Port Hudson Organics CSA

The Fighting Ducks!

2012-02-23T19:44:00.001-08:00

well...every spring there's a female duck from next door who decides that OUR pond is THE optimal mating and egg-laying place to be. Not that she doesn't have the most awesome pond next door (much more awesome than OUR pond). But this is her choice, and she shows up on schedule. Usually, a couple of male ducks follow her over here, and without much ado, it narrows down to one male duck and they hang around. And you know. Once, there was a lovely egg just deposited right there on the dock. Just there. But this year, there is some competition for her attentions..in the form of two very feisty males. Both of whom want to win this war of the ducks. So there was some commotion the other day. And Will got his camera. Below is a series of photos of The Fighting Ducks. Don't ask who won... We can't tell them apart anyway! Hopefully some decision has been made! Otherwise somebody is going to get hurt!

Tis Spring...

2012-02-21T09:19:00.000-08:00

...and the bees are stirring....so of course it is time for Will to prepare the hives for the little critters. Will rummages in the workshop and pulls out boxes. He wants to let them air out overnight so he can put them on the hives. Then the little bees will have lots of room to begin building up their store of honey. Very nice. He starts to set them up right around the corner of the house - up on the sawhorses. "Why don't you put them over on the levee...a little further from the house?" I ask. Just in case. "Oh, there's not much in the way of honey in these - I'll move them tomorrow" he says.

well. ok. There's something so nice about seeing the boxes all lined up in the spring. So I ran to get the camera.

Well that was yesterday right before dark. This morning, a beautiful Mardi Gras day. Going to be in the 70's and perfect for all of us lucky Louisiana types to be off of work and - if you're not going to get into the partying fray, you can spend the day outside playing in the dirt - my plan exactly. I went out to the patio to plant the flats of petunias. An innocent thing to do, surely. Yes, there were lots of bees around the side of the house, so I couldn't get the rake. I figured I'd just get down and crumble and smooth the dirt I had shoveled and hoed late last evening...no rake really needed. I put in one tray of petunias - oh such a nice morning. And then I heard buzzing. Not a little but a lot of buzzing and I looked up from my work. My god there are a lot of bees, I thought. Then I looked into the carport. uh-oh. Hundreds and hundreds of bees. Can I make it to the door? I darted inside and slammed the door. And called Will at work. um. Will he think I'm just a ninny? probably. But at this rate, I won't even be able to get to my car! He agrees to come home and deal with it, move the boxes somewhere further from the house. I saw him stop his car out by the hives down the road. He knew right away this was a big problem. The bees had found the boxes and reported back to their minions. All the bees were robbing each others hives out there and there was bee craziness by the house - big time. As you can see, I couldn't even step out to take a picture.

Will loaded all of the boxes into the truck.

He asked for a bunch of sheets. He wet them all down, went out to the hives and threw wet sheets over them. Then he came back and threw a sheet over the stack in the truck - then drove the whole mess out to the barn and left the truck out there. He came inside and peeled off his bee suit and I got some baking soda and made a paste for the inevitable stings he had gotten - yes, the bees find their way into the suit no matter what you do. They were not happy with all of this moving around of boxes.

It had calmed down considerably in the carport, but you could still hear quite a bit of buzzing through the screen door. Will walked out to get into his car to go back to work. Then he started high-steppin' it and had to jump into the car. There was a bee on him. I saw him slapping around, but he must have killed it, because he drove away. I'll give it an hour or two. Eventually, the bees will figure out that the boxes are no longer at the house, and they' trickle down to just a few. Then I can get back to enjoying the dirt. I'm a little embarrassed I had to call him, but, as usual, he stepped in and saved the day. He's glad I did call, because the bees were going nuts and it would only have gotten worse later in the day. Who knew how ready they were for spring? Who knew the boxes had such a store of bee-magnet material in them? you certainly couldn't tell that last night. They looked almost 100% clean of anything interesting to a bee. ha. And it wouldn't have made a lick of difference if the boxes had been further from the house. Those little buggers were armed and ready for action. One thing I can tell you - there's never a dull moment around here. Happy Mardi Gras.

This from Will:

Oh, I knew the bees were ready for spring, which is why I was preparing the honey supers to go onto the hives this afternoon. It is a live and learn thing. The supers we extracted last year were initally put back on the hives for two days in order for the bees to clean them up. I stored them over the winter all taped together with moth crystals placed on a board on top of the boxes to keep the wax moths out. When I set them out to "air", I didn't realize how much nectar the bees had deposited into the combs over just a two-day clean-up period last summer. But that's all it took to drive the bees nuts this early spring when there is still a dearth of flowers. But the hives are primed and ready for the spring flow, better this year than any thus far. Here's looking forward to a productive year.

Walk Around in the Afternoon

2012-02-03T22:01:00.000-08:00

So it's February...the 3rd....Spring SO wants to be here, but I don't believe it...but all of the plants do believe it. It makes you smile, but then it makes you a little sad. It has to freeze again...and sometimes the plants and trees do get fooled - all but the pecans, of course. For now, though, it's into the high 70's during the day, and it just feels so good. We took a walk; we both had cameras. I don't have Will's pictures, so you'll have to settle for mine. No real farm activity - except the tomatoes coming up in their flats in the greenhouse. Other than that, just things busting out; jasmine, figs, clover, camellias, may-haws...the biggest. head. of. lettuce. ever. The Mousey-Tongue checks it out - Will hold it up...altogether a beautiful afternoon.

The New Farm Cat!

2012-01-23T14:32:00.000-08:00

ok - we lost our fabulous and much-loved Crazy last year...and we've held off on getting a new cat because the timing has to be just right to introduce a new critter into the fold. But one of our sons asked for a kitty from Santa Claus (he is 27 by the way) so Santa did in fact go to Cat Haven (a rescue center) and get one for him...but apparently Santa could not resist a new orange cat for the farm.

May we introduce you to Pretty Boy! yes, he's cute, and he is surely pretty - but he is hell on wheels with the other cats. He has decided that the house is his, as is the yard and everything else. The fighting will abate at some point, but we know now that he's not running off and no other cat is going to run him off either!

Here he is practicing his 'cat-ness'..he doesn't have the sneaking up thing quite down yet with birds - but he has most definitely honed it for jumping the other cats!

The Farm in January

2012-01-23T14:25:00.000-08:00

Just this and that...things are blooming at an alarming rate...not sure what this is all about, except it is very very early for some things, like the narcissus...and if you pull back the weeds, you can see the mint ready to go...

the camellias, usually burned from frost, are beautiful this month...and here is the state of the greenhouse which currently has strawberries, broccoli, artichokes, and lettuce - pretty nice for winter!

We also added a couple of navel oranges and a pink grapefruit to sit alongside the satsumas and meyer lemons...hope they take inspiration from their giant friends....

As for projects, we're preparing to dig trenches and put in water lines to the bees and the field...but that is the near-future...in the meantime, this is how you drag concrete steps away from the house in order to put railings on them...

that's all there is for this moment...seeds have been ordered, and one new company we used got the seeds to us in NOTHING FLAT! I mean, two days or so...but now we have the precious Shishito Pepper Seeds!
Time to pull out the seed flats and get to work. Really, the tomatoes need to be seeded right this minute. Well, the seeds aren't here yet, but they will be this week, so you know what we'll be doing this weekend.
It seems like we just put the farm to bed for winter and here we are gearing up for spring. I do wonder when and if we'll have more freezes. It doesn't seem possible that the answer is no and never again this season.We shall see.

Sunday Project

2012-01-09T12:49:00.000-08:00

pretty simple - few words are needed!...messy overgrown flowerbed...several freezes so far this winter, so we know there will be no very bad wasp surprises. Some hoeing and weed pulling and help from Will (digging out two little trees) and this one is ready to sit until spring. Of course, the way things are going, it may already BE spring! The Robins came through last week and the yellow ditch weeds that come late March are already doin' their thing in the ditch down the road - I guess we'll have to wait and see. Yes and the paper whites are blooming also. This the 8th of January.

The 'Under The House' Rose

2012-01-03T06:57:00.000-08:00

no kidding...this rosebush lives under the house. We didn't plant it there - maybe somebody threw a piece of it under the house years ago before we moved in. Every year, we spy it behind the camellia bush (which we did plant), crawling up from under there and blooming. We just leave it alone. It's kind of nice. But the other day I was in my studio and looked up at the tops of the windows and what on earth is THAT? I guess it wanted to give one final burst before the winter really set in. You have to admit, this is kind of amazing.

Not Quite Back In The Saddle

2011-12-30T21:45:00.001-08:00

...but feeling like a bad bad blogger of late...

There you go - Christmas come and gone again...my dad used to tell me that when he was a little boy Christmas seemed like it came once every 5 years...but when he got old, it seemed like Christmas came every other day...and now we've lived long enough to know what he was talking about...

We made several farm gifts this year; beeswax candles - tapers and votives - and each person got a special candle holder (or two as the case may be) and I learned something about the times we live in and candle holders...taper holders for the dinner table are pretty hard to come by these days (!)

and, as a re-make of a present from long ago - the 'Make Your Own Stuffed Flounder' kit 0 put together after Will had an especially successful flounder fishing trip - this time it was 'Make Your Own Fried Catfish' kit. Here are the fishies from the pond

and then of course in a bowl ready to package and here, the other kit ingredients ready to assemble: special seasoned corn meal and lemons from our Meyer lemon trees..and a crazy little asian platter to put your fried catfish on I don't really have a picture of everything in one place - we wrapped the platters and had little bait-bucket ice chests for carrying the frozen fish home - so I asked everyone to take the empty ice bucket and put it on the drivers seat of their cars - that way, when getting ready to leave, they could just come up and say - 'I need my catfish!'

So - there's a teeny tiny part of what went on during the holidays...lots of family, lots of different celebrations..a good time was had by all.

Babysitting the Broccoli and Romaine

2011-11-19T19:38:00.000-08:00

So our friend TJ, after showing up this morning to help plant the winter garden (and she had a miserable cold to boot!), agreed to babysit our Romaine and the remaining broccoli plants over the Thanksgiving Holidays....and she sent this picture to let us know how happy they are!
...She also said she is babysitting all of the Classroom Pets for the Copper Mill School during the break - something about a toad, and some other creatures - but she did say that the classroom Hissing Cockroaches had died, and she was glad of that!

2011-10-01T15:09:00.000-07:00

so yes...the hay-guy came and yes the hay is cut. and with it the wildflowers -

but that's the way it goes.

So now we wait for him to show up again and fluff it up...I just love that fork-like attachment that throws the hay into the air to lay it down to let it dry...
and then he bales it and then we figure out how to get it into the barn -this requires some help- before it rains, of course - that's always the trick. We only missed it once; well, actually, the dude was baling IN THE RAIN! and man did we have moldy hay and man was it noxious...
or should I say most dangerous to those of us who are allergic to mold!
...and a postscript!
Fluffing and Baling

(and Fluffing is just what I call it - I'm sure there's a real name for this!)

Squirrel! It's What's For Dinner!

2011-09-24T09:31:00.000-07:00

...just kidding!

I was minding my own business, sitting here trying to post and BLAM! there goes a transformer! That happens a lot around here...no electricity till the DEMCO guys get over here...I wandered to the front of the house and Will says..."It's the transformer by the pond - I saw the squirrel fall out!" This is not a joke.

In other news, we are slowly but surely finishing renovations on the bedroom, and in the meantime the farm has taken a big neglect hit. But I did manage to weed a bed along a fenceline that I so carefully planted with perrenial herbs this spring - not everything made it, but I do have a beautiful row of ox-eyed daisies and a couple of good stands of bergamot and some questionable looking hyssop...but its been so dry (notwithstanding the Tropical Storm Lee) that it was easy to weed.

The moonflowers on the fence behind this bed have been miraculously strong; I don't know why. It's a shame that they always bloom after everything else is over for the season, and I always seem to plant them in a place far away from my daily activities in the early fall-

There's a beautiful wildflower out in the fron t field, and looks like a possibility of many more...if the hay guy continues to not show up to cut the hay! I don't know what it is, but it's huge...I don't think it's from our wildflower planting a couple of years ago, but I've never seen this.

You can see from the picture in the heading of this blog that the satsumas are coming in - it's so hard to leave them on the vine, although if you do, they get sweeter...the bushes are loaded this year, after a no-satsuma year last time around...many meyer lemons also, but those aren't ready until Christmas!...and the cats lay around in the early fall coolness...what a relief for them.

after the storm...

2011-09-04T16:51:00.001-07:00

well, ALMOST after the storm - this tropical system had been here for many days..but the catfish are hungry! We feed them and they fight each other for the food...don't worry - we feed them until they are calm enough.

No Farming of Late

2011-08-22T19:45:00.000-07:00

that's how it goes...farming in a very intense way..then a period of OTHER THINGS!here is my renaissance man

and I have been reminded...my renaissance sons as well (and a daughter in law!)

