127 yard sale Update

today we got two additional dealers making our current total at 6. We will have knives, walking sticks, antiques, military items, food, produce, tools and lots more. I fully expect a few more to rent spaces by Thursday.

Also I was interviewed by the Dayton Daily news about thios sale so this should draw in even more people than the several thousand expected over the course of the weekend.

This is not your average yard sale and this year is shaping up to be far better than the previous 4 years (all of which were fantastic!)

The New Farm Sign

The old sign circa 2007 (the white one, not the yellow one). As you can see, you cannot read it from any distance. This is an example of a horrible farm sign

After 5 years of having really bad signage we now have a very nice sign for the Farm and people should start noticing that there is a produce farm on US 127. And it has already had effect. Before we even have the sign completely done people stopped and said they had never noticed the farm before.

The sign has been 6 years in the making. We bought two of them from a local Dunkard who was getting out of the clock repair and sales biz. He had been bothering us to buy his 2 huge signs for about a year and finally he offered the two signs for $50 each (they cost him $1500 each). We at the time had no real use for the signs but we went out on a cold windy day and cut both signs down. one fell on me and almost caused me great harm. The guy's father saw us taking one of the signs and assumed we were stealing his son's signs and almost called the sheriff on us. But we explained that his son had sold us the signs so he called him first and found we were telling the truth and left us to our work.

The signs laid around the Crubaugh Rd farm for a couple of years than were moved to this farm with the intent of getting at least one erected within a year. But since I did not want to go the vinyl letter route-I hate vinyl lettering- it took a bit longer. I wanted a proper sign that was painted by an artist. I was hoping that perhaps my father could do it but by the time we got around to getting our shit together enough to get one of the boards painted my Dad was in failing health. So that did not happen. I asked around to various artist friends and acquaintances I know and no one wanted to do the sign (I was pretty amazed, especially with the younger artists, that no one seemed to want money for their art. I guess sign painting is considered too low brow). Finally, our friend, artist and farming colleague Debra Bowles said she would do it.

So we got the big board we planned on using prepped for her (it had been, in a former life been a clock repair and sales shop sign) and took it to her farm in the spring of 2008 and waited. Many months went by and nothing had been done on the sign. Autumn happened and Debra told us she still had not had time to work on the sign because of family, goats and other issues and and now it was getting too cold to paint her unheated space. My brother visited for Thanksgiving and we told him of our sign progress and he made the observation that we were using a hippy artist and we would just have to be patient. That the result would likely be wonderful. I believe he said the fact we were using a hippy artist was perfect for us (and one who learned her craft under the teaching of Crossan Curry, one of my Dad's best friends, a person I have known my entire life and a wonderful master artist in his own right. So keeping all this in the family, so to speak).

Winter passed and spring and warmer weather was upon us and still no sign.

At this point (early May) Debra implied that perhaps she was not the person to do the sign after all. This hit me hard. Now we were looking at paying someone close to $1000 to create a design in vinyl, resurface the sign (which had been primed for pain by this point) and apply the design. Yes, we would have likely gotten a decent sign (and far, far better than what we had) but it would have been vinyl. Somehow she seemed to feel my bitter disappointment and decided that she could do the sign. So in mid May the project finally was started in earnest and by mid June she told us it was finished and we could pick it up. We drove to her farm and put the new sign in the back of the van and took it home where it languished on the front porch of the store until yesterday.

We now have a beautiful new sign and just in time for the 127 Yard Sale. I suspect this will increase business by several hundred percent in the next few weeks. I cannot use this coming week to gauge as I expect business to increase by at least 2000% during the yard Sale (as it has the past 4 years)

Eugen dismantles the old sign

Digging out the eastern post that had been cracked in half 3 weeks ago by a truck that had hit it

Surveying the work so far-old sign down, new sign about to be erected



First post being put in place

Second post erected and Eugene with his trusty level is getting his bearings on where the post need to be exactly in their post holes so the entire sign is level

Sign is up but not quite finished. Eugene is bring a rope to put around the sign so the side bolts can be tightened

Sign is up and almost finished. Still needed to pour concrete in the post holes and than the final step is painting the white horizontal board so it matches the rest of the sign.

How to freeze Zucchini

I found several large zucchinis this week so I decided that was a sign that it is time to freeze some zukes for winter use. I did not freeze any zukes last year and that was a mistake as I like to use them in pasta sauces throughout the year, including the 7 or 8 months we do not grow zucchini.

