Farmer's Market

Last week was our first time as vendors at the local farmer's market.  I was not sure how much to take so I didn't over do it, but in the end I could have sold lots more.  I sold spinach, radishes, kohlrabi and cherries as well as fresh eggs and the beautiful garden art my husband handcrafts. 

Within an hour or so we were out of eggs and not long after we were sold out of produce.  I was a little surprised the garden art didn't sell better, but that's okay.  I was pleasantly surprised that the produce did sell so well! 

The hardest part was pricing everything.  I didn't want to be too low so that I sold everything quickly but didn't make any profit on it and I didn't want to be so high nothing would sell.  After our first market we have decided that the price on the eggs was too low but the veggies, I think, were just about right.  I was so excited to go and very glad we did, finally!  This is something I have thought about for a couple years now and finally just made the commitment.  Our market is on Thursday afternoons, which works great for me with a funky work schedule.  

We are debating applying for a market license for meat products, which is required in our state, but will wait until we have a few more markets under our belt.  Next week we will return if we have enough produce, which we should.  We have started picking zucchini and the tomatoes may start  by then and possibly the cabbages could be ready.  Oh and green beans and sugar snap peas should be ready.  Next time I will also try to take dried egg noodles (great grandma's recipe) and maybe some bakery goods (everyone loves cupcakes!).  This is such an exciting next step for us and our hobby farm.  It's also a great place to meet more people who also farm on both large and small scale.

I would call it a success and I look forward to more markets.  We do have more to learn and it is a decent amount of work to get everything ready, packaged and hauled there, set up and to be there for 3 hours selling.  It is quite a time commitment, but well worth the rewards if I can keep up enough produce to continue!

Farm Happenings

There is lots going on at our farm in the past couple of weeks!  Last Thursday evening our heifer "Red" looked kinda funny in the pasture.  She is the one that had an enormous bag but the hind end wasn't really puffy yet.  My hubby went out to check on her(I would have but I was getting supper ready) and I got a call a few minutes later telling me that he could see hooves.  Of course, I dropped everything and rushed out hoping to see the birth.  I did see it and my daughter got to too!  It was the first birth she has been home for and she was so excited!

I did get photos on my phone (which I will post later this week) of the entire birth and, believe me, Red was an all-star. I should have taken my camera out there, but I was hurrying so I didn't miss it altogether.  She had a beautiful heifer calf that is, of course, solid black.  Glad it isn't the kinda icky brown that she is.  We love her anyway.

The very next morning I went out to do chores and our heifer "Tiny" had a little membrane hanging out.  After a bit she didn't seem to be progressing.  I was all over the pasture that morning looking at her and the others.  I left her alone for a while and when I returned an hour later to check on her all the cows were in the barn lot, including her.  I walked around the corner of the barn and nearly stepped on a new black calf.  A little confused at first, I finally came to the conclusion that since the calf was cleaned off and I saw him stand and drink for awhile, she had already had him when I first saw her!  What I was seeing was the afterbirth, but there was so little of it I couldn't tell.  I felt like such an idiot that the calf was probably bedded down in the pasture I had just been in a little while before.  He was a healthy black bull calf that wasn't as small as I thought he might be considering she was our smallest pregnant heifer.  

All the calves, we have 4 now, are doing really well and were jumping around the barn lot tonight.  They all seem very happy and healthy.  It is extremely exciting having so many!!  We have 1 cow left to calve and my son has one to calve also.  Each one is just as exciting as the last and I feel blessed to have witnessed 2 out of 4 births this year so far.  

In non-animal related happenings I was able to, with my daughter's help, get our garden all planted this evening.  Actually we have 2 gardens!  I always feel so good about getting that done in between the weather!  It was extremely windy here but that didn't stop us!!  We have some new crops this year and I planted some more herbs, too.  The asparagus has begun and I need to get out in the pastures to check it again soon.  The rhubarb is growing well and all the fruit trees are beginning to bud.  

