Winter Greens

It's mid-January and for the Northern Hemisphere, that means winter. Lots of people are deep in the throes of winter blues, but I'm feeling a bit... "green" this year. Winter greens... mmmm... delicious.

Some of the tastiest plants like it cold and do well in near freezing (and sometimes below freezing) temps. Since this was the first winter with the greenhouse, I decided to try my hand at winter gardening.

Over the summer, I read and re-read Eliot Coleman's Four Season Harvest. The man is inspiring for many reasons, but a big one is that he lives up the road from me in Maine. He's more northern than I but is right on the coast, so has some advantage there. However, in page after page of his book, he makes a compelling case for selecting and growing cold-weather crops. Heating a greenhouse through the winter takes energy and is wasteful. But if you work with the plants that love the cold, you can have fresh greens without any extra electricity. Sounds right up my alley.

In keeping with the theme of "At Least I am Learning", not everything went according to plan. For one, Coleman recommends starting your winter veggies in August at my latitude. In August, I was suffering from heat exhaustion and the last thing I was thinking about was winter. I thought if I planted my greens now, they would mature and bolt by the time it got cold enough to put them in a deep sleep for the winter. So I stalled.

And stalled.

And then, at the beginning of October, I remembered and feverishly planted. My poor lettuces and kale. They tried to grow as fast as they could, but the sun was already low in the southern sky and it was cold at night. I completely underestimated how up here it goes from late summer to late fall in two weeks and that the lack of sun was the biggest problem.

But the wee plants did their best and I was able to prove that even now, in mid January, green things are not dead in my greenhouse despite the lack of heat and the extra cold this year.

Snowy greenhouse (and cute goats).

I ended up growing two sets of plants, those under an internal cold frame and those outside a cold frame. I wanted a "Control Group" for this experiment. I wondered if the double layer of plastic in the cold frame would slow down the meager sunlight and stunt the plants. The opposite effect occurred. The plants under the cold frame far surpassed those outside the cold frame, although both sets survived and did not die from frost. Totally fascinating.

Double layers. A cold frame within the greenhouse.

Plants without a cold frame.

Plants under the cold frame doing much better.

Looking good, just not big enough.

Overall, I am very pleased and I am planning to keep a bunch of those plants through the winter for my early start in spring greens since they will likely grow as soon as things warm up. The biggest problem is I didn't plant enough greens and didn't let them grow enough before the seasons changed. Both issues are easy to fix next year and I can't wait to see how much greener I am in January 2011!

Too Long

I am a bad blogger. It's been way too long since a decent update. I got home today and grabbed the camera. So here we are in May... things are growing, there is hope.

First, we got two fruit trees from the county extension: A Champ Black Cherry and a Quincy Garnet Beauty Peach. They don't look like much now, but they are going to be spectacular additions to the homestead.

Plants in the greenhouse are very happy. Plants outside are not so much. We got fish emulsion fertilizer to help things along since we lost a winter's worth of compost.

I am way behind in my planting. I need to plant seed to replace my fried herbs, my next salad green rotation, more peas, more beans, more... everything.

The Quincy peach.

Signs of spring in the peach.

The Champ cherry.

Asparagus is UP!!!

Strawberries donated by a friend in their new home.

Greenhouse Kale. Very happy Kale.

Greenhouse spinach.

Greenhouse Broccoli.

A permanent resident of the greenhouse. Please leave name suggestions in the comments.

A feral strawberry patch near the terrace in the front yard.

A Japanese Maple. Just wait until the fall on this one. Stunning.

A big bumble bee visits the Azaleas.

What's Up?

Ask me "What's up?" Go ahead, ask me.

...

Peas! Peas are up! The first real veggie sown directly outdoors showed up this weekend. And, lo, carrots are also up.

So I planted some more today. Onions, carrots, more peas, more potatoes, turnips. I transplanted cucumbers and pumpkins. It might be early, be the forecast is for HOT, and they were getting root bound in their seed trays. So out they went.

Yesterday, in between getting ready for the show and lessons and bathing the International Horse of Mystery, I wired the greenhouse fan to turn on when needed, based upon a thermostat. Too little too late, the 90 degree record temps fried some spinach, cilantro, and tomato seedlings. Oh well, we'll plant some more.

Lots of work is getting done around the farm, the barn roof is almost finished and it looks awesome! Some drainage work is being done to clear out the spot I hope to use as a compost. The sacrifice areas got more stone dust, leaves got raked, fencing got repaired.