Ian - Jazz drummer extraordinaire and NPR announcer!Aaron - Whole Foods employee and stand-up comic(!)
and his rockin wife Kendall - nurse and awesome dog lover!

what an amazing family we have...Our daughter and son-in-law and fabulous grandchildren would be pictured as well, but they (sob) live too far away...

and the renovations continue!

It's Banana Spider Time

2011-08-11T06:06:00.000-07:00

yes, this spider is as big as it looks...but that's just the female - the males are very tiny. I saw this one while looking out the bathroom window...they're quite frightening! but not very dangerous. I know only a couple of things about this spider, and none of my observations are scientific...They show up in the late summer or fall - their webs look like they are on LSD -psychotic in structure...and very very big. They will build webs from one tree to another so LOOK OUT if you're walking in the woods. You can't see the web very well, but all of a sudden, there's a giant spider right about face-level - yikes! Once, my mother was in the woods on a riding mower and ran smack into one - she leapt off the mower and the mower kept going - that was 'back in the day' when mowers would run with nobody sitting on them - they don't do that anymore.
I read somewhere that people use them as hurricane predictors - a week before a storm they'll pack up and leave (!) Don't know about that. But I still believe that once the pecan trees leaf out, there won't be another frost!

First Fishing Experience!

2011-08-02T21:34:00.000-07:00

Little Sparrow came to visit with us (her Mimi and Papa) for a few days...she really wanted to catch a fish, although she was worried about the fact that they were also going to be dinner!

First she caught a small perch and gave it to Mousey Tongue, who was VERY appreciative....then she caught this enormous perch...she didn't really want to hold it for the picture...it kept slipping around, and she wasn't keen on grasping it...but Will convinced her to stand with it in her little hands for just long enough!

Geese In The Morning

2011-07-31T19:47:00.000-07:00

Just coming over for a visit

Eggplants and Romas On Vacation!

2011-07-18T06:56:00.000-07:00

After the long CSA season, we did the unthinkable...and went on an actual vacation! To the beach! Will and I went round and round about whether to take along a watermelon....as fabulous as they are, the last thing I wanted was to haul any part of the farm to the beach. period. In the end, I acquiesed; I said sure, a watermelon would probably be a good thing to have with us - as long as it's not a whole truck full of watermelons that we'll be selling on the side of the road! (we have actually DONE this -long ago on one of our 'family visit' trips to texas...never again!). What I didn't really understand was that Will was actually having much bigger visions about vegetables on vacation. Why not bring a big bag of Roma tomatoes? and hey! Why leave those nice eggplants behind? What could I do? Sure - let's bring tham all! hey - they've never been away from home before...they probably would love the beach!
So here are the two lucky eggplants - winners of the 'go to the beach' lottery. First, they relaxed on the sand and took in the scenery

...then spent some time sunning...although their tans were already fabulous

Here is everyone around their little camp fire - no, they did not sing any songs, but a good time was had by all!

After having been part of the organic farm experience, and then enjoying the 'vegetable vacation of a lifetime', the eggplants met their destiny as a very tasty crabmeat-stuffed eggplant dinner.

The romas made it back to Louisiana, but gave themselves to a tomato-basil-garlic pizza last night...that was ok with them, I think - they did have fond memories of their lives in the garden with their garlic and basil friends.

One More Time - With Feeling

2011-07-09T10:38:00.001-07:00

Well...that's it...we're done. One more CSA season is history. And a good season it was. I think we even have all (or most all) of our baskets back! Flower jars too! And for the first time, we didn't need to supplement baskets with what are called 'value-added items', otherwise known as jars of pickles or jelly or such, or (as we all remember) loaves of bread for everyone! We could even have folks go out and forage for a week or two. But it will be a beautiful thing when Will gets the tractor and just mows it all down. Lets hear it for cover crops. Here are baskets ready to be filled for the weekend (a fraction of the total baskets of course)

And one last table lined with tomatoes. Dont' let those little melons fool you - they are also stacked up under the table, and there are two wheelbarrows full on the carport.

Here's Sarah after she graciously went out into the heat to pick just enough hot peppers for a few members

...and here is the ubiquitous Mousey-Tongue, waiting for little Gwen to arrive with this weeks' issue of The Neighborhood News. I am here to tell you, that between her newspaper and cookies she baked, she now has her $100 (one quarter at a time) with which to buy her American Girl doll. You go, Gwen.

After some sleep and the putting away of all vestiges of this year's garden (hats, gloves, scissors and shears, bags, buckets, bins and baskets....and much more), we will call upon our dedicated and fabulous members to help us rip and tear and put the field to sleep for the fall. And they'll come help...many were actually asking about this (!) - hey - how many CSA's have members who will come months before the veggies come in and after its all over...this is what is meant by 'CSA' It's called COMMUNITY Supported Agriculture for a reason; it's not the dropping off of a box and 'here are your veggies for the week YOU figure it out'...ours is actually a community. wow.

Catnip and Figs and Flowers

2011-07-07T06:31:00.000-07:00

Multiple cat pictures...not exactly on purpose, but the cats seem to be keeping close to activities lately. This morning I went out to pick figs; Will seemed anxious about them, but there aren't armloads of them ready to pick. I had bought some netting and Will, with the help of a CSA member, covered the tops of three of the fig trees - then a big bad storm came yesterday and blew the netting right off! Stepping around the trees and getting my boots caught in the net was a little unnerving - mostly because I had visions of bumping a wasp nest up in the darkness of all of those branches - in which case I'd have to run...and you can't do THAT with netting wrapped around your boots, now can you? In the end, I picked what I could reach and what was ready (I did dodge a cardinal at one point). And in my daily hunt for herbs to dry got a basket of catnip...thus the picture of Mousy-Tongue checking out the basket...and zinnias for the kitchen. Got to get in there and trim and stuff the herb dryer with the catnip before it begins to wilt.

Cat In A Basket

2011-07-05T16:43:00.000-07:00

...too small of a basket, but he doesn't seem to care.

Well, it's Week 9...

2011-07-05T07:03:00.000-07:00

last year, there were only 8 weeks of the CSA - this year, we wanted to pull it through nine weeks,,,and we will. But it will be interesting. Sure, everybody gets watermelons for the second week (yea!) Outside of that - yes, there are tomatoes and of COURSE hot peppers...some eggplants, some cucumbers, some field peas...figs, okra...flowers for all. The herb beds are a crazy mess, but that's always the case late in the game. You just have to go through and find what's there. Oh, it looks fairly organized up front in the herb beds, but I've been drying herbs for the past few days and they're flowering like crazy, so getting to the good stuff takes a little doing. Will has promised to take the weedeater to the top of the basil...this may force it to give us another go-round for the late summer. By Monday of next week, Will is going to be out there cutting most things down and doing some plowing...getting ready to cover crop most of the garden for the fall. Like the insane people that we are, we've already been talking about what we're going to plant for the fall. The greenhouses give us all kinds of opportunities - few of which were realized this sumer, as they were slow in coming together in the spring. But now that they're up and functioning, we can plan for greens and early strawberries...and I'm trying to convince Will that artichokes would be so cool..they need to be over-wintered. It seems to get harder and harder to get excited about going out in the garden in the early morning and working until the sweat is just dripping into the dirt before you give it up and come inside..that's my m.o. anyway - the only time I feel eager to work. This morning I was out working a long fencerow of perrennial herbs. I didn't plant any of that in the garden this time, not even in the herb beds...I didn't want it sacrificed to the tiller. So if I keep at it, I'll have permanent stores of bergamot and ox-eyed daisies and hyssop. I don't know aout the feverfew. It dos NOT like the heat. We'll just have to see. In the meantime, it's only Tuesday, and this weekend we'll see all of our CSA members one last time. Sad in a way, but it's been such a good season...it's tempting to think about doing it all over again in the fall...but in order to do that, we'd need about ten hours of sleep a night for the next month!

Surprise!

2011-07-03T06:40:00.000-07:00

We had no idea the melons were ready...Will has been watching them carefully and had calculated that they would not be ready until next week-we didn't promise anyone a watermelon for the 4th of July. He had been watching one big one in particular and he cut it a couple of days ago...but he figured we'd only have a few that were mature enough to take...not nearly enough for all of our members. The raccoons had not been in there taking a chunk out of a melon and moving on to the next. The critters will let you know when the melons are ready - I remember last year - the raccoons preferred the yellow melons over the red - I don't think we got even ONE yellow watermelon - every single one had a big bite taken out of it. This year, Will put out a trap after the coons got into the corn. He snagged one a couple of weeks ago in the trap (of the Have-A-Heart kind of course); usually he drives down to the river and lets the little beast loose;this time...uh...I'll let Will tell it if he's so inclined... a most unfortunate occurrence. Anyway, since that first coon, we haven't had another visitor. And SO, Will goes out and checks things Friday evening and lo and behold - It's Melon Time! So all of the members got two for the 4th, and will have two next weekend to end the CSA season.

Make it Stop! Make it Stop!

2011-06-29T05:51:00.001-07:00

You wouldn't think you'd EVER get tired of a beautiful plump fresh just-picked tomato in the summer. Or, for that matter, a giant mxing bowl of red red strawberries...or a five-gallon glass jar of liquid-gold honey...but you do. We know that about two weeks from now, this summer's tomatoes will be history - but Will picks into the night and I grab and set out tomatoes on every possible surface...and it's late and we haven't had dinner yet and I'm just plain tired. I must work harder on staying in the moment...one moment to the next, it's a pretty nice situation to be in!

Will tells me he keeps a tomato on his desk at work...in order to admire it's many excellent qualities. See? Thats the type of mind-frame I need! But first, let me drive the 80 lbs of tomatoes into Baton Rouge to the natural food store...then I'll think about sitting and admiring a single fruit.

June in the Deep South

2011-06-28T06:13:00.000-07:00

by late afternoon, everybody just gives it up -

too hot to do anything but find the coolest spot

and remain very still until nightfall.

Food Art!

2011-06-27T08:09:00.000-07:00

If you have to wipe off the squash and put up the okra anyway, you might as well have a little fun...this does not compare to Will's famous zucchini art from a few years ago (somewhere on this blog in the way-back machine)...

Somebody's Week 7 Basket

2011-06-26T08:34:00.000-07:00

..let's see...rainbow chard, potatoes, tomatoes, yellow squash, bell peppers...summer savory, lemon basil...cucumbers I think...don't know what else they chose, but I DO know that there are jalepenos in there, because we threw them in everybody's basket! Jalepeno overload...

Photos from Week 7 of the CSA

2011-06-25T08:14:00.001-07:00

...curtesy of CSA member Chris Shows...thanks Chris!

And The Tomatoes

2011-06-19T15:42:00.000-07:00

...just keep on coming...

Famer Will Wears The Blow-up Snake

2011-06-19T09:34:00.001-07:00

no longer needed in the corn, the snake provides a little humor on Saturday morning...

Mousey Tongue doesn't seem to care...the other cats wouldn't go near it!

Ah...but that's farming

2011-06-15T07:47:00.001-07:00

You know...most of the time, you can really count on the corn...as a crop. At least, that's been our experience. Ok, well the first go-round of corn didn't germinate very well, but Will figures that's because he missed the crucial last step in planting, which involves getting the riding mower and running over the rows with it. This is because it packs the seeds down really well, and this makes it hard for those pesky birds to yank the seeds out of the ground once they spy the little green shoots. But that's ok. We had some corn from that patch...and we had another planting that DID germinate well...and it was very beautiful...

and then it got bigger and started to tassel and it still looked very beautiful
and then, when the critters started letting us know it was ready,
Will and Warren Dazzio (CSA member) got out there last Saturday morning and put up
3 Owls and a Big Balloon with EYES on it... ...and a Blow-Up Snake!!!!!!!!!!!!!

The raccoons didn't care about any of that, but all we really hoped for was to keep the birds out. And then, after two months of absolutely NO rain at all...we had a big bad violent rain storm that same Saturday afternoon...almost 2 whole inches of rain! yea! kind of. Because it blew the beautiful corn down. Not all the way into the dirt but very close. So the corn is on the ground. Oh well. It can still be picked, and we've been taking care of that (with help of course). So here is a closeup of the coon party - which takes place at night

But, you know, farming is like that. Win some, lose some...lost some corn but not a lot of it. It just didn't stay beautiful till the bitter end.
We're at that moment in the garden when we say

The Earth Laughs.

