Film Festival!

Last Saturday, I met Michael over at Homestead after work and he showed me around the farm (including the mulberry tree...yum). Then we went to this festival put on by the new co-op that will open in Troy this fall, had some jamaican food outside until it rained and then went to check out the new co-op. and have a bit of wine and cheese over there. After walking around Troy (now marketing itself as "the walking city" - we passed the jamaican restaurant that sold at the festival three times, each time progressively more awkward), we played a bit of chess at a coffeeshop and then headed to the film festival. We watched "the real dirt on farmer john". I showed it for eat in act out week a couple years ago in boston but it was nice to see the whole thing without worrying about logistics, or what I was going to talk about after the movie. Plus, it was cool to see the way Angelic Organics worked from more of a farmers' perspective - i think they have about 600 CSA shares now so it's a HUGE farm, and we got shushed a bit during the movie for our whispered conversations about soil blocks and how to raise eggplant.

Sunday I did some napping and then watched the Eurocup final between Germany and Spain - so nice to see some soccer again! and my picture of the rainbow was accepted into the Massachusetts Ag calendar! So it was an exciting week.

Our chickens are doing great! They usually send out "welcome committee" anytime we walk by, whether or not we're coming into their pen to feed them. It kind of makes me feel like i'm a celebrity being followed by the chicken paparazzi.


Last week was my first week of distribution - we starting giving out swiss chard by the end of the week. This week we also have rutabagas and u-pick basil. Plus, we had help from lots of volunteers to put straw on our tomatoes, and then drive stakes into the ground and start to trellis them using a "basketweave" where you go back in forth in front and behind the plants to hold them up.

Summer Solstice

We had a big summer solstice party this weekend. we started by teaching Gabriella how to do a couple of contra dancing moves as we waited for folks to arrive. Then Bridget took the group down to see the new solar panels that were installed and turned on this spring. We expect they will supply about 90% of the energy needed for the farm. This time of year, it means that they are selling electricity back to the grid (and buying some from the grid in the winter, when we get less sun). Then there was a big potluck with amazing vanilla pudding, live music with don joining farm members, and lots of arts and craft to get ready for the 4th of July parade. We wrote a veggie puppet show, highlighting Arugula, who brings home a guy named Purslane to her parents. her parents won't let her marry him, because he is a weed. distraught, she goes to Sage for advice. Sage, however, doesn't want to give her advice on such petty affairs and refers her to his wife Lovage for relationship questions. Lovage tells Arugula that a weed is only a weed if it's planted where you don't want it. Elated, Arugula returns home, where her parents allow her to marry Purslane. They are married by the holy (wholly holey) row cover. After the potluck, the apprentices had a campfire and smores with Michael, who's an apprentice at Homestead farms and Ellen, who was an apprentice here last year and is starting her own farm this year.


















This weekend there was also an opening at the Clark, one of the art museums in town. I ran into Melissa and Geoff and Don and Gabriella there, and got to see the Berkshire Taiko group doing taiko, a form of Japanese drumming which was incredible.




Meanwhile, on the farm, I started my first week as distribution manager and ran my first CSA distribution today, which went pretty well. Our collard forest is growing everyday, and or course so are the weeds.

Prom, visitors and visits.

We've started getting visitors! in the last week Steve stopped by and worked with us for a morning and Katie's parents came by for the weekend. Always a good time. Williamstown isn't packed with that many folks my age, so I have been looking forward to the North Adams' 20-something prom for awhile. Saturday I finished chores, showered and dressed, and went over to Emily's apartment for a barbecue. She's a farmmember, and she introduced me to loads of cool folks at the prom. they had dancing, they had some outstanding outfits, they had 80's music, and they had a signature drink: the "razz-ma-tazz". weeha. I took some before and after pictures (Gabriella voted for me wearing the brown dress, but I ended up wearing the black one, so I decided I'd at least take the requisite prom picture with the chicken in the brown one).


















We've been going on a lot of CRAFT visits to other
farms in the area. the last two weeks have been amazing farms to see - side hill farm in ashfield (featured in Barbara Kingsolver's book "Animal, Vegetable, Miracle") and then Natural Roots. The Side Hill apprentices built themselves this amazing little house for $5000 last year!

