Life on a small Iowa Farm

Entry 117: The Indianola Farmer's Market

2011-09-11T21:33:00.000-07:00

Yesterday was something of a special day for me. One of my goals in coming to Iowa, and starting a large garden at the farm, was eventually to sell produce at a farmer's market. We love to go to the Des Moines farmer's market, which is, like, the largest farmer's market in the US (don't quote me on that), and of course I immediately thought I'd one day be setting up shop there. As I've let the idea marinate a little, and have worked through some of the details, I reached the conclusion that it might be better to cut my teeth on a smaller market, and see how it goes, kinda like working the minor leagues. Well, there is a farmer's market in Indianola, which is pretty ideal because it's close to the farm, but I didn't know much about it, except that it was at the county fair grounds in town and was much (much) smaller than the big one in the DM. One Saturday this summer, we decided to check it out, scope it out, actually, like the shrewd business moguls we are. Actually, at the time, I didn't know if I'd even have enough produce to sell at a market this year, so this was just a chance to see what other people were selling and what kind of vibe the market was giving off. Well, it was like a breath of fresh air, not to say that the Des Moines market is stale or commercialized, but this was the real deal if you were looking for a true farmer's market. Humble, to say the least, but very refreshing. I could look across the tables of vegetables and see me, dirty fingernails and tanned neck, looking back. The highlight of the day was our daughter getting her fingernails painted by a little ten year old beautician in training and then being able to buy three gourmet, home backed cookies for a dollar (we didn't buy any veggies because I could probably grow them in my garden). I left feeling like this might be a possibility, I just needed to talk with the organizer about the booth fee. I talked with him on Tuesday and targeted the next Saturday as my first market day. I had to do an assessment of the garden, as to what could be sold, and this time it wasn't too much. Really, this was going to be a learning experience, you know, a chance to get to know the customers. Actually, I love to people watch, and this was going to be a great chance to sit and do that, and maybe sell a watermelon or two. Well, the night before the market, I was trying to get everything harvested, but I was running out of daylight because apparently I had a little more in the garden than I had thought. I was just wrapping up as the coyotes started to howl on what felt like a very nearby hill, and then I sped up a little. Actually, I had to leave quite a bit on the ground to pick up the next day, because I'm just not comfortable yet with being out at the farm, alone, at dusk, but I was able to swing by before the market to complete the harvest.

So for this first one I was a little nervous, but excited. As I stacked the winter squash and arranged the garlic on a table made from an old door, I looked at some of the other people with their fancy tents and stacked boxes of produce and thought about being a little fish, even here in Indianola. The family next to me mentioned having a seven acre "garden" (an acre is about the size of a football field), and I don't even know if mine is an eighth, but I like it and I'm proud of it and I was proud of what I brought. Once all set-up it didn't look so bad. I had some pumpkins, watermelon, winter squash, a melon, peppers, potatoes, garlic, and peppers. Definitely not all that it could be, or will be, but a good start. The booth fee was five dollars, and my goal was to make that back. Eight is when the market opens, and as I sat on the truck bed I noticed it took thirty minutes until my first sale (four bulbs of garlic). At this rate I would barely make my fee back, but then I remembered it was a beautiful day and I was finally getting to do something I had dreamed of for years, and I couldn't get the smile off of my face. What a great city to people watch, and I could tell some stories from this first day, but I'll save them for myself. The vast majority of market goers were well north 75 years old, which made me realize they probably wouldn't be interested in half my offerings because they probably couldn't pick them up, but they were friendly. Really, everyone is just looking for a "good morning", and I must of been doing something right, because I had to carry two watermelon to cars (which made me wonder how those melons would get out of the car). The icing on the cake was having family stop by and getting to share this with them. There was just something so right, so natural, that it can't be explained. Like when a flower bloom is full after a rain. Noon came quickly, and there were dry spells and busy spells throughout the morning. I tried to take note of what sold well and what other people were selling or what their prices were and what the visitors asked for or didn't care for, but I'm not sure I want to make this a game, and there is no reason it has to be. This can be something so much more than that, something better than that, and I'll try to keep it that way. That being said, it felt good to make back the fee money, and then some, like I had done some honest work, made something with the labor of my hands (but it was just too early for pumpkins).

Entry 116: Bring Out The Heavies

2011-09-11T19:31:00.000-07:00

This really has been the year of the pests. Deer and cutworms at the farm, plus the spider mites and squirrels at home, have made me aware of what really goes into successful gardening. Honestly, though, I thought with the onset of early fall, and the cooler temperatures, that possibly the energy put into pest control might be reduced a little. It was with that mindset that I walked through the garden one day and noticed a chubby green caterpillar nibbling on some tomato leaves. Now, you must admit, tomato hornworms are pretty exquisite creatures, and upon seeing this one I paused to watch it eat in solitude. Last year, I only had one hornworm on all my tomato plants and so I didn't even bother him. I had never seen one before, and if anything, I thought it was a privilege to have him grace my humble little garden, but, as I've said before, one year of experience can be worse than no experience when it comes to certain things with the garden. So I watched this caterpillar and thought of my luck and the beautiful moth he would grow to become one day and maybe I would get to see that moth (and on and on) until, looking on the next tomato plant, I saw another one. Three on the next one and a couple more on the plant next to that one, and before long it was apparent that this could become a problem unless I acted.

I wrote previously about cutworms, my immortal enemy, and how they've really been a problem with the tomatoes, but these hornworms have a different MO. The hornworms typically feed on new growth and young stems, so they are found on the tops of the plants, and when they eat a tomato, they literally eat it, not just nibble a hole in it.

Size wise, these guys are the tanks of the caterpillar world and definitely have some muscle. The big ones were slightly longer and thicker than a finger, and when I tried to pull them off they'd clamp onto the stem with their serrated little feet and really put up a fight. With the cutworms I've gotten to the point where I can just grab them between a finger and my thumb and "pop" them. A little juice on the fingers, but it's quick and effective. I have to wear gloves when I pull of these hornworms, though, because I swear one tried to bite me, and I don't really know how to kill them because if I squished them they'd completely drench my hand. So far, I've had to rounds of picking off hornworms. The first time I got about ten, the second time a few less, but I think that's where I'm going to end it. The tomato plants are wrapping up the season and there's only a few worms that I see, so I'll pick a few off here and there, but I'm not going for total eradication. The cabbage worms have bounced back nicely (hooray) on the broccoli, kale, and cauliflower, and the cutworms are also back in force on the tomatoes. I still see the soldier bugs and the occasional empty sack of a caterpillar, but they just aren't getting the job done. Aside from the fact that your vegetables are the battle ground, that predator/prey relationship among insects is quite fascinating, and while I am on the verge of negotiating terms of my defeat this year, I am already seeing positive signs for next year. The soldier bugs should have a nice population bump, plus I'm seeing a lot of ladybug larvae on the okra plants (and subsequently, around the garden) and the occasional preying mantis has materialized out of the bean leaves. I, myself, though, would like to be a little more proactive and try my hand at attracting some beneficial insects, namely, wasps. The tentative plan is to build some wasp condos (blueprints are still being finalized), and try to get their numbers up in the spider range. In all, I partly blame the dry weather for this increase in pests, but I'm glad they showed themselves now so I can start planning for the future. Hasta La Victoria Siempre!

Entry 115: Barn Rattler

2011-08-29T20:19:00.000-07:00

I haven't posted on snakes in a while, not that I haven't seen any lately. Small brown garter snakes are a semi-regular site in the gardens, which makes me happy. The other day, while I was looking for dry beans, there was a snake in a bean plant. Must have been the right spot that day, but they are a pleasant site. Now, last month I saw quite a large black garter snake and it took me a bit by surprise. I had been a bit spending a little too much time staring at thick bunches of tomato leaves trying to find the hidden caterpillars. Now some of these caterpillars were pretty large, and some were dark (almost black), and that's the search image I had plugged in for my hunt. After a bit of intense searching, I let my eyes fall off of the tomato plant and drift past the beans, and I saw what I first believed to be the largest tomato worm in the entire history of the world. Turns out it was just a large garter snake, but I could have sworn it was a caterpillar.
Well, two weeks ago I was out at the farm on a nice day and was doing some work near the hay barn (my headquarters). I had just finished and was pushing the wheel barrow back to the hay barn when something caught my attention sprawled across the gravel entrance. It was a snake, sunning himself, but not one that I recognized. Now, if it's not a garter snake, I'm probably going to be a little scared of it, and this was definitely not a garter snake (and did I mention it was quite large?). Regardless, I wanted some sort of documentation, but my camera was in the truck and getting it would mean passing by the snake. I decided to outflank the snake and loop around the back side of the barn, but before I could get far, he started moving. He crawled for the side of the barn as I made a dash to the truck, but by the time I had retrieved my camera, he had disappeared. i poked around the side of the barn, but didn't see any movement. I was a little upset because it's not everyday that I get to see a large snake, but really I wanted a picture of it so I could see if it was a dangerous snake or not. Just a few days previously my wife and daughter had been out to the farm, and I wanted to know if this was something to look out for.
I returned to my wheel barrow and emptied my tools and picked up a little, but I was a little more alert and on edge from the snake encounter. I walked past the barn entrance and saw some movement behind a board leaning against the wall. Snake, camera, bingo! It was larger in diameter and length then I had first thought, but it didn't seem to be too overly aggressive. I watched it move behind a larger board and out of sight before I could get a picture of it's head or a clear look at it's tail (which would tell me if I was an idiot or not). I slowly lower this board, revealing the entire body of the snake against the side of the barn, and then I heard a clear, distinct rattle. Heart started beating a little faster, but I could have sworn I didn't see a rattle on first observation. Was this a juvenile? Did it have an internal rattle? Was this a disoriented and lost timber rattler? I backed away as the snake began to coil, but once it started moving again I darted in to get a clear picture of the head and tail. I was not content to let him go about his business, and would find out his identity once I got home.
It was pretty clear from his head that this was not a rattlesnake of any sort, and it didn't take long to find out what midwest snakes mimic a rattle to scare away predators (If only I had the internet on my cell phone). This was a prairie kingsnake, and from what I could tell, it was a very healthy specimen. Not much of a threat, and actually a good snake to keep rodents down. I'm doubtful I'll ever see him again, but it's good to be reminded that there are still things I don't know about this rural life, and that as much as fear is an inhibition, curiosity still wins the day with me.

Entry 114: Battlefield Tomato

2011-08-22T20:14:00.000-07:00

Well, it started with the broccoli and those little green cabbage worms that feed on the leaves. I had them last year, and they sorta came in waves with, a period of heavy infestation followed by pretty much a disappearance of sorts. At one point, I saw a wasp fly in and snipe a caterpillar right of a kale leaf, one of the coolest sights of the year, and so I figured that the predators were eventually winning out with the caterpillars. Now, what part I play in this balance of sorts is beyond me because at times I feel I may be helping one and hindering the other, but in the end the effect is the opposite of what I intended.
This year, I was eagerly anticipating the return of these wasps that would carry away the little green trouble makers, but they didn't come, and the caterpillars kept multiplying and multiplying. I would post a picture of the broccoli and cauliflower plants, but it's too embarrassing. I decided to take matters into my own hands and began spending a certain amount of time each day at the farm picking off caterpillars. A typical day would probably be about forty, and yet I didn't feel like I was making any progress (as I was swarmed in the garden with white butterflies). Then one day I saw a worm, draped across a leaf, discolored and obviously the victim of an insect homicide. The next time I saw another dead one, and then another, and I noticed the number of caterpillars decreasing (or at least not bouncing back as quickly). And then one day, I saw the act itself. There was a tan colored stink bug hanging out near the center of the leaves of the plant and in his grasp was the limp carcass of a cabbage worm. Part of his mouth must act as a spear to piece the body and then part is like a straw to withdraw the insides. A little research revealed that these "stink" bugs were actually called striped soldier bugs, and were well known garden predators.

It was about this time that I started noticing worms on the tomato plants. Now, there is what is called a tomato horn worm, and it gets to be about the size of a finger from munching on tomato plants. These were not those (I had one last year), but were smaller and darker colored. Eventually, I started finding larger and larger ones and seeing holes in my tomatoes. Like the cabbage worms, I started putting focused effort into extracting these pests, but didn't seem to be making too much headway, and was growing more and more frustrated with these large holes in my precious tomatoes. I had hoped the birds might be my allies in feeding on these, but that seemed to be wishful thinking. A little research revealed that these worms were, what are known as, cutworms, another common garden resident. They were not a problem last year, of course, so their appearance surprised me, but I wasn't going to give in and decided to remove as many worms as was humanly possible. I'd comb over the plants with such an intense stare that the worms cowered behind their leaves, or crawled inside the tomato cavities they had made for themselves to avoid getting squashed between my searching fingers. The truth, though, was there were just too many tomato plants and too many leaves and too many caterpillars, I would need some help. Well, one day I saw a dead cutworm, and it looked very similar to the cabbage worm victims I had seen earlier, and so I started scanning the plants for striped soldier bugs. Bingo! Not only were there soldier bugs on the plants, there were also what looked like hatching soldier bug eggs. My calvary had arrived, but it's too early to tell if this means the cutworms will be eliminated, or just kept at low numbers. I'm still finding worms on tomato plants (and peppers), but feel the tied has turned in my favor now that I have there are some 'protectors' on the plants.

Entry 113: I Got That Boom Boom.......

2011-07-31T21:29:00.001-07:00

Pow!
The real black-eyed peas made another appearance at the farm this year. Last year there was this kinda familiar, kinda bizarre plant growing out of the compost pile and it produced these long purple bean-like pods. My first thought was that it was some kind of weed and that the "seeds" were probably poisonous, even though they looked remarkably like black-eyed peas. I did a little google search after the fact and found out that these really were black-eyed peas, but the thing was, this plant was coming out of the compost and I had no clue where the seeds could have come from because neither I or Grandpa had grown them out at the farm. My guess is that the seeds were buried in the bull compost I put on the pile a year ago, and who knows where Barney picked them up from.
I didn't save any of the seeds, which bummed me out a little once I found out they were edible, but these black-eyed peas ain't going out like no fad, and came back volunteer again this year (and this time I was ready). I collected the seeds and next year I should have a nice little patch of black-eyed peas. I'm kind of a sucker for beans, so this is a good one to add to the growing collection.

Here are some of the other new plants on the farm this year.

Black Sesame - a only grew a couple of these, because I really didn't know what the plants were like (or how cool they were) until this year. I'm not sure how to collect the seeds, but these plants are very sturdy, have a lot of large flowers, and, if the seeds are easy to harvest, they could get a bigger area to grow in next year.

Blue Flax - another unknown till this year. Lots of delicate, blue flowers that produce small, round seed pods. Extracting the seeds is kind of a pain, so harvesting our own flax by hand might not be a very practical idea, but the plants are attractive and fit in well at the farm.

Tomatillo - a sad story, but the tomatillo plant did very well early, and was covered with blooms and lantern-like fruit, but then apparently a worm bored into the base of the plant and that's pretty much been the plant's downfall. Next year the plan is to grow a few more and maybe try to make some new Mexican foods/sauces with the fruit.

Prairie Blazing Star - this is a prairie flower I planted last year, but this is the first time for it to bloom. I love the chaos of these flowers, and so do the butterflies.

Musque de Provence - after seeing how easy it was to grow pumpkins last year I decided to try something a little more unique than just the standard orange. This picture doesn't do the squash justice, but by fall these will be like rusted orange/green cheese wheels (or at least that's what the seed package says :)

Entry 112: Triple Strength Severed Deer Head

2011-07-14T06:34:00.000-07:00

Sometimes, one year of experience can be just as bad as having no experience at all. Last year, there was an occasional deer visit to the garden to nibble on some bean leaves, and the only real problem was when they demolished the four or five corn stalks I was attempting to grow. This year, however, the deer have been ubiquitous in the garden, and it was something I really wasn't prepared for. MId spring was probably the worst time, when the plants are just starting to grow, and I'd walk out to the garden to see uprooted plants, stripped plants, or plants that had been crushed underhoof. It was in those times of sheer frustration (and anger) that I brainstormed about how to solve this problem and the best idea I came up with was to stake some severed deer heads around the garden to send the message that I really meant business. I guarantee that would have been extremely effective, if not a little sadistic, in a very primitive man sort of way. Well, more evolved brains developed, and I researched some more humane ways of controlling the deer, which could be the biggest development of the year. Deer in the country are like pigeons in the city, and if I want to get as much out of this garden as possible (and maintain my sanity) I'll need to figure out a way to deal with them.

The first attempt was to create some noise makers using tin pans and string. The idea is that as the breeze blows it will cause the pans to clatter and make enough of a racket to scare away any jittery deer. Brilliant, and I immediately put up six of these around the garden and grape vines. Well, the next day I realized my designs needed some tinkering when none of the tin pans were still attached and were scattered on the ground (it probably didn't help that we had 70mph winds that night). Anyways, I tinkered and came up with something that worked, but the final verdict is that these are not doing the job. Either the still nights with no wind are too numerous, or the deer ignore the clanging pans. I think they help, but they aren't the answer.

My second venture, then, was to put up "fences" around the garden beds. This idea was a little far-fetched, but came from something I heard about how deer don't like to walk under things. Now, the ideal solution would be to set-up an electric fence around everything I wanted to keep the deer out of, but that is just a little too aesthetic for me, it takes away any of the challenge of man vs. nature. My "fence" is nothing more than a ruse, but so far it's worked. I put bamboo poles around the perimeter of some of the smaller garden plots, and then strung two lines of string from the poles, one high and one low. If any deer want to get to the garden beds, they will need to go under one of the strings, and that may just be a little too risky. I'm optimistic about this one, but I know it's a pretty long shot to work in the long term.

My most recent, and most dangerous, idea was to create my own homemade pepper spray. I did do a little bit of online research for this one, but in the end just kinda threw together my own recipe. I had some dried fatalli peppers from last year (these are the ones that nearly killed me) in my basement, so I crushed up five or six and added them to a gallon of water and about three teaspoons of dish soap. I let this mixture sit for a couple days and then strained it into a squirt bottle before applying it to all the grapevines and a number of plants at the farm. I have had to do everything in my power to keep from tasting just a little drop of this blend because I want to be sure that if deer even lick one of these treated leaves they will wish they were dead. Okay, so that's a little cruel, but the burning sensation does wear off in time.
Honestly, 90% of the plants in the garden have been affected by deer, and even though most of them are doing good now that they are a little larger, I'd like to have a little assurance that next year I'll know how to keep the deer out from the start.

Entry 111: Permanence (and Repurposing) pt. 2

2011-06-27T05:34:00.000-07:00

Sometimes (most times) at the farm I feel like what I'm trying to do is beyond what I'm capable of. Well, I haven't quit yet, and lately I've been thinking that maybe it's a good thing to bite off more than you can entirely chew. It's a driving force, a constant challenge, and nature isn't the enemy, but at times it's the adversary and I'm still very naive when it comes to dealing with it, but I can't stop or give in because this place is as much a part of me as my arm or my leg. That being said, I am not planning on expanding my garden this year, but rather, make the existing gardens as nice, and easy to maintain, as possible. I sense that I am close to my limit, as one man, and even though I do like a challenge, I am not an idiot :)
So that pretty much sets the stage for these wooden garden frames. The more I work on them, the more I value them. I know aesthetics might not seem high on my priority list, especially for a garden that has one visitor 99% of the time, but I, at times, see this garden as a work of art, and these frames give straight lines and boundaries, and I like that. I mean, the garden is still wild at heart, and I'm not trying to muzzle it, but this will keep that savageness from spilling out of the beds and into the paths. Another way of stating that is, "less weeding", which for me, is the greatest future benefit of these frames. I know it's taking quite a while to get these frames installed, but each one saves me countless hours of garden work in the future, and for that, each one is absolutely priceless. This garden wasn't dreamed up for one season or a few years, but for the rest of my life and for the generations that pass. The dirt and straw garden of last year, honestly, might not have made it to my 40's, and I don't know for sure how long these frames will last, but my eye is now set on permanence, and we're moving in the right direction.
So far there have been three or four days of focused work on these garden frames. In all, I think I've installed eleven or twelve of them, and I'm passed the turning point of believing this can be completed this summer. I don't know if I will have enough wood to completely finish, but it will be close, and this week should see some more progress made.
Now, wooden frames were the original idea, and what got the ball rolling on these garden renovations, but the more I thought about it the more I realized that this was also the opportunity to do something else that would greatly improve the garden. Last year, I put down hay or grass in the garden paths to keep the weeds down and it worked so-so, but this year I wanted wood chips! In the vein of trying to keep my budget low, I went on the look out for free wood chips. Craigslist had someone claiming to the the woodman with free wood chips (didn't respond to my email), the community garden down the street had huge piles just out of my reach (I'll share that story of awkwardness later), but my persistence was rewarded when I discovered that the Indianola dump/brush facility gives away free wood chips on the weekends, cha-ching!
So it's been a two part process, put up the frames and put down the wood chips. Lots of things get me excited on the farm, but this garden project is on another level, even if it doesn't get finished till the fall. Next year, next year, is always the refrain, but it's the how you have to live out here.

Entry 110: Permanence (and Repurposing) pt. 1

2011-06-25T08:18:00.000-07:00

Over the winter I sat down a couple times and worked up a list of things I wanted to do out at the farm this year, in addition to the normal garden upkeep. A couple things were a little far-fetched and many things got crossed off of the list after more thought, but one project that I couldn't shake, and that made more and more sense the more I thought about it, was putting wooden frames around the garden beds. I put a star by it in my notebook and put it at the top of my priority list for the spring/summer.
Now, if someone is wanting to make a garden with raised beds, they probably start by constructing wooden frames and then fill them in with dirt, but not this guy. In preparing the garden beds last year I had wanted "raised" garden beds, and that's what i got simply by digging out pathways through the garden. With raised beds, the soil is able to drain after a rain a little quicker, which came in handy when we had such a rainy spring. I threw down some hay in the paths, and all in all, it worked out pretty well, even though keeping the beds and the paths weed-free was a bit of a task (one that I thought I might just have to accept as a necessary evil).
There is a large community garden by our house in Des Moines (more stories from the Franklin Street Community Garden and it's acolytes later this summer) and we made many visits to it on family walks last year. I didn't "steal" my renovation plans from the community gardens, much like I didn't "steal" some pink cosmos seeds or an occasional strawberry, but they did strongly influence me. As spring rolled around I was ready to go and optimistic that I could accomplish my garden renovation by the end of summer, even though I would have to retrofitting the garden beds would take a few more steps than just building and filling in the frames. My only problem, and it was a big one, was where would the wood come from?
I had been perusing the lumber sections at the local hardware stores throughout the year and trying to do some very elementary math in my head to estimate the cost of buying boards to use as frames. Even with grossly underestimating the amount of wood I would need, I still thought buying wood would be far too expensive, but then an excellent idea for free wood came to mind. Since there are no longer cows at the farm, there is no need for the wooden fence by the old barn, and I could use those for my frames. Now, I hadn't previously inspected the fence with the foresight of possibly using it's boards for wood frames, but I assumed that surely it would be usable. Well, I was right (and wrong). About half the boards will be usable, and that first day, crow bar in hand, I collected quite a few boards to get me started. I drug them up to the hay barn, which had become my carpentry HQ, and got to work.
Little did I know what a challenge this would become, or how great it could be for the garden. To be continued.......

Entry 109: Know Your Enemy

2011-06-07T20:01:00.000-07:00

This little guy with a long torso thought he was pretty hot stuff till I got my gloved hands on him. He was frolicking across my aronia field one sunny day, thinking nothing of the content and frustration behind the two eyes fixed on him (I'm assuming it's a him, but I didn't actually check). Normally, I just chase these small creatures into the tall grass, but this day I was feeling a little adventurous, and was wearing leather gloves, so I decided to pick him up. Now, he's a very cute creature, mouse-like in many ways, but do not be fooled, he has caused unmeasurable (well, I probably could count it if I really wanted to) damage to my aronia plants and possible some of the grapes. This unsavory creature is the vole (shudder in fear good people)!!! He's bigger than a mouse, and much slower, hence the capturing and parading around on my hand, but is very much a rodent and loves to gnaw on any tender woody growth he comes across. Now, to be fair, I made things very easy on Mr. Vole last year. Seeing how voles would be a tasty meal for any bird of prey, they prefer to live in long grass, and that's exactly what they encountered in my grape and aronia fields last year. For a myriad of reasons, the grass didn't get cut for a long, long time, and when it finally did I encountered many little vole burrows of dry grass and the remains of the young aronia plants I had set out the previous fall (always with vole droppings nearby). It was frustrating, but it was my own fault, and so this year I have made it a priority to keep the grass well cut and discourage any voles from setting up their little love shacks on my property. This fellow, though, apparently was a little late to the party and didn't get the memo. Catching him was pretty easy and in another time or place he might have made a good little friend, but the wounds are still too fresh, and in the end I let the little guy run away by a wood pile (where I thought some large snakes might be living).

Entry 108: The Birds Of My Neighborhood

2011-06-06T19:39:00.000-07:00

The geese remind me the pond doesn't belong to me.
The pheasant call is still new, and so strange.
The turkeys survived another hunting season unscathed.
The robins are are my companions in the garden and the barn swallows are my guides through the fields, while the red-wing blackbirds keep a lookout. Together, we are a pretty formidable team. When I get tired, they remind me that I don't have to fly myself to Mexico in the winter, and if I did, then I would know what real fatigue was.
The turkey vultures, that now frequent the old barn, make sure I don't nap on the job and am sure. to shower on a regular basis.

