LOVE to eat really good food!  We make it a priority in our life to harness most eating opportunities with vigor and passion, and something new included.  You new Food Club members are in for a treat!  Our little mini CSA/farm share program is really all about sharing our love of food and cooking with like-minded individuals.  We hope you enjoy the ride, which begins next Wednesday, June 10th!

OK.  Enough yabber-jabbering.  If you can't tell, I'm slightly sleep-deprived, slightly drunk on the early season abundance, and hopeful of what's to come.  I'm finding it hard to harness my thoughts and be coherent, though most major recent projects on the farm have been accomplished successfully and according to plan - and so, we're off and away!  Enjoy the stream of consciousness photostream and look forward to more focused posts.  I promise!

The Haygrove long-term section planted out with the tomatoes and cool tomato trellis system.

How that trellis gets built - we pound 6' two by fours into the ground in a very safe way...

Like this!  I hold, Spencer climbs a ladder and pounds them in with a sledgehammer.  I should be wearing a hard hat.  It only took us 30 minutes to get them all in, though!

The tools that make it all happen: the ratcheting spool, the duckbill anchor and the 20-penny nail to pound it all in.

Put it all into place, and pound it in until the ratchet is where you want it.

Something like this.  Attach the high tensile wires to the ratchet.

Tighten down a bit.

It should look like you have just strung a telegraph wire.

Next, tie the clove hitch with your tomato twine to the wire...

And plant your tomatoes - burying the twine with the tomato plants!  This is the only way we plant the tomatoes now - it's strong enough to hold everything up and allows for plenty of ventilation.  

Spencer and Chloe getting the peppers and eggplants in...

The coolest looking tree frog we've ever found at the farm!  He was hanging out in the arugula 

So clingy!

The other tomatoes in the Ledgewood house - growing like champions!

Our heritage breed chickens make the move outside!  Awkward stage.

First baby carrots are ready!  YAY!!!

First baby beets are ready, YAY!

The broccoli rabe is out, the biodegradable mulch and the melons are going in!

Spencer's been working diligently on the front yard garden at our house - here's where the Dill's Atlantic Giant Pumpkins are starting their journey to hugeness!

We'll have a few cherries this year!

There it is!  Nicely mulched paths, and the plants are in, but hard to see at this stage.   They will be filling out shortly!

Two Successful Markets, Conestoga, Wind & Tomatoes

We are still reeling from two great farmers' markets - our best first two markets ever, despite the deluge of biblical proportions last week and the windy & rainy end of market this week!  Thanks to all of our customers who come out every week (rain or shine) to support us - thank you!  What a productive week we've had - if not a little unnerving with all of the wind!  Every hoop-house owners' nightmare - 50+ mph gusts of wind.  We did our best all week to try and ignore the needling sounds of flapping plastic from the hoop-houses, and all in all, I'd say we succeeded.  The Haygrove also fared fine, though the FEMA-approved flappable side skirts did indeed flap in the wind (loudly), and in the process tore and became tangled.  It will actually not be too hard to repair it, but it is just one more thing for us to deal with in the busiest time of the year.  At any rate, the wind has come and gone, and hopefully we now have been blown into more consistently warmer weather - I write this as we expect another night in the 30s, but the 10-day forecast looks more promising, thankfully.  The plants will simply take off and grow like crazy when the weather regulates.  Looking forward to that!  Other fun developments this week include building the at-farm goose and duck house!  Spencer's vision panned out well - building a conestoga wagon for them.  We've heard horror stories from other farmers with ducks and geese that predators will stop at nothing to get to them - so we decided to build a fortress of sorts, with a nice looking facade.  The hoops are made from electrical conduit, and the shell is made from two layers of chicken wire.  We actually scavenged all materials and purchased nothing to make this