I love spring and all the new life it brings!

Garden Season Approaching

Garden season is fast approaching us and we have started to get the garden area ready for it.  My husband has done the first tilling of both garden areas and will do it again just before I plant.  This makes the soil nice and loose for easy planting.  He also threw some "fertilizer" on from the chicken house that he tilled in with the first tilling.  Many old timers will advise that chicken droppings are the best!

With plans to attend farmer's markets this year, I have added some new crops to our garden plan.  These include spinach, beets, head lettuce, eggplant and kohlrabi.  These will add to our already large variety of produce including veggies, herbs, cherries, plums and peaches.  I have also thought about planting garlic and cilantro.  I will be mapping out the gardens this week to give me a better idea of what will be planted where and how much we can fit.  We have enough room to add another garden if needed.  I would be planting by next weekend, but since we have 3 dance recitals in those 2 days it will not happen until the following week.  I probably could have gotten it in this week, but with the unpredictable weather we have had I decided it was better to wait.  I get pretty nervous about planting anything before May 1 at least.  

I also am going to do at least some of our garden plant shopping at the local nursery instead of the big name stores.  They often have varieties available that the big names simply don't have.  This would include some of the heirloom tomatoes and spinach varieties to name a couple.  They are a little pricier, but not enough to make the difference to me.

Every year I get so excited at garden planting time.  It is so much fun planning it out, shopping and getting all of them planted.  I always feel a great sense of accomplishment and then the work and wait begins for harvest time.  That is always my favorite!  There is nothing better than the first tomatoes and zucchini.  

As always have a wonderful day!

Are We Crazy?

The short answer is, yes, we probably are, but that is a different story altogether!  I have, through the years since we moved to our country paradise, thought about the pros and cons of living in the country and raising livestock.  

During the winter months the thought crosses my mind many times about how much easier life would be in town.   At times, we get snowed in and when the roads do get plowed sometimes it's only one lane.  The wind is worse in the country which means that everything drifts worse than in town.  And we definitely have more to plow here than we did in town.

It is, in general, more expensive to live in the country.  Everything from electricity and water to our weekly gas budget costs more.  This is a huge downfall if you're not aware or prepared for it.  We have learned to live with it and do what we can to save by growing our own food in the summer and raising our own livestock.  

Country life is tons more work than living in town.  From daily chores to maintenance on equipment, fences and barns the work can take it's toll.  We all pitch in, with my husband and I bearing the brunt of it.  Before we moved I had no idea just how much more work it would be.  Not that I don't like work, but I just had no idea how much it would entail.

The beauty of living in the country is that I can see about 5-10 miles in all directions of our house.  I can see storms coming from the west long before they get here.  I only have one neighbor who really doesn't care what we might be doing.  We can do just about whatever we want with our land.  We can make a garden as large or small as we want.  We can plant trees or bushes without a building permit, yes a building permit was required in the town we came from.  My kids have plenty of room to run or play as they wish.  I love having animals and treat each as a part of our family.  I get so excited when the babies are born and it drives me crazy with anticipation when they are close. I also believe it is good for children to grow up having chores around the farm and caring for animals of their own. 

In the end, the list of pros is endless and the cons only represents a few of the things I don't like about the country.  I wouldn't give it up for anything.  It is our home and everyone knows there's no place like home!

English River Farms -Our New Adventure!!

Ever since purchasing our piece of heaven on earth, we have been brainstorming ways that we could possibly make a living with our farm or at least the farm could sustain itself.  It is very difficult to revamp a farm, acquire animals and feed them all if you are on a limited budget.  We finally have built our animal herd into something potentially profitable.  Time to start thinking seriously!

We do all we can to save money such as:

1.  Raise grass-fed livestock (except the animals the kids show in 4H) -This allows us to only have to buy feed (hay) in the winter.  Since we don't crop-farm it would never be profitable to feed our livestock grain as it is expensive to purchase.