Entry 107: Clandestine

2011-04-24T20:01:00.000-07:00

A year is becoming a shorter and shorter unit of time on the farm. It's mid-spring and I'm already lamenting the things I wasn't able to do in early spring, but I find comfort in the reassurance that I'll get to them next year. Last year, to talk about it like that would be to give it too much credit (so maybe I should call it step one), was amazing, but there were so many things that weren't done right or didn't get done or didn't get in the ground soon enough that I really don't want to a repeat that year again. Fortunately, a year isn't a book, it's simply a chapter, or maybe even a page, and once read, it is remembered and pondered and quoted, and if it is rewritten, it's rewritten so that the best parts are even better and the bad parts are diminished. I have the hardest time, though, remember that the bad parts (weeding the garden for a month after a vacation, mowing thigh high grass around the grapes and aronia, preparing endless garden beds) were really that bad, but I wrote them down and if my words said to never do this again, then I'll try and heed them.
Well, one thing that did go really well last year was starting my own seeds at the Drake University greenhouse. I think I wrote about how getting to use the greenhouse was one of the best perks of working at Drake and that I couldn't have imagined a better scenario for growing transplants for my large garden. It was step one, my first time ever starting seeds indoors, but I felt like I couldn't fail. Literally, everything I planted grew, and I went big, mainly because I had such little experience with plants and wanted to see if I really could grow all of them, and secondly, because I wanted to see how much I could really handle in the garden. So it was go big or go home, and I ended up going home with some big vegetables (that was so corny (did you get both of those?)). But I could sleep easy knowing I always had the Drake greenhouse in my back pocket when spring came around.
It was nice while it lasted, wasn't it? Long story short, Drake ended up hiring a botanist and, seeing how botanists typically like to work with plants, the greenhouse became valued ground. Last year, the greenhouse was like the wild west, if you could clear off table space of overgrown succulents, keep the other desperadoes from stealing your plants, and navigate the unpredictable temperature shifts, you could make a decent living running vegetables (and by desperadoes I do mean professors). This year, there was a new sheriff in town and she doesn't play games with desperadoes. Her first order of business was to clean up the algae slicks where the humidifiers leaked and let everyone in the building know that the greenhouse was for research (and if we wanted to do any plant research we needed to submit a proposal). I remember getting that email and immediately my mind, equating access to the greenhouse with any sort of gardening success this year, raced to come up with some inane "research" idea that involved me "testing" seeds, but honestly I thought that once I expressed my love for plants that any green blooded botanist would give me all the table space I wanted.
No, and no. Those were the answers both times I asked. She stuck to her guns, which meant, as of a couple months ago, I didn't know if I'd be able to have a decent garden this year. I'm not embarrassed to admit that I went into panic mode, and I even asked Adrienne if we could use the kitchen table to start seeds (just for a couple months?). My inexperience was showing, but this was a problem I never anticipated I'd have to deal with. I had some ideas, but wasn't sure if I could pull them off, until finally, with the clock ticking, I decided I had better do something or else the garden would be a wash this year (because seriously, what's a garden without tomatoes and peppers and I was not going to buy seedlings if I had grown them like weeds the year before). I sketched some quick blueprints and headed to Home Depot with the $50 dollar gift card our realtor gave us when we moved into our house. Later that day I assembled, in the basement, the greatest seed starting apparatus known to man, which I named "Eden 2".
Okay, this post is dragging on. The key point, building this thing was a lot easier than I thought it would be and I actually like this set-up better than the greenhouse because now I can check on the plants everyday (in my pajamas). I still have a lot to learn, but with a little bit of patience, much is possible. I feel like the plants are a week or so behind where they were last year, but that's because I started them later, and I have full confidence they'll do great once they are in the soil. The really key, though, is the heat pads underneath the trays, which I picked up from Amazon.com (with the earnings from my fantasy football team, Amnezia). So I guess all's well that ends well.

Entry 106: Tomatoes are the heart, beans the fingers

2011-03-26T12:20:00.000-07:00

It's spring, ready or not. Yes, it snowed yesterday and won't get to the 40's today, but it's hear and it's time to start getting ready. It's amazing how quickly things start to happen once the frost gets out of the ground. The robins and back in force, red-winged blackbirds are marking their territory, earthworms are pushing through the soil, and the new green leaves of growth are taking hold.
I have high hopes for this year on the farm and I think I'm definitely more prepared for this spring season, but there will be some long days ahead to get the new garden beds prepared and everything planted. Last year was pretty amazing, and I can't explain just how much of me is expressed through planting and harvesting, and just marveling at the wonder of life in all it's various forms. I'd like to think I've brought a new measure of life to the farm, and that the farm has awakened in me a small child that has been asleep for far too long. I could go on and on, but what I wanted to do with this post is just wrap up the garden exploits of 2010 and set the stage for the new and improved 2011 garden :)

The old standards: There really wasn't much that I didn't grow last year (to some extent), and I definitely enjoyed some of the more traditional garden veggies.

- Tomatoes - these are definitely a favorite, and as the title says, the heart of the garden. I ended up growing about ten different varieties of heirloom tomatoes, and despite the horrible weather for tomatoes, these did pretty good. We ended up dehydrating and freezing a lot, as well as making sauces and soups with the fresh ones. If I had to pick a favorite, I couldn't :) but I did like the amish paste and pineapple varieties.

- Peppers - another favorite, but these didn't do quite as good as I would have liked and I think that's because they were a little more affected by the wet weather than the tomatoes. I love peppers, though, and will try out some home made pepper cages to see if I can keep a few more plants from falling over this year. The favorites were definitely the marconi red, sweet chocolate, and poblano peppers. On a side note, I grew an insanely hot pepper (fasali) that nearly killed me when I ate (part) of one and my plan is to use some of those dried peppers to make a pepper spray for the corn/aronia/grape vines to discourage nibbling.

- Beans - each vegetable could get it's own entry, and it's really a shame to try and compress that bond between a gardner and his plant into one little paragraph, but this is better than nothing. Beans fascinate me, and this is the one plant that I am looking to increase production of more than any other. Green (snap) beans are great, but I'm mainly talking about dry beans. Expect some good entries on the wonders of the dry bean this summer and fall, because I think they are amazing.

- The rest of the standards did good as well. Broccoli, onions, eggplant, zucchini, lettuce, cabbage, beets, peas, etc.

The overachievers: I knew enough about the standards to have a pretty good idea what I was getting into, but there were a number of plants I had little experience with and knew this first year could be interesting.

- Okra - these plants may win the award for newcomer of the year. I love okra, and these plants were so easy to grow and were heavy producers. Plus, Peyton is a big okra fan, so they should be in high demand again this summer.

- Swiss chard - these plants are garden warriors. No frills or fancy displays, they just get to work and get the job done day after day. Definitely the top leaf crop of the garden.

- Vines - from watermelon to pumpkins, the vines showed that they belong, even if they take up a lot of space. It's pretty hard to beat eating your own watermelon or carving your own pumpkins, and to think that Peyton could get to do this all through her youth makes me happy.

Entry 105: A Lesson In Prayer and Humility

2011-02-19T15:12:00.000-08:00

I definitely left the farm yesterday a different man than I was when I arrived (and it wasn't just because I found a deer antler). It wasn't a long day at the farm, by any means, but it was a meaningful one, if for no other reason than because I was put in my place in a very, very convincing way. Now, I often don't like to be told what I can or can't do or how to do something "the right way", but sometimes there are things that should not or cannot safely be done anyway but the right way, and that's something I found out the hard way.

Looking back on it now I'd say I was a little overconfident, a little naive, and too careless about something I didn't understand the power of, and of course, I'm talking about fire. There have been many posts about fire and how it's been a great way to get rid of all kinds of things on the farm (old cow bones, mulitfloral roses, woodpiles, etc) but the more I read about native prairie the more I am convinced of the power of fire to increase the health and well-being of the land (as far as native plants are concerned). Well I did a little bit of isolated grass burning last spring, which weren't a hassle to contain and turned out pretty well, and I think that gave me some eagerness and false confidence about increasing the areas burned this spring. Okay, if you are reading this, and you know even the slightest about grass fires or prairie burns, then you are probably anticipating a certain outcome to this story and I want to tell you that it doesn't end nearly as bad as it could have. I remember doing a little reading on grass fires this winter, and specifically taking note of the safety measures to follow, but then I remembered how I didn't need them last year and for some reason my few hours of experience outweighed the words of the fire ecologist experts.

So I showed up at the farm with a plan to burn a large pile of limbs that had over-wintered in one of the near pastures. There had been heavy snow, but the warm temps had melted the snow a couple days previously and I figured the wood would be dry enough to burn. It was a large pile, so this would take awhile, but I was coming off a pretty stressful week and was looking forward to sitting down for awhile and having nothing more important to do than watch a fire burn. Well, my schedule was thrown off when I ran into Grandpa at the farm and got to talking. After we parted I didn't think I'd have enough time to burn the whole pile, but I'd take a look at it. The wood pile was on a south facing grassy slope, and it seemed dry enough to at least attempt, but it was much larger and spread out than I remembered it to be and would need to be compacted in order for it to burn well. I didn't think I had the time to do that, so I thought I'd just see how it burned as it was and grabbed some nearby dry grass to start a fire. The dry grass burned great but did little to incite the branches, which was okay with me because by this point I had decided I didn't have the energy to see it through. In those few moments I decided I would at least get something out of this little burn and decided to go with Plan B, which really wasn't in my plans at all before this moment. There is a small area nearby that I had wanted to burn this spring, but it was a little difficult to access and at least part of my brain was working to anticipate that I might have a hard time controlling a fire there if I were to start one. Where I was now, though, seemed a little more manageable, seemed a little more like the burns I had done last year, so why not just let this little grass fire go and see what came of it. I mean, I thought I was doing something good by burning this ground that hadn't been burned in probably fifty years. Well, I'm sure there have been many catastrophes that were a result of someone doing "something good".

So once I decided that I'd let this little grass fire go, I ran up to the tool shed to grab a shovel (which is what I used last year). I couldn't find the shovel, so I grabbed a garden hoe and a spade (this would just be a little fire) and headed back. From here on it gets a little foggy. At some point I realized that it was a little windier than I first thought and that there was a little more dry grass in this area and that maybe a garden hoe wasn't going to do the trick. Now my mind actually started functioning, and a slight amount of adrenaline kicked in, and I started seeing what I had actually gotten myself into. This innocent little fire (aren't they all) was growing and I had better start containing it, and honestly, this garden hoe wasn't going to get the job done. I now sprinted up to the shed and returned with a manure shovel, only to see that the wind had widened the path of the flames and was pushing the fire into some thicker areas. Now is when the adrenaline starting flowing. I started smothering the flames on the up wind side of the fire (where it was moving slowly against the wind). Thinking back on it now, this was probably a big mistake because this end of the fire wasn't nearly as dangerous as the down wind side, but I thought this would be the quickest way to put out a large part of the fire ring. By the time I had put out the up wind side of the fire, the down wind side had doubled, and this is where I stared praying, fervently. Looking at the situation, I new I had put myself in a very tough spot. I was the only person out there, I had limited resources to contain this fire (read; no water), and the fire was in a position to spread quickly in an open area. The fire wasn't headed towards any buildings, but it was headed, potentially, towards a fence line and the neighbors land. I contemplated calling the fire department, but took a quick, final look at the situation and decided I had one chance to stop this thing now before it got out of control and I couldn't spare a second. My prayer was for the wind to stop and for my shovel to suffocate the flames and for forgiveness for thinking so naively, and then I was off. It was a blur of smoke and ash and leaping over flames. Time stood still, but the fire wouldn't, and I looked nervously at where it was headed while trying to contain the periphery. I was making progress, the wind was slowing, the fire was starting to bottleneck, but I needed to stop the flames now, or else I risked this fire reaching a large patch of dead grass where I would not be able to contain it. So I put myself in front of the flames, made my last stand, and won. I finally had my chance to sit down, exhausted, coughing, thanking God. It's kinda funny how close the words "humiliating" and "humility" are, but I guess they come as a pair. I saw the day with new eyes and I pray that never changes. Thank you Lord, for protecting and sparing me, please help me to never put myself in a situation like that again.

Entry 104: Weapon of Choice (Deer Antlers)

2011-02-19T14:27:00.001-08:00

Made it out to the farm yesterday for the first time this month. I had missed it. We've had an amazing week of weather and all the snow melted and the ground even started to dry out a little bit. Grandpa was out there too, he had the itch to throw his horseshoes. He hadn't seen my new truck yet, so he wasn't sure who exactly was coming around the corner when I pulled up. In talking with him he mentioned that he thought I may have been the son of a friend who he told could come out and look for dropped antlers. Grandpa said he didn't mind people coming out to look for them because that was better (and cheaper) than a tractor tire picking one up. I had heard of hunters looking for antlers and then using them to attract deer during hunting season by rattling them in a bag or knocking them against a tree, but I didn't know when the time to look for them was. Apparently, this is that time. I made a little mental note and went about my business (the idiocy of which is covered in another post).
Eventually I made it out to check on the gardens and as I was walking through the field there shown something ivory and jagged in the grass. I kinda thought it was garbage, looking as out of place as it did, but then I realized that this was actually an antler, the first one of my collection. Holding it in my hand I felt a sense of awe, as if this antler had purposely selected me to find it and claim it. This was a relic, a journal of the life history of this deer, if only I knew how to read it. Much of the antler was worn smooth and its points were chipped, but when I picked it up it felt alive, as if I still had time to attach it to my own body. I carried it with me the rest of the day as my protection and no creature or man dared to cross my path.

ps. On second thought, maybe it's not such a good thing that the deer are frequenting the field near my garden so much that they are dropping their antlers there.

Entry 103: Prairie Hunter

2011-01-29T18:48:00.000-08:00

I've got the feeling again, like I need to start writing in here again. I'll get you caught up, don't worry. It was a good, long summer and fall on the farm. The garden, again, took up most of my time, but it was well worth it. I think I learned something, and as long as that is the case, then it's was worth while. I plant to have a garden the rest of my life, so if I can learn one or two things a year then I think I'll be doing pretty good.
The garden has been one of my dreams for the farm, and to see it established and prosper has opened up my mind and my heart to other ideas and projects, and the one that I really cannot shake is this prairie thing. It's gotten to the point where I can't walk by a plant (that I think may be native prairie) and look for seeds to harvest from it so I can grow them in my "prairie". I have to think small, very small, but it's like the garden, if I can grow a little each year I'll be happy. Last year I planted a small part of the garden with six different prairie species and they did great, so I wanted to expand that venture for the upcoming year. Now I do have plans for some burning, but that's more for general weed control then for prairie growth, and I wanted quicker results, so I dug a couple small garden plots that will be just for prairie species. I'll have to keep these weeded at least the first year, like a garden, but hopefully after that they'll more or less be self-sustaining.
So this prairie interest has lead me to learn about native plants and to search them out, whether on the farm or in park and library landscaping. I don't know how many species I have been able to round-up, but I'd say something close to twenty-five. There was the yellow coneflower, milkweed, indian grass, and wild bergamot from the cemetery, and the river oats and cardinal flower from Colby Park, to name a few, but the farm has been a surprising source of native prairie plants as well. There is a small patch of the alfalfa field that has never been farmed for erosion purposes (a sloped watershed for the field) and it's what's called a prairie remnant. It's a glimpse of what used to be everywhere here but has been plowed over, leveled out, and fertilized beyond recognition. It stands strong, with it's small grove of wild plums providing shade for the deer, but it is not thriving, due mainly to the abundance of non-native grasses. Needless to say, it's a sign of hope that all is not lost or forgotten. It's a little bit bigger dream but one I cannot shake loose, and year by year, species by species, something may start to change out in those far fields where you can't hear the cars on the highway.

Here are pictures of some of my favorites from the farm: tall bellflower, showy tick trefoil, purple coneflower, mountain mint, common ironweed, compass plant, columbine, black-eyed susan, big bluestem, and wild bergamot

Entry 102: Somewhere

2011-01-29T04:45:00.001-08:00

Somewhere, the sky ends and the earth begins, but this surely isn't that place.

Entry 101: What I Came Here For

2010-09-09T20:41:00.000-07:00

Firstly, for those that read this blog, thank-you. I've done poorly in keeping this updated, but really, really, really will try to do better. I guess part of the problem is that at times I feel like I've gotten into a routine at the farm and things aren't new and fresh like they used to be. I guess I've just done too good of a job documenting life on the farm :) That would be impossible, and new (and old) things still fascinate and capture me, I've just been lazy about getting on here and sharing them. No more!

This is a good post to get me back in the swing of things because it touches on a lot of what I felt I came here to do in the first place. So my normal farm routine is to get out and check the garden, weed a little, mow in the grape or aronia fields, dig a little for a new garden, and maybe look for new flowers. It's pretty much self-contained. The soybeans in the field are doing fine all by themselves and all the hay equipment is just sitting looking pretty, so life is good. Well, Tuesday was going to be different, an old fashioned day. I showed up at the farm early and hoping to do a bit of mowing and really start to make some headway in cleaning up the aronia field. The grass was a little wet with morning so I dug up some garlic I had planted last fall. The bulbs had sprouted roots and, in some cases, green shoots, but I just put them all in a bucket and replanted them in my new garden. I figured they were too far gone to eat this year, but should provide quite a harvest next year (if I remember to pick them sooner). Next I did some organizing in the hay barn where I keep most of my work items. Bamboo poles and plastic grow tubes had been sitting in a big pile for too long and I didn't want a family of mice to move in. It was as I was finishing this task that Grandpa showed up on the scene.

Though we don't have any hay to harvest this year (but a massive amount for next summer) Grandpa still likes to keep the machinery running and will bale hay for a couple neighbors. Well, he wanted to do some baling today, but the baler was acting up. This baler is still highly functional despite it's old age, but lately there is always something that makes using it a huge headache. This time the mechanism that determines the length of the bales was being difficult and causing bales to be either huge back breakers or mini-bales. Apparently, the mechanism is easiest to fix while the baler is running and that's where I came in. Grandpa wanted me to drive the tractor and run the baler while he monitored the size of the bales and made any changes if needed. I was a little grumpy at first because I had my big plans for the day, but I told Grandpa I would help him, and the more I thought about it the more I realized this would be a very good experience. I hadn't driven the tractor in months and had never operated the baler, plus Grandpa said we'd be going to Bill's fields and I hadn't seen him in close to a year. Really, just getting to have another Bill experience was the tipping point. I have fond memories of working with Bill on his farm. It seems like I was a kid then, but it was really only about a year and a half ago.

Bill was finishing raking the hay in his fields into wind rows when we arrived. There was some concern about the hay being too wet from the light rain the night before, but the strong breeze and sun was able to dry the hay to a suitable level. We were able to speak briefly, tractor to tractor, in the field. Here was Bill, the man whose house interior I had repainted, whose basement walls I had braced, whose fields I had cleared of anything resembling a tree sprout; he looked at Grandpa then to me and said, "Why, hello Jeremy." Classic. I'll give him a break because Grandpa had told him earlier I wasn't going to be able to make it, but I was wearing my signature hat (which he has told me he uses to recognize me).

We started in the farthest field, which also happened to be the hilliest. I put on my confident face in front of Grandpa as I mounted the tractor. He showed me the level to pull to engage the baler and we were good to go. Now for those that don't know, I don't have much of a history of driving tractors (or any stick shift vehicle for that matter), but since moving to Iowa I've had some occasional lessons. Little did I know Grandpa would be betting his life on those few lessons today. I was in first gear, which meant I wasn't going to be breaking any land-speed records, but pulling the baler was a new challenge, especially with Grandpa walking beside/riding on top of it. Basically, I had to keep one eye on the wind row of hay in front of me, one eye on the hay going into the baler, and one eye on Grandpa in case he wanted me to stop so he could make an adjustment. It was pretty much a tractor obstacle course, complete with hairpin turns, crooked hay rows, and hills. You know how stress actually helps you learn things, I do now. There wasn't a lot of time to ask tractor questions of Grandpa because the focus was on fixing the baler, so I had to trust what little I knew or else the results could really have been bad. Normal driving was fine, but having to stop after every couple bales was a challenge. When Grandpa first signaled to stop, I really couldn't remember the proper way to do that, so I just mashed all the petals as hard as I could, and wah-laa, the tractor stopped. As long as I kept all the petals (clutch and both breaks) compressed the tractor would not move and Grandpa could wrench around with the baler, and to start again I just had to slowly release all the petals. This worked like a charm, but soon I noticed a problem. My legs were starting to fatigue from all these stops and I was worried at some point I might not be able to keep the tractor still. Relief came when Grandpa revealed that, on level ground, with the tractor in neutral, you didn't have to press the breaks or clutch and the tractor would sit still. Later I would learn that if I have the tractor in gear and turn it off on a slope, it would stay in place (having it in neutral would cause it to roll). So besides stopping the tractor, the other challenge was keeping the baler lined up with the crooked hay rows that Bill left for us. I was zigging and zagging, turning early and drifting on turns, all in an attempt to get as much hay picked up as possible on one pass. Looking back at Grandpa hopping on and off of the moving baler was a little distracting, plus having him reach into the baler while it was operating, but the funniest thing was having Grandpa be a back seat (or baler) driver. He's picked up hay on this field for probably a couple decades and couldn't help but nod or point now and then. He was a good sport, even when I missed a chunk here and there.

In the end, I drove the tractor for about and hour and a half, which eclipses all my previous experience three times over. I did cause Grandpa to fall off the baler once, on a jerky start, and got caught daydreaming about all the monarchs, dragonflies and swallows out in the meadow, but other than that it went pretty smooth and we were able to get the bales to be the right size consistently. I wasn't able to help Bill pick up any bales, I had to get back home, but I did get some apples from his apple tree (which reminds me of the amazing apple pie he makes). Maybe I'll find another reason to get out there again this Fall.

Entry 100: Grassroots

2010-07-12T05:15:00.000-07:00

It's been awhile since I've put anything up on here, and I apologize (this is an older picture of the garden to use as a reference). I justified it to myself by saying that I couldn't blog until I finished this big project I was working on at the farm (like that would be motivation for me to work harder) otherwise I would just be posting about the same thing over and over. Well, the project is finished and I can return to my blog :) What was this epic project you ask? Weeding the freakin' garden, that's what the project was. Here's a little story to help you understand the difference between last year's garden and this year's garden. Last summer we went on a midsummer trip, similar to what we did this year. It was about a week in a length and I knew that on returning there would be work to do in the garden, and last year that meant spending the better part of two days at the farm pulling weeds. Well this year it took me the better part of a month to completely weed the garden after our little summer trip. Now, that wasn't the only thing I did at the farm, but it was a primary focus and one of those things that I couldn't let just slide by.
You are probably wondering why, after my experiences from last year, I wouldn't do something to control the weeds, especially if I knew I was going to be out of town. Well, as I like to think of it, I'm not an idiot, I had a plan, probably the best plan I could think of, but I was a victim, a victim you hear! The long explanation would take some time, so I'll keep it simple. The plan was to mulch around the garden plants and thus keep the weeds from growing. The mulch would be grass clippings from mowing in the grape and aronia field, and I would be the conductor in this biodynamic production. The plan was perfect, except for one small problem with the lawn mower (which works a lot harder than I do at the farm). It was blowing smoke when I started it and being the opposite of a mechanical genius, I decided it needed professional care. Still had a couple weeks before the big trip, so I thought I'd be fine, until I learned that the wait for the mower would be two to two and a half weeks. What could I say, the best laid plans of mice and men.......
I got the mower back a day before we left and embarked on a desperate scramble to mulch what I could. Oh yeah, here was the other problem. The weeds were so small that they were hard to pick, and so I wanted to wait till they were bigger (and easier to pick) before trying to control them. Well that didn't really happen before it was time to go, so they had pretty much free range of the garden and what mulch I could muster didn't do much good. I wouldn't let myself think about it while on vacation, but honestly, when I got back, it was far worse then I could have ever imagined. Somebody must have sprayed weed steroids on those bad boys because they were not the tiny little grass blades I had bid adieu too a week before, they were monsters with a choke hold on my garden. Fortunately, the garden had just enough energy to break that choke hold and will its way over to the ropes to tag me into the match. Those first couple of days back I was like Hulk Hogan in his glory days, but then it hit me how long this was actually going to take and then I started moving like a more current Hulk Hogan. My back and knees would ache, my fingers became calloused and cracked, but I was making progress little by little. And this time, once I had cleared a bed, I was able to cover it with mulch, ensuring that my work would last.
In the end, some plants really took a hard hit from the weeds and are still failing to thrive. I'd like to think that I finally learned my lesson about staying in front of weeds, but trust me, I learned it last year. I guess anything worth doing is worth doing twice, and the hard work was worth it in the end because now I can go out to the garden and really enjoy it (and I don't have to worry about losing my daughter in the tall grass).

Entry 99: Natty Ice

2010-07-05T14:58:00.000-07:00

I thought deer or rabbits would be the biggest problem in the garden, but with the weather we've been having it's the slugs that are doing the most damage. There is hardly a plant in the garden that does not show signs of being munched on by these little slime balls. Slugs (and snails I'm sure) are always going to be a garden pest, and typically wouldn't cause me to bat an eye, but we've had an amazingly wet month of June which means the conditions have been perfect for a bumper crop of slugs and the damage they have done has been quite annoying. At first I thought the mighty farm toads would handle this situation, but sightings of them have been scarce in the garden (probably too wet for them). I am wanting to avoid the chemicals, but don't want the garden to be a slug AYCE buffet!

