Wednesday, May 21, 2008

5/18 Work Party - Pleasant Valley Acres & Broadturn

Pleasant Valley Acres:

-cucumbers starts in the back row, covered them in remay.
-radish seeds sowed directly in between the cucumber starts.
- bush bean seeds sowed directly in the back left
- tubing and rebar used to make hoops to hold up remay; rebar cut with bolt cutters.


Broadturn Farm: Angel & Ryan
- weeded around the whole herb spiral and surrounding area
- back area of the field looks nice as the "wild" section of the garden, encourage the growth of some red clover, yeowdock, red raspberry, plantain, and dandelion which are already growing there

Saturday, May 17, 2008

5/11 Workparty

Peas - the row was weeded (clover left to keep nitrogen in the soil -- a nitrogen-producing bacteria grows on their roots) the seeds were sown directly

Red Oak Lettuce -- had reseeded itself from last year in the field; the plants were separated and planted four to a row about three inches apart; added one more to each row last year because the plants didn't get as big as expected

Mesculun Mustard, Mesculun Lettuce Mix, Chard -- sown directly 3" apart, all in same row

Kale -- Winterbor, Nero di Tuscana (dinosaur), Red Russian -- row was tilled, sown directly 4" apart in two rows, covered in remay cloth to protect from flea beetles.

Some of us went on an herb walk with Angel and potted comfrey and motherwort.

Monday, May 5, 2008

May 3rd Parsnip Harvest

harvesters: Christina, Jonah, Amy and Michelle

One row of parsnips were left to winter over in the field at Pleasant Valley Acres. We cleared the hay that was insulating them. Found that loosening the dirt at least half-way down the root before pulling them out was the best way to avoid snapping them. The damaged ones were taken home to be eaten, the rest were stored in saw dust.

Jonah cut some wild cattail shoots, peeled back the green leaves to the white heart which is edible. It tastes like cucumber.

Saturday, May 3, 2008

Arpil 27, 2008 Tomatoes, Cuke & kale

Jada, Margot, Jeff, JD, Bella, Amy, Abi, Michelle, Chris, & Pico at Broadturn Farm Greenhouse

Transplanted tomatoes, cukes, and kale into 6 packs from 200 packs.

TOMATOES (started in 200 packs at home by christina on 4/8/08, transplanted today)
Prudence Purple-84
Bellstar-24
Amish Paste-30
Bonney Best-0?
sungold-18
sweet chelsea-36
unknown variety from wolf pine- 96

CUCUMBER: (started at home by margot on 4/1/08 in 200 packs, transplanted today)
unknown variety, seeds from wolf pine- 240

KALE: (started at home by jada on 4/21/08)
variety- 24


...john bliss, farmer at broadturn, will water for us, in exchange for work. we planted some flowers for him today. ...

Notes for next year:
- (Next year, we should plant cukes in 6 packs to begin and then put them directly into the ground. Their roots dont like to be bothered. So, start later, at home is fine.)
-(Tomatoes should go from 200 packs into single packs, then into ground. They need more space.)