The Living Green Farm Journal

"Sweet fields arrayed in living green, and rivers of delight"

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Tuesday, June 30th

Cherry Season!



3698_FarmPickingCherries (33k image)

Cherry season is finally here! Thanks to Lou's tireless intimidation of the starlings, this has been a bumper year for cherries. I picked some last week when I was down at the farm, and thought that they were pretty good; I came down again this weekend (gotta hoe them beans, you know) hoping that there would be some left still, and there were still many on the trees, perfectly ripe. Note to self: even when you think they're ripe enough to eat, come back in about a week.
Kurt on 06.30.09 @ 03:16 PM PST [more...]

Monday, June 22nd

The Weekly Hoedown



3664_FarmDutchHoe (70k image)

The word "hoedown" means to lay down one's hoe, and then have a dance. I'm using the word in another sense: every week I've been getting the hoe down in the dirt for some weeding in the bean and squash patch. The time it takes varies; I can usually get the patch hoed in about an hour. If the soil is wet it takes more time as the hoe accumulates mud that I have to periodically scrape off. Then it's slow going! But, if the soil is dry, and the weeds haven't gotten too widespread, I can knock them all out pretty quickly.
Kurt on 06.22.09 @ 01:02 PM PST [more...]

Tuesday, June 9th

A Tough Nut To Crack



3588_FarmRotaryCutter (41k image)

Time is gettin' on at the farm, and the weeds and blackberries are a-growin'... I've been trying to get the rotary cutter, AKA bush hog, ready for use before the weeds have all gone to seed. Job 1 has been getting the blades on this cutter sharpened. When Grandpa Dennis was in town a couple of weeks ago we took an ineffectual run at getting the blades off - it turns out that it is not sufficient to just jack it up and crawl under there with a crescent wrench! My back up plan was to file the blades in place, but that was laughably naive - the blade edges were as round as your finger. Grandpa Dennis immediately recognized that we were in a tougher spot than I suspected, and we went home to regroup.
Kurt on 06.09.09 @ 03:06 PM PST [more...]

Wednesday, June 3rd

2009 Bean Project



3527_FarmBeanSprout (36k image)

So, with all this equipment-related work, and infrastructure work, does any actual farming get done? Well, not a lot, frankly. But I have been working on a small dried bean planting down in the pasture; a couple hundred row-feet of dried beans. It's enough to give me some experience running the seeder, and setting up irrigation, weeding, and keeping tabs on the crop. Actually, it's not just beans: at this point I've also added a couple dozen winter squash plants, and I may still put in some dry corn.
Kurt on 06.03.09 @ 01:05 PM PST [more...]