Day Of The Woman

2011-06-11T13:40:00.000-07:00

ok. Will is on call, and has to be at a meeting this moring (Saturday). So I'm on my own. And this after a late Friday night of harvesting and CSA activity...and we groggily get up before 6 a.m...but I'm determined to pull it off by myself. Of course, there is no 'by myself', because the whole point of the CSA is COMMUNITY! Lo and Behold...only women showed up this morning. And I mean, only women. Lots of them. Seems that the husbands and/or significant others were 'too tired' to come with, It was a beautiful thing, let me tell you. The women pulled bean plants out of the field, sat around and pulled all of the beans (red beans this time), packed all of the baskets and got it done, by god. By the time Will got back home, it was mostly over. Late in the morning, a couple of guys showed up. I was ready to tease them mercilessly...but each had a baby strapped to his body so what can you say? They deserved a reprieve...because mom was at home enjoyng a minute of alone-ness. A good day. all in all. And the end of Week 5.

It's Bean Pickin' Time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2011-06-06T20:24:00.001-07:00

Horticulture beans first - Red Beans next.

These beans, also known as 'Cranberry Beans' are amazing. They have proven very popular over the years....cook them like Pintos or very very good baked beans, or anything else you'd like to do with them...they're called 'cranberry beans' because the shells are white with little red squiggles on them. Will pulled a wheelbarrow of red beans under the tree for us to pull and then shell (my goodness there were more beans than you'd think). And we had exceptional Red Beans and Rice this evening. Wait till our members taste fresh red beans - it's quite the experience - nothing AT ALL like the dried beans you buy at the grocery store.

Diggin Up Potatoes

2011-06-05T09:17:00.000-07:00

'...and what does that have to do with this picture?' you ask: well, that's easy. Volunteer sunflowers in the potato rows! These CSA members yanked them up and hauled them over to the carport...to cut off the flowers...to give someone sunflowers to take home. And here we have a father and son going through the childrens garden to see what could be picked...in my opinion, dad had more fun!

The Crows Have Found The Corn

2011-06-03T09:39:00.000-07:00

..and the blackbirds have too. This calls for Mr. Owl...we have no idea how effective he'll be this year. One of our members threw a dirt clod at a blackbird feasting on the corn yesterday afternoon. Apparently someone told the birds that the owl is just a big plastic thing.But that's ok - so far. This is the first crop of corn, and it hadn't germinated very well. Will planted field peas in the spaces. It's going to be picked and pulled down tomorrow. The other stand of corn is so so beautiful. Don't know how we'll combat the birds, but that's next weeks problem. In the meantime, tomatoes are spilling out of the field and greenhouse and into the carport (and of course the kitchen). The tomatoes don't exactly jump and roll towards the house, but I wish they could. One of the more ominous jobs is braving the greenhouse and picking the tomatoes. The rows are close together and the first tomatoes are very low to the ground. And it is a million degrees in there. So yesterday morning I got out there at 6:30 to tackle it. In addition, a 5 gallon bucket of tomatoes weighs - I don't know - maybe 70 lbs. Maybe I'm wrong there, but I''m not that far off. If I start at the back, I wind up pushing the bucket in front of me as I kind of crawl forward. The bucket is full before I reach the front. Haul it out, get another. Not a pleasant task, sad to say. Picking tomatoes in the field will be easier.

...and let us not forget it itty bitty baby watermelons! Cute cute. I suppose if we're going to be in the middle of the worst drought ever, we may as well enjoy the fact that (for now) there are no weeds!

Tomorrow (well, starting tonight, actually) we are at WEEK 4 of the CSA season...maybe I'll figure out how to negotiate all of the members and baskets and work going on and take a few pictures.

Will's Monday Lunch

2011-05-23T07:52:00.001-07:00

2nd CSA Weekend...

2011-05-21T10:19:00.000-07:00

So Friday comes, and HALF of our member familes show up in the evening to help with the harvest! This is great, because they are doing the lion's share of the hard stuff...and they can go home on Friday with their baskets. This is working well. I am not kidding you when I say these fine folks picked 100 POUNDS of green beans!...and this off of the same two rows that gave us 60 lbs last week! AND they weighed and bagged all of them. They also dug enough carrots for the 40 families (and they washed and bundled them too). While all of this was happening, other members were staking and tying the zinnia rows - a precaution before they blow down in a storm we're probably never going to get at this point). Below is a very busy girl...mom has her hands full- Ah yes - I do remember the chasing of small children.

Here are the carrots - quite nice. Cover them with a wet tablecloth

and they'll overnight just fine.
The Hall family (5 beautiful kids) cut and bunch the arugula.

Here is the Saturday morning carport. It was just as busy last night...lots of organized packing of baskets and checking of lists.

And here is a random shot of some of the packed baskets,

with Weekly Selection Sheets sticking out.

My goodness but we're tired. Last night, after all was over for the evening (Will and Rich Beam picked squash in the dark) I brought out a pitcher of Sangria and Will and I sat in the galvanized livestock tub we have in the yard freshly filled with cold water) and we watched the lightening bugs. Seemed like we didn't sleep for 5 minutes before we were up and at it again. But it's what we do. And we love it. We have the most fabulous group of CSA members this year. They all 'get it'...and we're enjoyng their company. Two weeks down - six to go - maybe seven. Lots of good food all over the place.

What month is it Anyway?

2011-05-19T12:01:00.001-07:00

June-like hot in late March; cold front in late May (nights in the 40s) and no rain, no rain, no rain. So we've been watering non-stop...two kinds of sprinklers, two kinds of drip hoses and flooding the field with the pond water. Distressing, but if we had a good thunderstorm things would be very raggedy out there, so you just don't know what to wish for.

And the bell peppers have TERRIBLE aphid problems and Will has been doing everything there is to be done, but the problem is not solved - we shall see. And the basil on one side of the field is dying - some kind of bacterial rot thing. And the first planting of cucumbers, after two weeks of good production - well, those are dying too. But it's strange - they're dying on the tops. who knows. Every year there are some things that fail - but it's still heartbreaking. All is not bad, though,. The garden as a whole looks pretty fabulous. You have to be very intimate with the garden to see the problems and worry about them. There is another planting of cucumbers and of basil, both of which look great so we'll cross our fingers on both. Maybe even plant an extra row of bell peppers, even though they won't be our own seedlings. Here are some random garden photos to keep you going...just this and that from here and there.

Dinner

2011-05-09T17:12:00.001-07:00

Beets, beet greens and chard, fried zucchini, cucumbers...yes.

The Weekend

2011-05-01T15:31:00.000-07:00

....very productive. Many things done. Will always gets so worried as the week goes by-tasks seem to multiply and this is a very hard time of the season. Then the weekend comes, our members show up to help and the list is back to a reasonable size - not nearly so scary. We've gotten almost everything in the ground, whether it be seed or plants we've started. Just as the flats at the greenhouse dwindle in number, it's time to start more yellow squash, more zucchini, more cucumbers...because what's out there is just the first go-round. So it never looks like we'll be at the point of no flats with seedlings in them - don't know if that's good or bad. And my word it has gotten hot out there. One of the many big deals this weekend was the mulching and staking of the tomatoes that are NOT in the greenhouse.and maybe my sense of time through the morning is skewed I don't know, but it seemed like they got this done in about 40 minutes...which is very fast work! And a huge relief, I don't mind saying. In addition, the field peas were planted, and two more rows of green beans; the little rainbow chard plants put in among their big brothers and sisters The herb beds got some attention in the weeding department, and Will is out there now fertilizing and hilling up the corn. A word about fertilizer. All of the organic choices are pretty darn stinky. I don't know which is worse; crab meal, chicken stuff, or fish emulsion. Because this time it's fish emulsion (pretty much ground up and liquidized fish) I vote for that. I dont remember how many gallons of the stuff Will bought but it was a LOT. He rigged up this system whereby he puts (I think) about 5 gallons in a big 55-gallon tank, then fills it up the rest of the way with water. Then he attached it to a frame on the back of the ancient Farmall tractor and fits plastic piping to it - with a valve you can turn on and off. The pipe has holes dilled exactly where the rows of plants are. So he cranks the whole mess up and gets positioned and I have to get in there and open the valve. Thank goodness it didn't splurt all over me. It's pretty ingenious - but it still smells to high heaven.
and VERY IMPORTANTLY!...the little watermelon plants have been awaiting their new home! One of our new members is a couple who I swear have been here every single weekend for many many weeks! and they showed up today, Sunday...and because of that, the watermelon rows were lined with hoses (for watering) and laid with black plastic! do i get a halelujah!?

no, we didn't get the plants in this evening but we will tomorrow - that is small potatoes compared to preparing the rows...a VERY big deal. Thank you and you know who you are!

And now for some flowering plants; potatoes! :garlic

div align="center">borage (see the bee?)eggplant
and I leave you with the first tomatoes of the season...

No! Wait!

2011-04-25T20:19:00.000-07:00

I spent the whole morning out in the garden...but I didn't go to the BACK of the garden...I had a mission and it was located in the front...you can't see EVERYTHING!..Will comes out this evening and he says..."get a long sleeved shirt and some scissors - I'll get some buckets" Well, I know very well what that means. It means cutting squash! But it hasn't rained in the longest time, and the squash were setting lots of babies but they aren't REALLY growing fast - but that was yesterday, wasn't it? Half an hour later, I had a bucket (of the 5 gallon kind) of yellow squash and a bucket of zucchini. The CSA doesn't start for another two weeks! I kept thinking - 'stop! stop! It's not time!...but the squash says HAHAHA.

I told Will "We're having Spinach and Feta Cheese Pizza tonight" He says...'We don't have enough spinach" and I think... oh yes we do.

Things Happen So Fast

2011-04-20T12:11:00.001-07:00

One minute there's just a whole field of dirt....empty greenhouse frames and mulched herb beds covered in black plastic. You look at it all and think...can we do this again? It seems like so much - to start from nothing every year and turn it into something big and alive and beautiful. Then you turn over the dirt and till and plow and start seed flats and transplant little seedlings into peat pots and little bit by little bit - it gets done...some pictures from this morning.

dill

flowering tomatoes

cilantro

beets

...and we were so anxious back in January and February - we planted WAY too many tomatoes. Before we knew it, we had all we could possibly put in the ground and many more. We put up a little sign..Tomatoes For Sale. I've sold 60 plants since yesterday. What were we thinking?Today it is around 90 degrees. This not only means that it is hot...it also means you have to go out in the heat and drag hoses around and water stuff. No rain lately. That's farming, though.

Work Work Work

2011-04-09T15:56:00.001-07:00

Plant Plant Plant...

Here's Hannah

you can see what an excellent job she is doing...

Will calls her 'The Planting Machine'

Meanwhile, there are csa members all over the place doing the hard work of getting ready for the season: re-planting the spinach and covering it up; planting the little okra plants in amongst the garlic; we had to do this because we're flat out of room. But it ought to work - the only little problematic thing will be pulling up the garlic when the time comes and not puling up the okra along with it! setting out the teeny tiny pak choi, and also the rainbow chard;

some are too young to really help, but they're out in the sun in the morning, and that's good. Little Jackson wasn't so sure about all of this at first, but he got with the programWhen it's time to go, everybody gets fresh cut mint, a mint plant if they want one, and a bundle of green onions - these are the things that say 'ready or not, it's time'. Some folks carry their loot to the car, and others just stuff it into their purse! all in all, a wonderful morning. This CSA thing is the smartest thing we've ever done. SUCH nice people! And many of them spend the week in an office, and the opportunity to come out to a garden and listen to the birds and get worn out with this kind of work gives them renewed energy to meet the work week once again. I would say it's a 'win, win' if that weren't the corniest thing one could say.

Will Says..."I have a project for you!"

2011-04-08T20:57:00.000-07:00

you see, that's the problem with farming...endless projects. And that's ok. Unless the other guy has a project that involves not him, but you!...Turns out it was relatively harmless - and well-meaning. He was going to go on a MOWING EXTRAVAGANZA. Translated, this means 'we got the mower back from the shop again, and I'm going to mow everything in sight before the mower breaks!'

He wanted me to go out and cut a boatload of mint, because it is so beautiful and so ready to harvest (early as it is!) and he didn't want to blow grass all up in it before I got a basketful to dry...and might I add, he completely re-worked the herb dryer this winter so it would be ready for just such an occassion...so who can argue with all of that?

Out I went...he thought i should use a knife, but I knew that scissors would do the trick just fine/

A giant laundry basket full of mint later - you would not know that I had even touched it. The mint beds look exactly like they did before - but the dryer is running and the whole house smells like mint...a first harvest of the year...very nice.

And so the carrots are weeded...

2011-04-02T18:49:00.000-07:00

and the kids were well-behaved and adorable... you can always spot a Future Babysitter of America

Here's What Is Going On In The Background

2011-04-01T17:35:00.000-07:00

...a message to our 2011 CSA Members this morning:

Port Hudon Organics "Early Bird Special"!

Greetings Members: We are happy to announce that, despite the heavy rains and quarter-sized hail of this past Tuesday, the garden is relatively unscathed. A few small holes in the greenhouse plastic and at least one tomato plant that took a direct hit are among the casualties - it could have been much worse. The larger problem is the packed soil and muddy conditions, which pretty much eliminates field work this weekend. This is where the greenhouse comes in. Unlike the fields, the covered greenhouse remains pretty dry, and the plants are in great shape, as are the weeds.