In reading about gardens, and various pests, I remembered an interesting remedy for slugs and snails that didn't use anything too harmful and promised to be effective. Apparently slugs are attracted to the aroma of a cold one in the garden and will investigate to the point of drowning in a pool of amber bliss. I laughed at the thought when I first read that, but it kept coming back to mind as I looked at my beloved plants riddled with holes. I decided to give it a try, but it would require something special of me, something I had not done before and felt a little embarrassed about, but for the good of the garden, I would do it. So the next day I made an extra stop at Wal-Mart before heading to the farm. I headed to the back isle and perused the options. 48 cans would probably be too much. Would the slugs prefer light, ice, or full bodied? What about a near beer for those designated driver slugs? I settled on a six pack of Natural Ice, primarily because it was the cheapest and the smallest amount I could purchase, and with beer in hand I triumphantly walked to the check-out to get a dirty look from the elderly cashier woman, who I'm sure thought 10 AM was a little early for this. If only she knew the real purpose of my mission.

It was actually about a week after purchasing the beer that I actually put it to use. I'd intended to do it on a number of occasions, but run out of time working on something else. Finally, I made this a priority and put two cans in my orange bucket and walked them down to the garden. First, though, I wanted to trim around the grapes a little with the clippers. The grass has gotten beyond lawnmower height, so I've had to resort to just trimming around the individual vines with hand clippers. When that was done I mindlessly tossed the shears into the orange bucket and "FIIZZZZZZZZZZTTTTTTTTTTTTT" was the sound the beer made as it gushed out of puncture in the can. I worked quick to save what I could and ended up with enough for one trap and the rest all over the bucket and my tools.

There were a lot of options as to where to place the trap, but I decided to put it by the pepper plants because they were showing serious signs of slug damage. I poured the beer in a shallow plastic bowl and brushed away some soil and mulch so that the lid was at ground level and let the natty ice do its thing. I was a little pessimistic that this would work, but man, there was a slug headed for the beer almost as soon as I stepped away for a picture. I checked the trap two days later and found eight slugs, booyah. Now it's time to kick this thing into full gear as soon as I get back to Iowa.

Entry 98: Hunter or the Hunted?

2010-06-08T11:50:00.000-07:00

Look at this picture. Now look at it again, closer this time, and see if you can spot the two figures completely camouflaged and hidden in the dense forest foliage. Still having trouble? Not surprised because we were invisible even to the wild animals of the forest.
In this picture with me is Dr. Muir Eaton, a professor at Drake University. Muir teaches a number of biology/ecology courses but his specialization is in ornithology (the study of birds). One day, during an exam of his I was helping proctor, he mentioned that he likes to hunt and that the turkey season was coming up. I said we have a lot of turkeys on the farm and if he'd like, he could come out and hunt them. It didn't take long to settle on a day.

I am a turkey hunting neophyte, and so this whole thing was new to me. Fortunately Muir was willing to show me the ropes and didn't mind me tagging along. Step one was showing up before sunrise, which meant getting to the farm around 5:30am. Once there, I needed to get camo'd up before heading into nature. Turkeys are apparently keen at spotting faces, so a face mask is a crucial piece of equipment. I had hoped the mask would resemble another forest creature, like a deer or owl, but it was actually just a piece of fabric that covered your face. Once dressed, we trekked out to the woods. The strategy is to get to your location and set-up camp before the turkeys are active and then try and lure them to you, as opposed to stalking. As we walked through the pastures in the dim light we could hear some turkey activity in the trees to the north. Turkeys roost on the limbs of large trees, and then come down to the ground during the morning to forage and mingle. It wasn't long afterwards that we reached our spot on the edge of the forest and made ourselves comfortable, confident that there were plenty of turkeys in the vicinity. Muir set up two female turkey decoys across a small stream from us and we ducked behind some large fallen trees. Soon after we heard gobbles coming from behind us, as well, so we took our positions and waited. Muir checked his camouflaged shotgun and I made sure I was mentally prepared to defend myself against a marauding tom turkey with my fists of fury if Muir missed. Much of turkey hunting is waiting, and it could be waiting all day for a turkey that never comes or it could be waiting fifteen minutes for three turkeys that stumble into your sights.

Four male turkeys dropped out of a tree about a hundred yards northwest of us and went on the far side of a ridge. Out of eye-sight, but not out of hearing range. Here's where an expert turkey hunter earns their keep, and surely I was seated next to one of the best. Muir removed his turkey call, a small, tan colored reed, placed it in his mouth, and let out the call of a desperate female turkey. And we waited for the inevitable turkey stampede coming our way. Long story short, those male turkeys were not buying what we were selling and failed to make an appearance. Muir said that during this time of the season, the early part, the female turkeys are very available to the males and there really isn't much need for the toms to go out looking for females, so it can be a little hard to lure them in. It looked like that was the case here, so after waiting it out, we decided to explore and see if we could out flank those turkeys we'd seen earlier. A little unorthodox, but we weren't having much luck playing by the rules. Like forest shadows we crept through the undergrowth, stepping behind trees and shrubs to stay out of sight lines. Muir peeked over a hill and motioned me to join him. On a hill side was a large tom in full display. There was no cover between us, so sneaking any further was out of the question, even for two green ninjas like us, so our only hope was Muir calling him closer. Didn't work and so we headed back to our original sight and gave it one last try. Crickets (nothing).

Apparently turkey hunting can be feast or famine, but even though we didn't bag a turkey or even get a shot, I thought it was a great day. I am up for any new farm-related experience, and this definitely qualified. Plus, we were out in the forest during the time of day when birds are most active, and I was sitting next to a guy who could tell me what each one was just by its song. Pretty amazing stuff. As we left we made plans to come back later in the season, when the toms would be a little more desperate to find mates, but that unfortunately didn't work out and so the turkeys on the farm are safe until next spring rolls around.

Entry 97: Dutchman's Britches

2010-06-03T09:10:00.000-07:00

Here are some pictures from spring. I wish I had taken more. These represent a couple months of spring that have been grouped together.

This is an ox-eye daisy. Disappointingly non-native.

May apple flower.

Purple and pink larkspur. I had never seen pink ones before.

Dutchman's britches. This is one of the first flowers to emerge in early spring. It was all over the forest floor.

The compass plant. This has become one of my favorite plants on the farm. I discovered it last year and thought it was some sort of weed on steroids with these huge leaves, but then I found out it is an important native prairie plant. I have never seen it in bloom on the farm, so I'm hoping to catch it this year.

Wild columbine. This comes out with the larkspur in the forest.

A very young deer I came across in the forest. It's hiding.

The aronia that were planted last fall.

Entry 96: Straw Paths

2010-06-03T08:26:00.000-07:00

I am proud to say that everything but the pole beans have been planted in the garden, and hopefully those will go in this weekend. Truth be told, this whole blog (not just a post here and there) could be devoted to the garden and that still wouldn't be enough, but here's a glimpse. Much of the time on the farm this spring has been devoted to getting the garden ready, which ended up being a little more work then I had imagined, but in future years it will be much easier. I made a map (of course) in winter of what the garden would look like. It didn't turn out that way, but it is remarkably similar, better probably, and it's real :)

Okay, I posted once about starting plants in the greenhouse. Well, I just finished planting the last of those plants two days ago and there were a few things I learned for next year. For one, I started a lot of things too early, mainly the tomatoes. The tomatoes grew so big they were starting to fall over in their pots and that sent me into a mini-frenzy to get them planted. I didn't know if it was too early to plant them, but I had seen some other gardens and they had tomatoes, so I figured I should give it a go before they outgrow their pots. With my schedule being a little hectic I only had one day to plant them, and it ended up being the hottest, windiest, and least welcoming day for tomatoes. I had tried to harden them up a little at home, but they were in no way prepared for these conditions. Leaves immediately wilted, stems snapped in the wind, and I was getting so frustrated that I was tempted to forget about tomatoes for the year. I was only able to plant about ten plants, and I had little hope that they would survive, but at least they were in the ground, well watered, and had a chance. When I returned a few days later the tomatoes looked ragged, ragged but alive! I then planted some more in conditions that were a little better suited to garden work and felt a sense of accomplishment. Then I heard we were going to get a freeze that would likely kill any warm weather plants (like tomatoes) unless they were covered. These tomatoes were not making things easy for me. I didn't have plastic to cover these plants with (and I didn't want to be one of "those" gardeners) but I needed to do something for these plants, and then it hit me, insulate them with old hay! Of course, I had old hay, and if I packed it around the tomatoes then it might be enough to keep the roots and main stalk warm. So the next day I did just that and when I returned after the freeze I noticed a lot of frost damage to the exposed leaves but the plants were still alive! What's next, nuclear attack?

There are some plants that are supposed to go in early in the spring, and those are thriving. I had to prepare the garden in stages, and once the soil was able to be worked, I made enough beds for these early season plants to go in. Included in this first planting were the broccoli, kale, cabbage, and cauliflower plants from the greenhouse. I picked up an onion set, and those went in as well, and we also planted lettuce, beets, radishes, turnips, peas, spinach, swiss chard, and arugula from seed. The potatoes, which are supposed to be planted on Good Friday, went in about a week later. These plants have provided our first harvest and have thrived so far in the garden. I didn't plant carrots, like I wanted to, but I guess you can have a fall planting of those.

Now that the weather has warmed, and the danger of frost has passed, everything else can be planted. It took me awhile to prepare the beds, but they are done and the sun is shining on the little plants as they grow. It will be a year to learn, and hopefully eat a lot, and I'm already making plans for a bigger garden next year.

Entry 95: Soybeans, Oats, Alfalfa

2010-06-03T07:24:00.000-07:00

What a spring, not likely to be seen again. I'm not sure if changes like this happen often on farms, but they must because Grandpa seemed to know what he was doing. There were two key factors that lead to this point, one was that the alfalfa in the fields was getting pretty thin and the second was that the cattle were sold over the winter and wouldn't be returning. Grandpa, being the farmer he is, looked at the situation and formulated a pretty darn good plan. There was plenty of pasture suitable for planting (treeless and flat) and we could put it, and the fields, all in crops this spring and eventually have it all back in alfalfa by next year. Bold, definitely, and looking back on it now, the farm has undergone a metamorphosis even Kafka would be proud of :)

Pulling Fence: In order to pull this off, a large amount of fence had to be pulled so that the pasture fields would be accessible to tractors and other farm equipment. I had never pulled fence and had the fear that it would result and a large pile of mangled wood and barb wire that would need to be buried somewhere on the farm. My fears were put to ease when Grandpa showed me how it was done, and the end result was a tidy piles of posts and a couple tight rolls of wire. The process is a little time intensive, but well worth it. You start by removing all the staples form the posts (these are what hold the wire to the posts). You then go through and roll up the woven wire and barb wire (both of which require separate techniques). Lastly, you pull the posts out of the ground, which would be extremely difficult without the help of a tractor. Grandpa said on work like this two people working together can do the work of three individuals. Well, I felt like we did the work of four, especially when my Uncle Jeff was out there working with us. Grandpa would run the tractor and I'd work the heavy chain, which I grew fond of after pulling countless posts. Pulling posts is actually the easiest part of the process and once they are all out you go back and load them on a cart. In some cases dirt work needed to be done to smooth out any cow paths made by the fences, but there is a neighbor with a cat (bulldozer) who took care of that. I think Grandpa was surprised at how much fence we were able to pull and how quickly we did it.

Kill off existing plants: Before putting the new plants into the ground, the existing plants need to be killed. This is done by applying a herbicide to the fields and pastures, in effect turning them brown like mid winter. Yes, it is sad that this is how it has to be done, and I'm not sure I want to know the total effect something like this has on the farm ecosystem, but this is definitely a time of learning for me. Herbicides are only used when necessary out here, which is a practice my Grandpa holds strongly to, and this was one of those times.

Planting: The end goal is to have all alfalfa in the new and old fields which will be harvested for hay. A stand, or planting, of alfalfa will last anywhere from four to seven years, depending on a number of factors. For us, the alfalfa was getting thin, meaning there were a lot of weeds in the fields and the concentration of alfalfa was getting low (I think this was the fifth or sixth year from planting). The process, then, for reseeding alfalfa is a little complex and takes a little time, but the results are superior. First, you plant soybeans in the fields, and that is what we are doing this spring. The soybeans help replenish the nitrogen in the soil and give the fields a break from the demands of alfalfa. After the soybeans are harvested, oats are planted. I'm not entirely sure why they go in, but I think it's partly just because they are one of the few things that can go in late in the season and produce a crop (they also help prevent soil erosion caused by having bare fields). Finally, the alfalfa is planted and for us that will be next spring. So no hay this summer, but there will be a soybean and oats harvest, and next summer there should be more hay then this farm has seen in years (my forearms rejoice).

We have to hire out the planting to a nearby farmer who has the equipment to handle large scale plantings. This one ended up being about sixty acres, which isn't large compared to some of the thousand acre farms in the area, but still nothing to shake your head at. We utilized no-till planting, which means the seed was planted in a furrow made in the soil by a disk and does not require that the soil be tilled first. The seed is a GMO :( (genetically modified organism) and has resistance to the herbicide the fields are sprayed with. Once the plants are about six inches tall the fields will be sprayed again to kill any plants that missed the first spraying. In no time the fields will be a dark green of soybean leaves.

In all, this really is a big change for the farm, and it was spear headed by Grandpa. He's taken care of cattle forever, and I was a little surprised with how easily he let that go, but nobody loves putting up hay more than he does, and with these changes there will be plenty of that in the future. Man, with all these fences down and changes, I might need to make some new maps :)

Entry 94: Fire and Fish

2010-06-03T06:32:00.001-07:00

Congrats for sticking this out, because I don't think I would have. I guess when I don't post on here you need to know that it's because things are busy, and this has been a pretty crazy spring. I won't go into the details, but it's been a good couple of months. A lot of time was spent on the farm and a lot of time was spent off of the farm, but I want to get caught up on a couple things before we hit the summer months.

The winter we had was almost a record breaker for snowfall. It made any trips out to the farm a little boring, but I read that it is actually good for plants to have a blanket of snow in the winter because it insulates them from the cold winds. It's pretty amazing how wild life and plants out here are so adapted to the changes in weather, but this was one winter not all the animals would survive. Apparently, when a pond freezes, not all the water actually freezes and the bottom part of the pond is still water. The fish slow down their metabolism and wait it out at the bottom of the pond until spring returns. Well, all the snow we had this year pushed down on the pond ice cap enough to get things a little too crowded and I'm guessing the oxygen ran out.
Whatever the mechanism, we experience what is called a "fish kill" this winter and with the melting ice and snow comes the bodies of dead fish on the shore. It looks like all the fish died, but I'm guessing some survived and now have the job of repopulating the pond until it is teaming again with bass and blue gill. There were two key members of the pond who definitely did not survive and will need to be replaced, the grass carp. These were introduced however many years ago to keep the algae down in the pond and over time they grew and grew and grew.
Sightings were a little frightening, even though I'm sure these fish were harmless (unless they thought you were a large piece of algae). Well, they both died and their massive carcasses washed ashore. The smell really wasn't as bad as you would think, it really just smelled pretty fishy. So here's to the pond, and it's recovery from an overly snowy winter.

There are some things you can do in early spring that just aren't good to do any other time. Once the snow has melted and the exposed grass has dried out, it's time to burn it, like with a fire. I've burned a lot on the farm in my days, but a grass fire has always been something I was hesitant to do or try, mainly because I knew so little about it and feared what might happen if I should try. Well this spring I experimented a little, nothing big or unsafe, and tried to get a feel for something I will now be doing on regular yearly basis. Fire, and I know I'm beating a dead horse here, is a natural part of the prairie (Iowa) ecosystem and native plants and animals are adapted to it, whereas non-natives are not. So, in many places on the farm, there are nonnative plants out competing and overcrowding the native ones and a little fire is a way to even the score. The two places I burned probably amount to half of a basketball court (the sun was not blocked by plumes of smoke) but they provided a wealth of experience. I'm already mapping out my burns for next spring, and getting a little a crazy about native plants, so watch out Smoky.

Entry 93: Oh, You've Woken

2010-03-14T07:56:00.000-07:00

I think we've finally been able to peak over the crest of that snow covered slope and see the green on the other side. The walls of snow have been sublimated into fog and blown away by the breeze. But I guess one challenge begets another. You have to keep the embers smoldering during the winter, but then you have to make sure that fire doesn't burn out of control at the first sign of warm weather.
Here is a picture taken at the farm (in the hay field) the last time I was out there, about two weeks ago. I was walking on the moon. There was so much snow I had a hard time getting through the fields and ultimately got frustrated and left. I just wanted to see, and I did, so I guess it wasn't a total loss. I also needed to take about six weeks of vegetable scraps from our apartment and put them on the compost pile (success).

On my way back through the pasture, I did come across something interesting, and possibly a little frightening. I saw a well worn trail in the snow leading under a fence, across a particularly deep snow bank, and into what appeared to be a den. I crept up as quietly as I could in a foot of crunchy snow and peered into the dark den. The walls were smooth and dark with use, and it looked like it branched into two chambers, but the bleached white snow made it hard to see much detail. I looked at the footprints leading in and out, which would suggest a mid-sized mammal, but there were well worn and inconclusive. I did find a tuft of dark fur in the snow, and after that I decided it would be a good time to leave. Skunk was the first thing that crossed my mind, and I could see myself stuck in a knee high snow bank and getting face-sprayed by a family of angry skunks. I carefully walked past the den, cognizant of any sudden growls or movements in the dark, and at this point I was imagining a feral cat or maybe a large raccoon exploding from the hole and permanently attaching to my unguarded rear. After retreating to a safe distance and checking my backside, I was able to see that the well worn animal trail lead from the den to the hay barn, so this story might not be over just yet.

Entry 92: Now It's Getting Serious

2010-02-27T09:24:00.000-08:00

It would take a long time to tell the whole story, but the gist of it was that about a month ago I realized my grand gardening plans were in danger, or at least needed modification. Gardening is a simple activity made complicated by men, and I was on the verge of a mini-collapse because, as I realized from reading the back of the seed packets, a lot of these plants needed to be started indoors. Problem was, I don't have the resources at our apartment to start any seeds indoors. I knew this day would eventually come, this garden reality check, but what I didn't know was how great it would turn out in the end.
So I work at Drake University, in the biology building, and it's been a great fit. It's still my first year so I'm not familiar with all the staff or all the rooms in the building, but I know where my office is. Well, the first lab we did this spring semester involved planting corn and then growing it in the greenhouse that is attached to the building on the lower level. It took a couple trips there with students before the ball started to roll in my head (too many soccer headers), but then it hit me, maybe I could start some of my garden plants in this greenhouse. It just so happened that the next week I would have a meeting with the department head to review my first semester student evaluations and I decided that then and there I would ask him about my plan. Well, it came to the end of the meeting, he asked if I had any questions, and I said just one. His answer was, as long as there is room and no classes need the space for projects, then it would be okay, plus there are some in professors in the department who do the exact same thing. That really made my day, but I still had no experience starting seeds and would need to make a trip to Menards to get supplies.
I felt like such a champ getting the potting soil and planting trays from Menards. I wanted somebody to ask me, "what are you getting this stuff for?' and I'd be like, "listen, buddy, I'm starting plants for my garden indoors this year, you got a problem with that?" So then about ten days ago I decided it was time to do the deed. The tricky part, though, was knowing when to really start because a lot of seed packages will give you a range, and then online resources give you another range, but I figure whatever works is right and that plants are pretty adaptable. The one thing I wanted to avoid was plants getting too big in their little pots and becoming root bound before being able to be placed in the garden. The easiest way to avoid that is to split the planting up into a couple of sessions. So this first session was plants that can stand to be put in the ground while it is still relatively cold (before the last frost) and plants that take a long time to germinate.
After a little trial and error, I figured out a pretty effective way to get the potting mix properly damp and into the trays and pots. Once that is done, you just have to get the seeds to their right depth and you are good to go. It was fun to see all diversity of the different seeds in these packages (and to try and not spill them on the floor). Labeling the pots is also important because many of the plants will look very similar at a young age, especially if they are in the same species (like kale, cauliflower, and broccoli). When it was all done, I breathed a little sigh of relief because from now on it would be easier :) Now is the waiting game, and daily visits to the greenhouse to check on the plants. It is very relaxing, I have found, to go to the greenhouse and take ten minutes to hover over these pots and look for sprouts. I know what's waiting for me when I leave, but for those ten minutes I can be in Eden.

PS. The second round of plantings will take place tomorrow. The tomatoes and the peppers will be the main things to get planted, but there will be plenty else as well. So far, from the first planting, every broccoli, kale, and cauliflower plant has come up, the onions are growing very well, and some of the prairie grasses I started have sprouted.

Entry 91: Cheese (in pictures)

2010-01-31T08:09:00.000-08:00

I know, I know, this didn't occur "on the farm", but it's related. In one of those books (you know the kind) I read about how easy it is to make your own cheese at home and so we decided to order the kit and give it a whirl. The pictures speak volumes, but I will say that overall, making mozzarella was very easy and the results were very good and I could see us making our own cheese now for years to come.
The kit came from the Cheese Queen (www.cheesemaking.com) and for mozzarella (which is the easiest and fastest cheese to make) all you need is some milk, citric acid, rennet tablets, and some cheese salt for flavoring. And then you go through the whole curds and whey thing and end up with some very shiny, very squeaky, and very delicious cheese. I had a hard time eating it by itself (this batch tasted too much like milk, the next one will get a little more salt) but when cooked it was amazing. Enjoy!

Entry 90: The Slow Season

2010-01-31T07:34:00.000-08:00

Getting out to the farm in the winter is always an interesting endeavor because you have to take into consideration that if you get to far away from the car or shelter and you twist an ankle you may be in for a very long and cold survival experience. It's that element of risk that you really don't have to consider in the summer or fall that makes the farm much more of an exotic place in the cold months. It's called out to me, a couple times. I actually had pretty big plans for the working out there this winter, but I couldn't really remember what last winter was like and what I'd actually be able to do, but I had big plans. As it turned out, this winter has been one of the best (or worst) in terms of snowfall, and just nasty winter weather, and has served as a good reminder of what exactly can and cannot be done during these days. Trips out to the farm are now just chances to see how miraculously the landscape has changed. At times I do believe the farm really looks better in white.

Those are the drone bees in the snow that get kicked out of the hive once it gets cold.

And then there was this ice storm and you wonder how the cows survived. Looking at these picture just makes me shiver, but it really makes you think when even the bad weather can be beautiful (if not a little haunting).

I've been reading a couple books about gardening and so they've gotten me all excited about working in the new garden this spring, and so I was racking my brain about what I could be doing now that might be of some use come spring. Here's what I came up with: since there are still the old cows in the pasture (they'll be sold first week of February) they are still producing cow pies, which, in this weather, should be relatively solid and easy to accumulate in a wheel barrow and carry to my compost heaps. That was the plan on my last trip to the farm. Problem one was that the wheel barrow had a flat tire and didn't move too well over six inches of snow, but the cow pies were just as I imagined and so I couldn't completely bail on my plan. I found a very large bucket and proceeded to fill it with the pies.
I tried dragging the bucket, but the only way to move it was to carry it. I was about twenty yards from the compost pile (as the crow flies) but I had to climb over two fences and go around the barn. One trip was exhausting, so I shifted to plan B. I'll just make a nice pile of these things and then when the weather is better (and the wheel barrow is functioning) I'll come back for them.

Entry 89: Frozen Fingers

2010-01-20T06:38:00.000-08:00

I must say, hickory nuts are still number one in my book, but maybe that's because I've never eaten black walnuts before this year. The common walnut you buy in the store is an English walnut and one reason it is so popular is because it has a relatively thin shell and can be processed by a machine. It also has, what I would call, a mild walnut taste, this being based on the very, very strong taste of a black walnut. Adrienne has decided that that taste is just too strong for her, but me, being a man and all with a more feral palate, thinks it tastes all right. The best comparison I can make, and this won't be very convincing, is to say eating a black walnut, compared to an English walnut, is like eating venison when you all meat should taste like beef (at least from what I've heard). The key thing to me is that they are edible. Yes, their flavor is very complex (some might say "gamey" but it's like nothing I've tasted before) and some people might not like them, but I can't stand some types of cheeses while others love them to no end. One thing I do grapple with, though, is that since I've never tasted black walnuts before, how am I supposed to know what a good one tastes like? These may be the worst, rottenest black walnuts ever, but I wouldn't know, and right now it doesn't matter too much because ignorance is making them edible (not quite bliss, yet).

As I wrote about before, for some reason there were no hickory nuts this year. That's not entirely true, because one of Grandpa's two Missouri hickory trees produced nuts, but the shagbark hickories in the woods didn't and that's what we harvested (and enjoyed) last year. Plan B this year was to harvest black walnuts, and so I did, and winded up collecting quite a lot. One of our regrets from last winter was not collecting more nuts and then running out of them before we would have liked to, and I didn't want that to happen again, so I made sure to collect a lot of walnuts (and a few Missouri hickory nuts) to keep me busy this winter. The black bag is for the walnuts, the tan one is for the hickory nuts.

