In the past I have gone the the Mosca Pit Stop to pick up our potato seed order. White Mountain Farm runs part of the building as a packing and distribution center for their potatoes. It is an intriguing little establishment in the middle of the San Luis Valley. You can stock up on the regular quicky mart fair like chips and dip or purchase a hunting license, all alongside a selection of organic vegetables. Or you might need a new heating stove that burns whole corn grain. But, I generally just pick up a couple hundred pounds of potato seed. This year we ordered from Rockey Farm, White Mountain’s neighbor and business associate. When I arrived they were in the middle of cutting seed for a 3,000 lb order. Rockey is a “small farm for the area”. They have 5 circles, 250 acres. They said an average big farm around there is 20-30 circles. Rockey focuses on specialty potatoes, like fingerlings. They sell potatoes for seed and for the fresh market. Their fresh market accounts include high end restaurants in New York and LA.
Farm size is such an interesting subject. I can’t imagine ever selling produce to New York City. Yet, in talking about crop rotation, covercrops and their effect on soil biology I find our philosophies very simular. At first glance Rockey Farm may be labled a big farm, in the negative sense, because they have big machines. I wonder what people think of me as a farmer when I take videos of these “big machines” with my new Palm. Check out the mail order part of Rockey’s business at www.potatogarden.com.
I’m driving down to Rockey Farm tomorrow to pick up potato seed. Weathervane Farm, Javernick Family Farms,and Colona Comunity Farm all put our orders in together to get a bulk deal and that means 1,300 lbs. in the bed of the Tacoma. It is hard to think about planting potatoes while the temperature is forecasted to drop to 5 deg tonight. This is a time of the season when I really feel the difference between the Front Range and Chaffee County. Although, the Front Range is in the middle of another double digit snow storm and three nights ago Palisade dropped to 10 deg. East, west or center, Colorado weather seems challenging this spring. I talked to Glen from Austin Family Farms on March 20. He said the apricots where in full bloom. I talked to another farm after the 10 deg. night. They are expecting a 90% loss this year. I wonder what the fruit shares will end up looking like. This situation makes think about the idea of sharing the risks and rewards of agriculture that many CSA farms express. I trust Glen will find something to fill up his truck. Maybe it will be full of cantaloupe this season instead of peaches. It is interesting being in the position of having the money from CSA members but not being involved in the decision concerning the availability of the limited fruit crop this year. If Weathervane doesn’t have access to enough fruit to fullfill our agreement, it seems inappropriate for Weathervane to keep the money. The hard part is that I can also think of convincing arguments for why Glen, our fruit grower, should get the money. Maybe it will be a good melon year?
I just finished the vegetable seeding and transplanting schedule which Caitlin and I started this morning. I think this is the first time we have completed it in one day. Caitlin will finish this part of the planning with the flower dates. We are ahead in planning compared to last year. We announced the new website update last week and six share sign ups were in the mail box by Saturday. Even the weather seems to be pushing the season. While we were working inside today, Cait kept a watch as the temperature rose to a high of 72 deg. F. We took a walk later, still pleasantly warm, and passed by the garlic, which is starting to push some roots but is still not seen above ground. There were plenty of pocket gopher holes to be seen, though. I better get this inside work done soon. It is time to be outside.
I noticed K’s Dairy Delight is open while Juni and I were at the park the other day. As we got out of the car I could smell the hamburgers. We threw rocks in the stream that was nearly free of ice. The mountains were obscured by thick dark clouds nearly to the tops of the urban horizon and then it started to drizzle rain. Juni and I played on, it was comfortably warm. As was tonight walking from the Vic after a Fat Tuesday celebration. Our friend Eric is there playing with the Groove Farmers. When I got home, Caitlin told me Masonville, where we formerly farmed on the Front Range, will be on average 6 deg. cooler over the next 5 days and tonight with 60 mph winds.
I repaired flats today. We had some old three sided flats once used for soil blocks stored in the root cellar. Caitlin needs more four sided flats right now for seeding our alliums and perennial flowers. Recycled shelf slats from an old greenhouse bench fit perfectly as the fourth side.