 cool house for the birds!  Plus, we gave them shade with white plastic we already had - and for extra panache, we lashed the plastic to the frame, which makes it look a lot like the Haygrove.  Consistency in all things!  We thought the ramp/door (made from a pallet) might be too steep for them to walk up, but they can make it up just fine.  After only 4 days of teaching them to go up the ramp before nightfall (and much goose and duck chasing!), they seem to have learned when it's time to go into the house, and just about 60 seconds of herding is required to get the gaggling 

mass of fowl up the ramp and bolted into their wagon for the night.  The area that we have them living in is fenced in with a woven electrical poultry fence with a battery powered terminal - training the dogs to that was not fun, but necessary, and they now give the penned in area a WIDE berth every time they pass it!  The geese and ducks LOVE to have access to tons of grass, and seem to be very happy out at the farm.  They're feathering out nicely and this week we'll move them to the garlic patch to start their actual job, which is weeding!  I'm sure we have a lot to learn on that front, but we're giving it a shot,

 anyway.  Speaking of workers on the farm, we have a woman named Chloe that will be working some with us this summer - she volunteered several times at our farm last year, and we're very happy to have her back!  She helped us with transplanting and weeding this week - a HUGE help!  We planted out all the kale, sprouting broccoli, parsley, swiss chard, cardoons and artichokes as well as all the heirloom tomatoes.  It's definitely a milestone in the season to get the tomatoes in - feels good!  Nice to know that the tomatoes are on their way - especially since I only have 5 quarts left from last 

year!  Come on tomatoes!  We decided to devote the Ledgewood hoop-house to the heirlooms this year and all the others (romas and cherries) will go into the Haygrove this week along with the peppers, squashes and eggplants.  We also did not graft the tomatoes this year after all.  We were all ready to do it - grew out the rootstock and everything.  We just revisited our experience last year and decided it wasn't worth it for us to do this year.  The grafted plants last year were indeed robust and huge - but mostly in the realm of foliage, not fruit.  I can sell fruit, not foliage.  Decision made.  Also - the grafting

 process always sets us back at least 10 days, and we decided that the time lost wasn't worth it.  So, we're happy with our decision - our tomatoes are in the ground way earlier than ever before - they're super healthy and getting established.  It will be interesting to see how much sooner we'll get fruit than years prior.  We also received the next round of chickens - this time it was 50 assorted heavy breeds, a favorite delivery to receive because they are so beautiful and varied in their coloring, and always super fun to receive a box of peepers in the mail!  They like their brooder and have been so much heartier than the 

cornish cross guys - out of 25 cornish cross birds we received, we're down to 19 at week 5 - they simply die over the tiniest things.  The heavy breeds are still going strong here at the end of their first week - no losses!  It's always such a stark contrast to those cornish birds, who got moved outside to feather out a bit more and then they'll move out to work at the farm in their chicken tractor for a few more weeks before harvesting them.  The next round of birds will be

 the quail, quickly followed by the next round of building housing for farm creatures; apparently our new pastime!  Luckily, once the buildings are complete - they can be re-used over and over again, and we'll be all set for animal structures for a while.  Such a busy week!  We accomplished most things on our list this week, and look forward to next week's projects, which will see us getting all of the rest of the long-term plants in the ground, the first weeding projects tackled, and getting 

potted plants ready for the biggest plant selling weekend coming up - Memorial day weekend!  Can you believe it?  The Spring continues to breeze by as we try to notice all of the lovely Spring smells in the air, the orioles flitting about the trees, the first mow of the farm fringe, the non-bugginess of early Spring, and the lengthening days giving us light until 7 pm.  Will close today with a picture of the dogs discussing the new electric fence at the farm keeping those geese and ducks just too far away!

Haygrove = 2 weeks earlier!