2. We do 99.9% of the work ourselves.  From fencing to chores to cutting trees and maintaining everything  --WE do it!

3.  We have mostly been able to grow our herd by retaining the young --except last year we did buy quite a few Boer does for our goat herd.  We only did this after deciding our budget could afford it since goats don't cost an arm and a leg.

Recently, we have been thinking more intensely on the profit side of things and how could we possibly make a decent profit.  That is the point in keeping livestock in the first place! (Also, I love them all)  We are truly blessed to have our 40 acres and maybe someday will be able to sustain our living from it.

We have started the process of obtaining a meat sales license from our state which will allow us to sell frozen meat from our home after being processed and inspected at a licensed facility.  This may sound a little sad, but that is in fact what livestock is intended for. (I just keep telling myself that when it's time to refill the freezer.)

The meat we will be selling is goat, beef and possibly lamb.  The animals are grass-fed.  This takes longer, but the meat is tender, flavorful and leaner than grain-fed meat.  We don't use antibiotics but we do vaccinate.  

I am very excited to get this adventure started and start to market our farm, English River Farms.  I have started planning our marketing strategies, also.  I will be putting up a website featuring our herd, our farm and life on the farm.  We will also sell produce this summer at a local farmer's market.  This is also very exciting as we always have extra produce from our huge garden and will be planting some extras this year for this purpose. 

It's always exciting to begin a new adventure and while it is not exactly "new", it will be different.  I do have high hopes for our adventure.  It will take hard work, but that is something we would never shy away from. 

This farm really is our little piece of heaven on earth!

Easy Homemade Tomato Juice

This summer flew by so quickly! We have been so busy this summer that we have barely had time to take a breath.  We had a child graduate this year, then getting everyone ready for the county fair, birthday parties, the state fair and back to school! Oh yeah, and gymnastics all summer!  With one starting college, one starting junior high and a 5th grader life is BUSY!

The last couple weeks I have been busy canning tomato juice.  I thought I would share my recipe for it the way grandma did it.

I start by washing all the tomatoes (I always plant beefsteak because they are huge and I get lots of juice out of each one), then I cut off the tops.  Next I boil them in a large metal washtub until they are soft.

Next I smash them until all the juice is gone in my grandmother's metal juice collander.  This is fast and works great for getting all the juice out.  And the kids think it's fun!

I dump the bowl of juice in a pan to boil.  I usually add a little pepper and sometimes garlic and oregano.  I wash the jars in hot soapy water and sit them on a towel (the next step can get messy).  I put 1 tsp salt in each jar.  I use a plastic measuring cup to fill each jar with tomato juice until there is 1/4" space left at the top.  Immediately I put the flats and rings on the jars.  The jars get hot fast so I usually have to have an oven mitt on to tighten the rings.

I put all the jars of juice in a hot water packing enormous pan filled with hot water.  It works best to fill it part way, put the jars in and finish filling until jars are just covered.  This goes on the stove on med-high and boils for at least 10 minutes.  Then I take the jars out and set them on a towel to cool.  You can hear each jar lid pop as they seal.  When they are cool I check each one by pushing on the top.  If they don't push down they are sealed.  Any unsealed ones go back in the hot water packer or in the fridge to fix soon.

This is the way my grandma canned tomato juice when I was a kid and I always loved helping her!  Now my children enjoy doing it and hopefully they will pass it on to their children.  Life gets so busy these days that I love it when I can take a little time to pass on a tradition from older generations.

Have a great day and take time to enjoy the little things!

Garden Pros and Woes -Part 2

Last year was the first time I tried bush beans.  I had tried green beans in the past and they always flopped.  These bush beans did amazing last year and I froze about 10 quarts in addition to the ones we ate fresh.  This was all off 2 rows.  This year I planted them again and once again they are doing amazing.  They did have a rocky start that I am still not quite sure what happened.  The seedlings sprouted and only about half of them came up.  The others died, I imagine, due to the extreme heat/dryness.  Almost all of them that came up had no leaves on them?  I haven't ever had this happen before.  I quickly replanted them and now have a bountiful harvest for the past couple months.  We all love to have garden green beans in the winter!