I packed my bag and set off from home on a week long trip to attend the annual meeting of the Colorado Farmers Market Association (CFMA) and the Rocky Mountain Compost School. I have a day off now between talking about how to sell food and how to compost it.
It is just over a year ago that we moved from the Loveland area to beautiful Buena Vista. Interestingly enough I am writing this post as I sit in the CSU library and look at the foothills of the Front Range. I am amazed at my reaction to being here again, driving the streets, walking on campus, eating at Lucile’s. I have no nostalgia of “home”. I just know the street names, how to get to the library and how good Eggs New Orleans are. The point of all this? Home is where you go to Farmers Markets.
The big news from the meeting, The Salida Farmers Market has overcome the biggest challenge for new markets (surviving year 1) and is gaining momentum. There are some very established markets in Colorado and I hope to use their collective knowledge to help guide the Salida Market to self sustaining success over the long future ahead. Garry Stephenson, from the Small Farm Program at Oregon State University, was the keynote speaker at the CFMA meeting. He excited everyone with stories of hugely successful markets in Oregon and the technical studies he has published through the efforts of the Small Farms Program. It is refreshing to meet someone in the state university setting that is working hard to promote and support local direct market agriculture. It gives me hope that CSU, my alum, will be more of an ally in the future. Until then, the Salida Market is moving ahead.
As the market manager for the Salida Farmers Market I’ve got the inside scoop. In December there was a meeting of market vendors and other interested parties to discuss the vision of the market. From that meeting came the decision to approach the city about locating the market at Alpine Park. I am happy to say that the discussion is going well and I hope to get the the city council’s approval of our application at the April 7th meeting.
I’ve been having some lucrative surfing sessions on the keyboard recently. Web sites can inspire or just take up time and space. I love it when a tool works well. I’ve created a new page on this blog that has a categorized list of sites worth going back to. I want to keep this list “living”. It will change as the bookmarks change on my browser.
The new 3/4 in. ratchet I used to rotate the wheels on the 2130 made my day. It was a success in thinking through a problem and turning the solution into reality. I believe the greater the connections between the local farming, food loving, knowing where you’re living kind of folks, the more support we give each other, the more dynamic, creative and sustaining our collective efforts will be.
Last week we had four days above 40 F and now we can see the ground which has been out of sight all winter. There is still a foot of snow on the garden. It has been interesting listening to local folks compare this winter with others. They vary from, “this was normal before the winters got so mild” to “this is the worst winter ever”, but they all agree that this year has been big. I’m excited to watch the snow melt and observe my second spring here. I was thinking today of how I need to burn the ditches (when they are not covered with snow) and repair a leaky section before the head gate gets turned on. This morning I finished changing the wheel spacing on our John Deere 2130 tractor. I’m looking forward to tilling beds and turning our plan into reality. I hope that doing the tractor maintenance now will get us a good jump on the busy season, but I feel that no matter what I get accomplished there will still be many events which demand my attention and time and all need to happen at once.
This weekend we are all going to visit my parents. Cait and I may get a solid chunk of time together while Juniper hangs out with grandma and grandpa. Hopefully we can finish the detail of the seeding schedule. Cait is planting the second succession of scallions in the greenhouse today. It wasn’t planned, I just felt it was about time. The timing of successions is one practice that we are adapting this year due to our recent move to a cooler environment, crop spacing is another. The 2130 now has a straddle of 54″. That’s 6″ wider than we were working with before. I drove through the snow to see what the new bed size would feel like. It feels big. Stepping across a bed with out stepping in it was difficult before, now it will be impossible. I need to use the model snow bed to see if our row cover hoops will still work and I’m concerned about how easy it will be to push the Planet Jr. seeder out in the middle of the bed. How will cultivation and harvest be affected , and if we purchase a tiller sized to this bed width, will it work with a narrower bed if we decide to change? It’s amazing how 6″ will affect things. On the positive side, that same 6” could have a dramatic effect on our long term success. With limited space to work with, increasing the productivity of the land is how we will be able to produce more. This reminds me of Eliot Coleman and the Nordells. Both have focused on increasing the productivity of the land, not increasing the amount of land in production. An extra 6” may mean consistent heads of lettuce, faster growing carrots, and more bushels of beans. I hope so; we have to wait for spring.