Last winter I could sit down in the comfort of my own living room, pull out a bucket of hickory nuts, and use a hand cracker to shell them. Not this winter. I'm pretty sure black walnuts have the hardest shell of all nuts and so I've had to move my operation outdoors where I can use a wood block and a hammer. It's been my goal to work on my pile for most of the winter, but for this work I have to use my bare hands (no gloves) because of all the small pieces, and the truth is it's honestly been too cold and I wasn't able to really start till last week. If the temperature is in the low 30's (or mid 20's) I'll step out on the patio, grab too big handfuls of walnuts, sit down at my block, and go to work. This amounts to about fifteen walnuts, or around thirty minutes, and by the end my fingers are too stiff and cold to do anymore so I head back inside. This would be great work to do in a heated garage :) It will take me some time to work through the whole pile, but it's relaxing work, so I'm not complaining, and when the temperature gets a little nicer I'll be able to put in longer shifts.

PS. The bucket under the wood block is to collect the cracked and fragmented shells. We live on the third floor, so there is a neighbor's patio directly underneath us, and they probably wouldn't like a steady rain of walnut shells a couple times a week (though it would be their just rewards for having a ridiculously loud TV). I'm also collecting them to add to the compost pile, which should be in fine form come spring.

Entry 88: Seed Money

2010-01-16T19:32:00.000-08:00

The evolution of this farm seems to happen fastest in the winter. I guess when you are forced to wait for and cherish the spring you have plenty of time to walk down all the paths of the crazy ideas that pop up in your mind and decide which ones you'll actually take. It's been a long, cold winter, and it's not anywhere near over, but I've got some ideas for when it is. This garden thing is kind of my latest craze. I can recognize in myself that this is probably the start of very, very many "crazes" on the farm, and in fact, some of them have already started and I'm just suppressing them until I know I'll have more time to get to them. This next spring will be the garden, the fall fruit trees, next year prairie and hardwood trees, and on and on like some Dante's inferno of nature. It seems you can't really get far on this farm without coming across something that sounds like a good idea, and the books aren't making it any easier either.

So let's talk about this garden thing. Fortunately, this will not be the first attempt at a garden, that was last year, and what we learned from it has us very excited. Honestly, we did the minimum and what we harvested was beyond our imagination, and so now, with a little prep work and a little more effort, we are hoping to make it something special. Besides, the grapes and aronia are going to take years to mature, and it would get boring just waiting for them.

I think we must all have a "garden" center in our brain, and mine's been dormant for so long that when it got jostled last year it kinda went haywire. I'll admit, I think I went a little overboard in digging the new garden. If it actually works (the dirt, that is) and I think it will, this thing is going to be huge. I saw it again today, for the first time in a month, and I couldn't help thinking we've bitten off a little more than we can chew. But you never know till you know, and I've learned not to doubt myself, so when this godzilla of a garden idea first came into my mind I decided then and there that I could do it and I would do it. On paper, it's absurd, and I wish I could give you the square footage, but I don't know it yet, but I would say it's about the size of the two bedroom apartment we live in.
This is Iowa, and so if you build it, they have to come and that works for vegetables as well as baseball ghosts:) And just who exactly would be haunting the garden took me the better part of a week to decide. Last spring we just went to the local Earl May's, perused the vegetable seed shelf, picked what looked good, and were out in half an hour. Sometime in the middle of digging the garden, though, I was turned onto the idea of heirloom vegetables, and my life has never been the same. For those that don't know, and I won't make this long, an heirloom vegetable is one that has been in existence and grown successfully by gardeners for many generations. A key characteristic is that heirlooms produce viable seeds, meaning a farmer can grow a tomato plant one year, keep a couple tomatoes for seed, and then plant those seeds next year (or give them to a neighbor to plant). Over time, these plants have developed characteristics that both make them unique, but also well suited to the region or climate they are grown in. It is safe to say, when I learned about heirloom vegetables, my mind was blown. For example, I, biology degree and all, thought a tomato was a tomato was a tomato. Red, sometimes small, sometimes large, and that was pretty much it. Well Pandora has opened the box, and now I know of red, yellow, orange, pink, purple, black, and striped tomatoes.

None of this would have been possible without The Seed Savers Exchange (www.seedsavers.org/) and Baker Creek Heirloom Seeds (www.rareseeds.com). Both have free catalogues, and getting them in the mail was a strange joy because, at the time, I really didn't know what I was getting myself into but I knew, in theory, that this was something to be excited about. I had decided to order mostly from Seed Savers because they are based in Iowa (keeping it local) and if they could grow it at their farm, then I could probably grow it at mine too. Baker Creek is based out of Missouri (nothing wrong with my brothers to the south) but the climate is different to a degree, and even though many of the offerings are the same, I'd use them as a back-up or secondary resource. For Christmas I asked for gift certificates to Seed Savers (nerd) and flipped, marked, and scanned that catalogue like my life depended on it. I discovered a weakness for dry beans, tomatoes, and peppers, not to mention melons and winter squashes, and sunflowers should be added to the list as well.

In all, I think I ordered around a hundred different seed packets, which may seem like a lot, but I gotta go big on this one (and you haven't seen this new garden:). I'd call it going off the deep end, but I'm too excited about getting started to really see this for the challenge it's going to be. Don't worry, the fun will be documented :)

Here are a couple of the plants I am most excited about;
Sweet Chocolate peppers - these bell peppers turn a dark, chocolate color when fully mature (wait till you see a picture)
Rostov sunflowers - a good variety for roasting (I love sunflower seeds!)
Carbon tomatoes - tomatoes ripen to a blackish, deep red when ripe

Entry 87: Early Christmas Present

2009-12-18T15:08:00.000-08:00

I know the temperatures were dropping all Fall, but it still came as a surprise when Winter hit and there was no turning back. I guess you just always want one more day. After a very busy spring, summer, and fall, I thought I was ready for a nice long winter break, but I guess I'm still too inexperienced. My heart wants to go again, start the whole year over tomorrow, from the beginning if I need to, but my head is saying to wait and to relax because if I want to actually do what I'm planning for next year, I'll need the rest. It's frustrating to be forced to learn this; it's youth mixing with old age, but I guess all traditions have to start sometime, and if I'm going to do anything on this farm I better get in tune with the first one.

It will be a slow, cold winter on the farm. I was barely able to wrap things up for the fall before we were hit with a blizzard, and I haven't been out to the farm the past two weeks. When springs comes, and it will come, the farm will be a different place. For the first time in who knows how many years there will not be any cattle on the farm, and despite the fact that raising cattle is a good way to make money (I'm told), I'm happy about the change. I had some good talks with Grandpa while finishing up the new garden and one of the things we talked about was selling off the cows this winter. I'm sure some of you know the time commitment it takes to raise cattle, or any animal, and it just wasn't going to work out on the farm this next year. I can't get out on a daily basis, and Grandpa can't either anymore, so this will be the end of what I know has been a very long chapter on the farm. The fifteen or so calves have already been sold and next month the cows and Barney will be sold as well.

It's a change that was going to come about sooner or later because I really had no intention of raising cattle on the farm, and it will cast the farm in a new light because for the first time, in probably fifty plus years, there won't be cattle roaming the hills. I'm sure this wasn't an easy choice for Grandpa to make because raising cattle is what is in his blood, but then again, he didn't seem too upset when he told me. Checking on the cows everyday, regardless of the weather, making sure they have water (and the tanks haven't frozen), taking out hay on icy slopes, helping calve in the spring (and castrating), chasing runaway bulls, fixing fence and gates, treating the calves for illness, all that can take a toll, not to mention the years spent milking when there were dairy cows on the farm. Who knows, there may never be cows making mud pits, getting into the grapes, and pooping in the streams on this farm again. I won't say never, because I can imagine a time when there will be many animals on this farm (and many kids to take care of them). Time will tell if this change is for the best, but my bet is that the farm will be born anew this spring and will start to flourish in a new way. This really was a surprise and a present from Grandpa, and we even talked about taking out some of the fences next year as well. The wind is blowing across the frozen fields, but this farm is changing faster than I can keep up with it and it's going to take a long, cold winter to be prepared for the spring on this reinvented farm.

Entry 86: The Garden, Like a Book

2009-12-03T18:10:00.000-08:00

The garden, like a book, was easy to start but hard to finish. I can remember my optimism earlier this summer when I boldly marked out the boundaries of what I hoped to be the only garden I would ever need to dig in my life. I wasn't exactly planning on putting in a garden, but when I didn't end up planting as many grapes as I originally planned, I had an empty, open space at the bottom of my grape field. Since I had been mowing the grass in this area in preparation for the grapes, I didn't want to just let it all grow back and lose all my hard work, so after some thought, I decided that this would be the place for the garden. If we do build our house on the ridge, then it will be a short walk from our back door to the garden. The space was large, but I had always observed that the grass grew very thick and quickly after mowing, and so I figured that the ground must be good, and since I wanted as little of this area to go to waste as possible, I made the outline for my garden very big (very, very big). I did this in the summer with the full knowledge that this would be a very time consuming project, but heck, I'd have the rest of the summer to finish it. A little sleep, a little slumber, a little folding of the hands, and before I knew it Thanksgiving was in two weeks and I had only completed about fifty percent of the digging. Me, being me, dug the perimeter of the garden first, and worked towards the inside so I'd be more motivated to finish the whole thing, and not just leave the bottom half for another year. Apparently, that wasn't motivating enough, because I was staring at not much more than an outline of a garden with time running out until the ground froze and I wouldn't be able to dig anymore. I made it my mission to finish this garden before Thanksgiving, even if it meant digging was the only thing I did on my trips to the farm. It was cathartic, to dig and not think, to put the shovel to soil and measure my progress in footsteps.

Thanksgiving came before I was able to completely finish (but I did finish the book that I had started long before I had the idea even for the garden, so it wasn't a total loss). I still had a two day island of grass in the middle of the dark, upturned dirt, and I accepted that this job would have to be finished in March. My fear was that with the Iowa weather the ground would freeze anytime after Thanksgiving and I would have to wait till spring to finish my digging. By finishing the garden this Fall, though, the soil would be exposed to the elements and go through the freezing and thawing process multiple times and hopefully be in workable condition by Spring. It was a pleasant surprise to return from Thanksgiving break and see that the weather would hold out for a few more days, and this allowed me to finally finish, and now, literally three days after completing the garden, a cold front has blown in and has frozen the ground.

Grandpa liked to remind me of how easy it would have been to use the tractor to dig this garden, but I chose to use a shovel, and in a very real way I think that earned me some old timer farm credit :) There were a couple reasons why I chose this, though, one of which being that I was not in the least bit comfortable strapping a plow on the back of one of the tractors and running it through my grape field. That will come in time, but the other reason was that I didn't want to compact the soil. Soil characteristics, as I'm learning, are very important, and I didn't want to compress the soil of the garden by running over it with a tractor, even if that meant I'd have to spend a lot more time digging it. Plus, it gave me a lot of time to think and dream about what would one day be growing here. Next spring, if the garden is workable, is going to be amazing and there will be a significant amount of time this Winter spent planning what will go where. Heirloom vegetables have entered my farming/gardening atmosphere, and I must say I am a fan, so it's safe to say they will be well represented in this garden.

I'm hoping I've done the hard part, but I think I may have just made more work for myself. The truth, though, is that I've invested so much into this garden already, that I'm going to be willing to do what it takes to make it work out, whether that means putting in a fence around it or keeping it permanently mulched. And when it does work out I don't think I'll know what to do with myself, but we may try our hand at selling vegetables at some of the smaller farmers markets.

Entry 85: Late October Ramblings

2009-10-29T08:08:00.000-07:00

It's been a pretty amazing month and I'm sorry I haven't been able to keep up with everything that has happened on here. Fall is a great time to be in Iowa, and in many ways this seems like our first fall, even though we were here last year. This year our eyes have been opened to see so much more of what is around us.

Well, let's get started with this. This month has been relatively mild, except for one cold front that moved through the state about three weeks ago. It brought our first snow and freezing temperatures, and that wasn't the best of news for the little farm garden. I was a little naive about what affect snow would have on the garden, but I found out pretty quickly which plants are "cold hardy" (broccoli, spinach, kale, cabbage, strawberries) and which ones are definitely "heat loving" (tomatoes, peppers, eggplant, beans). The saddest part was that there was still so much food on these plants that was now lost. It was definitely a learning experience, and for this part of the state the first killing frost averages around the 17th of the month. I'm not too upset, but this winter, as I plant next year's garden, I'll be sure to plan space for a few more vegetables that will produce in late fall. I've even read of some that will go into the winter.

One Saturday at the farm, as I was digging up the dead plants in the garden, I noticed Grandpa was in the garage working. I poked my head in to say hi and smelled something very sweet. Grandpa was extracting his honey for the fall, and since I've never had a chance to see this done first hand, I hopped inside and volunteered to help. The harvest this year was reduced from last fall, but it still seemed pretty large to me, especially since we were using a hand cranked extractor to get the honey off the combs. My goal is to have a bee hive or two next year, and hopefully get to have some of my own honey to harvest next year, but I'm definitely a neophyte when it comes to apiology. My uncle is a professional beekeeper in Georgia, and my Grandpa has had bees for years, so I have a few helping hands :) In the garage we had the stacks of supers (the smaller wooden "drawers" that go on the top part of a beehive) and a metal extractor. Each super contains about twelve frames, which are what the bees build their wax combs on and fill with honey. Before you can get to the honey, though, you have to uncap the frames because the bees seal the tops of the combs with wax, so Grandpa used a heated knife to gently remove that top layer of wax. Once both sides were done, the frame was put in the extractor, which resembles a large metal bucket with a hand crank on top. The extractor can hold three frames (but my uncle in Georgia has one that can hold 52 frames, and it's not hand powered), and when you crank the lever it spins the frames and causes them to "throw" their honey against the sides, and it slowly slides down to the bottom. Once the bottom fills up and starts dragging on the frames, it's time to empty it. There is a nozzle on one side at the base of the extractor, and when this is opened the honey pours out. It's best to filter the honey to get out any pieces of bee debris or wax, and what works the best is an old pair of panty hose. Uncle Jeff was there too, to help with the extracting, and the three of us made quick work of those supers (even though it's a little risky to have three Weeks males in one room at a time). The final count was about thirteen gallons of honey, which is quite a bit, and it tasted amazing.

The day I went out to plant the aronia, I found a large, dead rat right in the middle of the field. It was probably the largest rat I've ever seen, and looking closely at it, I couldn't see any signs of trauma or teeth marks. There were just some really long blades of grass lying on the ground beside it. I tossed it, and started planting. Two days later I returned to the field to check on the aronia. I was told that sometimes deer (I'm liking them less and less) will investigate new plants and actually pull them right out of the ground. Armed with my shiny, trusty trowel I made my way through the hay barn and headed out to the field. As I was passing the corner of the barn, something caught my eye and I turned around to see a pair of huge yellow and black eyes staring at me from only a few feet away. My fight or flight response kicked on and I made a quick exit, but I soon turned right back around to get a closer look at what I know realized was a great horned owl. I had never seen one in person before, and this one was letting me get pretty close. It wasn't full grown, but it was still a large, intimidating bird. After a few moments I bid it adieu, and went out to the field. The next couple of days I looked for the owl around the barn, but didn't see it and thought it must have been passing through. The sad conclusion to this story, though, is that the other day I was passing the same corner of the barn when I saw the owl before and noticed something in the grass. It was a half eaten owl carcass. Now what eats an owl, I have no clue, but if I ever find out I'm going to kill it (or at least make it uncomfortable for it to live on the farm anymore). It was a very, very sad site. I would guess now that the owl was either injured or sick and made any easy target. I could have helped it and I should have helped it, but I didn't know any better. Sometimes lessons out here can be a little harsh.

With Jake (the dog) gone, there have definitely been a few more critters around the farm. One that I came to enjoy was a very large ground hog that moved in under the garage. When I would pull into the farm, I would often see him eating acorns under an oak tree in the yard. He would look at me and dash for cover. I once tried to sneak up on him for a picture from behind a clump of flowers, but he was too alert to fall for it, but that bit of reconnaissance did allow me to observe that there were actually two, very large, groundhogs living under the garage. As the weeks past, they got bigger and bigger, and if I had to guess I'd say they were about twenty pounds (because they looked about the same size as Peyton), and in a way they became my farm friends and I looked forward to seeing them. Well, while extracting honey, Grandpa asked me if I knew about the groundhogs under the garage. I said I did, and then he told me how he had shot them that morning. One died instantly and the other broke its back and crawled its way under ground. I'm not sure exactly what the feeling was that welled up inside of me, but I don't think I want things to die very often on the farm.

And lastly, those walnuts better be darn good because they are taking quite the effort to harvest. My large pile was just taking up space in the hay barn, so one day I decided to process them (remove the hulls from the nuts) so I could eventually crack and eat them. Grandpa had said he would put walnuts in a bag and drive over them with his truck to remove the hulls, but he also said you could just do it with your hands. Since this was my first time, I decided to keep it simple and just use my hands and an old pocket knife. I also wore a pair of latex gloves, which I thought was pretty smart, because they didn't hinder my dexterity, but protected me from all that juglone. Well, this was a larger pile than I had originally thought, and it took me five hours to process the walnuts. The gloves, well, I had only brought one pair and they stayed intact for about the first forty five minutes before both thumbs blew out. I kept going, I had to keep going, but the result wasn't pretty. That was about two weeks ago and my thumbs are still stained (but much lighter). I soaked the walnuts in water over night, and then set them out to dry for a couple days before finally putting them in a large sack and bringing them home. The bag must be a least a hundred pounds, and carrying it up to the third floor really got me heart beating. I haven't cracked any yet, but they better be good.

Entry 84: Aronia in the Ground

2009-10-21T13:43:00.001-07:00

Well, it's been quite the process, but I can finally say that all the aronia plants are in the ground and setting their roots to endure the long Iowa winter. Don't remember what aronia berries are? Well then you just need to read my old post on them! As it turns out, I decided that I wanted to put aronia berries on the farm a little more than a year ago, and now that they are in I can see that they have already bared their first fruit, a harvest of patience. It will be about four years before they bare their second fruit, the actual berries.

Here is a quick run-through of how this whole aronia project reached fruition (have you caught onto the theme of this entry?). Last December I made the drive to Missouri Valley, Iowa (just north of Omaha, Nebraska in the Loess hills) to talk with the guy with the largest aronia plantation in the midwest, Vaughn Pittz, and get the ball rolling. My idea was to do a spring planting, like with the grapes, but as it turned out, a stork brought Adrienne and I a little present (not really that little) and I just wasn't able to get around to ordering the aronia and am fortunate to have been able to get the grapes in. Fortunately, aronia is best planted in the fall, so me missing a spring planting may have been a blessing in disguise. I made sure to get my order in and waited till the weather cooled down.

Three weeks ago I finally got the call from Vaughn that my 160 plants were ready to be picked up in a few days and planted. I knew I was going to be planting the aronia at some point in the fall, but not knowing exactly when kinda got me lax in my preparations. Once I got the call, though, I sprung to action. I had kept the field mowed down all summer, so it looked good, but I needed to mark out my rows and dig the holes. I measured out my ten foot rows, but when it came to how far apart to space the plants within those rows, I hit a roadblock. Aronia aren't grapes, so the same measurements don't have to be used, and I tried my hardest to remember how far apart the plants were that I had seen at Vaughn's farm. Five feet kept coming to mind, so I measured it out and eyeballed it and imagined the plants and eventually convinced myself that that was just about right. I had never really measured the area of the field and thought about how many aronia plants it could actually hold until now, and if I placed them five feet apart I could fit them all in nicely. I dug about thirty holes with the post hole digger (my good friend) and called it a day. My plan was to pick up the aronia one day, dig the holes the next, and then plant them on the third day. So the next day I made the drive in my Honda Accord to pick up the aronia. It's about a two and a half hour drive, and with about a half hour to go, the thought crossed my mind, what if the plants don't fit in the car? I had no idea what size the plants would be, but fortunately I had plenty of space for them after all. Driving home with those five boxes of aronia plants just had a good feeling to it. I was taking a significant step for the future of the farm, and I didn't need a Dodge 2-ton to do it.

A cold front was on the way, so the plan was to hold off on the planting for a week, but I still wanted to get out there and dig the holes. Some days on the farm are just a little more epic than others (like when Ian visits), and this was definitely one of those days. I look back on it now like it wasn't that hard off a day, but I think that's just my brain encoding the events of that day as something reasonable to keep me from reflecting on the fact that what really happened was closer to insanity. I knew it was going to be a long day when I found out that the holes need to be eight feet apart and all those holes I dug before would be for not. It was back to the drawing board, and at times it felt like trying to put a square peg in a round hole, but I was able to fit in an extra row to make up the difference, and then it was time to get to work. When I have to work, and I know it's not going to be the most interesting of jobs, I'll put on my headphones and I feel like I'm cheating the system because it makes the work melt away. I put on my headphones and next thing I knew I had dug 130 holes in this field. Ridiculous. Now I know these "holes" aren't the same you'd dig for setting a fence post, but doing 130 of anything is pretty tough and at the end of the day I was spent.

A week later I returned the the field and put a little aronia sapling in each well measured hole. Just yesterday I put the final touches on the last twenty-five plantings, which I had to place around the perimeter of the new garden, and now I'm done. If you did the math, I put in 155 plants, and the other five went to my uncle Kirk :)

Entry 83: If you can't be with the one you love

2009-10-08T07:25:00.000-07:00

I guess you just have to love the one your with. Before this gets misinterpreted let me just say this is in reference to hickory nuts :) One of the surprises of last Fall was the hickory nut harvest. Adrienne and I went out a couple times together, and then I went out a lot of times by myself, to pick wild hickory nuts in the forest that's on the east side of the property. There are so many hickory trees back there that it wasn't hard to fill a grocery bag or two in a half hour, and what we picked up probably represented less than one percent of all the hickory nuts that fell from those trees (I did the calculations). Like our kindred souls, the squirrels, our stash sustained us through the cold winter months and when we ran out, we made plans to pick even more this next Fall. Well, as it turned out, there weren't any hickory nuts this Fall. I made a couple scouting trips and found maybe one or two trees with a few nuts on them, but the vast majority were barren for this year. I did notice a lot of new growth on the trees, so maybe they used the energy normally reserved for nuts to grow a little bigger, but either way, we were out of luck.

But there is always a plan B, and plan B for this farm involves another type of nut, the walnut. There is a nice little patch of walnut trees on the farm and throughout the summer I could see that they were going to be producing a large number of nuts this Fall, so I made preparations for a harvest. Mainly, I just mowed around the trees so the walnuts would be easy to find and pick up. I read that the time to harvest them was after the first freeze (which will be later this week), but my theory is that the walnuts are ready to be harvested when they fall to the ground, and that just happened to be last weekend. The walnut harvest coincided with my birthday, which should make it pretty easy to remember, and now I'd like to do this every year on my birthday, and if anybody is with me on that day they can plan on going out and helping me harvest because it is now officially a ritual, one of the first on the farm.

I like to harvest, it makes me feel like a primitive version of myself. If I didn't have that peanut butter and jelly sandwich in my backpack I could probably survive off of these nuts, and besides, mankind has been gathering walnuts every Fall since time began and I'm just continuing that tradition. The harvest was good, and I to return on three separate occasions before I was convinced I had picked up the majority of the nuts. My haul, for this year, was about eight 5-gallon bucketfuls, with some of the walnuts roughly the size of a tennis ball, but most are the size of golf balls. And picking up these walnuts is about the extent of my expertise on how to handle them, and now begins the fun part because I'm not exactly positive about how to get that nasty hull off of them. Hickory nuts are so easy, but these walnuts will take a few detours before they reach the apartment. I have a general idea, something involving soaking and shaking the walnuts in water with gravel, but again, this will be the first attempt and it may not go so well. I'm sure the failures and successes will make their way on here in the future.

ps. Grandpa has two Missouri hickory trees in the yard, and one of them produced a large number of nuts, so there will be at least some hickory nuts this winter!

Entry 82: "Big City" Ian's Return

2009-09-24T19:46:00.000-07:00

My friend Ian came back. Basically, this guy is such a hard worker that I go great distances to get him to come down for a weekend, even to the extant of naming him as the godfather of Peyton. Well, it worked last weekend, and we were able to get two trips to the farm fitted around a baptism, and now that Ian is practically family, I can pressure him to visit on a more regular basis. Manipulation, the hidden tool of a farmer.

My original idea was that my aronia plants would be delivered the same weekend Ian was in town, and then we could go out and plant those. No aronia, so that will be a fun day by myself, but we were able to find plenty to do instead. I didn't want to bore Ian with my typical mow, dig the new garden, and mulch routine, so we tackled a couple projects that I had been ignoring because I thought they were two person jobs. The first was that darn barn door that blew off in an early spring wind. It had been laying in it's resting place about thirty yards from the hay barn for months, even after the new door was assembled and attached. This would be a salvage project and what I wanted was the sheets of metal siding held together by the wood and nail from. My purchase of a crow bar came in handy, and with two people working we made quick work of the project, even though there seemed to be about a thousand nails in the side boards. I'm not sure what I'll use those pieces of siding for, but it was nice to get that old door out of the way (and out of the calf pasture).