Here is how I freeze zukes.

You will need the following:
A large pan with lid for the boiling water
Slotted spoon
A large bowl or pot for cold water
Salad spinner
A cookie sheet
chest or upright freezer
Plastic freezer bags

Take any large (up to 18 inches) zucchini and cut it lengthwise. Scoop out the seeds and than cut it into pieces. I usually cut it into 1" cubes but other shapes work too. While you are cutting up the squash put a lidded pot of water on high heat and bring to a boil. When the zukes are deseeded and cut up and the water is boiling put about 1 cup (2 or 3 handfuls, depending on the size of you hands. Larger hands need fewer handfuls) of the zukes into the water and blanch for 1 minute. Remove from water using the slotted spoon and plunge into cold water. You can add ice to the water. I don't, instead I replace the water as soon as it gets warm with cold water from the tap (if it has been hot-above 95F- for several weeks than I will use ice as the well water will not be cold enough). A couple of changes of water will get the squash cool enough for our purposes. When cool, load into a salad spinner and spin dry and put on a cookie sheet. Repeat this until all the squash is blanched, cooled and on the cookie sheet(s). Put cookie sheet(s) into the freezer for at least 10 hours.

Frozen zucchini in the freezer ready to be bagged

When squash is frozen remove from coolie sheet(s) and put into labeled/dated plastic freezer bags, put the full bags back into the freezer and you are done

More SSE Drama

Here is the latest in the Seed savers Exchange vs Kent Whealy Saga

http://www.patnsteph.net/blogpics/Kent_Whealy_Letter_July2009.pdf

Ohio 127 Yard Sale

I got an email in my in-box the other day inquiring about the 127 yard sale. This woman wondered if it was worth traveling the Ohio section of the route. She could find nothing on the web about Ohio and where the hot spots are. Not even the www.127saleohio.com site had anything on it. This surprised me as they had some information last year.

So I sent her this reply:

I can give a rough run down of the 127 sale in Preble , Darke and Mercer Counties. Okay, going north from the Butler County in Preble County there is very little until you hit Camden which has a big sale, 30 or so vendors. Than there is not much until you get to Eaton which has family run sales around town. You get to us a mile north of town. We will have 3 or 4 vendors (maybe more) including incredible BBQ so make plans to stop for lunch or dinner (before 6pm as that is when the BBQ folks leave and they never set up on Sundays) And bathroom facilities (most places do not and this can be a problem for salers). Than there are sporadic sales going north into Darke County. The VFW in West Manchester usually has a good group of sellers and than not much until you get north of Greenville and hit North Star (home of Annie Oakley). About 3 miles west of there is Eldora raceway which had around 150 vendors last year and I heard from many yard salers it was worth getting off of 127 to go check out. 6 miles south of Celina (Mercer County) is Niekamps-last year they had over 100 vendors.

I have no idea what will be the state of things in west central Ohio this year. I know we are selling Thursday through Saturday 8am til 7pm or so. We are planning on having the BBQ folks back as well as Jules the knife lady. There may be a couple of other vendors as well, but no confirmations yet. Though Boulder belt has no plans to be really open on Sunday August 9th, the knife people do plan on it. So there will be a reason stop if you are traveling by us on Sunday

If you are looking for a place to set up we have spaces for rent. $10 a day for a ten foot wide space and you get Sunday for free

Breakfast Time

Week old chickens at breakfast

The Education of the Chicken

I was out feeding and watering the chickens, who are all 4 days old as of yesterday, and I noticed they had figured out that insects are good to eat. This is a good sign that this batch of chickens will do well on pasture. That they will eat more than the grain they are given 2 to 3 times a day. That they will eat various bugs and lots of greens such as red and white clover (clover is amazingly high in protein, around 18%). That they will move their bodies around.

Most chickens raised on pasture are in a brooder house for the first 4 to 5 weeks of their lives. they are not outside on pasture and thus miss out on that important window of opportunity to learn to eat things other than chicken feed. From watching hens raise chicks I have figured out that the first 5 or 6 days are an important learning time and again at around 2 to 3 weeks they have another big learning spurt. Chicks brooded indoors miss both of those opportunities and when they are put on pasture for the last 3 to 4 weeks of their lives they do little more than sit around in the shade until grain is brought to to them. Than they slowly waddle over to the chicken feed and gorge themselves.