(left to right: carrots / eggplants / hot peppers / potatoes)

Of particular annoyance is the strong weed growth among the baby carrots. We have been doing hoe work around the edges, but there is just no getting around the tedious, but low energy work of sitting on your butt pulling weeds out from among the baby carrots, taking care to avoid pulling up what will become a bounty or orange goodness in May.

Now, the greenhouse is pretty much unbearably hot by 9:30 a.m., so we are offering an

early morning mingling of rustic farm work and fine French dining - our "Early Bird Special". For any who would like to come out this Saturday for a brief stint of delicate weeding in the 8:00-9:30 a.m. time frame, we will provide a light brinch of Mimosas, Croissants, and fruit - on the carport immediately after. You can sit in the shade and listen to the fountain and all of the birds while sipping your champagne beverage and nibbling on pastry and making small talk with your fellow members. The carrots will love you for it.

If this sounds good to you, please come out Saturday morning as early as you can make it. And remember to bring something either to sit on in the greenhouse, or to cover your seat in the car because there will be dust.

Here's hoping you can join us.

Thais and Will Perkins

Port Hudson Organics

I've Been a Very Bad Blogger Of Late

2011-03-30T10:07:00.000-07:00

We've just been SO SO busy...If I could publish or Cut and Paste our GARDEN PLAN that shows the layout and everything that's been planted so far, I would...but i can't figure out how to cut and paste a Word document here...sorry. I've been toying with the idea if using one of the newer templates, but worry that I'll lose everything so far is I start to tamper with things...

I'd say 3/4 of the planting is done. And last night we had Hail! Big Hail! Other than knocking a couple of holes in the little greenhouse where seedlings are housed, there doesn't seem to be much damage. The little beets are flat - but we know they'll spring back up. I haven't had the nerve to go look at the tiny herbs set out last weekend. I'll do that in a while.

We have our quota of 40 member families for the CSA this season - and more knocking at the door. I wish we could just let everyone in who wants in, but we need to draw the line at what we know (or hope) we can do. There's been a lot of hands helping the past couple of weekends, and this is why we're a little ahead of the game.

In the meantime, I'll try to be better about pictures and blogging and such.

Here is the new sign (!)

It's SPRING! It's SPRING!!!!!

2011-03-05T12:00:00.000-08:00

We have a few pictures of Spring...we're busy busy busy...flats in the greenhouse and more , many more you cannot see in this picture

and many more flats to be planted still...

I've been having fun planting flats of things I haven't tried before...Korean Hyssop; Lemon Catnip...and reseeding things that had to be plowed under because they were in the field (very sad); Wild Bergamot, Feverfew, Ox-Eyed Daisies, Blue Hyssop.

spent a moment weeding the mint beds again - I am trying to stay on top of it this year (this is before the weeding!) The rosemary is blooming... The yellow jasmine is crazy beautiful The Lady Banksia rose is busting a move...and of course the redbuds are red-budding

That's all I have time for now ...Will just bought I-Don't-Know-What at Whole Food so I have to go check it out...although I know that 20lbs of Yukon Gold Potatoes was one item...because we have to plant organic everything... and you can imagine the shipping on potatoes - so this is another solution to that. We already have one row up in the greenhouse and another one in the field he planted yesterday,. Hope our folks love potatoes. More later.

Every Day That Passes is a Day Closer To Spring

2011-02-11T13:57:00.001-08:00

Frozen berries is all we have right now...but they're ours and that's a good thing. We decided not to plant strawberries this year, and we'll be moving the blackberry vines around in the early spring - so we won't have either of them this time around. But you can't have everything every year. right?

It's been a very cold and very wet winter. Many mornings of Will's 'ice happenings', formed when he puts the hose up in the bushes to drip it overnight... But there are flats in the new greenhouse, warmed with a heater and heat mats under the tomatoes and peppers...which are now UP! YEA! Go plants Go! And the green onions in the field will make you think it is spring, even though it's not.
bring it on

It's THAT time!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

2011-01-29T15:37:00.001-08:00

yes yes yes...time to plant. Well, time to plant seeds in seed flats, that is. Which brings the question...once we do this, where will we set all of the flats?!

It's the age old question - because the seeds need warmth...and the regular (tiny) greenhouse is FULL OF PLANTS! And its only January, so we can't pull the plants out yet...
although we're pushing deadlines right and left, Will designed a new 'cold frame' for our flats...now, usually this kind of getup is just a lean-to up against the house or some such...close to the ground and only as big as you need at the moment...well. But no...this is what is happening (and I must say it is a beautiful sight) AND - we won't have to haul flats from the house to the garden.
pretty nice, no? Things feel hurried-the birds are back in town (well, the ones that left in the first place)' the cover crop in the garden is busting a move, as are all of the weeds...we can call it winter if we want, but nature does things in her own time, and we don't want to get caught behind the curve. It's going to be a big year around here...

MouseyTongue Takes Matters into His Own Hands – Er, Paws

2010-12-16T16:41:00.000-08:00

It's not unusual to find little "gifts" on our doormat in the morning or late afternoon, left by our wildest cat MouseyTongue. In fact, it was the regular presence of these sometimes whole, but usually parts, of various rodents, amphibians, and reptiles that caused us to change his name from Mao Tse-tung to his current moniker. When parts show up regularly, you remember to look before you step. When the pace slows - and you forget - you get to play the game of "what was that I stepped on/in?" Then I get to examine the little multi-colored lumps of guts and gristle and use my Comparative Biology 101 skill set to try to identify the organism that they came from before I take the whole mat to the dock and dump the parts. Always me, because Thais won't go near it - and this is one of the truly masculine jobs at the farm with no contest. Usually it is mouse or frog parts. Sometimes only a hide. On occasion, a detached head sitting upright, eyes unblinking like something out of a Godfather movie.

Mousey is the cat we used to fish for on a regular basis. He likes his fish whole and flipping. Mercifully, he usually eats the small bream (his favorite) from the head down. If you go anywhere near the pond when he is in sight, he bolts for the dock, singing his desire for sushi. We haven't been fishing in a while... Now, how he managed to get this one-pound bass out of the pond and to the doorstep I can only guess. And my guess is that either the fish launched himself out of the pond while chasing prey or, more likely, a blue heron speared it but the fish was too large to manage and the cat took over. I would like to believe that the cat pulled it out by himself - and the mental picture is hilarious - but I don't think he could manage that. Anyway, Mousey was very smug this morning as I stepped out, and wasn't at all interested in his dry food.

And This Is Late November

2010-11-23T12:39:00.001-08:00

I cannot believe we've been this lucky....we transplanted these from the field, where a gazillion zinnias were sprouting - but Will had to plow. They've had the chance to completely do their thing this time; thought I'd grab the images while I could...maybe fill the whole house with zinnias for Thanksgiving (thanks for the idea, Erbel!)

New Endeavors

2010-11-15T10:55:00.001-08:00

Here We Go!!!!!!!!!!

...Work So Far On The Greenhouses

Over The Past Two Weeks!!

Many many thanks to the CSA Members who came out to help.

No end-pieces yet - no coverings yet

but I think this was the hardest part

and now it's raining...so we got this done just in the nick of time!

Early November Farm Update

2010-11-06T08:29:00.000-07:00

Well...it is finally and definitely fall...leaves on the ground, little piles of dead branches etc. raked up. The zinnias we transplanted from the field to the fencerow gave a mighty spurt of flowers before our first frost, which was last night; we covered them with black plastic, and although they are a little worse for wear, they'll go a while longer. Will traveled down to Cameron, La. (for those who don't know, it's south of Lake Charles, kind of almost in the Gulf - and there's very little left down there since the hurricanes). He picked up a ton of...well...it is basically fish gut fertilizer - it's in a big plastic 'tote' on the back of the truck...because getting it OFF of the truck is a problem for now. But Will cannot go anywhere near a body of water without trying to catch fish - because that's just the way he is. Luckily, there was another dude hanging around by the edge of the water, and this guy had some bait with him - and he was willing to share. Will caught his limit of redfish in no time at all! very nice.

So that was Tuesday.

We spent most of yesterday (into the night) hauling potted plants hither and yon; first frost of the season has us scurrying. You bring what you can inside, putting plants in every possible spot by a window. Then you cram everything you can into the tiny greenhouse (which has to be cleaned out first) and then you STILL have stuff that won't fit in either place so you just drag it into the pool room and line em up. Hopefully you find time the next day to haul them back outside. It's all quite a job. I had no idea those avocado plants were taller than the ceiling in our front room - and that is VERY tall. I did most of it, because Will was out in the field putting black plastic on two long rows (greenhouse prep). Covering rows with plastic is not a one-man job, but it can be done. I felt kind of guilty not being out there with him, but there was just too much to do before dark. And it all got done.

Also, this week, we planted the garlic. The way that happened is like this: Will comes in from work and says...'you can come out and help plant the garlic, or you can desert me in my hour of need!' I suppose this doesn't leave room for much decision making on my part! Now those rows have to be mulched. But we can't do everything! At least not in one day. Now that I look back, I guess it was a pretty busy week.

And now it is Saturday, and Day One of the great High Tunnel Construction Effort.
We have your pieces and parts. We have the field preparation done (lots of dirt moving and row making). At some point (and I can't even remember which day it was), Will unloaded this GIANT piece of felt he got from Georgia Pacific. It was so heavy that the two of us could not even spread it out flat. But we did the best we could. The idea was to get on your hands and knees (that would be me) and, using one of those handy-dandy little razor knives, work your way backwards and cut a STRAIGHT line all the way down until you have a 42" strip about 80 feet long. Geez. I did that twice. That was all I had in me. Then it rained. and the felt is still there and i need to do at least two more. Maybe I'll get out there and give it a try. don't know how wet it will be...nasty job. The point is to have long strips to lay between the rows inthe greenhouses to cut down on weeds. A laudable concept - difficult to bring to fruition, but a lot of what we do is like that.

So we put out 'the call' to start greenhouse construction. Thankfully, somebody just showed up. This should take a couple of weeks, but it will move us in a new direction here on our little farm. Winter greens, planting peppers and tomatoes in January (more or less). Much more about all that later, I'm sure. I should quit writing and get out there and see what I can do to help.

Just Checking in...

2010-10-11T09:12:00.000-07:00

...and now it is October! My oh my time does fly doesn't it? The hay is in - quite a beautiful lot I must say. Back in the summer, we were so excited to have the red clover hay. We assumed it would be soft and nice. not. It was scratchy and sticky sticky sticky! Live and learn. This time, there wa no special planting...just your regular mowing and baling of the grasses that live in this field. The hay is very, very nice. In addition, we finally got our order of honey jars. That took until mid-September. So we've been slowly decanting the honey, and have it for sale. A we all know, if you leave honey sitting around for any time at all, it begins to crystallize. We had ours in 5-galon buckets. Most people store it this way. But the honey at the bottom of each bucket had begun to set. So we had to figure out how to warm it up. Once you warm it, it achiees it's beautiful fluid state again, and all is well. No harm done. But we were concerned about heating up the plastic buckets. We didn't want to take a chance and accidentally overheat it, so placing them in the crawfish boiler outside, in the end, didn't seemlike a good idea. Will did a lilttle research and checking around, and in the end built this groovy box and hung a lightbulb in it. Voila!We are awaiting our 'government greenhouses' - ordered and now shipped. Two high tunnels that we will put up in the very near future. We'll be having a 'Greenhouse Raising' weekend. Much more on that later, I'm sure.

in the meantime, the field is plowed, it won't ever rain again, seems like, and the garden is resting.

Time To Rest

2010-08-03T07:05:00.000-07:00

...you would think.

The 2010 CSA season was a resounding success - the final Saturday was the second week in July. Time to sit back and catch your breath. Never. Time instead to take care of those things that we had no time for during the season. Honey harvesting was this past Saturday. Thanks to CSA members once again - they came, they worked, they got us through the day - and they stayed for the long haul. What would we do without them? Will and I would be slowly taking care of this task and it would have taken us many days, many days. More than four hours in the kitchen...moving bee boxes around, uncapping, spinning, straining...30 gallons of honey later, the bees now have their (empty) boxes back. They seem to be settled in - although I must say, they were NOT happy with the disruption!

Then there is the mowing. Why do we have a drought all through the growing season, then have all the rain you could ever want once it really doesn't matter anymore? who knows - but the pond does need to be re-filled - I guess so that next year we can pump from it again during the growing season. We mow. It rains. We mow again. And so on.