On completion of that project, Ian spotted the old bathtub that sits in the shade of a couple soft elm trees near the cow pen. Adrienne hates this bathtub, probably because it sticks out like a sore thumb, but I've always thought it was unique enough to keep its place. Ian's vote, though, was to get it out of there, and so it was decided. Upon gripping the walls of the tub we soon discovered that it was a solid cast iron beast and moving it would not be easy. Tumbling it sideways. proved to be the easiest way to get it through the pasture grass, and once we were on some shorter turf we could slide it. We eventually were able to maneuver it upon a concrete base near the grain bins with the full intention of one day building a base to set it on so a fire could be made underneath it and the tub could be used as a country jacuzzi. I'm sure Adrienne will be thrilled, but there are just too many possibilities with this tub to get rid of it.

I actually jumped ahead of myself because before moving the tub, Ian and I tackled a pile of about 3 tons of steel beams. Why we moved them would be hard to explain, but I wanted them moved so I could clean up the area around them, and Ian just wanted a workout, so we both got what we wanted in the end. I was hesitant at first because I knew there was a skunk that lived under these beams, and thought maybe we should smoke him out first, but, to our relief, he didn't make an appearance and when we moved the bottom beams we could see his little den was vacant.

Since all these tasks were located in the same general area I thought it would be good to take a little walk and let Ian see the country side. Plus, I wanted to pick up another water tank to use as a leaf depository for this fall and would need help to move one. I had seen a couple abandoned tanks in the middle pasture, but was unsure what there condition was, or how hard it would be to dig them up. For the most part, the old tanks were just thrown in the ditches, and forgotten, so Ian and were excited that we'd be cleaning up the pasture and also giving a new use to the tank. I wasn't positive of the location, but I knew it was behind the pond, so we walked to the clear east side of the middle pasture, right beside the fence, and sure enough, there was an old rusted tank right in the middle of a wide stream bed. I thought this was going to be a pretty easy job, just loosen up a little dirt and pry this tank out, so we only brought one shovel. It was also getting late in the evening and we were running out of daylight, so I hopped in to get started. Well, this was not going to be as easy of a task as we had first thought. Though it wasn't sunk far into the soil, the tank wouldn't budge when we tried lifting it together. Digging around the perimeter of the tank revealed that we were actually working in a mud pit and that the pressure of the mud on the tank was going to be tough to overcome. We called it a night and swore to return with TWO shovels the next day. It wasn't pretty, in fact, it was down right disgusting at times, but we put all our energy into digging out that tank, and when it looked like we just didn't have enough strength to complete our job, and Ian wanted to walk all the way back to the shed and get a metal pole to use as a lever, I said "NO, we're going to man up and get'er done now!" By focusing the remnants of our strength on one side of the tank, and ignoring the fact that our feet were sinking deeper and deeper into the darkness, we were able to pull it free. Once the pressure was broken, we were able to shake free the tank and lift it out of the mire. The bottom had completely rusted off (which wouldn't affect it's new use), but we were still able to roll it all the way back to where my compost piles are set up.

I guess, sometimes you just need a friend to come along and help you out. What we did wasn't "fun" by any stretch of the imagination, but you would never have known that from Ian's attitude. I guess he's pretty good, for a "city boy" and at the end of the day he cleans up nicely.

Entry 81: September Son

2009-09-24T06:58:00.000-07:00

Summer is gone, and it was mild enough that I'm sure some people will wonder if it was even here at all. The one constant on the farm seems to be that time will always pass (and weeds will always grow), but with the arrival of September you become aware of many things that just didn't seem important before. For me, feeling that first cool breeze wrap itself around me was like an alarm clock going off far too early in the morning. If the summer months on the farm are like a nice dream, then Fall is like that morning wake-up call to get your rear in gear before winter sets in. True, I'm not a dyed in the wool farmer (yet) but I still feel that urgency felt across the state. Get out to the farm and get things in order before the first freeze, or before the ground freezes, or before the snows too high to drive.

September is a great month, though, because it's your time of transition. Now if you finish the month the same way you began, than something is wrong, but if you look, listen, and learn, this month will show you what needs to be done. I'm still scrambling a little bit to try and finish up all my "projects" from this summer, and then there are more projects I was waiting for the Fall to start. Summer was hard work, as it should be, and Fall promises the same, but it's like trying to sprint after a long run when your legs are heavy.

The grass is growing slower, the leaves are falling, and apples are ripening. It's a great time to be outside and it's a great time to live in Iowa. The garden is still producing an unbelievable amount of food, and I never would have imagined from the humble beginnings of this dirt pile that it would be something of a cornucopia in the end. The gift of these plants from Adrienne's mom was one of the most amazing gifts I have ever received and what they have stirred in me will never be quieted down. I have a hunger to grow, and as those who know say, planning next year's garden is a special joy. This one, though, still has a lot of life in it yet.

So the end of this year is now on the horizon and ever approaching. The sun sets are coming sooner day by day, and what doesn't get done in the daylight now will have to wait till the light of next spring. I'd like to think of myself like this first garden, still full of life and wonder, and still holding on to the hope of this Fall. Is it desperation, to work like the bees and gather nuts like the squirrels? To dry flowers to remember that they were once alive? I don't think it's done out of desperation, I think it's done out of respect.

ps. A new quirk to my life is that as the temperature drops my desire to read rises. I did this last year, too, pulling books off of library shelves like ripe peaches, and it's already begun this year. Lucky me, my status as a Drake faculty member gives me access to the Drake library and yesterday I swooped for three books that have me excited for snow filled days. I know I said this last year, but Winter truly is the time to dream (not that Summer season).

Entry 80: Found Bird

2009-09-09T05:40:00.001-07:00

There are a lot of animals that I like out at the farm, but my list of animals that I really and truly enjoy is pretty slim. For instance, it's nice to see a hawk screeching through the sky and descend on its prey, but if that hawk were within twenty feet of me and descending with its talons out, I'd be running for my life. So my perceived risk of losing an eyeball definitely influences where an animal will rank of my list. That being said, my number one friend, that is also an animal, is the toad. I love them small and I love them large. They are such amazing survivors and must taste horrible because they can hardly flee with any haste, which makes it that much easier for me to pick them up. They do pee a little in your hand, but that's to be expected. Second on my list is the amazing and dynamic barn swallow! I can't really catch one of these and hold them in my hand because they fly at about a thousand miles per hour and can change direction on a whim. My Grandma embedded a like for these birds in my head at an early age, and it stuck. They also, apparently, eat a ton of insects and so are very beneficial birds to have around.

Well, last week (or was it two weeks? It's been too long between posts) as I was wrapping up my time at the farm I noticed something small and dark in the grass by the grain bins. Coming closer I could see that it was a small barn swallow. These birds are horrible on their feet and you almost never see them on the ground, unless they are injured. As I approached the small bird didn't try to flee and only, clumsily, tried to spread his wings (I'm going to refer to the bird as a he from now on). I could tell something was wrong with his right wing, and that he was still pretty young, so rather than leaving him for another animal to find, I decided I'd try and take care of him. Now, I have no experience with animal rescue or first aid, but if there are going to be kids living on this farm one day, then I figured I had better brush up my skills.

I placed the found bird in a plastic container with a little bit of hay in the bottom. These birds make their nests out of mud and perch on crossbeams, so I'm not sure how comfortable this hay bed was. Regardless, he survived the trip back home and the all important wife test. I fashioned a small bee cage with mesh walls and a wooden frame into his house, and promptly placed a small water cup and plate of cut up veggies and grains nearby. After a bit of internet research (oh internet, you are my friend) though, I discovered that swallows are complete insectivores, meaning they only eat insects and not seeds or fruit, and they catch those insects out of the air. They even drink water while flying, which meant I would have a bit of challenge to keep this guy fed. My original plan was to keep him for a week of TLC and then hopefully that would be long enough for his injured wing to heal. I didn't try to evaluate his injury, so I had no clue as of the extent of it, but it seemed pretty bad.

The first night came and I placed a small lamp above the cage to provide a little warmth (apparently they prefer to stay very warm at night). The next day, after work, I went to work rounding up some local insects. Now if I was at the farm it would take me about five seconds to find a hundred bugs, but it was a different story at my apartment. I was getting frustrated until I started snooping around the small concrete creek by the side of our building. Crickets! And lots of them! They were pretty small, but I was able to catch about ten and headed upstairs. I wrapped up the swallow in some cloth scraps and put him in a plastic bin for his feeding. I had visions of naturalists wearing long socks on their hands painted like big heads in order to feed the baby condors in California. Surely this wouldn't be that hard, and it wasn't. I fashioned a bobby pin to hold the cricket, held it close to his mouth, he made eye contact with his prey, and crunch-crunch, it was gone. He wiggled free of the cloth scraps, and though clumsy on his feet, made his way around the plastic bin in search of more food. I dropped a cricket in close, and the swallow struck quickly. This was repeated until the crickets were all gone and I patted myself on the back for being such a good care-giver.

The sad conclusion to this story is that the next day the barn swallow was dead. It wasn't until I picked up his limp body that I could really see just how young of a bird this was. His beak had not completely formed and still had yellow in its corners and he couldn't have weighed more than a couple kitchen utensils. I stretched out his injured wing and underneath there was an area of matted feathers, and so maybe his injury was a little more extensive than I originally thought. It was a sad morning, but I was grateful for our time together, and maybe, because of this experience, I'll be better prepared to help injured swallows in the future. They really are amazing animals, to fly with such recklessness on a frame of glass.

PS: I have a new animal to add to my farm friends list, SALAMANDERS! I finally saw one (and it was alive, if you've read some of my much older posts you'd know I once had a run in with a decapitated salamander). He pretty much just stumbled out of the tall grass next to where I was working. He was amazingly bold, focused on getting where he was going, and really could care less if I picked him up. I hope I see salamanders on a regular basis now because they could teach me a lot of things about being cool.

Entry 79: The Grapes of Wrath, an Update

2009-08-24T04:57:00.000-07:00

It's hard to believe September is almost here and this crazy summer is almost over. I want to say it went by in a blur, but when I look back I can think of a thousand things I did, so it couldn't have gone by that quickly. It's been a good summer, one of the best, and hopefully that will lead into a memorable Fall. This was my first full summer on the farm and it was truly an abundance of sights, sounds, and experiences that make this such a unique place. I tried to take note of all the flowers in the fields and when they were in bloom and what shape of leaves all the trees had and when the tall grasses went to seed and where the toads hid when it was hot, but it was too much in the end to keep track of everything. I decided that this summer I would be open to impressions, not details. I'd let the ideas swirl and bubble and then maybe rise to the surface over the winter when I'd have more time to think. I will say this, I spent a lot of time last summer clearing up multifloral roses, and not much time this summer, but the places where I worked still look great and the roses, once removed, don't seem to want to return.

The reason I haven't worked on roses much is because I've been spending a lot of my time on grapes. Here's the update (with pictures!): Most of the grapes have outgrown their grow tubes, which means it's time to take the tubes off and attach the vine to a bamboo pole. This serves a duel purpose, for one it allows the grape more room to spread it's leaves and send it's shoots, and secondly it begins the hardening process for the vine. Being in a grow tube is like being in a greenhouse and so there is an acclimation process once the tube is removed and the plant is exposed to the elements. As the vine hardens, though, it changes from a green to a brown color and this change must occur for the plant to survive through the cool fall and winter.

By next week all of the grapes will be out of their grow tubes, even the ones that haven't grown out the top, so that they have plenty of time to harden for Fall. Things were looking pretty good in the vineyard, and then something happened this last week. I wasn't able to get out to the farm for about five days, and when I did finally go out I found the vineyard in a sort of disarray. I could tell some grow tubes had been knocked over, but on closer inspection something had gone through and stripped the leaves off of a number of vines. My guess was that fifty percent of the vines on the bamboo poles were affected. They weren't killed, thank goodness, but in some cases they were reduced to bare vines, and if to add insult to injury, so bamboo poles were used for what appeared to be toilet paper. It had to be deer. Grandpa had put the cows in the pasture that neighbors the vineyard, and deer are much for comfortable around cows, and so they must have jumped the electric fence and had their way with the grapes. I was a little upset, but at the same time I knew this was something that could happen to anything growing in a rural setting. Wildlife was one of the challenges, and if I wasn't up to dealing with it then I wouldn't get very far out here. Besides, the grapes would bounce back in a week or so. These are a very hardy variety, and with the good soil and moisture they'd be back at their best in no time. It was a new experience with adversity, but deep down inside I wondered if this was now going to happen on a regular basis.

I cleaned up the damage and returned the next day to find out that it wasn't deer after all, it was one or more calves! I caught one on my side of the fence and thought to myself, I'm going to strangle this brisket burrito right now and end this game, but my rationality returned and I just ushered him back to his side and saw where he had been able to get through. There was a small gap between the hay barn and the fence post where only a scrawny no good calf could get through, and this one definitely fit the bill. I blocked the opening with some fence posts and breathed a sigh of relief that this problem was fixed. I went down to dig some more of my new garden, and after about an hour I walked back up through the vineyard, and sure enough, there was that same calf and this time I had a shovel in my hand and it was all I could do to just lay it down. Apparently, this calf could crawl under the fence in a place where the wire was a little higher than others. This problem wouldn't be so easy to solve. I could lower the electric fence in some places, but not everywhere, and so I went back to work and let this problem stew in my mind. I wasn't going to do nothing and just let my grapes be pillaged night after night, and as I thought about how much work had gone into these plants I got a little angry that it could be so easy to undo all of that. Adversity was back, two days in a row, and I didn't like it, but if something is worth doing then it's worth doing twice (that will be proven an infinity of times on this farm). I thought and thought and thought, and finally, BINGO! I could use my knowledge of physics to extend the range of the electric fence by attaching a metal conductor to the parts of the fence that were high enough for a calf to crawl under. I used the wires I had cut for securing the grow tubes, wrapped them around the fence, and wah-lah, one deluxe calf proof electric fence (I prayed). I did, of course, have to test to make sure these attached wire really did conduct electricity (where was Ian when I needed him) and, yes, they definitely do. I came back the next day, and the vineyard was untouched! The next day grandpa moved the cows out to the far east pasture and now it looks like smooth sailing until the first frost.

Entry 78: Juglone

2009-08-14T16:22:00.001-07:00

If you know what plant this chemical comes from then you are a huge science nerd (whether you admit it or not). I, lacking in science nerdness, did not know what this chemical was until I came across it doing a little bit of online research, and I'm glad I did because juglone is an important chemical agent on the farm. To end the suspense, juglone is an allopathic (new science term) chemical produced by walnut trees to inhibit the growth of other plants. Fortunately it doesn't affect all plants, but it does harm certain beneficial garden plants, which is how this whole thing got started in the first place.

Sadly, it looks like the hickory nut harvest will be not existent this year. There are literally no hickory nuts on the trees this fall, which makes me think its something weather related, and maybe has to do with all that flooding that hit last summer. Maybe they just needed a year off, and so this year the focus has shifted to the walnut trees on the farm. The number of walnut trees is only a small, small fraction compared to the number of hickory trees, but I think we'll be able to get a lot this fall. In fact, I've done a lot of work to clean up the area around some walnut trees so that harvesting is easier later this fall. The ground around these trees is littered with the old shells and it gave me the idea of possibly using these in my ever growing compost piles. So, one thing lead to another, and I collected a large amount of these old walnuts in a short amount of time with the full intention of putting them in the compost pile.
Going out to collect them was like multiple Easter egg hunts, and I enjoyed it a lot, especially since its been ages since I've been allowed to participate in an Easter Egg hunt. Most of the walnuts were intact, and either just fell to the ground and rotted after years, or were buried by forgetful squirrels, and I wanted to break these up into pieces. My system needs tweaking, but I pulled out the sledge hammer on a concrete platform and began the process. I had a five gallon bucket full of walnuts, but only got through about a fourth of it before my forearm was tired from wielding the sledge hammer. Thor would not have been happy, but I called it a day, and mixed the fragments in with the compost.

As I've learned from past experiences, when I have a "great" idea about how to do something new on the farm it's always best to do a little research online before I go full speed with the plan. If I were to crush every walnut I collected (probably eight five-gallon bucket fulls) I'd have a lot of crushed shells to put on my piles, was that really such a good thing? Well, as I soon found out, the walnut tree gets some mixed reviews when it comes to gardners. Apparently, this juglone chemical, which is at it's highest concentration in the roots, leaves, and hulls has devastating effects on tomatoes, peppers, potatoes, eggplants, and rhododendrons, so much so that these plants cannot be grown in the vicinity of walnut trees. Most resources advised readers to avoid composting anything from the walnut tree, which was not what I wanted to be reading. I dug deeper and narrowed my search to only walnut shells. Could these really be hidden assassins in my compost pile? The jury is still out, but I'm putting my faith in an article that was a little more scientific than most. The article dealt with the decomposition of juglone when exposed to oxygen and soil and discovered that juglone in leaves and hulls actually breaks down in nature within one to two years. The walnuts I collected were definitely more than a few years old, and "shells" are similar to walnut wood in that they don't have the highest concentrations of chemicals in them, so I feel pretty confident in their inclusion in my compost piles now. The best advice, though, for weary gardeners is to put some tomato saplings in the suspect compost. If the saplings die, there is too much juglone, if they live, then the dirt is good to use. I think I'm pretty safe this year and I'll be sure to stay away from the leaves, but this will be good info for when I want to start composting newer walnut shells.

I know this post was pretty boring, but its neat to know a little something about the natural world that out here on the farm and how these living organisms interact. It may be walnut trees or it may be alfalfa hay, or it may be something you've never noticed before, like this caterpillar that arches its body when threatened by giant gloved hands. I guess science is just really cool to me right now, but not in a nerdy way :)

Entry 77: He Lives On

2009-08-05T20:35:00.000-07:00

As it turns out, Jake had quite the near death experience this weekend on the farm. I made it out to the farm on Saturday, and typically when I drive down the gravel road in front of the house Jake bolts off of the porch like he's going to intercept the car like a wayward cow. In Jake's world he's invincible and he's also the fastest moving object on the planet, which means you sometimes have to swerve or slow down to keep from running him over. Well, when I pulled in there was no Jake to play front bumper tag, and when I stopped there was no Jake to do a drivers' side window glass check, and when I got out of the car there was no Jake to paw at and inspect my trunk for dog treats, so something must be wrong. I called out for him a couple times, but there was no reply. He didn't emerge until I was nearly back to his doghouse in the woodshed, and he was moving very slowly. I thought he was favoring his hind legs and maybe was in a fight with a gang of raccoons, but there weren't any marks on him. When I filled up my bucket to water the garden there was still dog food scattered on the concrete step by the backdoor, now I knew something was very wrong with Jake. You see, it is impossible for Jake to ever have enough to eat. In a typical day he probably runs a marathon, and so eating is something he loves like no other. Reaching inside that back door and grabbing a handful of dog food instantly makes you a demigod in Jake's eyes, so to see him sniff and leave this food was very bizarre. I concluded that it must be his tapeworms. At some point they have to get bad enough to cause side effects like these and now what could we do? I saw a pretty fresh pile of vomit nearby, and that just further confirmed that things were pretty bad for Jake, I mean, this guy will eat anything living or non-living and has had no problems, so what could be causing this now?

I did a normal day of work, and usually Jake is my companion on trips, but today he just stayed in his doghouse. Before leaving I stopped in and talked to my grandparents and they wanted to know if I'd noticed Jake's behavior. Their tone was pretty serious, and as it turned out, Grandpa had accidently put out some rat poison where Jake could find it and he'd eaten every last piece of it. Maxine seemed pretty sure he'd die that night. That was a little much for me and really made me realize how much I liked this mangy, tick-infested farm dog. I told them that Jake had thrown up earlier and they said, well maybe he threw up some of the poison, but would it be enough? Well I left the house a little more somber and thinking that maybe this would be the last day with Jake. We'd had some good times together, probably my favorite was when he "caught" a baby deer and I had to pull him off and hold him by the collar till bambi ran away, but things would be different now. I found him and gave him a hug, avoiding the ever present tick near his eye, and for old times sake, tossed him a dog treat. He ate it! And there was a little more spring in his step. I gave him another one and he ate that too. Maybe this wasn't Jake's last chapter!

I made it back on Monday, and sure enough, as I pulled up in front of the house out comes Jake barreling in and out of control at 100mph. Crazy dog, he sure had us worried, but I guess we should know better than to count Jake out. He's a fighter and has probably picked up immunity to every possible disease or sickness in the state of Iowa. I've never had a dog, or a pet (besides a water beetle, which is another story), so it's been fun getting to experience that bond a little bit with Jake. Grandpa told me, though, that Jake will have a new home this Fall, on a camel farm in Georgia. A dog like Jake is a hot commodity, and their wouldn't be anyone to take care of him on a daily basis, so this new home will fit him nicely. Maybe someday one of Jake's descendants will return to the farm and reclaim his throne!

Entry 76: One Year

2009-07-28T13:45:00.001-07:00

One year of this, I can't even believe it. For fun (and to check the dates I wrote them), I looked back at those first entries of mine about this crazy farm in Iowa. I laughed out loud at those because they represent a completely different person than the one that walks those fields now. I was clueless, and I still am, but now I at least have a years worth of experience at being clueless on the farm to pull from :) The place is still so amazing, though, that it's impossible to put the experience in words. It's life, and life abundant, and life that will proceed with or without your help or interference. Pictures show a fraction, a nice yell would show more, a quiet nap would show the most. There are probably a billion living things on that farm and they hum a song as the sun shines and the wind passes and you can sometimes catch the refrain if you sit still enough. And when you hear it you jump up to chase it because you think if you can just catch this song, this spirit, then the secret will be yours, but it's a warm breeze and the song rises out of reach. Maybe tomorrow, or the day after that, and maybe there are some things that are never meant to be caught or understood with human hands, just to be left alone. It's a strange place, this farm, and it's only going to get stranger as the years go by and the more I think I understand, the less I actually do. It takes time, this change, but it's time freely given.

So with one year in the books, I'm looking forward to the next one with even more enthusiasm. I can't imagine what adventures are laying in wait behind the tall grasses and under the surface of the pond, but I'll find them.

Entry 75: Answer - With a Shovel

2009-07-20T11:25:00.000-07:00

I have decided that this whole gardening and growing thing is definitely for me. The garden, and I use that term loosely, is amazing and it's not even that good. The one spinach plant that survived will never produce anything we will eat, but I've never seen an actual spinach plant before and it's fascinating! The leaves of the zucchini plant are larger than life itself and I won't know what to do with myself when it's actually time to harvest the acorn squash that's about the size of a softball. I never thought the tomatoes would actually make it, and now there are about a dozen green fruits just waiting to ripen. For some reason, I had it set in my mind that if we actually were able to grow and eat some tomatoes this year then the garden would be a success, but as it's turning out, this garden is a virtual cornucopia (spelled it right the first time) of produce. One of the lettuce plants is about the flower, which means the leaves will taste bitter, but it's fine because who has ever seen a lettuce flower before? Grandpa did inadvertently pull up the rosemary, but I think he thought it was a weed in the path of his ever expanding musk mellon plant :) And the carrots, did I mention the carrots before? The carrots survived! Grandpa has an entire row of carrots, but we have about five, and they are the best five carrots in the world!

So, in all flurry of activity of this spring and summer I thought it would be a good idea to think about next spring. I want a bigger garden. Plain and simple, but for someone who has never gardened before this spring the task of making a brand new garden seemed a little daunting. So how do you make a garden, read the title. Nothing like a little manuel labor for a good cause. There is an open space with full sunlight and good soil past the grapes, and so I marked it out with flags and begun the lengthy process of turning over the soil. My eyes may have been bigger than my muscles because this dirt and shovel work is pretty taxing, but I've told myself that a do a little bit here and there and by the end of the summer it will be finished. There is a ton of possibility with a larger garden, and this labor will be well worthwhile because in theory, you only start a garden once. The picture shows the beginning of the digging, and as you can see, there is a very long way to go.
In other news, it might be a spotty year for hickory nuts. I've been out to look at them a couple times this summer and really don't see many in the trees. I'm not sure why this would be the case, but in preparation for a small hickory harvest we are planning on a big walnut harvest this fall. We didn't pick up any last year, so this will be a new experience. The picture is of a walnut tree that is loaded with nuts, but I didn't get a chance to mow around it this summer and the plants are waist high. I decided not to mow it and instead just pushed them down with a fence post, alien crop circle style. I'm sure I'll have to do it a couple more times to keep them down, but in a pinch it'll work.

Entry 74: Some Pictures to go with the Words

2009-07-11T07:37:00.001-07:00

1. Jake had a rough day yesterday. First he was rummaging around a wood pile only to get sprayed by a very small skunk. I was close enough to hear him yelp and flee, and by the time the smell hit me I was fleeing as well because that skunk was coming straight at us. Jake reeked the rest of the day and would rub his face on the grass to try to get the smell off (like in the picture) but it didn't work. Then later, out by the grapes, he rubbed up against the electric fence and it gave him a good shock. Poor guy.

2. Here's Jake at his favorite past time, harassing barn cats. You'd think they'd figure it out by now that this isn't such a great farm to settle down on, with Jake and all, but they don't. This one got away by making a made dash for the fence and squeezing through while Jake had to run around the barn to get through.

3. Yes, finally a picture of the compost piles to much has been made about :) Not sure what I'll put in that tank beside them, maybe leaves or shells come fall.