So happy to write tonight after the most productive past two weeks!  We have been so busy laying biodegradable plastic for the onions and potatoes, successfully getting those crops in last week, then transplanting all the rounds into the Haygrove - ensuring weeks of amazing produce, then potting up tons and tons of plants for our sales to Gardener's Supply Company's retail store as well as our customers at market.  We even found some time to harvest dandelions for that all-important Spring ritual of making dandelion wine.  It's time, folks!  There are dandelions galore - and I'd say this Saturday or Sunday are the last days of this bloom if you'd like to make it - recipe at the end of this post.  All of this and last week's efforts culminated in this morning's harvest of nearly 80# of various greens to bring to the first Downtown Burlington Farmers' Market!  After quick reflection on last year's market inventory sheets - we didn't have greens until the Memorial Day market last year - putting us squarely 2 weeks ahead of last year.  This is due to several factors - the amazing weather we've had this Spring, our organizational and planning skills, and finally - the Haygrove - doing exactly what we hoped it would do!  We are pushing the early season a full 2 weeks earlier than we have ever before!  We will even be getting our tomatoes in this week - which is nearly a month earlier than last year (I must confess that last year we got our tomatoes in way later than we would've liked to last year - due to many factors; fava beans were left in the tomato spot too late, grafting the tomatoes automatically makes us 10+ days behind...)!  Needless to say, we're feeling good and realizing those 12+ hour days that means it's Spring.  We're feeling frantic, though, with all that needs to be done - we're moving the gigantic geese and ducks out to the farm this week, moving the broilers outside, and receiving the next round of rare breed heavy chickens on Monday or Tuesday; what's that they say about a rolling stone gathering no moss?  If that's true, then we are certainly some shiny and clean stones working up a storm at Half Pint Farm!  Life is good - there is a terrific green smell in the air, the grass needs mowing, the soil is perfectly moist, the crops are in on time, the weeds are being held back for the moment, and the animals are happy.  Hopefully it doesn't rain at market tomorrow, but even that would be OK, too.  Some pictures of our progress, and the dandelion wine recipe, as promised.

Using the new mulch layer to lay the biodegradable mulch at our field.  Using this machine saved us 3 days - we normally lay it by hand!

A 3 hour job to lay 19 beds.

Planting potatoes into the mulch - we also had our friend Chris Wagner help us on this day - we was a huge help on both the potatoes and onions - thanks, Chris!!!

The onion tunnel - looking so good!  Nothing we hate more than weeding onions - this mulch has been a life-saver in that department!

Making the delivery to Gardener's Supply Company!  We did 3 wagon loads just like this one - and that's only a little less than half the total!  Nice early season revenue...

Geese & ducks looking good!  We can't wait to get these guys out to the field this week!

We've been training them to grass and weeds from the farm - hoping they'll take to it naturally!

Spencer plucking dandelion heads!  A lot of recipes say to remove all the green around the petals - we never have and never will.  This is an unnecessary step, not to mention time consuming.  The amount of dandelions in these bags totaled 5 pounds - just so you can get a sense of volume. 

Dandelion Wine

• 2 Gallons, or about 3 pounds of dandelion heads
• 3 pounds of raisins
• 10 pounds of sugar
• 6 tsp. of acid blend (citric, tartaric & malic)
• 1 tsp. of grape tannins
• 2 tsp. of yeast nutrient
• 1 pkt. champagne yeast
• 5 gallons of spring water (or well water)

1. Combine all above ingredients in a 6 gallon pail.  Specific gravity of 1.11 - 1.13.  Cover with a plastic bag.  Let bubble and ferment happily for 10 days at room temperature.  Every couple of days in those 10 days, stir the mixture.
2. After the 10 days, rack the liquid off of the solids into a 5 gallon glass carboy.  Cork the carboy with an air lock stopper.  Let it do it's thing in a dark corner of your house for 6 to 9 months.  
3. Every 2-3 months during those six months, rack the liquid off the sediment.  Put back into carboy and wait.  
4. If you start it in May, it's ready to bottle in December.  It's a great taste of Spring in the dead of winter.  Enjoy!!!
5. All of the ingredients can be found at your local homebrew store - in our neck of the woods, we go to the one in Winooski.  Have fun!!!

