Ken has bees here. He is most concerned with having a healthy hive to help with pollination of our crops. Honey bees also make two useful things for us:honey and beeswax Ken has been saving wax to make candles. I got him some molds and wicks a while back. While cleaning, Ken came across his beeswax stash and decided to make candles. He melts the wax in a pan of water …
Ken husked and shelled the dry corn. He has an antique sheller he has in a box. It is loud, but effective! We have two types – a yellow and a blue – black. Here are the empty cobs. Ken may burn them to an ash for a pottery glaze. Then he screens the corn and places in buckets with lids. This is our dry corn for …
The pork was ready at the locker so I organized the freezers. I had enough fruit to make some jam and wine. Here are two blackberry and raspberry combo batches, one batch of raspberry, and a small test batch of black currant jelly. I started wine from the culled fruit – a batch of raspberry, a blackberry, a currant and an elderberry. They are in closed buckets and soon I will move them to gallon …
Greetings from the Garden! This week’s CSA box has winter tomatoes, potatoes, onions, garlic, squash, sweet potatoes, carrots or beets, cabbage, and salad mix Field Notes. Snow and cold. It feels like winter has arrived in earnest. And we are so glad to see the snow. It insulates the ground so the frost doesn’t go down so deep so quickly and preserves the microbial life near the top – otherwise the microbes die or go …
Winter returned this week, and it looks like it is here for quite some time. After a beautiful warm fall that forecast of -11 for a low on next Tuesday sounds pretty cold! We got some snow, and Ken and I would like more. the snow acts as an insulating blanket to slow the frost going deep into the ground. One year we got early snow and the ground really did not …
Greetings from the Garden! This week’s CSA box has salad and braising greens, potatoes, winter tomatoes, sweet potatoes, squash, carrots or beets, onions or leeks, garlic, and herbs Field Notes. Well, We had an honest blast of cold after last harvest. Ken and I covered greens in both garden and mobile high tunnel, Ken got a hoopette over the carrots and beets, moved the chickens to winter quarters – …
Each fall we fill the root cellar for winter sales and our own use. This fall was so warm Ken has been harvesting later than usual and I have just finished getting some items in boxes and some roots buried in sand. Damp towels keep crops moist. Dry storage for squash and onions and garlic is upstairs in a dry cool corner Now I move on to book keeping and seed orders. …
This year we have a bounty of fall greens. One of my favorite ways to serve fall cabbage family – cabbage, kale, kohlrabi tops, tatsoi, Chinese cabbage like Tokyo behana, Brussels sprouts or the top part of the Brussels sprouts plant is to wilt them. I tend to cut any harder stems, and then cut the greens in ribbons I fry up a chopped onion or leek. Then add …
Greetings for the Garden! This week’s CSA box has salad and braising greens, potatoes, squash, sweet potatoes, onions, garlic, carrots or beets, celery, winter tomatoes, and herbs Field Notes. What a season! We have had such a beautiful fall. Ken has finished digging potatoes and is wrapping up field work. The forecast is for cold weather later this week, so we will be getting the squash and onions to inside storage, hoopettes up over some …
Monday evening Ken fed the pigs for the last time. Tuesday morning, Election Day, was the last day for the pigs. Early that morning Chris came and slaughtered on farm. We believe in on farm slaughter as the animals appear to have no stress, and all waste stays on the farm. We choose that time of year as the meat is processed before deer hunting season. Pigs here are a valuable …