4. The first is a picture of the garden as we found it when we came back from our vacation trip to New Mexico and Texas. It was a bit pasture-like. It is really ridiculous how much faster weeds grow than vegetables, but the second picture is after they'd all been pulled. The garden is actually holding its own and producing a good amount of food.

5. Not much to say on this one, just your common picture of a piano in the ditch. This was just one of those things that separates the generations, but it's in the ditch now and entirely too heavy for me to move. This thing almost took Grandpa with it when we tossed it out the back of his truck .

6. Mysterious orange vine that reminds me of silly string. I get the feeling that if you'd fall asleep near this stuff you'd wake up tied down like Gulliver by those little people, or this could be from aliens.

Entry 73: To Roam

2009-07-10T06:13:00.000-07:00

For me, few things on the farm are more enjoyable than just getting out and walking the land. The farm is such a dynamic place that even in walking a few feet you are going to notice something new from the day before, and so I love to get out there and roam. I don't have to speak to anybody (unless my wife calls me on the cell phone) and I can just watch and listen. I pretend I'm not there, like a moving tree or a billow of smoke moving through the grass, but I know I scare away most animals before I could even get a glimpse of them. It doesn't help, either, when the cows follow you and yell because they think you have food for them, but once you're past them it gets pretty quiet except for the wind, the leaves, and the birds, which is what I'm looking for. I'm not trying to get away from anything, I'm just trying to find that part of the world that gets dark when the sun goes down (not that I'd ever stay out there after dark because that would be entirely too spooky for me).
I usually take my pick-axe with me while I walk. Lately it's been thistles, but there is always something that can be dug up or cut down. I tell myself it makes a difference, these sporadic trips to weed the pastures, but that difference may not be seen for a couple more years, and if I can make it out of the pastures I get to walk the forest. I'm not convinced of the health of this forest. I think it's overcrowded, and one day, I tell myself, I'll work to thin it out, cut down the smaller and dead trees. It would be easy to get overwhelmed by seeing all that you think you could do, but I don't, honestly, because I know it will get done some day because that is just who I am.
I walk the land so I know the land. It's equal parts instinct and interest, and the more I roam the more I feel connected to the land. There was a time when people had to be connected to the land for their survival. There is still a value in that, I can't quite explain it, but I carry it with me out of that forest and it clings to my pants as I walk through the grass. All that to say, I hate camping because I'm never comfortable in a sleeping bag :)

PS. yesterdays trip had a special purpose. Adrienne wanted to try some wild black raspberries, and I knew of a couple places near the woods where I'd seen some growing. They are pretty fickle plants, and harder and harder to find these days, but I did find enough for Adrienne to sample. Also thrown in there are some "rotten" gooseberries.

Entry 72: Chateau de Barney

2009-07-03T17:34:00.000-07:00

If you ever visit the farm, please ask me if you can spend a night in the special barn guest quarters. It would a memorable experience for all involved, and believe it or not, the room just opened up because it's one occupant has returned to his pasture life. Chateau Le'Barney, as the French would call it, is where Grandpa puts the bull once the cows start giving birth to the calves. One day I was poking my nose around the barn, and propped up a five gallon bucket to stick my head in an open window and came face to face with old Barney. I had no idea he was in there, and being a foot away from him really reminds you of how big, exactly, he is, especially his huge white head with those golf ball eyes staring back at you.
I asked Grandpa the next day why Barney was kept in this small room in the barn during this time of spring, and he said it was so that none of the cows gave birth to calves in the winter. So it all comes back to the birds and the bees and cow gestation periods. What is it that they always say about birth control, abstinence is the only guaranteed method, and this was how Grandpa made sure Barney was observing his seasonal abstinence, for the good of the herd, of course. Grandpa would feed him hay and some corn and make sure he had his water, and every once in a while the cows and new calves in the pasture would get close enough to bellow back and forth with Barney, but his solitary stay in the barn was an extended one. Finally the day came to release the white bull. I wasn't there, but I'm sure his legs were a little stiff. Grandpa said Barney didn't show any signs of foot rot, which is a good thing, but I did notice he had a bad sunburn across his back.
My compost piles (there are three now) are probably going to receive a lot of press in this blog, but that is a fair representation of how important I think they are. They got off to a bad start, but honestly I think they are recovering nicely, and part of that is because I'm always looking for good things to add to them. I read that diversity is a good thing, and that included in that diversity is cow manure. My mind made the plan to one day take the wheel barrow out into the pasture and fill it up with cow pies and then cart them through the fields and over the hills to the compost piles, and since that would take a while I probably shouldn't do it till everything else was taken care off and I had a lot of free time to burn. Well, that whole free time to burn thing is never going to happen, and as a I stated earlier, these compost piles have become a priority on the farm, so something had to give in order to work this cow manure into the equation. Some people use their heads to solve complex math equations like how to shoot space shuttles off of airplanes, after a couple days mine crunched the numbers and figured out a much closer, and more abundant, source of cow manure..............Barney's room in the barn!!!!!
He ate, he drank, he must also have done something else in there, and for a couple months. This place could be the gold mine, I could be sitting on the biggest stinky brown gold mine in Warren County! The next day just happened to be the bailing and pick-up of the first cutting of hay, and so I said hi to my friend Bill Dillard as I hopped on the hay cart Grandpa was pulling with his tractor. Bill wanted to know where I got my fancy hat from. Typical. I laughed imagining him in my hat, which he would never do in a million years, and then we unloaded three carts of hay. It didn't take long and as soon as we finished I hightailed it over to the barn and bonanza, it was better, and more disgusting, than I could have imagined. The room is not very big, probably 8yds x 8yds, but the entire floor was about a foot deep with cow manure. This was a huge load of bull dooky (or whatever word you usually use) built up over who knows how many years. I felt pretty bad for Barney having to live in these conditions, but hopefully I can do something to make it a little better for him in the future.
The plan was to pull the wheel barrow into the room, load it up with brown, and run it up to the compost piles a short distance away. On closer inspection of the room, though, I found there was no door that opened into the room. It appeared there was once a door, but it has been nailed shut. I'm assuming Grandpa takes out the nails to get him in and out, and then nails it shut to keep Barney inside. After a few moments of thought I concluded there was no other way around it, I'd just have to hoist myself through the opening and land two-footed in the stuff. I poked around with my shovel to find a firmer area, and then up and over I went. The smell wasn't bad at first, it was more the thought of possibly falling into and being eaten alive by the manure that bothered me. After a couple shovel loads I was getting the hang of it. Avoid the soggy, wet patches because those released gases into the air that made me noxious, and try to scoop up the dryer, older clumps that were maybe dropped a couple years ago. All in all, I excavated five wheel barrow loads onto the compost piles, and kicked those bad boys up another level.
Will I go back for more? Yes, but probably not until Ian visits again :)

Entry 71: Grapes in a Box

2009-06-30T09:41:00.000-07:00

Funny, how you can take a field, dig some holes in it, toss in some plants, and presto, it's a vineyard which has a completely different connotation than the calf pasture it was a couple months ago. If you've been reading this blog or know me personally, then you know how much I was looking forward to planting grapes on the farm this spring. Well they didn't exactly get in this spring, but they are in the ground and doing good. The truth is, "planting grapes on the farm" was kind of the pipe dream that kept me wanting to get on the farm for the last three years. Planting a corn or soybean field was never really that much of an attraction to me, but dreaming of walking through the rows of a vineyard, my vineyard, and pulling ripe grapes off of the vine, did the trick.
Well here is the process, in pictures. The grapes arrived on a Wednesday in a large cardboard box that was labeled, "This Side Up". I had been waiting for these for a while, so was pretty excited when they finally showed up on the farm. In the future, I'll definitely be getting my orders in earlier because most places fulfill orders on a first come first served basis, and I was pretty much one of the last ones to get my order in for this year. Babies make everything more complicated. The order consisted of three different varieties (varietals) of grapes. Marquette made up the majority of the order and is a red grape used in making red wine. It was more or less "created" by the University of Minnesota to be very well suited to the midwest climate and produce a high quality wine, and so I thought it would be a good pillar in the vineyard. Concord, a popular table grape, and Bluebell, a multi-use grape, made out the remainder of the order.
I had the grapes, but unfortunately I hadn't received the grow tubes yet, so I couldn't plant all the grapes. Part of my order consisted of grapes that had been growing in a green house this spring, and so they already had leaves and well developed roots. The other part of the order consisted of what are called dormant vines, pretty much brown sticks with roots hanging off of one end. The grow tubes had to come in before I could plant the greenhouse plants, but I could go ahead and get the dormant "sticks" in the ground today. First, though, I had to soak their roots in water for about four hours. Long story short, the plants were planted that afternoon into the evening, and it made for a very long day.
The unplanted greenhouse vines were fine staying in the box they came in for a couple days, and Friday the grow tubes arrived. I was in the hay barn getting ready to plant, and around the corner came Grandpa with a spade, and he said he'd help me out. This was a pretty neat thing because two people could plant these grapes a lot faster than one could, but also because it was a way that Grandpa could be involved in this project and allow us to bond a little. Well that bonding lasted about 10 grapevines before an absolute downpour hit and sent us scrambling for the cover of the hay barn. It was raining so hard we couldn't see the highway about eighty yards from the barn, and it wasn't slowing down any, which was bad news for Grandpa because he needed to get to quartet practice. I ended up giving him a ride from the barn to the house, and he made it to practice on time, but I returned to the barn to wait out the rain. You see, I was working with a strict timeline and needed to do more work. My wife said we needed to leave Sunday on a family vacation to New Mexico/Texas, and if I didn't get these grapes planted today I would have to do it on Saturday, and wouldn't be able to mow the field, which would mean returning to a headache of tall grass. So I waited through a hard rain for about an hour, and then it finally it let up and I returned to the field. The holes were mud, I was soaked to the bone, and it was getting late, but I wanted so badly to get these vines in the ground today that I persevered. By the end of the day, all 99 vines were planted and surrounded by grow tubes attached to stakes in the ground to keep them from blowing away. Whoever said starting a vineyard wasn't easy sure was right, and I haven't even put in the trellis yet.
I left the grapes for a week and was a little unsure what, exactly, I would find on my return. Would any of those brown sticks actually grow? Would there be grow tubes strewn across the field from the wind? Would the world be the same without Michael Jackson? Yes, No, and definitely No! My first order of business, once back in the green state of Iowa, was to look down each and every one of those grow tubes and see what's transpired. Apparently, these tubes make a mini-greenhouse for the vine to grow in (called an optimum growing environment by the people trying to sell them), and so those dormant vines woke up to something akin to a nice complimentary breakfast at the Hilton of plant hotels. I don't have my notebook in front of me, but of the 99 vines, I think 9 haven't produced some big green grape leaves yet, which was really exciting to document for a first time vineyard owner. So now it's just the waiting game, about five years to be exact :) Yes, at some point there will be a lot of activity in the vineyard with the end result being a beautiful trellis system made from hedge posts, but I'll probably wait till Ian visits again before undertaking that project because it requires a lot of hole digging, which I think Ian could use some more experience in.
More seriously, though, it's pretty neat to look out and think, "I did this", I actually did something significant with a half acre of land on this farm, and who knows, maybe some day maybe I'll do something significant with the other seventy five odd acres here. This farm is changing, and how quickly, exactly, that change occurs depends a whole lot on how much confidence I put in myself, and getting this vineyard off of the ground has definitely opened my eyes!

Entry 70: It's More Like A Plant Detention Center

2009-06-22T21:55:00.000-07:00

I figured if I'm going to be living on a farm (and hopefully making a living off of the farm) it might be a good idea to start a garden this spring. There were some pretty grandiose plans for this first garden (cobble stone walkways, marble archways and fountains, maybe a few plants) but the reality was that I've never actually had or started a garden and so this first year might be a little rough. My dad always had a garden, but the closest I ever really came to it was when I had to pull a stray soccer ball out of the tomatoes without stepping on the peppers.
Adrienne was into this garden thing, as well, so there was some time spent over the winter planning our plot and with spring approaching, excitement levels were rising. Coincidentally, baby levels were rising at that same time, and so instead of spending those beautiful May days in freshly tilled dirt, we were enjoying our brand new baby, and if that means we'll have a second rate garden this year, then it was still time well spent.
So it was a late planting this year, but we were still able to get them in before the ground become too hard (or too hot). Adrienne's mom provided us with a tray of plants picked up at a local plant sale, and when it was time, Grandpa helped me get the little guys into the ground. This first attempt will be marked by the shear number of peppers planted. I think Adrienne's mom wanted us to get a little taste of New Mexico in Iowa, so we're well stocked in the pepper department. In addition, there were tomatoes, broccoli, kale, lettuce, strawberry, squash, basil, okra, and more peppers in this first planting. Much to Adrienne's delight, the okra was the first plant to perish in a windy, warm spell. This garden is near a stretch of wilderness (the old road) so it's frequented by critters, and they had their way the first week with the tomatoes and pepper tops. I have since talked with Jake about the importance of his constant vigilance, but at times rabbits, deer, moles, groundhogs, etc. sneak in for a twilight romp through the rows.
I also planted some seeds in our garden (another first) because there was plenty of room for more. Green beans and peas in one row, and spinach and carrots in another. I guess the seed bags come with directions for planting, but I went with instinct on this one and ended up spreading each seed about four times farther apart then needed. It's left plenty of room for the weeds, oh glorious weeds that are threatening to turn this first year's garden into a pasture. Anyways, the peas and beans are up, and so is the spinach, but the carrots take so long to break the soil. The great redeemer, though, will be the two zucchini plants that gobbling up garden real estate. At least they will be successful.
Look at the pictures of my grandpa's garden! It's like the varsity team on one end and JV on the other. He's had a little more experience (I keep telling myself) and talking about the garden is one of the things we do most often this time of year. On his end is rhubarb, garlic, onions, potatoes, nice tomatoes, peas, cabbage, lettuce, radishes, horse radish, watermelon, peppers, okra, carrots, and cantaloupe. It is definitely inspiring to walk by his neatly ordered rows on the way to the plant detention hall of a garden I've got, but again, I'll take a ho-hum garden this first year and maybe next year there will be a little helper to stick her finger in the dirt while her mom drops in a seed after her.

ps. Jake has actually been working hard as protector of the garden. Here is a possum he pulled out of the brush right beside the garden, and here is a groundhog he rounded up (and wanted to show off).

Entry 69: The Ammonia is Burning My Eyes

2009-06-16T19:52:00.000-07:00

I'll admit it, I've got a little bit of blogstipation (backed up on stuff to blog about) and will try to boil down the events of the last couple weeks into the essentials.
First off, the grape field is looking better than ever, but has no grapes, yet :( The good news, though, is that I heard from the nursery today that they are in the mail and hopefully will get in tomorrow and I can get them in the ground and growing as soon as they arrive. If not tomorrow, then definitely the next day, which is exciting and a long time coming. I know it seems a little late in the season, but they'll be fine and should grow just fine. This last week I was also inspired to clear a place about the size of a large basketball court right beside the grapes for the Aronia berries (these will be planted in the Fall). Unfortunately the pasture grass these days is about waist height, and so clearing it becomes quite the task, but I was up for it. I kinda prefer for it to be tough because it reminds me of those pioneers who had to clear entire forests before being able to start their farms. It's good wild land and it would be a shame if it didn't put up a fight. At times, though, it's hypnotic just to look at that tall grass blowing in the wind, like waves on the ocean. I love the contrast of the freshly mowed field separated by an electric fence from this gentle ocean.
I think I'll talk about the garden in a separate post, but I will make mention of my (less than) glorious compost pile here. I hate to sound like a broken record, but often times failing at something is how I learn to do it right, and this first attempt at compost was quite the learning experience. I was so proud of my huge mound of grass clippings from the grape field, but I learned pretty quickly that there is a proper way to handle these grass clippings if you want to do something beneficial with them. I mentioned the smell that was emitting from the clippings after sitting in the sun and rain for a couple days, and how that was inspiring to me, well unfortunately it didn't inspire me to find a more permanent location for my compost pile until days later, but it did inspire me to do a minimal amount of research on the internet. Oh, if only I had done my homework first :) It seems there are two ways that grass can break down and decompose, one way is with oxygen, the other is without oxygen. This is something straight out of a lesson I would teach by biology students, but I didn't think it would show up here. As it turns out, when you make a large pile of fresh, green grass clippings the blades and stems tend to pack together tightly, heat rapidly, and quickly create anaerobic (no oxygen) conditions for decomposition. The organisms (bacteria mainly) that thrive in these conditions release some horrible odors and ammonia gas as byproducts as they work on the grass. This is also a much, much slower way to compost grass. Apparently, green grass should only be about 10-20% of your compost pile (not 100%!!!) and mixed with some "brown" materials like leaves, small sticks, or dried grass. It's all about the nitrogen-carbon balance, and green things hold a lot of nitrogen, while brown things contribute the carbon, so you want to mix the two aerobically (in the presence of oxygen) for the best results.
Well when I finally got around to securing a permanent location for my compost pile the grass had been sitting for a good week in one large very hot pile. The top layer of grass was brown, but as soon as I dug into the lower layers with a garden fork a smell like fresh manure punched me in the nose. It was like falling into the pit bellow a port-a-potty. The grass was slimy and brown with occasional pockets of white, and as I uncovered the fresh, lower layers I would be treated to the overwhelming aroma of ammonia on the wind. It was probably seven wheelbarrow loads of mucky grass that I carried away. I could have quit there and dumped them in the woods and started anew, but I've accepted the challenge of making this compost pile work one way or another, even if I start with what smells and looks like hot cow diarrhea. Every couple of days I would turn over the clippings and let them "breathe", and believe it or not, the smell is now gone. The actual time before I can use any of this compost may be longer because of what I did in the beginning, but I think it'll work out in the end. Oh, and it's not just grass anymore. I've added some ash from a pile of burned branches, vegetable and fruit peels, and the secret ingredient, the shells from all those hickory nuts I cracked last Fall. It's definitely a work in progress, but I'm looking forward to adding to it throughout this summer and fall and hopefully having something I can work with next spring.

Entry 68: What's Behind the Grain Carts?

2009-05-24T20:34:00.001-07:00

Promise, this is the last entry for the night. I'm trying to catch up tonight after a couple weeks of inactivity, but this will be my the last post before retiring to bed.
I was able to steal away to the farm yesterday for a few hours of work between thunderstorms and rains. My plan was to do some more mowing and filling in of dirt in the grape field (as needs to be done now on a regular basis). The drive to the farm always allows me time to think, which is usually pretty interesting, and occasionally useful, and this day it was all of the above. The thought that came to mind over and over was that I'll probably make a lot of mistakes on the farm and maybe even fail at some things, but for me, to know how not to do a thing is extremely useful in finding out to properly do it. I'm not afraid to make mistakes because I know I will and I know that by making mistakes I'm actually moving in the right direction, there is a purpose in failure. I also know, though, that this line of thought doesn't always work with a short term goal, but my mind has been locked into the long term with this farm so that a mistake in these first years is exciting because it means for the next fifty I'll get it right. I can't really express why I like to be out there, other than to say it's just who I am and when I am out there working and immersed I lose myself. Time is used to measure the things you don't like, so what do you do that makes you wish the sun would never set?
I knew something bizarre was in store for me at the farm because about five miles out I passed an old farmer walking down the highway carrying snapping turtle the size of a small garbage lid by the tail. It was an awkward walk because he was trying to keep the thing out of reach of his backside, which I'm sure this turtle would have loved to take a bite out of. I think the turtle met his end that day (or else that farmer tossed it in the pond of another farmer he didn't like), but it made me want to see that turtle up close just for the thrill of knowing it could take the nose off of my face with one bite. The farm called, though, so I didn't pull over.
Once at the farm I could see storm clouds forming so I wanted to get to work as quickly as possible, just in case it rained and I had to go in early. I grabbed a shovel from the tool shed and headed to the hay barn where I kept my wheelbarrow and lawn mower. If everything went right, maybe I could fill in the rest of those holes today. As I filled up the mower with gas, though, something caught my attention in the hay barn. It was a loud noise I hadn't noticed when I first entered the barn, and from what I could tell it was coming from behind some old grain carts that haven't moved in ten years. Jake was with me, but didn't bark like he would if something was wrong, but he didn't seem to want to go near the side of the barn where the sound was coming from. The noise got louder, so I grabbed the shovel and decided I would find out exactly what the racket was all about. I crept closer to the grain carts, and after listening carefully I deduced the options for what this could be down to two pretty plausible choices. The sound was caused by air being forced through and opening, and there was a distinct inhale and exhale pattern, but since there was no air compressor in this barn I was a little confused. The sound was either A: a possessed rubber tire of one of these ancient grain carts that was spontaneously leaking air and then filling itself back up, or B: my Grandpa, or a squatter, hiding behind the grain cart and blowing up a huge balloon. As crazy as it sounds, I expected to find a person behind this cart, but as I tiptoed my way around the hitch my eyes quickly identified the culprit, and of course, just as I expected, it was a six foot long snake. What a relief, not!!! I've never seen a snake that big before in my life without a glass window separating me from it. My farm instincts told me it wasn't a poisonous snake, but my preservation of life instincts told me to run the other way screaming. Calmer nerves won out, and I climbed into the vacant grain cart to get a birds eye view of the hostile reptile. From above the snake sounded like an air compressor and I could see it's body heaving as it filled up with air and then forced it out it's mouth. I'm sure this is quite the popular party trick at the snake get-togethers, and keeps many a potential predator at bay, but it takes more than that to scare me, especially with my trusty,rusty shovel. It was a bull snake, which means if it did bite me it would hurt like the dickens, but it wouldn't kill me. They eat mice, rats, and pretty much any rodent they can catch, and are actually a very beneficial part of the farm ecosystem. Grandpa said the number of bull snakes has really declined with the use of chemicals in farming, so I considered myself lucky to see this one (and one of this size) and something tells me this won't be the only time I have a run in with this particular serpent. I looked me in the eye, as if to say, "Take a picture, it will last longer." ps. sorry Sam

Entry 67: A Shadow Falls

2009-05-24T20:17:00.000-07:00

There is a shadow falling across the fields and forests and striking fear into the hearts of the overgrown meadows and garbage trees. Only a broken axe can slow him down, but a generous Uncle gifted him a new one (and a chain saw, too!!!) so it's going to be a long, hot summer for some farm tenants. Also, you can add poison ivy to the list of plants I want to eradicate from the farm (multifloral roses, thistles).

Entry 66: The Front Lawn

2009-05-24T19:25:00.001-07:00

Well if you didn't know, one of the goals for this spring is to plant some grape vines in what used to be the calf pasture. Last Fall my uncle Kirk and I broke ground on the holes so that this Spring they'd be set for planting. Well, Spring farm plans were a little delayed, but the grapes are ordered. Unfortunately, after talking with the nursery I'm ordering them from, the plants just aren't growing in the greenhouse as quickly as they typically due and they won't be ready for shipping for another week or so. The grapes will be fine once they get in the ground and start absorbing some of this midwestern sunshine, and this shipping delay was actually a blessing in disguise for me.
As it turns out, things once Spring hits here in Iowa, things get to growing pretty darn fast, and that includes the grasses (and weeds) in the calf pasture/grape field. When I was finally able to get out to the farm and have myself a look, I couldn't even see where the holes for the grapes were because the grass was so overgrown, and this definitely was not going to fly with me. So that week I bought my first ever lawn mower and to complement it, I also bought a wheel barrow. Okay, so you look at this lawn mower and you look at this jungle of an early vineyard and you probably think there has to be a easier way to do this, and of course the answer to that is yes, but I wanted to do it this way and so I did. Holy cow it was some hard work, but I truly enjoy mowing, and just being able to see the results of my work was motivation enough. I also told myself that this would be the hardest it would ever be to mow, because from now on I would keep it pretty trimmed up. The other thought that rolled through my head was, well, I better be enjoying this because I'll probably be mowing this section of land (and more) for the rest of my life, especially if we build a house nearby. It ended up taking me about eight hours for this first cutting with the mower set on it's highest setting. Later that week I mowed it again (in about a third of the time) with a much lower setting. Maybe it was the gas fumes, but I convinced myself that the more I mow this field the more successful lower growing grass (and plant) species will be and the easier this field will be to mow. Maybe that's bad science, but it fits pretty well into my understanding of life adapting to it's environment. My goal is a field of dark green clover lying underneath the rows of grapes. My other idea was goats trained to eat everything but the grape vines. The odds are very high that that idea will get a chance and get significant discussion on this blog.
So why not use a riding mower? A couple reasons came to mind. First, a riding mower is a whole lot more expensive than a push mower, and yes it would take a whole lot less time to mow with one and probably pay for itself within the year, but it distances the owner from the field. This is a field I want to know very, very well, and I feel the closer I can be to it the better, even if that means spending a few more hours a month walking behind a mower. The main reason I chose a push mower, though, was because it comes with a bag for catching the grass clippings, which can then be used for compost! I have an amazing pile of grass clippings, and it's only going to get bigger as the weeks pass. I know leaving the clippings in the field is an option as well, but that's a much slower means of decomposing the grass and can lead to too much organic material in the field (sorta like overcrowding in a city) which can affect the health of the field. The other day I noticed a familiar smell coming from the grass pile. It was a smell that instantly took me back to my childhood, and walking by the compost pile of my dad who was a very good gardener. Again, I don't always know what I'm doing out there, but to recognize that smell of rotting grass and know that it was a good thing was a pretty special moment. I've saved a bag full of hickory nut shells to mix with the clippings to make some super compost.
After trimming the grass so I could get a clear look at the grape holes I realized that the dirt we had backfilled into them when they were dug had settled and left a a bit of a crater. The final act would be to fill these craters in with dirt so that planting the grapes would be a breeze. Since the field is on a slope there is actually large deposits of top soil towards the south end, and using this soil made much more sense to me than buying pricey bags of top soil, it would just take a little elbow grease. Well, I need about a five gallon drum of that elbow grease. Digging up the dirt wasn't too bad, it was the part where I have to push the wheel barrow up the slope to the holes that is a killer. I decided a wheelbarrow full of dirt is about as heavy as a wheelbarrow full of concrete and my legs are getting quite the workout. Actually, this is some of the hardest physical work I have had to do on the farm, and I'm only about halfway done with the field, but I did the harder half first and the rest will be pretty easy, and I should have plenty of time to finish before the grapes arrive.
Oh, and the last addition of complexity to this field is the electric fence that Grandpa and I are putting up to run around the grapes and the sweet corn patch he's got. Nothing quite like a good old electric fence to keep the animals out.

ps. This is my new hat. Nothing quite says "Eccentric landowner", or "Has a fear of skin cancer", or even, "Loves to do things the hard way like a stubborn mule", quite like this hat.

