They will rebuild the ruined cities and live in them. They will plant vineyards and drink their wine; they will make gardens and eat their fruit.
It is ironic, but one of the biggest challenges on our farm has been water. We receive 41 inches of rainfall annually, yet water is one of the biggest limiting factors to our productivity, because most of that rain falls between September and May and correspond to cloudy weather, while the periods of greatest sunshine… Continue reading Cold Weather
Quick update after we hung the prosciutto to age on Saturday. WE checked it on Monday, Jan 20, after it had been hanging a little less than 48 hours. I was amazed at how much weight they had already lost, about 0.15 to 0.20 kg each (roughly 2-3 ounces. Above you can see the reason… Continue reading Lamb Prosciutto: Part IV
Yesterday was MLK day (better known as "Milk Day" in our house. Mommy did not have to work as a result, so we had a family day. Of course we got some farm work done, and we will share that out in separate posts to... milk.... it for all its worth. But the highlight of… Continue reading Farm Feast
Despite Saturday's discombobulation, we did make forward progress on our lamb prosciutto. When Seppi and Daddy were over in the morning we put a thermo-hygrometer in the basement to check temperature and humidity. At 60 degrees F it was the perfect temperature, although 45% humidity is a little dry. So we turned the de-humidifier off.… Continue reading Lamb Prosciutto: Part III
25 degrees out this morning. Time to bust out these bad boys. The hens haven’t figured out where the liquid water is yet, but they will eventually. They’re dumb, but they’re not stupid.
With the weather turning cold for the next week or so, we are taking advantage of it to get our winter pruning done. We started with the orchard trees we planted in 2023. Last year we pruned them in February, But did not get around to summer pruning them, which, as it turned out, was… Continue reading Winter Pruning, day 1
Coldest morning of the year this morning. 25 degrees when I got to the farm at 5:30, so of course all the water troughs were frozen. This picture is from about 6:45, not 5:30. We've been having issues with this particular frost-free hydrant, one of the oldest ones I think, that the previous owner put… Continue reading Disappointment
About a year ago Daddy and Seppi and Winnie were out in the north pasture near the beehives. The small ones have grown a lot in the last year. They are become less small... More mighty. We have to revamp our tree protection system this year, for a couple of reasons. For one, I didn't… Continue reading Willow/Witch Hazel/Orchard update
I know on Monday I mentioned that we had had a little cold that ran through on Friday. Well, apparently, either it was not done running, or another one was waiting to pick up the baton. Monday we tried to get a day of work done on the Farm, but Seppi was not his usual,… Continue reading Spoke too Soon
Before the latest cold struck we were planning on hosting Lord's Day dinner last Saturday. So we went to our garden and harvested some winter veggies. Winter beets. We put these in back on 8/21, but they didn't really amount to much. They sprouted, but only three were bigger than my finger. We'll leave the… Continue reading Winter Roots
Little Farm in the Big City 