Natural Roots was really cool to see because they're a horse-powered farm. They pull plows and cultivators with teams if up to four horses, and they showed us their haying equipment too. Apparently, they get a lot of their equipment in from Amish communities in Ohio and Pennsylvania.

Meanwhile, we've gone through a week and a half of distribution, so Jenna, our baker, has been here and our farm team is complete! from left to right (standing) is Katie, Geoff, Melissa, Bridget, Micah and Don and down below is me, Jenna and Gabriella. Jenna's son Evan comes to help on the farm a lot too.

Planting pics

Farmwork keeps us pretty busy but while we were waiting for the calf to be born, I brought my camera with me so I got a couple of the ever elusive farmwork pictures. This is from the last day of planting tomatoes - we bring lots of transplants down in the tractor and in carts, and use a post-hole digger to get nice deep holes for the tomatoes. Here Don's driving the tractor and Melissa's bringing one of the carts. Our work has shifted more to doing bigger time-blocks of one task. Last week we spent a whole day planting all of our storage cabbage - we poked holes in the black plastic, planted the transplants, watered them in, put up hoops, and covered them with row cover.




We had a crazy night last night - at 9pm there was a HUGE storm that came on really suddenly and sent me running for the cabins at top speed (don't want to get caught in the field in a thunderstorm, since i'd be the tallest thing around). We found out today that there was a tornado watch here. This morning when I walked up, I was pretty proud that none of the row cover had blown off, but I was looking at Lina, one of our beef cows. I often find myself looking at them and trying to figure out if they're behind the fence or in front of it, but today it really looked like she was in front of the fence. In fact, it looked like she was in the middle of the field. So I yelled to Katie, the next person walking up, and ran up to get Don and we all walked slowly behind her to get her into the next pasture.


Since Chloe had her calf Charlie, we've started milking her. I had my first day of milking today. It's pretty challenging. You bring her into a stantion so she can't move around, give her some grain to keep her occupied (well...to keep her occupied for the first 5 minutes at least) and then clean off her udder and sit on the milking stool to start milking. By that time, she's usually decided to go to the bathroom, so you have to swoop the milk bucket out of the way with your feet, scold her, shovel the manure out, and clean her up and start again. Today, it went pretty well until she kicked the bucket over when I was almost done. But we're still giving the milk to the pigs right now until she's done giving colostrum (the yellower substance she gives with nutrients for the calf the first week.

Births, Birthdays, and Deaths

Last week, we got a new addition to the farm – a baby calf. After staying up late and checking on Chloe, our Jersey dairy cow, several nights in a row, we were surprised by a shout from Don at lunch on Friday. We all ran up to find Bridget carrying the cow and Don leading Chloe in from the pasture. They set the calf to nurse, and it was already trying to stand up! We also learned to milk. The calf was finally named Charlie, although Calvin, Che and Clarence were suggested, along with “Catie with a C” if it had been born on Katie’s birthday).

Katie’s birthday was on Tuesday. Geoff made black beans (her favorite), and we had ice cream, chocolate zucchini cake, and presents. Saturday Katie and I managed to finally get over to Greenfield, which is awesome – they have a community owned clothing store and also still have a local department store. And we went to have burgers and beer at the People’s pint, which was amazing. Lots of local, grass-fed meat and dark beer.

Sunday, we slaughtered the first four pigs. Saturday morning we separated out the four largest with a gate and some hog fence, and then Sunday at 1:30 when the processors were supposed to arrive we went in to push them into another smaller pen. Three went right away, and the fourth wouldn’t go. Luckily, they didn’t arrive until 3:30 so we had plenty of time to coax her in. The way they do the pigs is to get in the pen, shoot them, and then slit their throats so that the blood drains out. Like a “chicken with its head cut off”, they kick a lot for about 2 minutes after they die. Then the meat processing guys hang them up with hooks through their Achilles tendons (apparently, stronger than bone), and they cut off the skin, the hooves, and take out the innards. Then they saw the pigs in half with chainsaws down to the jawbone, which they cut through with an ax, and throw them in the back of their truck to butcher them at their place. Once you saw them in half, you can see the thickness of the fat layer, which is one of our indications of their condition. We distribute them to shareholders who have bought shares of the whole live animal.