Entry 65: Where you been?

2009-05-24T19:11:00.000-07:00

Let's just say it's already been a busy spring, and my priorities have had to undergo some changes. I've still been able to make it to the farm, but gone are the evening hours spent typing on the computer. I'm finding more time for it these days, but there are a few other things more important to tend to. Adrienne and I are still amazed that we have a beautiful baby girl, and I'm not sure if we'll ever completely get used to having her (or ever want to) because now every thing she does is amazing and completely worthy of our attention. She sneezes twice or has the hiccups and we drop everything to pick her up and hold her close. The farm is still great and awe inspiring, but now I try to get home a little sooner because now we can finally see the one who we are doing all this work for, and if I'm lucky, she'll let this smelly man hold her and kiss her before his wife makes him clean up.

Entry 64: From Bull to Steer

2009-05-01T11:44:00.001-07:00

It's not a very pleasant aspect of raising cattle, this whole castrating business, but it's a necessary one. It's calving season, and so far Grandpa's had five new calves born, with hopefully about ten more on the way. On wednesday I was able to go with Grandpa to check on the most recent of new additions to the herd, a two day old calf. Our goal was to identify if it was a bull or a heifer, and if it was a bull, well, that's what Grandpa brought his sharp knife for.
The cows were in the middle pasture and the new calf was lying placidly in a small mound of hay with it's mother nearby. Apparently, it's easiest to catch a calf in the first few days of it's life, and if you have to do the deed to them, at this stage it's not nearly as traumatic or painful. We approached in the tractor and stopped about twenty yards from the calf and dismounted calmly, only to see Jake come flying around our side and right into the group of cows. He loves to chase the cows, but especially the calves, so Grandpa usually ties him up when he's going out, but we forgot today. After some urgent calling, Jake came close enough for me to grab him by the collar and let Grandpa tie him with bailing twine to a hitch on the back of the tractor. He'd have to be content to only watch the rest of the morning's proceedings.
The calf was still in it's bed of hay and didn't seem to mind Grandpa coming up right beside him, though the mom was a little annoyed. Grandpa flipped the calf over and, sure enough, Bingo, we had a bull. I asked Grandpa where the rubber bands were, because that was the method of castrating young bulls that I was most familiar with (which reminds me of a hilarious story, when, as a young boy I found a lucky rabbit's foot on my grandparent's farm in Colorado with a thick green rubber band around it. I took that rabbit's foot home with me and excitedly shared it with everyone I knew, and it was probably two weeks before someone told me what that furry thing with a rubber band around it really was). Grandpa said we didn't need no rubber bands and proceeded to open his knife. My job was to keep the mother away from Grandpa and the calf, which got interesting when the calf started bawling and Barney came to check things out. Fortunately, for Barney, Grandpa finished before I had to drop him with a sleeper hold, and the the calf was released to his relieved mother. I didn't see the actual incision that was made, but I understood the concept. A young bull would have to be raised separate from the herd to keep it from becoming a rival for the main bull, so farmers and ranchers simplify things by changing those young bulls into steers by removing the testes. If you really must know, here's what is removed in the operation, with a little rubbing alcohol thrown on to disinfect the wound.

Entry 63: Spring is Life

2009-05-01T11:24:00.000-07:00

Spring is life in pictures:

1. This is by far the largest, and most disgusting, grub I have ever seen in my life. I caught him when I cut down a willow tree and he poked his head out of his grubby hole. I had no idea he'd be this big, I mean, this one is straight out of Lion King.
2. The pear tree is in full bloom and is promising another bumper crop for this Fall. It's keeping the bees busy on these early spring days. This year I'd like to cut up and dry some pears to have to eat over the winter.
3. And nothing says Spring is here like a handful of fresh asparagus from Grandpa's garden.

Entry 62: Earth Day, or "Where'd the forenoon go?"

2009-04-25T19:12:00.000-07:00

Why isn't everyday Earth Day, instead of just last Tuesday? It wasn't really by design, but I made it out to the farm for Earth Day. I can't really say I did much "on" the farm because I hopped in the truck with Grandpa and we headed into Indianola to run errands and work on the horseshoe pits for the day. I'm not sure if I've talked much about the city of Indianola yet, but it is pretty much the last outpost you'll find on leaving Des Moines to the south before coming upon endless farmland. It's a veritable estuary where the freshwater of rural traditions and beliefs (and dress) can mingle with the saltwater of city folks who commute to Des Moines for work. It's a unique ecosystem, providing habitat for even more unique organisms. A tractor driving down the main street in broad daylight, not really a big deal around here.
Grandpa says he doesn't wear his seat belt in his truck anymore, but I sure do, especially when he decided to call a fellow from church who had wanted to buy hay. The first stop of the day was to the insurer's office to drop of some paperwork concerning the barn door that was completely blown off in a windstorm. The door is huge, and it was thrown about 100 feet, but fortunately it was insured and a new one should be put on this summer. We did two laps around the square before we could pick out the small white name of the agent painted on the store front. Next up was the hardware store, which, I learned, is like "the place" for senior citizens to hang out. Not even two steps in the door and Grandpa is already greeting a man (former utilities worker) and after him is an elderly couple who have spent the winter in Arkansas, but are now back in town and are old friends of Grandpa's. I wondered towards a self-service popcorn stand and filled up a bag. It wasn't until I had finished did I notice the slot for donations to the local animal shelter. Grandpa had wanted to get a spare key made but the key maker at this store couldn't make duplicates of this type of key, so we headed out, but not before Grandpa got his popcorn as well.
Next stop was the Farm Service Agency, and the filling out of my farm plan for the year. On one form I had to indicate if I've made over a million dollars on the farm. There's not even a million blades of grass on that farm, but filling out the forms made this whole farming thing pretty real, especially when the lady told me I could be chosen for a random farm inspection and I'd better keep records of all farm activities with me or else I'd be penalized. Fortunately, the farm plan isn't too complex, even with changing a field of alfalfa to soy beans. I did learn a new farm term, HEL, which stands for Highly Erodible Land. There's a big push to conserve topsoil by limited the amount of it that is lost due to erosion, and so the FSA makes farmers accountable for certain practices and crop techniques used on this kind of land. Both of the fields at the farm as classified as HEL, so I had to sign off that I hadn't done anything to these fields this last year.
And lastly we headed out to the horseshoe pits at Pickard park on the eastern outskirts of Indianola. My grandpa is a pillar in the community of competitive horseshoe throwers in Iowa. Heck, he has the trailer for the Iowa Horseshoe Hall of Fame in his hay barn. He puts a lot of time into horseshoes, and these courts are his "home" courts. The league starts up in May, so now is the time to get the courts serviced are ready for competition. My Grandpa and a few other league members got together this month and built a wooden shed to store materials in at the courts, but it needed to be secured (so the kids wouldn't take it), so guess who got to dig the holes for the posts that would go on each side of this shed? I figure it's getting about that time again, so a little refresher course of working with the jobbers the and line posts isn't such a bad thing.
Lunch was on Grandpa at the local OneStop, which is a entire blog entry in and of itself, but I think I'll stop for tonight.

Entry 61: The Greenhorn

2009-04-25T15:17:00.000-07:00

My friend Ian, the greenhorn, is the first person to visit Iowa with the sole purpose of working on the farm. Amazing, but for those that know Ian it's pretty understandable. And, of course, the weekend he comes down it rains, but as we drove through the slick streets of Indianola Ian looked at me and says, "Heath, weather doesn't phase me."
Ian's not really a greenhorn, and in fact, he probably knows a lot more about gardens and farms than I do, mainly because he was raised as a wolf child in the wilds of Minnesota. Wait, that wasn't Ian, but it would explain some things. This, though, is truth, if Ian ever wanted to, I would make him my partner on this farm. He's probably the hardest working person I have ever met and has an unbridled love for the outdoors. His one fault, though, is a love for horses instead of miniature donkeys.
He came in on a Friday night and we treated him to a some green enchiladas to remind him of his time spent in El Salvador. I was actually able to visit him in the wonderful city of Son Salvador (I was living in Tegucigalpa, Honduras at the time). I'll always remember that trip because it's the place I picked up E. Coli from a street vendor selling banana milkshakes and nearly died two days later, that and because the previous morning Ian and I went on a run around the stadium for the national soccer team of El Salvador and then I beat him in a pull-up contest. Well, Iowa is a long way from central America, but now Ian lives in Chicago.
We were both excited to get started on Saturday. Ian was excited because he loves manuel labor and getting to work outdoors with his hands. I was excited because, with Ian's help, I'd get about a day and a half's work done :) Grandpa was outside to greet us when we arrived and suggested, since we'd be getting wet in the rain, jumping in the pond to clean off. It was at that point that I remembered I had forgotten to bring out the banana bread Adrienne had made for Maxine and Grandpa (or had Ian "misplaced" it in his bag?). Jake soon arrived and so we grabbed our tools and trekked back to the forest.
The hickory (and oak) forest is amazing, but it's also very cluttered with fallen limbs, dead trees, and annoying shrubs, so I thought, if Ian wants a full day of work, we'd head back there and start cleaning up a forest. Again, regular fires would have taken care of this, and not killed the hickory or oak, but in their absence the forest has suffered and so it was up to Ian and me to set things right. Our work can only be compared to a reverse tornado. Where there was disorder, we created order. A lane and fence line crowded with roses and gooseberries was soon cleared, but the majority of our work was reflected in the massive piles of branches we made among the trees. With the strength of an elephant Ian tackled and defeated the fallen trees, and with the tenderness of a monk he mourned the death of two baby field mice. It soon became apparent that we could make a hundred piles and not finish our task, but we were happy to clean up the roughly 1000 square yard area we concentrated on. It was wet work, and the mud clung to our axe and pickaxe, but it was good work, and our spirits were lifted by it. There are benefits immeasurable in a day of work deep among trees, and to share those benefits with a friend was a rare joy.
We didn't finish our job (that would take about a dozen more visits by Ian), but we worked till Ian said he was exhausted and could work no more (I could have). Ian had to return to Chicago the next day, but he'll be back, he has to, the farm is now in his blood too.

Entry 60: Coon Huntin' Donkey

2009-03-28T14:14:00.001-07:00

It sounds like some kind of rural put down, but a coon hunting donkey is a valued possession, and there's one next door to the farm. The neighbors to the north (the ones who race cars in Knoxville and have a couple hound dogs) are building a new house in the field that borders the entrance road to the farm. I was talking to Grandpa about it, and asking about what would happen to the donkey that was the sole occupant of that field for many years, and he mentioned that it was a special donkey, one trained to hunt raccoons. My mind immediately raced to a dark, foggy night lit up by a full moon, carelessly walking home through the field, only to be frozen in fear by the dark silhouette in front of me and a blood curdling, "HEEEEE-HAWWWWW". "It's the coon hunting donkey! Adrienne, bolt the doors, get the sacrificial raccoons, and hide the children!!!" Sadly, this donkey didn't "eat" the raccoons, and in all actuality, it didn't really "hunt" them, rather it was a donkey that was trained to jump fences. Boring, and the owner had to get off first and climb the fence by himself before the donkey would jump it. Regardless, I want one, but I'm going to train it to be a gold hunting donkey.
The weather here has been a little goofy, which, from what I hear from the locals, is right on par for early (very early) spring in Iowa. Last week it was beautiful and balmy 60 degrees. This week, let's just say it snowed today for our morning soccer practice and it turned out to be the best day of the week. Some trees are starting to bud, so I'm guessing that's a good sign, but I read that the true test that spring is close is vultures. Yep, everybody loves the robins when they return because they've got that little orange vest they wear, but the real harbingers of spring are the vultures because they apparently all forgot their knitted hats and hate the cold weather. I've seen some around.
I went out to the farm last week to do a little more work on a clean-up project I've started along the little creek that along the southwest corner of the property. I mentioned it before, and I don't expect anybody to know exactly what I'm talking about (unless you've been to the farm), but it's a place I really like, and as I've told Adrienne, I'd love for it to be a little natures playground for our daughter in a couple years (and at the rate I work, a couple years should be just right :) There are a lot of trees that have sprung up nearby this creek, and my first task was picking up all the fallen limbs and old dead trees that have accumulated over the years. I have been piling and burning these, and have made a lot of progress, so much so, that I've moved on to the next phase, cutting down trees. Yes, it's true, I, defender of the natural world, have been on a tree rampage. My validation is this, mankind has inhibited the natural cycle of fire in Iowa, which has allowed for the proliferation of trees (some good, some bad), and now I am just catching things up, you know, to be more natural. My main theme is this, take out the "garbage" trees and thin out the good ones a little. Garbage trees are your wild plum and crab apples which are also classified as soft wood trees (or trees that would burn like paper if there was a fire). They come down easy and really don't get very big at all. The good ones are the hardwood trees, and in this area by the creek the main occupants are walnuts. I haven't counted, but I would say close to forty, of varying size, and in some corners they are a little overcrowded. In a way, it's addition by subtraction. By taking out the smaller, misformed, and barkless (due to deer antler rubbing) walnut trees the whole population benefits. So I've been doing a little of that, but the majority of my energy has been spent on a tree that I am taking a personal vendetta against, the willow, my sworn enemy.
Pretty much anywhere there is water there will be willow trees, and these things are like the mother of all softwood trees because they grow very fast, get big (too big for their own good), and then collapse or lean crooked under their own weight. They also produce a ton of fallen stems which are so annoying, and their life span is short in tree years. I want them out, and I've taken matters into my own hands. Someday I'll get a chain saw (sorry everyone who gave me money for one over Christmas) but till then, I'm more than happy to cut down a tree with a double bladed axe. It's kinda like those crazy hunters who have so much respect for deer or mountain goats that they will only kill them with an arrow, or maybe a hunting knife, because they say if you are going to take a life you should take it with your own hands and be able to look into the eye of the animal. Crazy people, if you love animals so much then don't kill them, me, on the other hand, I have such a respect for trees, that if I'm going to cut one down I will do it with an axe, and take a long time doing it, because that's just how much I love trees. Well, I hate these willow trees, with their wind broken limbs hanging above my head and their branches keeping sunlight from the majestic walnuts, so I make the cut jagged.
Cutting down a tree is actually pretty fun, if you lived in the 1910's, but I like it. A willow tree, once you take a couple chops, starts spitting out a lot of wood chips (soft wood) and they very closely resemble cooked chicken (or what I remember of it). I'll cut out a good sized wedge and then stick my face into it to breath in the smell. It's a very damp and earthy smell, but I like it, and by that point, the tree is pretty close to being toppled. These trees , by nature, are pretty much living with one foot in the grave, I'm just hear to speed up that process. I played baseball for one season in 7th grade, and I thought I was pretty cool because I could switch hit, well now I think I'm the epitome of cool because I can switch chop. It's a useful skill when the trees are crowded, but sometimes I just like to showboat a little. Well, I was on my last tree (of the day, there are a lot more willows) and I had a predicament. The willow was leaning in such a way that, if I cut it down, it would partly fall on a couple smaller walnut trees. Then MacGyver took over and used an old fence post as a wedge to direct the falling tree away from the walnuts. It would be my first "directed" cut, which is considered an advanced skill for wood cutters, and so I gave myself a pat on the back for this ingenuity and returned to my cutting. Look at the pictures. It was a good idea, but didn't quite have the effect I had hoped for, and I ended having to "roll" the fallen willow off of the walnuts, with minimal damage.

And that was pretty much my day. I was tired, but didn't want to leave the farm, so I went on a walk and ended up sitting on the ground near the thick hickory trees and just sorta zoned out under the cloudy sky. When I left I saw a huge red squirrel not moving about half way up an oak tree. I think he was scared to death of being seen by Jake, who was on the other side of the tree, and just "clung" onto the bark. So naturally, I started picking up hickory nuts and throwing them at him. I wanted so bad to be able to brag about being able to walk out in the forest and hit a squirrel with a hickory nut (and who would I brag about that too, because, it's not like I'm hanging out with Tom Sawyer on the weekends), but after after thirty tries I had only glanced his tail, so it was time to go.

ps. This is Froggo, the first frog of Spring. I think he woke up a little early, but I saw him sitting in the middle of the creek surrounded by luscious flora, and lonely. I wonder if he thought there would be more insects out at this time of year. If this frog knew how many of his cousins I have dissected he would not have let me get this close to take his picture.

Entry 59: End of Hibernation

2009-03-28T13:15:00.000-07:00

Adrienne, my wife, has been getting on to me about how I am becoming a "bad blogger". Well, here's the end of that. These pictures were taken over a couple of trips to the farm.

1. The bluest sky and bare, dead limbs.
2. Where "shagbark" hickory gets it's name from. I read once that bats can live under this bark, and that's pretty darn cool.
3. A pile of squirrel hickory nut "empties". Trust me, there are some chubby squirrels running around in these woods.
4. This one was from awhile ago, when we went through some pretty severe thaws and refreezings. I don't know what explains this pattern in the ice, or if the conditions will ever be right again to reproduce this effect.
5. Dead mole, with his creepy mole hands.

Entry 58: Ch-Ch-Ch-Changes

2009-02-20T11:17:00.000-08:00

Last weeks' six inches of snow has melted away, and as February approaches it's end one can only hope that March holds the beginnings of Spring. And what a Spring it is going to be around here. I have long forgotten the days of crawling into my car exhausted from a day of work on the farm, and am eager to head back out there on a regular basis. There will be more of a purpose to this trips, even though tearing out roses and digging up thistles, I imagine, will be a life long passion. There will be new plantings, which simultaneously thrills and frightens me. Every work has a beginning, which is a cause for celebration, but at the same time I still don't fully know what I'm doing. I guess the same could be said for being a new father, but we'll talk about that later. On the docket for this Spring is about 175 grape plantings. I haven't finalized the numbers and types yet, but I won't be planting those ritzy glitzy types that get all the press in places like Napa Valley and (I can't think of any other places). Instead, I will be opting for grape cultivars (fancy way of saying "varietals", fancy way of saying "different types") that have been developed to withstand the climate we have here in Iowa. Some good advice I received was to select grapes that can withstand -20F temperatures in the winter, something that isn't encountered in more "traditional" grape growing regions. Believe it or not, though, before the Prohibition Era, Iowa was the fourth largest wine producing state, so there's a little legacy there.
I'm hoping to visit a vineyard later this week to finalize my order, but here's a preview of what may be on it. The Marquette cultivar was developed at the University of Minnesota and is considered very well suited to the midwest climate. It is a red wine grape and is rated very highly in resistance to the common grape diseases and pests. Norton Cynthiana is considered the grape of Missouri, and is grown abundantly there. Like Marquette, it is rated highly for it's resistance of diseases and tolerance of temperatures, but it is a white wine grape. Those two will make up the majority of my order, but I'd like to try a couple other grape varieties like "King of the North", "Bluebell", or "Mariochal Foch", and maybe even a couple table or juice grapes like Concord. Talking to the owners of the vineyard this week should go a long way in preparing for the Spring.
The other planting will be of about 175 Aronia bushes. Both the grapes and the Aronia will take years to become established and start producing, but again, every dream has to have a start and this is that start. Most people are more familiar with the annual plants, the ones that can be planted and harvested within a relatively short amount of time. It's the immediate gratification of the plant world, and in many ways, it's what suits the American lifestyle. Well, that's not the case with the perennial plants, the ones that are planted once and promise to pay you back in the future, if only you can wait till they are ready. They are the patience plants, the ones that require a vision more so than a desire, the ones that will be woven into your life and your family. Needless to say, a mix of annuals and perennials is probably the best, so don't be surprised if something has to be done in the years before any grape cluster or Aronia berries are harvested.
And then there is the issue of an impending fatherhood. She'll be born this Spring, in the midst of all the excitement, but when she's born she will eclipse everything else. We knew we would have kids, and I'd be lying if I said didn't use them as motivation for working on the farm, but to have a living, breathing child to love and care for makes me want scream (and that's a good thing). I think of the family walks through the farm, the birds fluttering through the undergrowth ahead of our steps, the snowmen, the picked flowers, the insects to discover, it's really too much to take in, but this farm is a world apart, a world separated, buffered, and now there is somebody to introduce it to, somebody to cherish it for, somebody to chase the butterflies through it when we can't anymore.

On a completely different note, here is a couple pieces of chocolate cake that Bill's daughter made the last time I was there to paint, and was forced to take home. I don't think Bill ever bothers himself with cakes, and why should you when you are a master of making pies? Of course, his apple pies are legendary (to me) and the other day he was recalling how they used to have a cherry tree and he'd make cherry pies. At that point my mouth started watering because I love cherry pies more than apple pies, but alas, that tree died in '95. One day this Winter, though, he made a pie I wanted nothing to do with. It was a mince meat pie, full of raisins and fruit and spices and meat. I should have asked him what cutting of meat, exactly, he put in his pies, because later that day my Grandpa told of how head meat makes the best mince meat pies. Lovely. But head cuttings can also be used to make another farm staple, head cheese, which is something I hope I never have to encounter in my life, that, and, fried cow's brain, which has definitely been cooked in kitchen at the farm house.

Entry 57: Farm Bum (Painting for a Living)

2009-02-01T07:27:00.000-08:00

Okay, I'm sorry I haven't been posting more this winter, but I haven't been able to make many trips out to the beloved farm in the past month or two. I've been subbing at a nearby high school and am also going to be coaching soccer there this spring, so that's what has been taking up my time, and it's a good thing, because there really isn't much I could have been doing on the farm and would have probably gone crazy with boredom if not for my other jobs.
I have been able to make it to Bill's house about six times over the hard winter, and it's through those days that I have become an expert painter! I guess I didn't quite grasp on my first visit the scope of painting Bill actually wanted me to do this winter. The entire house, pretty much, was the goal, and piece by piece, I think we'll get it done. We started in the stairway and upstairs hallway (ceiling and walls), then moved to the large living room, and last week I did about half of the downstairs bedroom. At times it's pretty tough work, especially cutting in on the ceiling and around the windows, and needless to say, I wouldn't want to paint for a living, but this is the first time I've ever had the opportunity to paint and I'm passing the competency test. What takes time, as well, is moving the furniture in the house, but this gives us an opportunity to clean behind it and the end result is actually a pretty significant change.
Well the last time I worked at Bill's the weather was nice enough to stop by the farm before heading home. Grandpa had mentioned picking up some fire wood, but he had a chiropractor's appointment that same day in the afternoon. So I bundled up and went for a walk. What made this walk possible, though, were the five-buckle boots that Bill had given me the day before. These are an essential piece of farm equipment, and was pretty excited when he mentioned he had a pair that were too small for him. They are pretty much "overshoes" which you step into with your normal boots on, and then there is a series of five buckles you tighten to get a good fit. With these shoes on you can pretty much go outdoors in any type of weather, and I knew a few inches of snow on the ground would not be a problem. Jake soon followed, oblivious to the cold or the risk of frostbite (and still carrying a tapeworm, I confirmed during a bathroom break).
It was just a walk about, but also a chance to remember how much I love this place. The snow blown landscape has just as much beauty and intrigue as the green fields of spring. I made my path in the snow beside the paths of deer and rabbits, on top of the sleeping flowers. I headed back to the hickory trees because that's where it felt most natural to be amidst snow (and a strong, numbing wind). Jake soon left me to pursue other interests, but it left me time to wonder round the trees and realize I'm like those people that can't leave the warm sand or the white slopes, I can't leave this land. Farm bum, fitting, and true. The amount of work I know this land requires, the amount of resources I'll bury in this soil, and the chance of relatively little return do nothing to break the attachment I have to this place. Now I just need to get Adrienne to feel the same way :)
I wondered further through the woods, along the east fence line where a truck can get through if needed. I saw Jake in a neighbors field in full pursuit. About thirty yards ahead was a squirrel running through the snow and brush, passing tree after tree until reaching his favorite. Jake let out a very masculine bark, as if to remind any nearby squirrels that he ran the show in these parts. He continued on his way, and so did I. We met up as I was starting my way back to the house along the north fence line, but he immediately took off under the fence, disappearing into the stream banks and brush, after something I never saw. A few moments later, though, he let out a yelp I've rarely heard. It was a YELP(I've stepped on an animal trap), or a YELP(I've fallen through the ice in the stream). He didn't return my calls or whistles, and so I climbed the fence and looked for about ten minutes, but saw nothing, nothing, that is, except a bald eagle! Now, a bald eagle could probably carry off Jake, but this one was empty handed, so I just watched it glide (further confirming how much I loved this place).
Grandpa had a nice fire going when I got to the house, and it was no time before my chin had feeling again. I stayed for dinner, and when I left, there was Jake by the back door. He's more of a sprite than a dog, and more than capable of avoiding any real danger on this farm and magically appearing at that backdoor for a handful of dog food.