And now, the farm is starting to look presentable. The house is a complete disaster. So off to clean the house. You can call me fat, but you can't call me lazy. :)

Just like that, I am a farmer

It's been a busy week. I am starting to feel the stress from work and the farm. Years ago, I was diagnosed with adrenal burnout and so now I am highly tuned to my stress reactions. It started about a week ago when all the food I ate tasted too salty. My body is out of balance. Stress hormones, at chronic levels, do bad things to the rest of your chemistry.

So stress is bad, so I took some sick time off of work to spend it on the farm. I can't fix the stress at work (just my attitude towards it), but I can accomplish goals around the farm which takes pressure off. Farming is all about timing, and Spring is an all too short window up here in New Hampshire.

So I was on a mission to get stuff done.

We finished building the beds in the greenhouse. We got the chicklins (In our particular brand of crazy, chicks are called "chicklins" and chickens are called "chickenistas" or just "nistas") out for their first play date in the greenhouse. I want them on dirt as soon as possible to start ingesting all that wonderful bacteria that helps chickens thrive. They got one monitored hour in the 65 degree green house and then back into the brooder.

We got the outdoor garden plot tilled. We ended up not doing the entire disc available, but settled on a 40' x 40' plot, so 1600 SF. That is plenty for this year, believe me. There's still work to do on the terraces, clearing out the overgrown raspberries and making room for some other fruits and veggies (strawberries perhaps?).

Outdoor garden plot as seen from the top of the terraces. Chicken fence only half completed.

I staked and twined the rows, both to keep me straight as I plant, and to provide a tenting structure if needed for me to cold frame any baby crops. When the danger has passed, I will remove the stakes and twine and build bean poles.

I also got two varieties of peas, early onions, and early potatoes in the ground. I planted 5 each of the peas, about ten onions and five each of the potatoes. I will come back in two weeks and plant some more, moving down the row in succession. I am hoping for staggered harvest, or at the very least, to not lose my entire crop to a late frost.

View of the terraces and back up to the house.

Terraces are very overgrown. That's tomorrow's project.

They will be nice one day.

I also planted a few seedlings in the greenhouse, experimenting with the temperatures in it. It may already get too warm in there for the kale, spinach, and broccoli I selected, but that's something I will have to see. Luckily, I have plenty of seedlings, so a little experimentation won't set me back. I have about three weeks to stabilize the temps before the tomatoes and peppers will get transplanted in there.

Beds in the greenhouse and first kale, bottom left.

Seed trays waiting for their day trips into the greenhouse.

In the next few days, my next shipment of spring chicks will arrive: Wyandottes. I spent today getting the brooder in order and transferring the older chicklins to their bigger, better brooder until they are old enough to move to the fenced off area of the greenhouse. We're playing musical chairs with the chicklins, but hopefully this will be the last year I will raise them. I expect broody hens to take on that duty in the future.

Odie is not such a bad fellow.

Wee chicklin brooder setup and ready for the onslaught (26 chicks)

Big chicklin brooder with five Speckled Sussex pullets (I hope)

At 3.5 weeks, they are reaching the fugly stage

Greenhouse Fail

*cry*

I can't have nice things.

But, when I went out to take pictures of the damage (and no, for once it wasn't me), I noticed that the morning's frost left the most beautiful patterns on the greenhouse film. Crystalline. Sometimes beauty shows up in your life in the weirdest places.

Insert some comments about lemons and a refreshing summer beverage.

Fini

As in done, finished, over, past, completed.

The greenhouse is fini.

I would be happy except I am so past the point of enjoying the greenhouse that I want a full week of not thinking about the greenhouse, not looking at the greenhouse. Then I am sure I will enjoy it.

For the final push, we asked one or two friends to help and we had six arrive, including my sister. A true team effort. Sometimes, mostly when I am sick of the greenhouse, I lose sight of the goal. I have a wonderful circle of friends who support my crazy ideas and endeavors, and they arrived (with beer!) to help with the final touches.

We tarped the long side, installed the doors, installed the fan, installed the louvers. It was a warm, beautiful day and even with the screen doors fully open, it was HOT in the greenhouse. All was good.

Later that night, I realized we installed the louvers backwards. No big deal, just need to pop them out and turn them around. Should take ten minutes...

So today we began the last day of work on the greenhouse. Three hours later, we're standing in the rain, trying to screw in door hardware and the slimy, wet plastic coating for the doors. Definitely not going well. But after much swearing and repeated vows to "never again", we got it done.

Finished.

The greenhouse is a small first step in a long journey towards a successful farm, but it's finally behind us. I underestimated how long it would take to build, how many precious hours of my nights and weekends would be spent measuring, cutting, painting, hammering, sawing, nailing, tying, screwing, and oh god, painting some more when I really should be conditioning my horse. It's a good lesson. When you work full time in addition to the farm, the "cheapest" solution is the one that takes the least amount of time, even if it costs more.