Compost, Soldiers and Gardening!

What a crazy week we had!  We spent a lot of time last week spreading compost on our fields - we do this every other year (mostly due to expense), and get 20 yards to spread on 1 acre or so.  At that time we also spread organic fertilizers like Cheep Cheep, Pro Grow, etc.   It is just such

 a great way to spread fertilizer since we already have the compost spreader hooked up.  We did this project last Sunday - a day when no other

 farmers at the Intervale really do any tractor work, and since we need both the New Holland (for the use of the bucket) and the John Deere (for the PTO for the spreader) for the task, it's just better knowing that we won't be hogging the tractors when other farmers need them.  It was a beautiful and productive day - preparing us for the task of tilling and laying the biodegradable plastic for the 

potatoes, onions and shallots - a project for 

this week.  It took us 3 hours or so - not too bad, considering we only do this every other year, and I have relative inexperience with using the bucket; that thing definitely takes some practice!  Our other major projects this week involved potting up hundreds of pots for Gardener's Supply Company - we have a growing account with them and do quite a few potted veggie starts for their retail store.  With all the beautiful growing weather coming up, it feels good to get moving on the potting up so that everything can get out of the greenhouse and sold to all those eager gardeners

 out there!  The pots all look so obedient with their colorful tags - like regimented soldiers ready to fight the good fight against conventional food! 

 I always feel so proud of all my plants when we drop them off at Gardener's Supply - I know they're going to good homes with people that will appreciate what they have to offer.  It's a nice component to our business that takes up most of our time this time of year and then it's over by Memorial Day weekend.  A short, but sweet part 

of our season.  We moved the geese and ducks out to their outside house - they were simply getting too big for their brooder!  They're only a week and a half old!  They have been growing so quickly!  I recently read that Pekin ducks can potentially be 

ready for harvest in only 6 or 7 weeks (that's faster that cornish chickens!) - and in that amount of time they'll have eaten 20+ pounds of feed!  Crazy!  I'm so glad we're supplementing with pasture (currently grass clippings - soon field

 grass) - which they love!  They descend upon any patch of grass like locusts; except they're quite cuter and make nicer sounds.  They actually

 whistle more than chirp - very cute.  We anticipate moving them out to field pasture very soon.  First, we must construct a solid home for them to live in at night after they're done ranging and also to protect them from predators.  We're planning on making them a house on top of this frame - Spencer was very proud of his medieval style wheels he fashioned out of an 

old cable spool!  They work quite well, actually.  We're also planning on a door that becomes a 

ramp for them to walk up.  This was a fun Friday project, after we deconstructed the old hay rick at our field - we needed a nice flatbed wagon for moving plants to the field, and the wood from the walls was rotten and dangerously falling apart.  So, we will be gleaning some great wood from that project for the duck house and the pig house as well.  Saturday was our first 80 degree day here in Burlington!  We were so focused on trying

 to pack so much in on this perfect day that we almost had project paralysis - but, we were able to accomplish some major gardening projects here at home (after spinning class, a great breakfast, and tuning up the bike of course)!  Don't worry, the irony is definitely not lost on us - we are farmers that leave the farm early some days to come home to garden!  It is definitely funny!  However, it makes tons of sense - we love 

gardening at home because it allows us to grow things we'd never grow at the farm; like perennials, fruit trees, flowers and fun herbs.  It was nice to see the Johnny Jump Ups doin' their thing, and to notice that our first try at asparagus seems initially successful!  The wormwood, angelica, chervil, chives, marjoram, thyme, sage and mountain mint are all up and looking great!  We spent time talking about the project for the front yard - Spencer's super fun crazy wild and huge garden!  Since we grow so many baby veggies at the farm, he thought it would be fun to grow HUGE veggies at our house.  And, after falling for the urgings of Eat the View and the White House garden, we decided it was time to do our own front garden here in suburbia!  As Spencer unloaded the tiller from our van and started to till up the front yard, I was listening to The Splendid Table, where Lynn Rosetto Kasper had a story on just that - growing a garden instead of a lawn.  