And of course the garden itself. As always, a complete mess in August. It looks like the aftermath of a big big party. No, it looks like an abandoned piece of property. Very intimidating. Our nephew was here for a week - and got out there, dismantled the entire cucumber fence (a chore of many parts) - then pulled up ALL of the stakes. Fabulous. Now for the plastic. Melons and berries and such on black plastic - this is a wonderful thing for keeping down weeds. But getting in there and pulling it up is quite the project. And nothing can be plowed until this is done. The herb beds - also a mess. Well, we'll deal with all of this a little at a time. In a month or so, the field will be clean and then cover-cropped for the fall. And the cycle begins again.

In the meantime, we can remember the garden...even the Kitty Witty looks a little wistful.

butterfly moth on a spider lily

2010-07-16T11:01:00.000-07:00

this guy let me get very close...he was, after all, busy.

Bailey Needs A Home!

2010-07-14T05:24:00.001-07:00

Yvonne works for a local vet here in Zachary...and when an animal is in need of a home, she always works to make sure that happens; Meet Bailey - a sweet, sweet dog. Abandoned, and headed for the pound if a home cannot be found. Yvonne has taken Bailey for a week or so to prevent her from this fate, and is trying to find a loving owner. Please let us know if you can help!

from Yvonne:

Quiet

Clean

Sweet

2 year-old

mixed breed female

calm, loving stray

has had vaccinations

needs spaying

good with other dogs and cats

call Yvonne:

(225) 324-3756

A First...

2010-07-02T20:17:00.001-07:00

Watermelons actually ready for the 4th of July!

We Have Officially Moved On...

2010-06-29T08:21:00.001-07:00

..It is now time for the late-season vegetables to make their appearance...
The garden is not as pretty - actually the garden looks kind of terrible(!) but only if you take a wide view...corn and beans uprooted and mowed down...peppers kind of fallen over from a storm or two: but up close, there is as much beauty as before...
The garlic is just about cured...enough to use anyway. although still a little sharp

The basil REALLY needs to be trimmed, but to do the job correctly would give you a garbage can full of basil, and that's too much to fool with all at one time. I had to fight the bees for this, even: It's the time of year when you have baskets and wheelbarrows and boxes and bins of vegetables kind of everywhere...not to mention all over the kitchen(!)
-

tonight's menu:

stewed okra and tomatoes

purple hull peas

fried green tomatoes

icebox melon

Didn't get around to pictures of the eggplants and peppers this morning: purple hull peas was the goal - enough for dinner. Calling on our CSA members to come on over and pick before the rains come. T.S.Alex should give us plenty of rain - it will mess up the garden, but the garden is halfway messed up already - and it will put water back into the pond, which is a good thing...

It Did Rain

2010-06-23T13:07:00.000-07:00

...and I have proof: this is for Will, cooped up in his office today. We haven't had rain in many weeks, and then only a little. So, Will, this is for you.

Oh Wait!!

This one has thunder!

The Transitional Garden

2010-06-23T07:40:00.001-07:00

It's so easy in the spring to take pictures of the developing garden...pictures that show order and beauty and all that is (at least for a little while) 'under control'. Before the weeds, before the drought, before the maturaton of anything planted for this season. I'm always amazed at the rapidity of change...so here we are, third week of June. Here are some 'then and now' scenes: Sunflowers: first they look up - then they hang their heads...heads of sunflower seeds will be on our CSA list this week for our families... (The sunflowers are beautiful in both stages)
First there was corn: ...and now there's not!
(takes a little getting used to, all this change)
First there was garlic, and in their place we now have field peas Once, you could walk through the flowers, and now you certainly can NOT!
This is just a taste of what's happening out in the garden - some things are just now coming into their own in the heat (eggplants, peppers...)

it's a transfomation - a little sad, but life is change, right?

"All Your Tomatos Are Belong To Me"

2010-06-20T19:56:00.001-07:00

Bird and Cat

2010-06-17T06:17:00.000-07:00

...It's that time of the year

the baby mockingbirds are hatching out

and the parents are all about terrorizing the cats!

look closely...that cat can't even figure out where the bird is....

Hard Work and Fun on a Saturday Morning

2010-06-14T07:15:00.000-07:00

...but lets begin with Friday, shall we? We all know we will remember this year as the Amazing June Heat year - let us not think about August, ok? On Friday evening, csa members began to show up around 6 to help pull red beans off of the plants...a LOT of people showed up! This picture does not show the entire group, which expanded as time went on - and when we ran out of plants, we had to truck on out there and pull more - because Will was busy back there in the potatoes. It was beYOND hot. No breeze stirring; just sitting there in a chair, and sweat pouring off of you..and nobody complained. Beans were pulled and piled into carts, then boxes...ready for the Saturday baskets.

We had an amazing number of members come out to lend a hand on Saturday morning...much work to be done. Digging of the potatoes, picking up, hauling, sorting; a truly grimy task!

There was the second round of sweet corn...some people just like to pull the corn...when it was all said and done, we (for once) had extra corn - AND - it's not exactly 'all said and done' - there's still corn out there!

Then there was 'the weighing of the beans'...accomplished by the boys - who do love scales...3 lb bags...ready to go

Always - I ask the first two women who show up to be the flower-gatherers. Although it is truly beautiful out there in the zinnias, one must cut and trim each and every bouquet, then get it back to the packing area and put into a mason jar of water - this makes for many trips...and it is getting hotter by the minute...but the results - oh my.

And then there are the kids - the ones too young to work really enjoy meeting each other and playing all morning...I mean, how cute is this?.This morning (monday), I picked (or cut, rather) the cucumbers...beginnings of week 4 ...

The Life Of Garlic

2010-06-07T10:26:00.000-07:00

These pictures begin last November, when garlic must be set into the ground. I want you to know that any CSA members you see working in these pictures were here to help long after the 09 season was over, and long before this season began. We just put out the call, and they showed up...amazing bunch of people, I tell you.

Here is the ground prepared for planting:

Then, we have the buckets of garlic 'toes', bought from the Glasers in New Roads (who sell at the BR Farmer's Market), and our csa friends setting out each one on these three 75-ft rows:

last, (but certainly not least- because it's a tough job) is the laying of hay over all of it, so the garlic can sprout and stay bedded down and weed-free until late spring

The garlic blooms about the time the strawberries play out (late May or so), and is beautiful, if a little strange looking to some:

And, as a grand finale, one of the dads from our csa families stayed and worked with Will to pull all of it, stack it in the barn for drying, and weed the rows, getting them ready for another planting (field peas).

I think this is beautiful, don't you?

And there you have it - start to finish. It takes many months, but such is the life of some things that must be over-wintered. And it's the only way to get fresh garlic (!)

Daniel - Future Beekeeper!

2010-06-06T09:09:00.000-07:00

well, it was time to rob the beehives, and Daniel (from one of our CSA member families) had decided he wanted to get in there and help (!) Mom (Barbara) was SO supportive!...looked around for a smaller bee suit to buy...in the end, Will thought that a couple of shirts and some boots and an extra hood and gloves he had - well, they could make do. First of all, you won't catch me within 100 feet of the beehives. I love bees, but hundreds of thousands of bees?...

So here we are with the suiting up of Daniel: Mom makes sure there's LOTS of duct tape around that hood!Then we have the gloves (which came up to Daniel's shoulders, but that was a good thing...)

And finally, after every potential place where a bee could crawl in and sting Daniel was covered and taped (!), he's ready to go: And he went up the road to meet up with Will and the truck.
He helped move the boxes around, check in on the bees, and remove 4 boxes filled with honey to bring back to the house. Will was glad to have Daniel around for the honey-getting, and it's always cool when a young person shows such interest in the workings of the farm. Thanks, Daniel, for your help!

Although I don't have pictures of the actual honey-spinning operation, Daniel and his family were there, as was another member family.

..A picture of some of the results of our beekeepers' efforts...from this Saturday's CSA acticities:

I Don't Know What's Going On Around Here...

2010-06-03T13:29:00.001-07:00

...But THIS guy was on the carport when I went out to do some clean-up. The fun never ends. This frog is HUGE!

OK: a little perspective is in order, I believe.

Aaaccck! - I'ts Walter the Wedding Snake!

2010-06-02T07:23:00.000-07:00

I am petrified of snakes
and I know that's rediculous - because some are ok
but what's this guy doing up in this rosebush anyway?
I must say, I do appreciate him letting me know he's here...we call him Walter the Wedding Snake because last year, right before our son's wedding, this snake (or one very much like him) was stalking the bride-to-be as she helped prepare the flower beds.

'Would you Mind Picking The Cucumbers?'

2010-06-01T07:08:00.000-07:00

'Oh...no problem!...sure!'

True, everything in the garden is beautiful in the early morning. Last Thursday, I picked 68 cucumbers...plenty enough for our CSA members for Saturday. Of course, not everyone chose cucumbers, so there are still some lurking in a bin in the outside cooler.

Even so, no vegetable waits for man; you either go out there and take care of business, or you have giant useless cucumbers, and vines that are putting too much energy into perpetuating giant useless cucumbers. All I can say is...when picking anything...there's kind of a rule. Don't look down toward the end of the row!

It's WAY too daunting! Just keep to the chore at hand and eventually you'll get to the end. We have this plastic netting pulled along this fence. It has tiny little squares. I have 2 distinct cucumber-picking problems. (1) those pesky cukes who chose to grow THROUGH the netting - so half is on one side and half on the other - and the only way to get them out is to cut a hole in the fence. Then, of course, you have this weird cucumber cinched in the middle...but it has to come out (see giant useless cucumber statement above). (2) I only pick on one side of the fence, because on the other side are 10-foot tall sunflowers and there's not enough room in there for a person. Well, if you squeeze in there you could do it I guess, but as we all know, the underside of cucumber AND sunflower leaves are sticky and will scrape you! SO; my little snips, although pointed, cannot reach those growing on the backside of the fence. Again, I have to actually cut a square of fencing out to get through and cut the darn thing. Man, I sound like a whiner...but that's not it. I'm just giving you the lowdown on picking massive numbers of cucumbers. You do have to be pretty careful. As with other vegetables that continue to produce throughout the season, you don't want to damage the plants, so you have to work slowly and show some respect for the vines....

Now on to the new garden cart. Yes, we love it - it's big and black and rolls nicely and is light. I pulled it up one of the old strawberry rows as I picked. I thought I'd avoid the 'dragging of the 5-gallon bucket.' This was a good idea, conceptually. Toward the end of the row, I was wondering how on earth i was going to pull that cart with all those cucumbers in it out of the garden and on to the house. I want to say this about that: I don't care how cool your new garden cart is. NOTHING is light and easy to pull when you've got maybe 80 lbs of ANYTHING in it. I'm glad nobody else was here. I got that thing to the carport, but it was one baby step at a time! Oh, and P.S. guess what's in everybody's basket this Saturday?

The View From Here

2010-05-28T08:19:00.000-07:00

Heading into week 1 of the CSA...

a week early this time

(and the way Will wanted things to work out...last week of May to 3rd week of July)

...all the planning in the world will not force vegetables to do what you'd like them to do. For the most part, everything is going according to Will's Super-Geek-Grid. Dates to plant, days to maturity, length of rows - calculated lbs of produce...quite an impressive excel spreadsheet, and for the most part right on the money...but the first planting of corn had other ideas...ands is ready right this minute!
Actually, We've been picking a bucket of yellow squash every day for a week...let me be clear about this; WILL has been picking a bucket of squash every day. I did want to get some squash flowers this morning to put in the fridge. Stuffed Squash Blossoms, yum. However, even at 7:30 in the morning, the bees were up and busy and every flower must have had 5 or 6 bees in it...and they did NOT want to be disrupted in their activities. Usually, bees sleep in a bit and don't get moving until about 8:30 or 9. Don't know what's up with that, but i know I'll have to get out there earlier tomorrow... but I digress.

The garden is it's usual amazing self, due first of all to Will working like a dog out there every minute he's not 'at work' (ha). But also, our CSA members have been coming out consistently and have accomplished a huge amount of work - without them the garden would not be where it is at this moment. For example, a crew showed up last weekend and spread probably 50 bales of hay, getting most of the tomatoes and peppers mulched. I remember weeks ago (not that many weeks), a young couple worked sop hard training the little cucumber vines onto their new trellis. ok. this morning I picked two 5 gallon buckets of cucumbers! And the vines are to the tippy top of the trllis and trailing everywhere. Beautiful. So, everyone gets corn, yellow squash, cucumbers, basil....and some will get chard, beets, beans. It begins.
Wish us well. This evening, several families are loading up their baskets early, because they already had Memorial Day Weekend plans. Then, in the morning, the big rush begins. I remember it as being somewhat complicated and confusing until we get into the swing of things. We'll see how much our experience with last season has helped us have a smooth operation on Saturday morning.

3rd Annual Fishing Rodeo and Probable Fish Fry

2010-05-09T20:27:00.000-07:00

It's that time again!