But that's all behind us.

It's done.

The chickens enjoy the sun as Odie presides over the hens.

Front view with the double doors. Screened here, but now have plastic coverings as well.

Wow, it looks like a real greenhouse!

Back view before the door was installed, the metal is the cover for the exhaust fan.

Inside looking north towards the front.

Looking south towards the back.

Done.

Brief Update

Life is getting really interesting around here and I apologize for being so behind in blogging. Between work and farm, I have little time for quiet reflection, and even less time for frantic blog typing.

So to sum up:
1) The greenhouse is almost complete. Expected completion is this Saturday where we will tighten down the plastic film, install the ventilation system and hang the doors. Benches, paving, 3 yards of soil and beds to come later.
2) The horse sacrifice paddock is on its 20th ton of stone dust. Oh yea, that's some serious work on the ol' tractor. We'll be driving posts and taping off the paddock this weekend. Once we get the horses off the "forest pasture", we can clean it up: logging, rock removal, raking, and seeding.
3) More tractor goodies in store: fence post digger and logging forks. Gotta get those on Saturday.
4) Another tray of seeds started: Cabbage, Brussels Sprouts, and Kale. I can't wait until I can take the trays to the greenhouse for day trips to get them some protected sun.
5) Two weeks or so until we break ground on the outside garden. In the meantime, we need to pick up last fall's leaves, drop a few trees, measure and plan it out and borrow a hand tiller.

I'm tired just typing all that.

On the chicken front, I was able to surmise that the sick chicken succumbed to an infection of Mycoplasma Gallisepticum (MG) due to the crazy weather. She did recover after 10 days and is symptom free. Since MG is omnipresent, I am not worried about the general health of the flock (unless she makes this a pattern). But she will not make the cut for next winter and is obviously not part of the breeding program.

I'm glad I was too busy to include you, my dear readers, on my chicken angst. I need to think of the collective like a farmer, but I don't want to lose compassion for the individual. I opted in this case to not cull the chicken after she recovered and she's back out with the flock. Time will tell whether I made the right call, but trust me, I spent many sleepless moments agonizing over the "right" answer.

The picture of the chick I posted earlier is a week-old Speckled Sussex pullet. I picked up five at a chicken swap locally, although I suspect one of them is a little cockerel. I've got 25 chicks coming in April 14th and that should round out my laying flock. There will be a lot of birds around this summer, but the intent is to get down to 20 by winter (18 pullets and 2 roosters) that will form the foundation of my sustainable flock going forward. Then the meaties arrive in July. I need to build two chicken tractors by then.

There's lots going on from the Brego front, but I will just need to post to that blog soon.

Greenhouse Raising

I am too exhausted to type. Only one minor injury (fingernail mistaken for a nail). Pictures from today. I will post more detail soon.

Yes, it freakin' snowed while building the greenhouse!

Another Spring Weekend

More slow thaw on the homestead. I can actually see part of my lawn for the first time in, oh, three months. It's quite exciting.

Today was Greenhouse Work Day. More painting of the frames and sealing of the foundation boards which will be in contact with the soil. I opted out of Pressure Treated timbers for obvious reasons. I also glued the PVC ribs together.

I found another good use for the tractor.

PVC ribs

There's only a few more things I can do on the greenhouse, like screen the doors and predrill some holes, before the Big Greenhouse Raising Day. I am not sure when that will be since there is still over a foot of snow on the intended site. But we're supposed to get five straight days of sunny, mid 40s - 50s weather which could very well take care of the rest of the snow. Of course, it could then dump another 6 inches on us before the next weekend, but I will have my fingers crossed.

Gratuitous cute dog shot. Gotta love those ears.

The sick chicken may not be sick after all. She is baffling me with her runny nose and complete lack of other symptoms. I asked around on BackYardChickens and they appear baffled as well. Maybe allergies? Regardless, she won't be contributing to the next generation, that's for sure. But I hate to cull a chicken who is actually fine, just because. Plus, she's our best layer. So she gets another week in isolation to see how it goes. She's actually adjusting well to being a basement chicken and is very social. I hate it when animals I am supposed to kill are cute. :)

I also set up the brooder because next weekend, if all goes well, I will be picking up some day old chicks at the ChickenSwap. More cute animals on the way! These chicks will be layers, so I am allowed to get attached to them, right? I am hoping for some Speckled Sussex pullets which will make a nice contribution to the sustainable homestead flock.