Her guest was Rosalind Creasy, who was touting her new cookbook, but she's also known for

 her book on Edible Landscaping - she grew wheat on her front lawn!  Felt good to be on the

 same page.  It felt like we were getting some support while tearing up the lawn in a block of lawns that are all perfect and manicured.  Now it looks so purposeful and industrious, and ready for the transplants of our Giant Red Celery, Mammoth Cabbage, Dill's Atlantic Giant Pumpkins, Giant watermelons, etc.  It's going to be a blast, and certain to be a conversation starter this summer!  We'll post pictures as the garden 

progresses...  There it is, the last post of April!  Hard to believe!  We're gearing up for the first downtown farmers' market, which is only 2 weekends away!  Hard to believe we've only got 1 free Saturday left for 5 months!  Gotta make some relaxation plans for next week...

Bird Pics & First Planting Projects

We've arrived!  We received our very first ducklings and goslings this Wednesday.  They are so cute and so independent compared to the cornish cross chicks.  The chicks seem to need so much care, or they die.  Even when you think you have covered every contingency, some die.  They need heat, they need water, they need grit, they need a surface to walk on that is not too slippery or they'll develop leg problems, they need their butts wiped or else they'll "paste up".  At times, it's a little much.  However, with the arrival of the ducklings and goslings, 

we have realized how cool heritage breed animals can be.  They simply know what to do, how to live, and they are oh so charming while doing it!  Our rare breed chickens last year also made us realize how much more sturdy they can be.  After growing out cornish cross chickens, the rare breed guys are just so much more chickeny!  They scratch, they look for bugs, they hassle each other and they make dust baths.  The cornish cross chickens are little couch potatoes - they sit, they eat, they poop.  Rinse and repeat for 8 weeks.  They sure are efficient food-meat machines, though; they make meat in only 8 weeks.  By comparison, the rare breeds aren't ready for 14+ weeks!  The feed gets expensive, but they certainly work harder on the farm - they scratch up ground and clear weeds far more efficiently than the cornish cross birds.  At any rate, it is fun experimenting, and we are having fun watching the ducklings and goslings!  There is no doubt that they are water-oriented animals!  They need tons of water to drink, because they play in it, too!  They need enough water access to drink, but not swim in quite yet - their down doesn't have their mother's oil on it so they'd chill really quickly.  We need to wait until they feather out before we install a kiddie pool for them, but meanwhile they make bubbles in their water font!  Especially these little black ducklings - they spend their entire day running between the water (blowing bubbles in the water while drinking), the duck chow and the little bit of grass they

get at this stage, their feet smacking on the ground all the while.  So cute!  I can't wait until we can get them outside rooting around in the dirt and in the sunshine - probably a couple more weeks under the heat lamps, until our weather regulates a bit more.  We got these birds from the hatchery in Iowa called Murray McMurray which has a great catalog (you should have one around just for reading material!).  The folks at Murray have a sense of humor, too - they offer lots of bird combinations based on use of the bird: Barbecue Special, Frying Pan Special, Homesteader's Delight, etc.  The bird package we got was the the Barnyard Combination #3, 6 ducklings and 6 

goslings.  They send an assortment of varieties - and we've had fun trying to figure out what types of birds we got sent.  We think we have 2 blue swedish ducklings (the black ones), 2 fawn runners (upright ducks), and 2 pekin ducks (all yellow).  In the goose department, we think we have 2 chinese white OR white embden, 2 toulouse OR african (they look identical at this stage), 1 Sebastapool (it will be frilly and white) and 2 buff goslings.  We got sent one extra goose - thank you, Murray McMurray!