Entry 56: Wild Life

2009-01-05T20:35:00.000-08:00

It seems that the temperatures have balanced out somewhat and the snow and ice have taken a break. It's still below freezing, meaning the ground is hard as a rock, but it's not so bad to be outdoors again. I made it to the farm a couple times this last week, and it just felt good to start the new year outdoors. And what was the goal of these inaugural trips to the farm? Picking up sticks, mainly. Kind of a clean up project on the farm, and trust me, there are a lot of fallen branches out there.
Intro's over, the main reason I was writing, though, was to mention the wild life. In driving to the farm on a typical day you can see plenty of wild ones out doing there thing. It's mainly deer these days, and the other day I tried to keep count of how many I could see from the car but I got lost somewhere near fifteen. It's not always that many, but they are a very common sight and, unfortunately, often times end on their backs, disembowled, with hooves in the air when they get too close to the road. Turkey are around, and I saw a rafter (gang is acceptable, but gobble is more of a colloquial term) of about twenty of them the other day, but the more common sight from the car window is hawks. These mottled, marbled birds of prey are everywhere. I even saw one in Indianola yesterday perched high above a kindergarten. With their feathers ruffled for the cold they appear pretty big, but not nearly as big as the big daddy of birds, the bald eagle! Yep, I saw one about thirty miles from the farm, and it probably won't get any closer than that. It was near a river, which, according to my understanding, is where they like to hang out and hunt. I had to do a double take out the driver's side window, but it was definitely a bald eagle. Now, if an eagle ever wanted to supplement it's diet with a little rabbit, it would find plenty on the farm. I haven't seen too many, but they leave their calling card everywhere. These little "brown" berries are a common sight in the brush and trees where I've been working. It would be so easy to put these in a box and sell them as a natural, high fiber cereal. I refrained from trying one despite their obvious visual appeal.

Lastly, as I was walking through the hay field to the trees, I saw something orange lying on the ground. Coming closer I could see that it was an animal, a dead fox. Foxes, coyotes, sometimes wild dogs, they roam out here but you rarely get to see them this close. I had seen one coyote, making a dead sprint across the same hay field, earlier in the fall, but this was the first fox I had ever seen out here. It was out of place, here in the open, and so I tried to shoo away Jake so I could analyze the crime scene. From the decomposition of the body I'm guessing it died between five to seven days ago and, even though I'm no wild animal veterinarian, I'm guessing the cause of death was that gaping wound to the neck. My first suspect was Jake, resident wild life determinator, but he behaved like he hadn't seen this fox carcass before and actually didn't even know it was there until I approached it, he then began gnawing on the tail. The ground was too hard to leave paw prints, but I would find it hard to believe that a fox, as intelligent and elusive as they are, would be caught out in the middle of a field with no cover by any other animal but.............another fox!

Yes, I believe love was behind this death. Two rivals, high on hormones, met under the moonlight, and only one limped away to mate. It's classic Animal Planet stuff.
Now this story would be a lot more believable if I was able to tell if this fox was a male or female, but I've got my limits, and wasn't packing any latex gloves. Plus, based on the size and color, I'm pretty sure it was a male, and somewhere, out there, is the winner, probably watching me, waiting for his chance to pounce, but I'm not going out like that, and maybe by this time next year you'll see a picture of my new fox skin vest. (Note: I have no intention of killing any foxes, or coyotes, and this experience was good to remind me that the farm is still wild, not like some petting zoo.)

Entry 55: The Old Road

2008-12-31T16:36:00.000-08:00

This is a picture from my Grandpa's school days that he showed me during the summer. I've been wanting to write about it for awhile, but it didn't seem right until the snow starting falling. Grandpa showed me this picture around the time we were looking for Barney (the adventurous bull) in the neighbors cornfield. Well there used to be a road ("the old road" as it's often referenced) that ran east/west just north of the farm house. The road is Polk St. now, and if you take it west from the farm house you'll cross highway 69 and then hit a rough stretch that has a sign warning that it's a level B road and isn't maintained. Enter at your own risk. Well, past that it cleans itself up and meets the old school house and if you follow it a little farther you'll get to Bill's house. The old school house was torn down earlier this month.
You can't go east on the old road from the farmhouse, not anymore. It's overgrown with trees and poison ivy, but you can see where a bridge used to be. When Grandpa was a school aged boy he could take the old road east to his school house. He pointed out the spot where it used to be. There's a storage shed there now, but it's right next to a mighty steep hill. Grandpa told me about coasting on that hill during the winter. It's not a hill for the faint of heart, and I'd be hesitant to try riding down it on a bicycle in the summer, but I'm sure it provided endless joys for the kids at the school house. Grandpa said you'd pick up so much speed going down the hill you'd be carried halfway up the other side before slowing down. One icy day the school teacher decided it was too dangerous for any sledding, and that didn't go over very well with the kids, so one girl who lived nearby ran home and got her dad, and after speaking with the teacher sledding was resumed.
Grandpa is standing on the far left and the three other schoolmates are brothers. The one next to Grandpa was held back a year so he could go through schooling with the twins. There were around ten students who went to this school (and I'm guessing they all wore overalls too :)

Entry 54: He might not be dead when we pull him out

2008-12-16T17:18:00.000-08:00

I had made it a point to get out to Bill's this week because it had been awhile and I knew he had some things lined up to do, inside. Upon waking, and finding something for breakfast, Adrienne informed me that the temperature outside was a startling -2F, with a wind chill of -24F. This is our first Iowa winter, and this was it's way of saying welcome.
Bill had said he wanted help cleaning up his house a little, and as long as we stayed indoors, I'd be happy, but, as is often the case on a farm, you just don't know what you are going to encounter. The first order of business when I got to his house was to help take apart their old old old computer and render the memory unaccessible. In this rural setting I felt like a computer programmer as I unscrewed some bolts and lifted off the case to reveal the CD tower like memory structure. Then it was just a matter of Bill crushing it with a hammer, and everybody was satisfied.
Next I had the job of cleaning the walls in the stairway so we could do some painting. Bill brought in a ladder, and putting it on a stair and leaning it against the wall, was able to reach the ceiling and upper wall. He was demonstrating it for me, and I'll admit that my knees were a little wobbly going up that ladder, especially when Bill said if I fell I'd wreck myself, but it was sturdy enough. The stairs took me awhile, but then I was able to do the hallway walls, and then get started on the basement stairwell. In the meantime, Bill had been going in and out of the house checking on the calves that are in the pen near the house. I didn't hear much of what he was saying about them, but I could tell he was concerned. His wife told me one of the calves was sick and that's why he was in a bad mood. Well, it was when I was about about halfway down the stairs when Bill came in with the news that the calf was dead. It went to a corner of the pen and laid down, and Bill couldn't get it back up.
It is a very sad thing for a calf to die, but it is a fact of life on the farm. A calf represents a significant financial investment on behalf of the small scale farmer, and for one to die at this time, so close to sale, is a big loss. Fortunately, this one calf would not make or break Bill, and he was more concerned if what had killed this calf could be passed on to the others. Apparently a vet had been out twice in the last four or five days to inspect the calf. The diagnosis was a bacterial infection in the stomach or gut that wouldn't allow the calf to digest it's food. This lead to clearly visible bloating and accumulation of mucus in the nose. I don't know all the details or the specifics of cow sicknesses, but to be sick in this kind of weather is a tough draw. The next move was to call the service that comes and picks up and disposes of the cow carcass. No lie, the name of the company was something "cow products". My mind raced of what they would do to, and use, this carcass for, and maybe I'd run into it again one day. Of course they'll probably just incinerate it.
The guy and and his truck couldn't make it out till probably Wednesday, and he couldn't pick the calf up and out of the pen, so we would have to move it out into the open. "He might not be dead when we pull him out." I grabbed my coat and gloves and headed out with Bill, anticipating that I'd have one leg and he'd have the other and we'd co-drag this 600 lb half conscious calf through mud and cow pies in subzero weather. Fortunately, the tractor would do the pulling and the calf was indeed dead. After we removed the bottom two boards of the fence, Bill backed up the tractor, attached a chain to the hind legs, and pulled the carcass right out and put it by the road. Next to it he placed a glass jar with the $60 fee for picking up and disposing of the carcass. Talk about adding injury to insult, your calf dies, and then you have to pay someone to pick it up.
Looking at that hulking, bloated calf wasn't what I would consider fun, but it was a lesson in the essentials of farming. A farmer may have varying levels of compassion for an animal, but when it dies it has to be taken care off, regardless of how big or loved it was. I asked Bill if coyotes would bother it, and he said of course, that's just a reality of living in the country, but at least it wasn't going to rot and smell.
I finished up the basement stairs and cleaned and rinsed my bucket with an outside faucet. Instantly the sponge froze to the metal gutter I set it on, and then my wet hands started sticking to the metal handle of the bucket. It was time to go.

Some details of the calf (don't read if squeamish):
The calf had only been dead a few minutes, but already it's nose had frozen and begun to crack in the cold. There was thick, white mucus mixed with blood on the walls of the pen where the calf collapsed (I hope that doesn't carry the infectious bacteria). The eyes had not clouded over yet. Part of the colon was extended out of the anus and moving perceptibly.

Entry 53: Aronia melanocarpa

2008-12-09T16:17:00.000-08:00

Last week I drove about two hours west to a farm in Missouri Valley, Iowa, which is about on the border of Iowa and Nebraska. It was a research trip to find out a little more about the black chokeberry (Aronia melanocarpa) which will most likely have a home on the farm next spring. It's a actually a fascinating plant, and I first read about it and this farm in Missouri Valley in an article from the Des Moines Register during the summer. I kind of planted it in the back of my mind that this was something interesting, but maybe not something I'd be interested in. Well, it kept coming up, here and there, and I read about it a little more and it just kept making sense that this would be something good to grow on the farm.
For one, Aronia a native plant, which means it is going to be somewhat strongly resistant to pests and diseases that are common to plants in this region. A non-native plant has to be treated and protected by various means, which can be a lot of work (as I'm sure I'll find out with grapes). Once an Aronia shrub (correct term) is established, it basically can take care of itself, you just have to pluck off the berries when they are ripe. It is in these berries, though, that Aronia holds the most intrigue. You see, Aronia has the highest concentration of anitoxidants of any berry currently known. What about blueberries and cranberries? About three times the amount in blueberries and ten times that in cranberries.
Aronia is grown in large quantities in Eastern Europe, but really hasn't been developed in the US. The farm I went to is really the first commercial Aronia plantation in the US and is responsible for bringing the plant "back" to Iowa. There is potential in this product, but the market is still in its early stages here in the US, plus the berries don't have the greatest taste on their own. I was able to bring some back from the farm, and being the curious person that she is, Adrienne popped one in her mouth before I could warn her, and presto, "Ewwwwwwwwwwww!" It's a little bitter and fleshy, but has a good aftertaste, I thought.

Like other shrubs and vines, Aronia takes a few years before it starts producing berries, and who knows what the market will be like for them in that time. I'm going to look into getting a few hundred to put in next spring, like the grapes, and go from there. I'm sure, they'll be some more posts on this plant, and hopefully it will pull it's weight on the farm, otherwise we are going to be eating a lot of very tart pies and jams :)

If you are interested in more information on Aronia, here is a link to the article and the website from Sawmill Hollow farms. It's really a neat place:
http://sawmillhollow.com/2008/09/des-moines-register-story/

Entry 52: The Farm in Winter

2008-12-07T19:41:00.001-08:00

I hate to admit it, but with the colder temperatures I'm just not going to have as many comical adventures at the farm as I did in the warmer months, which means I won't be able to post as often. I'm shooting for a minimum of one posting a week, but more than that would be a stretch over the next few months. There are things happening, though, over these months, and I'll try to keep everyone abreast, so do check back.........just not as often :)

1. The barn and large hay bales under a light blanket of snow (it should get a lot heavier this week).
2. & 3. Peaceful scenes. The snow has that dulling, cleansing effect, like covering all the sharp edges in frosting.
4. The cows huddled together for warmth, but also to eat. Grandpa took one of those large hay bales out to them in the morning.
5. Crystal clear water running through the creek by the spring.

Entry 51: Animal Abuser

2008-11-30T06:49:00.000-08:00

This post comes from earlier in the week, a few days before Thanksgiving, but with all the festivities I wasn't able to sit down and write it out till now.
Last week was most likely the last decent week of weather (as I look at my window today on the falling snow), and I made a couple trips to the farm, but really came to the realization that there isn't too much, if anything, more that I can do this winter. Again, it's going to be a busy Spring, but that's going to be the norm now.
I went back to the creek, where I had been working with the shovel to kinda clear it out and keeping it flowing in one direction, instead of splitting and flooding it's banks and making a big muddy mess. There are a bunch of willow trees that have fallen, or are in the process of falling, and I though I'd take the axe down and start chopping on them. They are extremely soft wood, and are trees that I'd like taken out eventually. On my walk to the creek, though, I noticed that Grandpa had turned the cattle back into the hay fields, which meant they'd be coming down to the creek to get there water, and would be undoing all the work that I had done. When a cow drinks water it puts it's two front feet right up next to the creak and lets those feet sink in a good foot or two, depending on how muddy the banks are. And sometimes, when they are done and in tight quarters, they have to turn around in the creek and just make a mess of things.
The cows weren't by the creek as I started cutting on the trees and making piles of limbs and branches, but as I worked I noticed them inching closer from a distant hillside. I turned my back to them to work, which was a mistake, because next thing I know, here comes two cows. They eyeballed me as they lounged by and went straight down to the water. Behind those initial two were about three calves, and behind them were the rest of herd, some thirty strong with the bull. I could feel something start to bubble inside of me. Was it fear? Nerves? Anxiety? Or anger? It was definitely anger! Arrgggggggggggggggh!
I scowled at those first cows, with little or no effect, so I proceeded to bang some of my tools together, much like a caveman probably would have done in a similar situation. I hopped around, for good effect, but thirst prevailed and the cows lowered their heads to drink, sinking their hooves deep into the newly manicured stream banks. One cow stepped into the water flow, and I felt a twitch. The rest is a little blurry, but I'll try to recount it as best I can. I charged toward the offending cow, banging my tools and yelling. "Hey!", "What do you think you are doing?" , "Get OUT!". No response, and now all the cows were nearby and eyeing the water. I turned around to see a rather large cow standing completely, four feet, in the stream, and lost it. Dropping the tools, I rushed toward the cow and picked up a fallen branch and began swinging it menacingly over my head. I wanted to hit the cow, but smashed the limb against a nearby tree instead. The cow was oblivious, which made me even angrier, so I picked up the biggest piece of the branch and swung again. This time, when the branch broke, it ricocheted right into my right elbow. It hurt so bad. I turned around again to see a group of calves surrounding my pile of branches, munching on the soft shoots. Easy targets. I picked up a long skinny branch which would make a good spear and hurled it at the nearest victim.
As soon as that spear left my hand I knew something was wrong with how I was behaving. The spear struck the calf in it's haunch and only gave it a scare, but the damage had been done. I was an animal abuser. It was obvious I could do little to stop the cows from drinking water and reversing my work from earlier this week, and I could either accept that, or continue my futile decent to barbarianism. I didn't hate these cows, they were just doing what they have done their entire lives here on the farm and I couldn't believe how upset that had made me. It wasn't "wrong", it was just something different from what I wanted. I apologized to the herd and almost immediately my anger subsided. The lesson I took from this day was one that I'm sure all farmers know through and through; there are always circumstances beyond your control, but you can always control how you react to them. I'll work on that creek again some other time, besides, anything worth doing is worth doing twice.

Entry 50: Groundbreaking

2008-11-23T18:14:00.000-08:00

50 entries! Didn't think I'd see that, but it's been one amazing ride so far, and I feel it's only going to get better. I kind of made reference to it in the last entry, but I'm not feeling like too much of an outsider these days. I love the awkward "only in Iowa" moments, but there has been a natural progression ever since we settled down here that makes those moments more and more the norm. I'd like to think I've always been this way, on the verge of hickness waiting for that final push, but that would be to ignore the importance of "place" on a person. Just as hard as I push, Iowa pushes right back at me, and it's winning, and I like that it's winning. We don't live in Boulder, or Santa Fe, or Philadelphia, we live in (rural) Iowa, and it's just as unique and worthwhile as any place in the world. Visit in a year (better make it three) and I'll show you what you can't find anywhere except in this "fly over" countryside.

Ha, all that to say, we dug the holes for the vineyard yesterday. I had agreed with my Uncle Kirk that Saturday would be the day to dig, so I meet him at his house to load up his Bobcat Toolcat (see pictures) on the trailer and head to the farm. Unfortunately, our first task of the day was getting the trailer reconnected to the hitch after it came off while going up a big hill right by Kirk's house with the Bobcat already loaded. It was one of those instances where the safety chain saved multiple thousands of dollars in damages by not allowing that trailer to roll (flip?) down the hill. There were a few tense moments, but we securely reattached the trailer and made it to the farm in one piece. Kirk had borrowed a one foot wide auger from a friend, and with that attached, digging the holes was a breeze. Our method was this, Kirk would dig the hole about four foot deep and I'd come along and fill it in using my pick-axe. Multiply that by about two hundred, and that was our Saturday afternoon. The reason we dug these holes was so that in the Spring, when the young grapes are planted, they will be able to easily establish deep roots, which will give them a better chance of survival. It was very interesting to look into these holes (at least the first 25) and see the soil make-up that is under our feet. In most instances there was only about 6-10 inches of dark, crumbly topsoil, and under that was a lot of clay. In some places the clay was reddish in color, in others gray (no distinctive taste), and in others almost a dark green, but it was extremely abundant. This "clay barrier" is what we are hoping to have broken through to give the grapes an advantage, but there will be some work by mother nature this winter to breakdown the clumps of exposed soil. Regardless, it was a huge step forward. Now the big question is what type of grapes to grow next spring?

Entry 49: Medora Methodist Fall Bazaar

2008-11-23T17:17:00.001-08:00

It was another Friday working on the farm, but after the week of work that I had had, I was pretty tired and stumbling through the day. As long as I kept moving, though, I stayed warm, and I could see little by little that I was making some progress on cleaning out the fallen limbs and old branches from the wooded area around the stream I had been working on earlier in the week. This is going to take some time because actually, some trees need to come down, but I thought I'd get started on some of the clean-up now. Honestly, when I was walking this area, by the stream and with the trees overhead, I thought of a daughter (I'm not trying to guess what's on the way come May) and that this would be her playground one day. It just makes cleaning it up a little easier.
The daylight was running out so I headed up to the farm house to say goodbye to Grandpa. Maxine was out for the evening, but when I came in Grandpa was dressed up pretty nice, like he was going out. He asked me if I was "baching tonight?", his favorite term for when I'm at home without Adrienne. I said I was and so he asked me if I'd like to go to dinner with him in a small town south of the farm called Medora. The Methodist Church there puts on a dinner every year as a fundraiser and it was tonight. I was starving, and Grandpa was planning to go by himself, so I said it sounded good and we loaded up in his truck and headed down the road. About two minutes into the drive Grandpa looks at me and says, "I forgot my glasses." I squeezed the arm rest as my pupils constricted, "Will that be a problem?" "No, I just need them to see things up close."
If you blink at the turnoff on Hwy 69 you will miss Medora. The landmark is a small feed store and diner, and up the hill is the Methodist Church. The parking lot was nearly full when we got there as Grandpa told me that this event is quite popular with the locals. The Medora Mehodist Church Fall Bazaar for Womens Aid, as it is properly called, was more than I could have ever expected. The line to get in nearly runs out the basement door for the duration of the meal that is prepared and served by the women of the church at the cost of a free will offering (donation). Following the meal is a large auction of crafts, baked goods, and quilts. Grandpa said this event always follows the harvest and raises a very significant amount of money for the church. The quilts are well known to be some of the best in the area and are hand stitched. I had my eye on a denim vest with two stuffed bears stitched on the back. Nothing said "farmer's wife" quite like this accessory, and I knew Adrienne would love it, but we didn't stay for the auction. Grandpa pointed out a goose berry pie for sale, his favorite. The berries are picked while still green, and extremely tart, but that's how you make the pie.
The first question in the serving line was, "Ham balls or turkey?". I looked at the kind white haired lady, with the drawn on eyebrows, sheepishly and said, "Neither." "Are you a wrestler?" That's what I love about Iowa, there is such a reverence for the sport of wrestling. I stacked on the potato casserole, creamed corn, and lots of pasta salad. For dessert there were about ten different pies to choose from. I chose a piece of raspberry, which wasn't the best of choices, and left me jealous of Grandpa's pumpkin and the rhubarb across the table.
Almost immediately after entering the room we ran into family members and friends of the family. All of these people knew my father very well, and I guess I share a resemblance to him, so they look at me fondly, but unfortunately I have a hard time keeping them straight and often times don't know who they are. I am piecing them together, and remember a lot of faces from visits ten to fifteen years ago. Once we found an open table, and could eat, the visiting slowed down and I could watch the people enter and leave. Grandpa pointed out a man who stood with him at his wedding to Grandma. His brother, Pete, came in with his smile. You should see pictures of Pete from his younger days. The pastor came over to tell us we had the most food piled on our plates of any two people in the room. Grandpa said, "He's a real nice guy, and gives a pretty good sermon for a Methodist." The most awkward moment of the night came when Grandpa said hello to a middle aged man and his wife as they stiffly passed, almost ignoring him. Grandpa leaned over and told me that's the guy who is supposed to have fixed his chimney top about two months ago. We didn't stay too long once we finished because they needed the seats for the new people coming in. On the drive home Grandpa told me his Mom was born in Medora and his Grandpa (would be my Great Great Grandpa) was the town barber and night watchmen and they even had the town switchboard in their house.
A month ago I would have felt like a stranger in a gathering like this, but this night, it almost felt normal. There is something great to be admired in the elderly farmer and the small town church. Both have gone through the seasons of draught and the seasons of plenty and can carry with them a palpable aura that, in the end, there is no hardship that can break them. How much one required of the other I'm sure varies, but they are the two legs on which the most of the Midwest stands. Is that foundation wavering, well I don't know, but I'll be at the bazaar next year, and maybe Adrienne will be wearing that teddy bear vest.

Entry 48: The Unholy Trio

2008-11-19T06:38:00.000-08:00

Yesterday was a great day, an amazing day, and now I can barely stand up or walk straight. It's the life of a farmer, and this Summer and Fall has been glimpses of it, but yesterday was an extended gaze, and I like what I saw.
To start things off, there was the ceremonial burning of the last pile of multifloral roses. This does not mean they've been completely cleared off of the farm, just the first pasture, but looking at the map you can see this is a significant bit of land. In many ways, this was my first test of working on the farm and to be done with it felt similar to a graduation. Okay, maybe like a Kindergarten graduation, but it's a start. Of course, though, this means I needed a new project, so I headed back to the calf pasture, past the ordered orange X's of the vineyard, down the hill, and up to the edge of the mud pit/frog pond that marks where the stream leaves the calf pasture and enters the hay field. Really, if Adrienne and I, and the ten kids, are going to be living up the hill from this stream it needs to be in a little bit better shape. Stagnant water is a harbinger of disease, for humans and for grape plants, so my goal for the day was to get this frog pond drained and landscape this stream into a pleasant neighbor.

For a task of this magnitude, I had to call upon the "Unholy Trio" of farm tools: mattock the pickaxe, muckrake, and old shovel. I also put to good use my new rubber boots and gloves. I started on the other side of the fence, where the water should be flowing but is blocked by a dam of debris. Removing some of the twigs and leaves helped, but I decided to walk the course of the stream (in the corner of the hayfield) before I did anymore. It's a really special little stream, and runs about forty yards before it leaves our property and empties into a pond on the neighboring property. In those forty yards, though, it weaves between and beneath trees and makes quite the picturesque scene. The only problem was that the stream wasn't well defined, meaning in some places it overflowed it's banks and made muddy grounds. I blame the cows, those destructors of the fragile. I would get to that stagnant frog pond, but first I would work on this precious stream. It was a lot of work with the shovel, but I defined that stream from where it left under our south fence until the point I was exhausted. I'll finish it today, but it was good work, good mud soaked work. Seeing results is such good motivation.
I thought I was exhausted, but hopping the fence and looking at that nasty water made me want to at least work on it a little more while there was daylight. I grabbed the muckrake and boldly walked into the mud. It was not a time for the weak hearted, as I sunk in to about 16 1/2 inches on my 17 inch boots. It was akin to quicksand, but I was able to keep a hand on the fence for support and navigate my way to the heart of the beast. I plunged the rake repeatedly into the slop, forging a path for the water on it's surface. The water was no longer leaving at a trickle but was now a small torrent as a smile crept across my face. Changes are in the wind, and as I left the farm my gift was one of those epic sunsets. Fitting.