Today as I was collecting eggs and filling feeders I heard, for the first time this year, the song of the chickadee. For me, that sound is a tick on mother natures clock moving the season one notch ahead and signaling the approach of spring. It is such a pleasing transition from one steady note to one lower. I enjoy whistling along as I’m working out side. Sometimes it seems like they hear my whistle and respond. After reading Dustin Urban’s recent blog post I realized I don’t know if the chickadee around here is the mountain chickadee or its lower dwelling relation. What ever the case spring is on the way, and with spring will come our new chickens.
Last year we began exploring the great green world of pastured poultry. Borrowing from Joel Salatin and other friends’ experiences we built a mobile chicken coop, got some electric netting, 200 laying hens and started moving the whole operation around the pasture. Each morning was an adventure opening the doors and dodging the birds as they jumped out ready to start pecking and scratching in the lush grass.
This year we will make a few modifications to the chicken tractor trailer and set off on another soil building, egg producing journey. Additionally we are planning to set up a flock of meat birds along side the layers. I am excited about this addition to our farm business. We will raise the day old chicks for 8-12 weeks and then process the birds on site. They will help us realize several of our goals; a diverse offering of local food, soil health through their scratching and manure, and an increase in overlapping enterprises such as moving the chickens to pasture behind the grazing cows.
It was warm yesterday, I was able to break up much of the ice on the back patio. It is snowing again today. Luckily I like to ski. If not, my patience would be at ends with this weather. As it is, I’ll think happy thoughts of green grass and go make some fresh turns on the mountain tomorrow.
Weathervane Farm is official now. There are two weathervanes turning with the wind high above the garden.
Caitlin and I, with Juniper in the wagon, set out down the ice rink that is our driveway to find a home for our business’s namesake. It is almost year ago that we moved here. It is such a striking difference, the feeling I have now compared with then. Moving a farm is a big deal. The big snow year didn’t help things either. But those days of packing boxes, loading trailers and wondering what in world are we doing are mostly memory. Now, we are talking about buying tractor implements and painting the walk-in cooler. We are creating our identity and putting up weathervanes. There is still the feeling of uncertainty, but like the weathervane pointing to the unseen wind we are getting a grasp on the forces around us and feeling more and more settled each day.
I hauled 3 tons of sand today in a 3/4 ton Ford. I’ve never heard a satisfactory explanation of truck weight ratings. There seem to be many things people say, “you can’t do”, but in reality they are very possible. For instance, growing vegetables at 8,000 ft. Weathervane Farm germinated its first seeds last year. In spite of all the uncertainties the season proved successful. Last year we demonstrated that growing food here is possible. Now we are striving for a higher quality.
We are in the midst of creating a new farm business, we are dodging pitfalls and road blocks every step of the way. Federal and State regulators who contradict them selves and each other alike, bankers, 2 foot snow falls and farming at 8,000 ft, we are not doing this because it’s easy. I’m doing this because I get to drive tractors…and all the other philosophical do gooder stuff you can read about our website www.weathervanefarmbv.com.
This blog is for the tractors; our John Deere 2130 and the mobile chicken tractor (trailer). It’s for all the questions of how, why, and did it really work? In spite of automated switchboards, unconstitutional regulations, and other unhelpful things, there are real people out there actually doing something productive with their days. Today I shoveled some sand and now I’m telling the world about it, is that really productive? The Deliberate Farmer published, on his blog, designs to make your own chicken scalder and chicken plucker, that is useful. His and other blog sites with good practical information on farming inspire me to tell our story. That and the incredible lack of information on small (commercial) scale, local based, environmentally, socially and energy conscious farming. We want to push the boundaries of agriculture beyond the accepted practices and past the fence lines. I hope that what we do will help someone else reach their goals and learn to laugh at the unexpected turns along the way.
We had some old three sided flats once used for soil blocks stored in the root cellar. Caitlin needs more four sided flats right now for seeding our alliums and perennial flowers. Recycled shelf slats from an old greenhouse bench fit perfectly as the fourth side.