In other farm news, we have officially completed all of the construction of the Haygrove with the completion of the simple doors!  Feels good to

 finally be done, and start using the Haygrove to its fullest potential!  We would have finished the doors last week, but we actually ran out of plastic that Haygrove sent us.  When we called to let them know we thought we had been very conservative with the plastic, but still ran out, they made good with us and sent us the perfect amount to complete the doors!  This is just another reason we love this company!  They have been amazing in the customer service department!  Thank you, Haygrove!

So now that that is done, we are well on our way with our growing season at the farm!  We have transplanted our first round of head lettuces, baby bok choy, red, chioggia, and golden beets, and seeded the first rounds of arugula, broccoli raab, radishes, salad mixes & fava beans.  Below, some pictures of that process - including a time lapse of transplanting.  Because it's fun to watch!  Enjoy!

Doors open and secured.

Irrigation set up and flowing!

Looking good!

Covered the brassicas - to protect from flea beetles.  I think that we could probably just have secured them with tacks instead of using a shovel and soil to secure the edges since we are under cover already and wind inside isn't too much of an issue.  Such creatures of habit are we.

Looking so industrious!

More gosling and duckling pictures... can't resist!  This is one of the African OR Toulouse geese.

One of the blue swedish ducklings looking curious!

Closing the new Haygrove doors.

Laying Driptape in the Haygrove

Transplanting Beets.  Note very tired dogs not doing much - end of the day.

Seeding, Irrigating, Micros & Chicks!

Mr. Smeems is super excited to be spending long days at the farm doing his favorite activities - barking, sniffing, digging, getting filthy while exploring...you know, dog stuff!  Bullet is never far behind, and is in fact usually leading the charge!  Last week we spent some time working on tilling the Haygrove beds with our BCS tiller, and getting them ready for seeding.  While Spencer did that manly job, I spent a lot of time re-organizing our irrigation and cobbling together what I think amounts to a really nice system.  Hopefully it works!  We'll turn it on this week and put it to the real test.  Digging trenches really puts the old muscles to work, but I'm happy to report that with all my gym-going activities, my recovery time after this super-physical activity was merely overnight - I woke up the next morning  surprisingly not remotely sore!  True testament to working out and doing strength training really paying off!  At any rate, Spencer seeded the first rounds of arugula, salad mix, radishes, dandelion greens, etc.  We'll be transplanting out the first round of lettuce heads this week in those same beds.  We're gearing up for the Downtown Farmers' Market, which starts this year on Saturday, May 9th.  Four weeks away!   Today, after meeting with my gym trainer, I received the phone call from the post office saying that there was a box of peeping chicks waiting to be picked up!  So, off I ran to collect some food for them from Guy's Farm & Yard out in Williston, do my grocery shopping, collect the peeping chicks from the post office, turn on the super cool new brooder box we ordered, and put them away in their toasty new environs.  All went smoothly, and we now have 26 cornish roaster chicks slowly getting meaty in our brooder!  They sure are cute at this stage!  They seem to like their new house and are happily peeping away - they are successfully finding their food and water, so all's well.  After getting those guys situated, I ran back down to the Intervale to harvest the first batch of microgreens of 2009!  They'll be sold to Healthy Living and should be on their shelves after 1pm on 4/14/09.   We'll be doing deliveries 2 times a week to them, on Tuesdays and Fridays.  Here's some pics of the chicks and microgreens!  We're anxiously awaiting our ducks and geese, which should be arriving tomorrow.

Here they are checking out their new digs.  The green gel stuff is 1st day vitamins for them.

Curious about the camera.

Doin' their chickeny business!

Micros!  Can you identify all 8 varieties in there?  Amaranth, Arugula, Mizuna, Red Bok Choy, Tatsoi, Hong Vit Radish, Giant Red Mustard and Russian Red Kale!

Close up micros.  Had some sashimi, pork dumplings, and rice over a salad of these tonight.  It was sublime!