Ours, because they are out on pasture from day one (we rig up a heat lamp in one of the tractors to keep them warm enough) they are physically active throughout their short lives. They eat a lot of natural food (up to 25% of their diet is bugs and pasture-because they are a hybrid they really do need the rest of their diet to be the 25% protein feed ration they get or they will start to die).

It is fascinating to watch them learn how to be chickens. It is amazing how much seems to be innate behavior. The pullets, even though they are only a few days old, know to scratch in the dirt to find bugs. The boys are not as quick to catch on to this behavior but they will in another few days. I have also seen them start learning to fly (an idea that will be aborted in a few weeks when they get too big for their wings). They seem to be at their happiest when trying to fly (though eating is a close second). for the next 2 weeks they will have fully fledged wings that will allow then to get a few inches off the ground for up to 2 feet. That reality will come crashing down and their bodies will get too big for flight (but they will still extend and flap their wings and run around like children pretending to fly).

I had forgotten how much fun having chickens is. Of course, with the threat of NAIS Looming I doubt we will get laying hens again and we may have to resort to killing our own birds in the future so we can fly under the NAIS radar. Since we do not intend to raise poultry for public sale that may work for us. Slaughtering chickens is not the nicest job in the world, especially when you do not have all the equipment such as plucker and the proper knives. I would really like to avoid having to do my own killing and cleaning but the fact is that all processors will be requiring NAIS ID numbers in order to start a job and if we do not get our premises registered and the chickens ID numbers that we cannot get them processed at any state or USDA inspected plant. So it will likely be home processing in the future.

Perhaps NAIS will become such a white elephant the gummint will dump the whole idea and we will not have to be so hassled. But I am not holding my breath.

Chickens!

We got chicks today. This is the first time in almost two years we have raised poultry. Here is a video of their first day on Boulder Belt pasture

Now We are Merely Whelmed

Yesterday was overwhelming but today was merely whelming.

We had a lot of help from Sarah our twice a week volunteer for the next 3 weeks. She has an excellent work ethic and helped us get more garlic out of the ground and put up in racks to cure. We also got nearly 40 half pints of raspberries picked, all the shallots harvested, all the tomatoes tied for the second time, a hoop house frame removed from the tomato/pepper/basil beds it was covering about 7 weeks ago, catnip harvested and now Eugene is weed eating around garden beds and where the chicks will be come tomorrow afternoon. He'd mow but the mower is still without a belt and now is covered in drying garlic.

Oh yeah, and got a bunch of stuff harvested for the farm Share members. Boy, they got a nice share this week. Lots of nice food including green and wax beans, garlic, cabbage, zucchini, arugula, scallions, oregano, tarragon, snow peas, raspberries, strawberries and kale.

I would not say we are exactly caught up. But only because from now until sometime in September we will never feel caught up as there are always a 100 things to do, it seems. But things are under control and no longer overwhelming

Overwhelmed

Life is getting overwhelming. Lots of big harvest jobs have all come in at once. Lots of mowing needs to be done so a belt on the mower had the excellent timing to break this evening. Though Eugene did get about an acre mowed before it broke. But now he will have to run into town to buy a replacement.

The raspberries are going nuts. I picked 20 half pints and that was maybe 1/3 of them. There will be more to harvest tomorrow. Along with beans, cucumbers, zucchini, strawberries and other things to harvest.

There is the farm share to deal with-A news letter needs to be written tonight or early tomorrow (tomorrow morning is looking more and more likely). I do have a food list in mind. hopefully the market garden is in agreement.

There is food to be put up for winter. I did get snap peas frozen but raspberry jam needs to be made ASAP and that takes several hours to do. I will likely be freezing beans in the next several days if I can find the time.

Beds need tilling for fall crops. Eugene says there are about 35 beds that need crops taken out or tilled in and than prepped for carrots, rutabagas, beets, etc,.

Tomatoes need tying. Fortunately I was able to get 2/3 of the tomatoes tied this morning-around 300 of them. They do look good and one already has a tiny mater on it.

To make life more overwhelming we are getting chickens tomorrow. 50 day old peeps that in 6 to 8 weeks will be in our freezer for our personal use. At least we are prepared for them. Have feed, a brooder tractor, feeders, waterers, etc.. The chickens will suck at least an hour a day from other tasks (but they are fun to have) which will continue the overwhelmed feeling we are having here.