The potatoes were not so wonderful this year.  They had never done well in our garden so last year my husband tilled me a potato patch in a different area.  Last year we had tons of potatoes and nice sizes too.  This year I believe the weather got to them and the plants died very early.  The potatoes we did get were mainly tiny ones with a few that were nice sized.  No big ones like I like to use, though.  The potatoes are a lot of work to have the harvest so dissappointing!  Next year I am seriously thinking about turning the potato patch into a pumpkin patch. 

This year was my second year attempting broccoli after a wonderful first year.  Again this year we had plenty to freeze from our 4 plants.  I love broccoli plants -they are low maintenance and it tastes so much better than store bought broccoli.  I planted 4 more plants hoping to get even more into the freezer.

Another crop that excites me early each spring is our asparagus.  I never realized I liked it so well, but when we moved here we noticed there were patches everywhere!  It was in all the pastures -a patch here and a patch there.  Every spring I harvest as much as I can and either eat it or freeze it.  This year I planted some new plants up close to the house.  We will see how they end up doing.  Every time we go asparagus "hunting" it's a long hike to get it, which provides all of us our daily exercise.  

One of my favorite things about gardening and living in such a wide open place is that I can do just about whatever I want to with the garden.  I can plant anything I want to and wherever I want to.  The other great thing is that it gets the kids involved and teaches them about planting and growing your own healthy foods.  They love to help plant everything and watch it grow.  They also love to help pick everything and of course help eat everything!

HAVE A GREAT DAY!

 

Garden Pros and Woes- Part 1

One of the things I love in the summer is my garden.  In the spring I cannot wait until it's time to plant.  The anticipation just about drives me crazy.  I usually plant the same items every year.  Those items are: zucchini, tomatoes, bush beans, cucumbers, broccoli and green peppers.  I also have a separate potato patch where I always plant red potatoes and Yukon Gold potatoes.  I periodically try pumpkins and other veggies.

This year was no different.  I waited and waited with the unseasonably nice weather late last winter to plant my garden.  I did plant a little earlier than usual and all was going well.  This year I was persuaded to try another tomato variety besides my beloved beefsteak.  I was told if I tried an heirloom variety that I would never go back.  I planted some brandywine tomatoes along with a couple beefsteak plants (I had to in case the brandywine were horrible).  After a whole season picking, eating and canning, I have to say that I love both of them.  The beefsteak are medium to large tomatoes with dark red insides that taste amazing and work well for canning tomato juice.  The brandywine tomatoes got amazingly huge.  The color on the outside is a lighter/different color of red, but the insides were equally dark red and amazing to eat.  The brandywine also were a little sweeter.  They reminded me of the tomatoes from grandma's garden when I was a kid.  I used both for canning juice and what we have had so far has been great. Next year I may plant both again! 

In June we started having some very hot/dry weather.  My zucchini, cucumbers and melons started to turn brown after having a great start and looking amazing in the beginning.  I assumed it was the heat and lack of rain that was causing this.  There were some insects I noticed in the garden, so I applied the seven dust as usual when I have this problem. I started watering the garden more than usual and while all the other plants were doing great these continued to look worse and worse.  By mid-July all of them were dead.  I attributed it to the heat and thought "next year I will do better at watering".  Only recently did I begin to research this problem that has bothered me since my plants died.  I have never had a problem keeping the garden alive!  Especially the cukes and zucchini -usually I have more than I know what to do with. 

What I found in my research was that my bugs were squash bugs that can wreak holy havoc on young plants.  They have a hard shell and are gray and flat.  They are hard to kill and harder to get rid of completely.  They winter under plant debris and rocks.  Pesticides don't kill them very well. I have never had a problem with these before and hopefully can get rid of them before next spring. 

If anyone knows of a way to get rid of these things please comment to this post. 

HAVE A GREAT DAY!