This was the third year we hosted the Southern University Music Students for an end-of-year fishing party at the farm!
A good time was had by all...I believe we had about 25 students; the serious fishermen showed up before 8 in the morning and got going - which is a good thing because the pond is teeming with some very bad-boy catfish and a culling is in order....here is Gerren (otherwise known as G-Sharp) with the biggest fish of the day. This is a point of contention, because Gerren and Harry were fishing in a spot staked out by Phillip, who had to drive to the next town to pick up a check from a gig he had played the night before - by the time Phillip got back, the insult had already occurred! But all were good sports, of course. Here is Phillip, who doesn't look too put out (!) and Harry, who caught not only fish but turtles as well: Some students weren't that into fishing, but picked berries for the dessert smack-down in the kitchen. (Jerrell's Strawberry Cheesecake and Jasmine's Frozen Berry Pies). Jerrell had already proven his dessert expertise last year, but Jasmine was in that kitchen all day, working like a demon, and loving every minute. Every time we turned around she was making something else. We now call her 'Baby Top Chef'.
Here are Ayanna and Electra picking strawberries, and Jared, who was mostly eating berries and giving the ladies a hard time. Then there was Marsha, who picked twice a many as anyone else, and fussed at everyone to stop eating and get to work! We don't need to say that Will (they called him 'Coach' or "Mr. Dr. P') was on his feet for nearly all of the 12 hour event..cooking mostly, but also rounding guys up to help with picking up the bales of hay in the field and hauling them to the barn - which they were more than happy to do. While dinner was bring prepped, some students began a serious card game, which proved difficult to break up, even when the food was ready (!) We had the BEST time (we always do). We're glad the semester is over. University life is stressful in general, but particularly difficult in these tough economic times...You'll never meet better students than these. I feel blessed to have landed in this music department. If I had a video camera, I would have been able to treat you to the late-afternoon boating expeditions on the pond - complete with the strains of 'O mio babbino caro'... curtesy of Electra and Jared; a capella of course.
Priceless.
And, as of tomorrow, I morph from university faculty to 'farm wife'. For a while. Looking forward to the summer.

Carpenter Bees -1; Homeowners -0

2010-04-30T16:42:00.001-07:00

I don't know - it seems as if there are more carpenter bees than usual this year....Someone told me last week that they're glad that the carpenter bees have been so busy - because they drive out the wasps(!) I don't know if this is true - I have not taken the time to observe this; I know that our little greenhouse has been FULL of the bees this spring - and I would love to think that we can still USE the greenhouse and not worry about wasp nests under every single 2x4 and in every stray plastic pot...
But I DO know that we joke all the time about the porch swing just collapsing one day - there will be virtually nothing left of the wood...and i have other friends who are paranoid about their houses - or porches - or carports...also collapsing. Really, you look at the amount of sawdust and try to translate this into what may be left of the structure involved...
Although I steer clear of these bees when they are being territorial about the redbud trees, I don't think I've ever known anyone to be stung by one - have you?

almost everything is in the ground...

2010-04-26T14:31:00.000-07:00

so: The field (or garden...it's a garden when you think about it - it's a field when you're out there working(!) is almost completely planted. Will has fretted over the design for this season, making sure there was enough room for everything that need a row.
He then proceeded to almost kill himself by spending forty kabillion hours out there...every single speck of free time when there was also daylight.
And, like I said - almost everything is in the ground at this point.
So, the question is... what the heck is this?or this??
can you imagine what the setup looked like in the beginning?
How many flats of plants we actually seeded and how many teeny tiny plants have been carefully set, one by one, into the ground?
Some of these are 'remainders' and some signify the final push of planting.
I haven't been completely absent for the big push, but cannot fully engage until the semester is virtually over (this week -yea).
So let's hear it for the one who does the heavy lifting (and I mean that literally).
Look to be a very good season...IF we get some rain in the near future. Otherwise, it's out with the pump and big hoses. I personally would like to see the pond remain untouched for a little longer - but we'll do whatever is necessary.

moving forward....

2010-04-18T17:16:00.001-07:00

Tonight we have a combination of things WILL likes to take pictures of , and things I like to take pictures of...unfortunately, we have no pictures from this day, Sunday, whereupon there was much setting out of herbs and peppers and then some re-potting and some planting of flowers on fencelines...sometimes one is just too busy to go GET the camera when one thinks 'man, I wish I had the camera!'
And, by the way, I hear thunder in the distance but that doesn't fool me...although I would love to be fooled and actually GET some rain (!)
But I digress...
The garden is shaping up very quickly - thanks to our CSA Members and their hard work last weekend, coupled with Will being stressed about everything getting into the ground!
Above we have onions blooming, and a scattering of cilantro (volunteers)
And can you say 'SWEET CORN'? It may look small from this viewpoint, but it is green and strong and we are excited about this. PS: the(other) corn planted by our families last week is already up and the germination is very, very good.....
Here are some of the young tomatoes...not as small as they appear here, and I know Will was trying to get a picture of the first little tomatoes set on the vine...but you'll have to imagine them at the very edge of the bottom of this picture(!) see the little yellow flowers?

Now on to the 'Here Today Gone Tomorrow' pictures...below, the Lady Banksia Rose and the Mock Orange (nice, yes?)

And the Irises I bought for Will last year....he planted them in this bed, just to make sure they got established, although they will be moved later... but for the moment, they can be seen from the favorite 'porch-sitting' spot.

And, through the front yard fence, a craziness of bleeding heart and our precious old-fashioned roses brought from Washington Parish 20 years ago...hauled around and finally planted on this piece of property...
And, finally. This we call our 'Under The House Rose'. It would seem it is the very same old-fashioned rose as the picture above, but we did NOT plant this here...maybe it migrated in some mysterious way...but it literally is under the house...and grows up from there...very nice though, don't you think?That is all for today...We are working hard on getting the entire garden planted. We are getting very close...

Pardon ME

2010-04-14T20:15:00.000-07:00

while I post WAY too many pictures of the red clover
this is important...
and this is very beautiful
but you know how it is with clover
it is expensive
and many times you don't get much of it
and then , after a year or two
its gone and you have to plant it again
if you want to go through all that
I'll be thinking the bees are VERY happy about this
Will is partial to the white ball clover
and of course that is a beautiful thing too

I, for one, am a big red clover fan!

Farm Day!....WOW

2010-04-11T08:06:00.001-07:00

What an EXCELLENT Farm Day! I don't know how many CSA members showed up altogether - at least twenty - but everything we hoped to accomplish got done! before noon!
We had members from last season, who just walked out and started working - they know the garden, they know how to weed and plant and mulch and anything else...and their stamina is amazing.
We had new members and in many cases their children...all were eager to get in there and work; no matter what the job. I was a little anxious after the first couple of hours...I did not want them to overdo it in the beginning of the season. But everyone was energetic and happy to be there. These people are just wonderful. It's one thing to be out in the garden when everything is lush and the produce and herbs and flowers are everywhere. It's quite another to be dealing with planting and weeding and construction! And so I admire their ambition and their willingness to contribute to what will be the summer garden.
Heck, we had one lovely young woman who came out just to work!. She's not a CSA member, but wants to know more about what is involved in the growing process. Fabulous.
Here is what our little community accomplished:
Two women set to work on harvesting lettuce. They carefully and beautifully snipped lettuce and laid it in the wheelbarrow to be brought to the carport and bagged. Meanwhile, one young man pulled all of the larger heads of lettuce from another row and set aside those that had not bolted. These were bagged and left in the shade by the garden. Oh my, so much lettuce!
Three or four folks were busy with the difficult (and seemingly not as rewarding) task of pulling big flowering vegetable plants up...this is a sweaty and tiring thing to do. But no one was complaining.
Two parents (from different families) helped to oversee two absolutely cute little girls in digging up all of the carrots and setting them aside. The girls stayed excited about this all the way to the end! - and there were may, many carrots. They loved laughing at the funny shapes carrots actually come in - certainly they all didn't look like the ones you buy at the grocery store...
Several women were busy on the other side of the garden, carefully pulling weeds away from permanent herb beds and, after that was done, helped mulch the whole business!
Two or three young guys helped load the truck with hay from the barn, then set to tossing bales out by the garden...one particularly impressive young man spent almost the whole morning picking up piles of detritus that had been created and hauling them, one wheelbarrow at a time, to the compost pile. I couldn't believe he kept this up for as long as he did.
The men got shovels and completely dug out the mint beds, setting clumps of mint buy the fence for future replanting. This was some serious manual labor! And a job I had not counted on having completed on this farm day...I am very grateful. thanks, guys. Afterwards, two of the teenagers pulled the hoses around and made sure the mint was watered.
One of the last big jobs was the building of the cucumber fence. This requires many hand, stakes, bamboo poles, lots of twine, netting, and everyone working at once to make sure the fence is straight and tight. The result was impressive.
Finally, four or five adults and kids carefully planted the second round of corn, laying the seeds about three inches apart. We're talking four 75 ft. rows here. That's a lot of bending down and carefully depositing seeds. Backbreaking for the big people...the kids are closer to the ground, so they don't have to bend down quite so far!
One thing I want to say about this wonderful morning. Anyone who wants to see good parenting at work should visit us when our member families come to the farm. It is just so heart-warming to see all of these kids - little ones, pre-teens and teenagers - ALL of them - pitching in and working and smiling and eager to do whatever was asked of them. Makes one know that the future is in good hands. Excellent work, moms and dads...

First April Weekend

2010-04-05T06:29:00.000-07:00

It started off like this...We had planned our first Farm Day of the new CSA season, but when I woke up and saw the rain, I hurredly sent an email to our members, telling them it was just too wet in the garden to get out there and do anything. Thankfully, some people just don't look at their email in the morning! Several new members showed up, the sun came out, and off we went.
When it was all said and done, the garlic and strawberries were weeded.
I always worry that we'll wear folks out. Don't want to do that. It's hot out there, and the work is something one has to become acclimated to. Thankfully, those who stayed to help called time when they had had enough. We're glad they had not gotten the first message. We do need the help. Everyone went home with lettuce and cabbage and some with carrots as well. There aren't many berries yet...it's the beginning. But I did manage to snag a few for Monday morning breakfast. We got quite a bit of planting done by the time the weekend was over. Red beans, Horticulture beans, zinnias, Bright Light chard. Probably things I'm forgetting. It's beginning to snowball, but that's a good thing.

Weapon of Choice

2010-03-24T09:57:00.001-07:00

This is the work of spring...digging out, pulling weeds, making breathing room for last year's plants trying to reach up past the winter grass. At last, the winter grass is beginning to die-which doesn't mean it just goes away. But it's a tad easier to deal with. Still, after having walked away from the herbs beds late last fall, we have to decide what to save, what to till under. I had planted some sage last season, and it did not have time to do much before the cold weather set in. I was surprised to see it peeking out from the weeds on the end of this thyme bed, but there is was...

Behold, the Weapon of Choice!

the long-handle weeding hoe...

with a blade on one side and a fork on the other, you have a hoe to use when you come across a mean big weed with a giant stalk (gotta have a hoe for that); with the fork you can hoe parallel to the ground and gently lift weeds out - even right up against a plant. I gave up the regular garden hoe a long time ago...I just love this tool....
And here we are after just an hour or so I would have made it all the way through the thyme as well, but came across the world's biggest nasty ant bed. Because we don't whip out the poison for this (or anything else!), and I'm not about to pour boiling water on top of my precious thyme plants, I just get in there with the above-mentioned weapon and mess the bed all up. If you make them mad enough, I find the ants will move. Which is fine. They can move ten feet over. that's fine too. Just get out of my thyme bed!

ok, I think I've been Had

2010-03-22T16:53:00.000-07:00

So, I was in the Ace Hardware, and I was picking up a big bag of birdseed, and I was looking at the rack of seeds...the herb seeds in particular. On the top, there was a pretty big envelope of something called "Cat Grass". And I thought...hmmm... well, I'm going to start some catnip in a flat anyway ( all I had in the herb beds had been tilled under for the last time). And, I thought, Cat Grass must be something they'd like too, so I'll start some of that, and I'll have TWO things they'll like! 'I wonder what Cat Grass is?' No Matter - this looks like an interesting thing.
So I seeded it in a flat when I started all of the usual suspects; basil, etc.
And, wouldn't you know, it came up (vigorously, I may add)...first thing up, in fact. But, it does look mighty like grass - just plain old grass. hmmm. I felt a little silly, and Will made a little joke or two about it. But, you know, I always like to try a couple of new things every year. You never know - maybe you'lll get something you'll grow forever and ever - right?
Well - here we are.You can see the problem. It's grass - I mean, it's just grass.

So I looked into it and sure enough - here's the definition (there are a bunch of definitions on the 'net, but they all amount to the same thing).

