March is upon us, which means work in full swing, getting geared up for the season ahead. The heat mats are rolled out and filling up quickly with seedling trays sprouting with new life.
As we shared last month, we have invested in some infrastructure for the farm in the way of a new greenhouse (which will eventually transition to become our seedling starting greenhouse, leaving the other one for full production) and a walk in cooler twice the size of our farmhouse kitchen. Both have been dismantled and brought to the farm awaiting a window to get to work erecting them. The greenhouse was purchased from an old friend and fellow farmer who is getting out of the "game" and he had many other goodies to offer cheap or free to us, including a substantial amount of red raspberry plants. Our oldest, Gavy has decided that this is where her niche is on the farm- in fruit. We have decided to not do strawberries this season, as they were overly labor intensive, and the drought last year made the crop less than worth the investment. We may still do a bunch in the greenhouse, but this season, field strawberries aren't going to happen; but there will be raspberries, which will help springboard Gavy's farm projects.
For the last four years we have had the opportunity to attend organic growers conferences in Wisconsin, NJ and NY. Last year we decided that this would be the year we bring the kids to the NOFA conference in Saratoga Springs, and set money aside for the conference and hotels with pools in the middle of the winter. We always find these conferences to be a great jump start to the season, learning from intensive workshops; meeting and talking shop with other organic farmers, seeing new products to make our jobs easier etc.
It's become such a tradition to get out of the slump of the cold winter months, shoveling snow, bringing in firewood and dreaming of spring to mingle with farmer kin. But when we had the opportunity to work with Rich last summer from Earth Perks Farm, our conference funds transferred to Florida funds, to take our educational field trip to immerse ourselves in his permaculture farm for a week, as he immersed himself in our farm for 2 months in 2016. While a much smaller farm than ours, we learned a lot about high production on a smaller scale, bio-char production and use in the fields, and marketing, and his experience having run a large multi-farm CSA in NC prior to moving the farm to FL. This sort of hands on experience was more valuable (and cost even less) than many of the conferences we've attended in the past. Seeing organic production in a different climate (certainly having 80 degree days but the sun still setting at 6pm was quite a transition) opened our minds to various methods of simplifying some of the work we do here. He is growing in virtually beach sand amending with loads of compost and biochar, and with the longer growing season, is able to get multiple crops where we'd only see one. With many perennials starting to produce including 100 plus citrus trees, and a few mangoes and ginger we are excited to see his farm grow and work with him again this summer. He will be back at Freedom Rains Farm in July for another two months of farming with us in his off season of oppressive summer heat. It was very inspiring for us to get away from the farm for our first real family vacation, and see great food growing, and enjoy eating some that we won't see for months here. The drive home brought us from summer through spring right back to the winter we left behind.
With another cold snap the forecast, it looks like it will be a lot of inside and greenhouse work and stoking the fires at night to keep the seedlings happy and warm. Here's hoping that March will go out "like a lamb" as the saying goes so we can get busy!
As we shared last month, we have invested in some infrastructure for the farm in the way of a new greenhouse (which will eventually transition to become our seedling starting greenhouse, leaving the other one for full production) and a walk in cooler twice the size of our farmhouse kitchen. Both have been dismantled and brought to the farm awaiting a window to get to work erecting them. The greenhouse was purchased from an old friend and fellow farmer who is getting out of the "game" and he had many other goodies to offer cheap or free to us, including a substantial amount of red raspberry plants. Our oldest, Gavy has decided that this is where her niche is on the farm- in fruit. We have decided to not do strawberries this season, as they were overly labor intensive, and the drought last year made the crop less than worth the investment. We may still do a bunch in the greenhouse, but this season, field strawberries aren't going to happen; but there will be raspberries, which will help springboard Gavy's farm projects.
For the last four years we have had the opportunity to attend organic growers conferences in Wisconsin, NJ and NY. Last year we decided that this would be the year we bring the kids to the NOFA conference in Saratoga Springs, and set money aside for the conference and hotels with pools in the middle of the winter. We always find these conferences to be a great jump start to the season, learning from intensive workshops; meeting and talking shop with other organic farmers, seeing new products to make our jobs easier etc.
It's become such a tradition to get out of the slump of the cold winter months, shoveling snow, bringing in firewood and dreaming of spring to mingle with farmer kin. But when we had the opportunity to work with Rich last summer from Earth Perks Farm, our conference funds transferred to Florida funds, to take our educational field trip to immerse ourselves in his permaculture farm for a week, as he immersed himself in our farm for 2 months in 2016. While a much smaller farm than ours, we learned a lot about high production on a smaller scale, bio-char production and use in the fields, and marketing, and his experience having run a large multi-farm CSA in NC prior to moving the farm to FL. This sort of hands on experience was more valuable (and cost even less) than many of the conferences we've attended in the past. Seeing organic production in a different climate (certainly having 80 degree days but the sun still setting at 6pm was quite a transition) opened our minds to various methods of simplifying some of the work we do here. He is growing in virtually beach sand amending with loads of compost and biochar, and with the longer growing season, is able to get multiple crops where we'd only see one. With many perennials starting to produce including 100 plus citrus trees, and a few mangoes and ginger we are excited to see his farm grow and work with him again this summer. He will be back at Freedom Rains Farm in July for another two months of farming with us in his off season of oppressive summer heat. It was very inspiring for us to get away from the farm for our first real family vacation, and see great food growing, and enjoy eating some that we won't see for months here. The drive home brought us from summer through spring right back to the winter we left behind.
With another cold snap the forecast, it looks like it will be a lot of inside and greenhouse work and stoking the fires at night to keep the seedlings happy and warm. Here's hoping that March will go out "like a lamb" as the saying goes so we can get busy!
RSS Feed