At least the hot humid weather has been replaced by crisp cool weather. And we have a lot of good things to eat (If I ever get the time to cook)

Raspberry World

The raspberry season has begun. As usual it starts small and slowly builds until my life is consumed by red raspberries for about 6 weeks.

Today I picked 1/2 pint, tomorrow it will likely be 3x that amount and by this time next week I should be harvesting about 10 to 20 1/2 pints a day. By the end of the month it will be about 50 1/2 pints a day. Maybe more as the plants are a lot bigger this year and are loaded with berries that undoubtedly will get big because now that spring is just about over we have lots and lots of rain, which the berries need in abundance to be big and sweet.



I took this photo in early May. At this point the canes were about the same height as they were last year. Since than they have put on an addition 2 feet of height and back towards the middle (where they already had started to lean into the aisle way) the canes have pretty much collapsed for about 25 feet. I have tied them up with bailing twine but it is still a mess back in there and will be a bitch to harvest but by no means impossible. And hey, they are thornless canes so no biggie.

I have been amazed at the variety of pollenators on these plants. Every kind of bee we have around here (at least 10 species) has been busy collecting nectar and pollen along with various moths and butterflies. I have noticed that the squash vine borers love the raspberry flowers and seem to get drunk on the nectar making them very easy to grab and squish. Normally it is hard to catch these moths as they are very fast and agile. This is something I really love about harvesting raspberries is watching all the activity in the canes. Spiders, daddy Long legs, flies, plant pests, preying mantids, wheel bugs, bees, moths, butterflies all either live there or come by to visit. I find evidence of great drama that has happened in the raspberry world. Husks of bug and spider bodies, a Daddy long legs sucking a plant bug dry (okay on that one I got to witness the drama), wheel bugs lying in wait for their next victim. For a bug nerd such as myself it is a fascinating world.

We have a small amount available at the store today and certainly will have a nice amount for the Saturday farmers Market in Oxford. The farm share members will start to see the raspberries in their shares starting next week.

What doesn't sell will either be made into raspberry jam (which will be available at the store eventually) or frozen for later use-mainly frozen rum drinks and yogurt smoothies.

May Farm Share Pot Luck and Farm Tour

Glenn Platt, Patricia Platt, patty Latham, Jim Latham (behind Patty) and Eugene Contemplating the beer in his hand.

We had our first Farm Share Potluck and farm tour on May 24th, 2009. 4 of the 13 member families showed up so we have 12 people for the event.

The weather was iffy. Dark clouds threatened to rain on our farm tour and dinner (and this would not have been a bad thing as we really needed the rain-still do). But the rain held off.

At 5pm most of the people had arrived and we did introductions and set off to look at the market garden. A lot of member were impressed that we get so much food out of just 4 acres. This makes me think of the very first CSA farm tour and dinner we did about 12 years ago and everyone than was impressed with how big the market garden was-we were doing just over an acre and our members had it in their heads that were farming a much, much smaller space (like the size of a largish home garden).

Lots of good questions were asked and the Platt's son, Duncan, fell in love with the asparagus beetle larva as only a 7 year old boy can. He asked if he could collect some and we said take as many as you want. So he got a lot and later wanted to take them home-they stayed here.

After the farm tour we all sat down and ate the food everyone brought and drank apple cider and some of Eugene's home brews. Dinner consisted of a big salad I made, garlic mustard pesto over rotini, a nice paella, cheeses from a small place in Wisconsin and cookies.

Genevieve O'Mally at the table, Duncan and Eric playing on the swing and Glenn looking off in the distance

There was lots of good conversation-we have an interesting and well educated bunch. The main topics were the farm, organic growing and local foods. But we talked about other things as well.

The Lathams, Art and Nancy Glidden and Eugene

After Dinner, Nancy Glidden did a short but sweet herb vinegar demonstration using our tarragon and her chive flowers. She supplied everything so we could all make a small jar of each kind of vinegar. it was fun, educational and amazingly simple. Now we all have yet another way to put up herbs for later use other than drying and freezing.

Nancy Glidden giving her herbed vinegar demo. Genevieve, Patty and Jim are making their own vinegars

Our next farm share potluck and farm tour is June 21st, the summer solstice. If you want to join us for such an event all you have to do is join our farm share program