"Cat grass is grass which is cultivated for cats to eat. Cereal grasses like oat, rye, barley, and wheat tend to be especially popular choices for cat grass, as these grasses are very easy to grow, and safe for cats to consume. Some pet stores sell cat grass kits, allowing pet owners to grow grass at home, and others sell cat grass which has been cultivated, so that it is ready for use."

ok. I feel pretty stupid. Apparently, this is what folks in the city who have cats trapped in apartments do to make up for the fact that their cat never sees grass, or any other kind of greenery. And you know how cats go outside and eat grass, and we all think it's probably to settle their stomach or some such? I think this is just plain old grass. Don't know what I'll do with it. I think I should make a special place in the garden for this amusing mistake.

YES YES YES!!!!!!!

2010-03-16T14:24:00.001-07:00

Tis' Spring!

Flowering pear trees!

Japanese Magnolias!

A veritable explosion
...and such a relief from the very long, very very cold winter we have had....

Flowers in the Ditch!

Yea!
whew

and finally, a plowed field. more on that later.

butterfly film - amateur version!

2009-11-06T12:05:00.000-08:00

obviously I have no idea what I'm doing....
I'm going to experiment with this today...
can't get good video of the flowers - very sunny today
but here we also have the fountain
because water noises are so soothing!

After the Storm

2009-10-31T09:27:00.000-07:00

After Passage of the Front...

I know it could have been much worse; everthing is relative. Saturday morning greeted us with sunlight filtering through the bamboo blinds, blue skies, cool-dry air. Lovely! But sooo wet!!! The Weather Channel the night before went on and on about Shreveport - something like 15 inches in some areas. We only received three inches. But it comes at a bad time for us and I've seen this movie before. The grass we had hoped to cut for hay now stands in saturated ground that would not support the hay equipment even if it (the grass) were to dry out enough to cut, and much less the pickup truck and trailer to haul the bales out of the field. The garden has sections of standing water - I usually hill up the whole field so it will drain during the winter, but this time I was lucky to get the fall cover crop tilled in and another one spread before the rains of last week made it too muddy to work. The last time we had this sort of weather foolishness, there were no strawberries planted, and I can see that happening again. But there is good news as well; the Australian Winter Peas that I spread and was unable to cover have remained so wet that they have worked their little primary roots into the mud and are spouting nicely, along with the crimson clover and sprinkling of mustard and turnips that I spread at the field margins.

Although pictures only a farmer could love, these sprouts promise to cover the field with green going into the winter and ought to pay dividends in the spring when they break down into humus. I wandered across the front of the field where we have planted a modest winter garden for us (modest, if you think two can eat 40 broccoli plants). Of course that is the problem when you start plants like these from seeds; it's hard to resist planting all of the starts - and we really only planted about half of the cabbage, cauliflower, broccoli and brussel sprouts plants - and this time gave the rest away before they were too old. Yet, there are flats remaining...

These on the left are more lettuce, some parsley, some cute little violas, and white and yellow California daisies from seed collected and given to us by a CA native - yes, Loree, they are indeed spouting. The flat below is more cabbage that we will probably give away because we are out of room.

But, back to the garden...
Here's a look at the ready-to-munch lettuce and the shot below that is the cutting celery that made it through the dry summer and is now mired in the mud at the wet end of the garden. This is some hardy stuff and I would recommend it to anyone who likes celery flavor.

On the right is shot of the turnips; already thinned
for greens and about two weeks away from nice roots to cook with bacon and cane syrup (a Cajun technique). There are more pics of the garden to come later, but I wanted to post a couple of zinnia and butterfly pictures. With the relatively warm and very wet weather, the yard has a spring look to it and I meant to take a couple of pictures of the giant marigolds that are in full bud, but we will have to do with the zinnias, Mexican sunflowers and fall butterflies. Till next time...Will.

Deer Bones In The Yard

2009-10-28T18:49:00.001-07:00

Here we have a hunk of dead deer. If you are already nauseous, just don't read this post, ok?
Poor old Dude, who doesn't get around much, apparently can smell a freshly gutted deer from a mile away. We have neighbors who hunt deer. That's just what they do. Hey - anyone who loves a venison roast should just man-up about this...because this is indeed where it comes from!
So the neighbors (and probably friends) go deer hunting. They clean the deer, and don't use the hind quarters for anything, so they toss them into the nearby brush. Dude wakes up from a nap and thinks "hey! I smell deer!"
So he goes way over to the neighbors property (its not THAT far, but it's pretty far for this old dog). And next thing you know, he had dragged a whole deer leg into the yard.
Will calls out and says 'Hey! Bring a cookie sheet!'...at first I'm thinking...oh no. He says..."we can either let it rot out here or we can roast it!" And then I'm thinking ...'uh...roast it? you mean, like...'
Of course not. He was thinking that Dude will drag it over, but we both know he won't actually EAT it. Not unless it's roasted, of course. I am guilty of roasting meat for this dog on a regular basis! ok, fine.So Will brings it into the kitchen and into the oven it goes! I must say, a venison roast smells yummy. A raw deer leg, not so much. Matter of fact, it smells pretty rank!
In the end, old Dude has three large hunks of deer to much on. I'm so glad it wasn't intended for us because, well, you know.
This morning I took the last one out of the outside fridge, but made sure to take a picture before I put it down for Dude. This probably looks very yummy if you're a dog...ok..I promise...no more blog posts about meat in the yard!

Cover-Cropping...Let's Do It Again!

2009-10-23T08:23:00.000-07:00

Of the two of us, only Will takes the deep breath and cranks up the tractor...to mow down the very last of what we have been hanging onto from the summer garden. Well, first of all, only Will drives the tractor, but secondly, it just kills me to see things go - which is why he is the farmer of course.
I suppose if it were up to me, we'd just have a big gnarly mess of old vegetation until it dried up and eventually became compost(!) (with a bunch of weeds). That anything is left at all after August 1st is only because Will is humoring me.

Here we have the last things to go:

italian basil in it's last throes, and huge yellow cosmos as a backdrop...

goodbye to that, right? nothing like a clean slate
(pay no attention to the herb beds at the end of the field -
even Will can't mow down the celery leaf. Next comes the cover crop...

very exciting if you're into that kind of thing. Happy soil, happy plants next time. a few weeks later, and you have the mother of all cover crops!! Knee-high and dense, ready to plow under (if the weather cooperates). Lo and Behold! We actually have time to do it all again! It's mid (to late) October and - hey...two cover crops are even better than one! Out comes the tractor and down go the peas! The other evening, Will was out there walking back and forth, back and forth - with the bag of seed and his little device that spits it out when you crank the handle round and round.
He walked and walked and it got dark and he was still walking. But it was going to rain (and it did) and the seed had to be down. Didn't have time to till it in, but it ought to come up anyway. Pictures later for those of you who think cover crops are groovy.
I promise a blog post about something a little more colorful first. Like, maybe, zinnias!

What Was I THINKING?

2009-07-26T09:04:00.000-07:00

...last week of the CSA; we're down to okra, squash, and one more watermelon for everyone. Yeah, hot peppers, but how many of our members want more of THAT? (answer: not many). Week 6, everybody got rosemary jelly as a 'supplement' to their market basket. Week 7, everybody got a jar of Hot Sweet Garlic Pickles AND a container of Dill Dip (very popular!). So, Week 8, Will makes pepper jelly and I decided that everyone would get a loaf of herb bread! Sounds good in theory, I suppose; and I have lots of experience with bread-making...especially this recipe. But 24 loaves of bread????? All having to be baked on Friday so everybody gets it fresh??? Good Grief! Luckily, I have a friend with a counter stand-mixer, so she lets me borrow it. I figured I could just whip out 24 batches of dough on Thursday, rise them once, put them in plastic bags in the fridge, and bake them all on Friday. this also sounds good in theory. right?

NOTE: This is a pretty long rant about bread-making, so if you're not well for it, you can just look at the pictures and get on with life!

So I go to the store and load up: 15 bags of flour, four jars of yeast...
I experimented on Wednesday. just to see what happens when you try to preserve dough for baking the next day- the only smart move so far. I made a regular batch of bread, by hand, put the dough in a plastic bag in the fridge. It just kept on rising and rising in the coldness of the fridge! It just wouldn't STOP! At this point, I realized I'd have to freeze all of them first, THEN put them in the fridge for later use. (Note: once they unfreeze, even in the fridge, guess what? yes. they keep rising. That little item I'd find out much later. So I just forged ahead. I had already planned to do this, and it was our only plan, so I had to go with it.
Thursday morning, I pick up from said friend's house the Kitchen Aid Accolade 400! I mean, who on earth decided to name a mixer the Accolade?! That's a car name, or it should be.
First, I just figure I'll do it the way I always do; no measuring, just rise the yeast and alternate hot water and flour until I get the right amount and consistency. Do not try this in a standing mixer! The mixer will have none of it! I wound up #1 with a great glob of goopy mess that of course never turns into a dough ball while using the dough hook attachment! But I had been smart, and knew from reading online conversations about this appliance that the dough wan't ever going to do that anyway. #2, I thought it would be a good idea to wrap the first two I did in wax paper before putting them in plastic bags. big mistake. good thing I didn't continue to do that with the other 21 loaves. more later. #3, I really should have made sure they were all frozen solid before transferring them to the outdoor cooler. I was flying by the seat of my pants. I had ten loaves done by 1:00 p.m. I figured I was making good progress. From start to end on Thursday, I had been on my feet (I kid you not) for 12 hours! I had to drag myself through the last 4 or 5 loaves, because I was ready to jump off of a tall building by then. But, by 10:00 at night, I had 24 bags of dough, once risen and cooled down in the freezer, on the highest shelf of the cooler in the shed.
Friday morning, I figured this would be an easier day. My oven will only take three loaves at a time which is good, because I only have three loaf pans anyway. I go out to the shed and open the door. My goodness it smells like bread in here! Uh...one of the bags had exploded (remember the 'keep on rising' part?) and spilled all the way down the front of all the bee boxes stacked in the cooler. gross. I start hauling all the bags out, crossing my fingers. Although this was the only actual explosion, many of the bags had expanded and popped the ties on the bags...I brought all of them inside and began stuffing them into the two freezers. What now? I only have this one day! I chose three and set them on the table. The goal is to get the dough to room temperature before baking. well, I waited an hour and a half and that just was NOT happening. So I put the first three in the oven. yet another mistake. I buttered the tops at 20 minutes. I looked in at 45 minutes, figuring they'd be ready but the bread just wasn't baking all the way! I left them in for an hour, and the middles STILL weren't done! Patience, patience. Three loaves maybe ruined. One exploded and ruined..AND, the two wrapped in wax paper? Well, let me just say that the wax paper became ONE with the dough and there just wasn't any way to separate one from the other. into the garbage. That's three ruined loaves before baking and three baked loaves probably ruined also (although they looked alright, I didn't trust them at all).
Good thing I am a very determined woman. I hauled all of the loaves from the freezers out onto the carport, put the bags on trays and in bowls covered with plastic wrap and dish towels. The real challenge here is making sure that as they got warm enough to bake, they never came into contact with a fly. With everything covered with tablecloths, I felt pretty confident about that. The day progressed, and every round looked better than the one before. After putting the last three in the oven, I whipped up three more by hand..the baking was done by 10:00 p.m. But I did it!Like Will said, everybody will be excited with a loaf of bread in ther market basket, but nobody will think 'MAN, 24 loaves of bread!' No matter. Here is the basket everyone received on Saturday...Watermelon, Okra, Squash, Pepper Jelly, Bread, and herbs.

Our CSA Members seemed to be sorry the whole thing was over, eager to sign up for next year, and pleased with the whole experience. Hey! We managed to pull it off, beginning to end! Now, as we do every late summer, cut it all down, plow it all under, cover crop...and rest.

CHOPPED!!

2009-07-17T07:57:00.000-07:00

...for those of you who have never seen the Food Network show 'Chopped', the premise is as follows: four chefs compete during the hour, making first an appetizer, then an entree, then a dessert. For each dish, the chefs are presented each with a basket. They open the basket, and there are three or four items, sometimes a pretty weird combination, and they must use all of them to make the dish. For example, 'Make an appetizer using....asparagus, Fruit Loops, squash, and ketchup!' Well, it's never been QUITE that strange, but sometimes it comes close....
Last week, week 6 of our CSA, we were a little concerned, because we are now down to the very late summer veggies, and we do like to keep our members happy, but we also know they've seen plenty of hot peppers and eggplant. So, we decided to take the basket we gave them last week, and do our own version of 'Chopped!', just to see what WE would do presented with the same items.
Here is the basket, exactly as our CSA members received theirs last Saturday:
the basket contains:

okra
zucchini
parsley
eggplant
chilis
jalepenos
rosemary jelly
watermelon

We cheated a little bit; we didn't make one dish, we made a complete dinner. By the way, chefs are allowed to use other stuff from the pantry, but other than spices and a 'protein', as they say, (and why can't they just say meat?) we didn't stray. Here is what we came up with:

the appetizer:
jalepenos, stuffed with cheese, battered and fried, served with rosemary jelly
the entree:
stuffed eggplant, with zucchini, shrimp, and chilis
served with fried okra
and dessert:
watermelon sorbet!

after this little experiment, we felt that the basket was actually filled with things very compatible with each other, and everybody was probably pretty happy with their weekly share. On to Week 7!

Please...I Beg You!

2009-07-07T13:43:00.001-07:00

NO MORE PICKLES!

one can only take so much pickle-making. A night and a day is my limit of the house smelling like vinegar and spices (sounds good, I know...). Buckets of cucumber slices in the bathtub; the washing of jars, the standing over a pot of pickle fumes stuffing jars...etc. etc. Will rushing around with giant pots of steaming jars - out into the carport - back into the house - he was just trying to be efficient. There were more cucumber slices this morning, in pots on the stove. We were supposed to finish this evening. But I couldn't take it. I wanted my stove and counters back. I just went ahead and finished them off this morning.
done.

Tomorrow - Rosemary Jelly!

4th of July

2009-07-03T06:28:00.000-07:00

Week 5 of our CSA adventure...and what a crazy gardening summer it has been: heat heat heat and no rain (except a violent inch and a half last week). Everything in the garden, in it's rush to complete the life-cycle, came to fruition almost simultaneously, or at least way earlier than it normally would have. I answer phone calls all day long from folks who want fresh things from the garden - but our CSA members come first, and I can only turn everyone else away. Our focus now is gathering all of the available produce...cutting okra, hauling in the eggplants, and this week: watermelons! yea! I don't remember when we have EVER actually had watermelons ON the 4th of July! We always try (or, rather, Will does) but it never seems to happen right on time. Not so this year...all of our members will have one for Saturday! Also, Will hauled in the bee boxes this past week. Amazingly, the bees have come through, even in these desperate-weather times. Some of the most beautiful (and bountiful) honey we've ever had. With help from a member family and a friend, we spent two evenings spinning. Everyone also gets their honey this week. fabulous.
Will had the foresight to put in a little bed (relative term) of lettuce late in the season, so we can harvest for this week, and that's a good surprise this late in the game>
In the meantime, value-added days are upon us: this means pickles, tomato sauce, jalepenos, and anything else we can can or freeze or dry. All I've done so far this morning is cut the okra: well, one row of it anyway. Got to get out and water plants and hose down all of the porches etc. Think I'll get to it. They say it'll be 100 degrees today. Oh boy, can't wait.

Father's Day Food!

2009-06-22T06:18:00.001-07:00

check out the little jalepenos stuffed with cream cheese and wrapped with bacon!
tomatoes and peppers and onions roasting for the salsa-making: red beans on the stove...ditto yellow squash...salad on the table. yea summer.

Garden Survey

2009-06-19T10:10:00.001-07:00

well. I wanted to say the garden is now at it's peak, but I believe we are beyond that point.
Things are getting gnarley out in the herb beds, but we're holding our own for now. The zinnias, planted especially for the wedding, are as pretty as they're ever going to get. The sunflowers have started blooming. The field peas went from this to this in one week!
There's okra, but you have to know that because all of the other vegetables are so distracting!
There are more cucumbers than anyone could possible deal with, and the squash have to picked every single day. Small squash in the morning, giant squash in the evening. I kid you not! The drought and heat wave are taking their toll on the garden and on us, but so far, we're persevering...I figure a high pressure system has to move or break down at some point, although this one has lasted - what - three weeks? four? I guess it's better than 'severe storms' with big hail and 80 mph winds, right?

It Just Does NOT Get Any Better Than This

2009-06-17T13:54:00.001-07:00

Purple Hull Peas...that is all.

Braving the Blackberry Patch

2009-06-16T08:30:00.000-07:00

...actually, it is a really, really long row - but a gnarley one! Used to be a row - now it is a wide patch of all sorts of stuff, including massive blackberry vines. We kept meaning to get out there and make it oh-so perfect for picking time. But it wasn't meant to be - too much else to do. The berries are plenty accessible, it's just a little creepy. I seem to remember that snakes like berries, and of course we used to pick them from all manner of semi-dangerous environs when I was a kid. This is pretty tame by comparison. Got enough to freeze and last night make blackberry turnovers (but the Filo was very uncooperative!). Yummy anyway. And I was able to send Will to work with a smoothie this morning.
If we were willing to draw down the pond more than we've already had to, we would flood the berries - but we need to conserve and use the water only on the vegetables. Yes, we're in a little drought - in the 95+ degree heat. That's fine, as long as we stay ahead of things and come inside by 9:00 a.m....on to the next thing - sorting tomatoes and putting them in boxes! yea! Glad the garden is so prolific, but MAN, there's a lot of tomatoes!

After the Party

2009-06-14T16:21:00.001-07:00

I cannot BELIEVE that I took no pictures this Saturday morning...week 2 of our CSA!
Many members came to help - they picked yellow beans, green beans, helped pull up ALL of the strawberry plants (that's a pretty big deal)...helped pack baskets, sort potatoes. A crazy time, to be sure. Lots of kids, lots of sweaty hard-working people. It's beautiful, I must tell you. But it never occurred to me to get the camera; I was just too busy. This time, I tried to get out earlier. I woke up at 5:30 and was in the garden at 6:30. It took me two hours and more to cut and bag all of the herb orders and flower orders: next week , I don't know - maybe I'll wake up at 5:00.
A great success, all in all. We are lovin' this CSA thing!The cats are hot (big heat wave here) and they lay around a lot. The Crazy Cat is very very sociable, and likes to mingle with all of the folks on Saturday morning. Last week he got ahold of some woman's purse and he was NOT going to let it go! But the others are close at hand: here is the Kitty Witty trying not to move very much:
And the Crazy Cat just daring Will to pick up his farm hat: This morning (Sunday), we heard the driveway alarm, and Will calls out: "Hey! It's Claire and her Dad!" And they're on horseback!" Claire is the daughter in a CSA family, a hard-working young lady and very smart to boot! She was the very first helper of the season, coming over to weed strawberry plants way before the garden was even planted. Here are the horses tied up for a moment on the fence. And so we begin another week...let's have some voodoo from out there - we are need of rain.

Remember the $64 Tomato?

2009-06-12T06:06:00.000-07:00

Those were the Brandywines, last year...well this is kind of the $64 Tomato Redux. Heirloom tomatoes can be a wonderful thing. In fact, there's a man down the road who grows all manner of interesting and beautiful ones...Purple Russians, that sort of thing. He gives them away. He grows them 'just because'...This time, it's a packet of free seeds from one of the seed companies. Uh - I can kind of see why they're giving the seeds away. An interesting tomato, to be sure, but not only are they way-ugly; it's hard to get any actual tomato to eat from one of these guys. We made a salad last night, and Will said he'd just use one of these and 'they better be good!' They were ok, but nothing to write home about. Give me a giant creole tomato anytime.

Attack Of The Vegetables

2009-06-10T07:20:00.000-07:00

It's THAT time...well, this particular job wasn't that big of a deal; Ian and Senna (son and girlfriend) sat around with us on Sunday and helped shell all of these Horticulture beans...so it was only a matter of blanching, dunking in ice water and bagging...THIS, on the other hand, is a different story! I remember a really funny Garrison Keilor story from way back about his childhood and all of the excess vegetables, mainly tomatoes, from the garden (and of course leaving bags of zucchini on people's doorsteps in the middle of the night - I totally get that). 'Canning' tomatoes is daunting in it's way. First of all, the ones you work with are the ones with imperfections - holes and little soft spots and such - and you stand at the counter and cut and throw the good parts into a really big pot and dunk the other stuff into a bucket at your feet. This goes on for a long, long time. Yesterday, I wound up with two huge pots of cut up tomatoes simmering on the stove. Then you wash the jars. Then you boil the jars. Then you line up the jars. Then you boil the lids. Then you haul the pot of tomatoes over to the jars. Then you fill the jars and continually wipe up the spillage. Then you wipe off the tops of the jars with a paper towel dunked in boiling water; Then you put lids on the jars. Then you figure out which pots you have left to set the jars in...then you set the jars in the water bath and then you let it come to a boil and then you let it go for ten minutes and then you pull the jars out and listen for them to go 'click',,,'click' - that's the sealing.
And then you realize that you never sterilized enough jars to begin with and here you are with half a big pot of tomatoes. Then Will comes in and offers to do 'Round 2'. That's a good thing, because by that time, I was just done in. I need an attitude adjustment...it's way to early in the season to feel overwhelmed by this kind of thing. The result is a beautiful thing, though!
And I still can't figure out why they call it 'canning' when in fact you are putting stuff in JARS.

'Many Hands Make Light Work'

2009-06-07T13:30:00.000-07:00

...Saturday and it was officially WEEK 1 of our CSA activities; I had gotten out early to pick and wash and bag herbs for the orders, but our members showed up early too. When I was finished, I heard laughing and talking in the distance and I thought...'man, I have to get over there...they're having too much fun!" Will pulled up both 70-ft rows of Horticulture beans, and folks were working pulling them off the plants...it's amazing how much work six or seven people can do! At some point, I was back in the carport beginning to line up the baskets for our 20 families......and was helped mightily by Caroline, who was spending the day with Dad....she learned to weigh out and bag 3-lb allotments of beans - and Caroline is going into the 2nd grade! A fast learner and a big help!in the meantime, members were busy pulling yellow beans off plants, and Will was free to till up the rows in the field - a luxury for him to be able to do this so quickly after vegetables are pulled up.I don't know what is up with this year's crops. We've talked about it a lot. Look at the size of these bell peppers - and it's early yet. But they're HUGE! Also, the crepe myrtles are crazy-blooming and if I'm not mistaken they're VERY early. Hmm. I'm not complaining, it's just that things seem to be in a big, big hurry.

Post-Wedding Farming

2009-06-03T08:35:00.000-07:00

The month of May has seen one son's college graduation and another son's wedding here at this little farm....the wedding is over and the vegetables are calling!The garden is not much worse for wear, considering we've done little in the past week or more...but the weeds are already asserting themselves, trying to get the best of us. I'm pulling weeds and hoeing and Will is tilling between rows - we both know it's only a matter of time; a couple of months from now, we'll just hand the garden over to the weeds and concede. But for now the garden still belongs to us. The produce is charging ahead, doing what it always does, and on its own schedule.Our PLAN was to begin our new CSA adventure this coming weekend (June 6). Thankfully, our CSA members happily chipped in a couple of weeks ago and helped with early harvesting and maintenance, and understood that the schedule had bumped itself up a week or two. This will be the first weekend that we will pick and pack for 20 families...kind of intimidating, but it looks like it will work! Thanks to Will who, scientist and horticultural maniac that he is, plotted the whole shebang out months ago, trying to make sure everything happened with some kind of order. It is kind of like herding cats, but fenced-in cats...in other words, there is a perimeter of sorts.

It's amazing that only three weeks ago, folks constructed this cucumber fence and the little plants weren't even THINKING about climbing it!vegetables wait for no one...

Wills pics are better than mine....

2009-05-25T20:25:00.000-07:00

Will wanted to wander around for pictures. I think that's always good, because his eye is different than mine...I think his camera is also better than mine - although smaller...here is what he found yesterday...
more wedding flower fun...and let us not forget the quickly maturing garden!and of course the ever-hopeful Mousey-Tongue cat in the evening, forever awaiting a fish - or two, or three...

Geting Ready for the Wedding

2009-05-22T22:02:00.001-07:00

..the second wedding in a few years...we've worked hard to time things - always a challenge. Unfortunately, I had a blur on my camera lens - so I had to crop some pictures. And now it's raining - and will probably rain for many days to come. But, no matter. Here are some flowers and beds and such. We don't have a Plan B for 'IF IT RAINS'...really, we should make one. Don't want to alarm the bride, but it's not looking good! In the end, a wedding is a wedding, right? A ceremony and a party!

CSA Farm Day!!!!!

2009-05-16T12:00:00.001-07:00

This morning we had our very first CSA Farm Day! It is incredible how much a whole bunch of eager people can get done in three hours!This is our first season running the farm as a CSA. We have 20 families, and a few folks on a waiting list. We asked, although we didn't require, that our members put in a few hours twice during the 8-week season. and, because the season is not quite upon us (tell that to the potatoes and corn), we didn't know how many would show up to help out this first time.
well, let me tell you....we must have had 15 people or so, and in a single morning, they dug and harvested three rows of potatoes, all of the carrots, weeded the beets, staked and tied the bell peppers..AND performed the fastest cucumber trellising I have ever witnessed! we are beside ourselves with (a) gratefulness and (b) amazement!A very successful start, I'd say. I only hope everyone didn't get too worn out (it was definitely hot).
All in all, everybody worked very hard and remained in good humor....went home with carrots and strawberries, and will be back next week for corn and potatoes. yea CSA!