April 27-May 2 (Day to Day)

Monday: This morning not a lot happened in the field due to the heavy rains over the weekend. The students split up and a few of us went to the greenhouse and started seedlings including watermelon, lettuce, and swiss chard. The rest of the students planted hakurei turnips and mulched the strawberry beds. 

Tuesday: The soil was still really wet today so planting was delayed again, and on top of that something is eating the head lettuce in the field (maybe a rabbit?). To help with this animal problem we covered the rows of lettuce with Reemay (a thin polyester fabric row cover). The heavy weekend rain also uncovered the recently planted pea seeds so we spent the rest of the morning raking soil back on top of the seeds.

Wednesday: This morning we continued to work on the hoop house and prepared a couple of beds for planting. In the afternoon Shawn and I planted a one bed of spinach and one bed of salad mix. After planting we worked on preparing a bed for planting more cauliflower and broccoli, however we ran out of time and hopefully the planting will happen sometime this week. 

Thursday: It seems rain is the theme of this week, and as you might have guessed it rained all day today. So all of the students used the time to catch up on repairs, cleaning and other projects that will be necessary when harvests begin. I repaired a washing station for potatoes and other vegetables (basically a large table made out of a screen). Other students worked on cleaning up the herb room (where we dry and store herbs harvested at the farm).

Friday: This morning was very productive. First of all we planted A LOT of winter squash in the green house, including acorn, carnival and butternut. For the rest of the morning we split up and some of the students worked on repairing the hardening off area(a small hoop house where plants come form the warm greenhouse and acclimate before going out into the field). Mara and I went back to Stella Gardens and began cutting seed potatoes in half to prepare them for planting and increase our numbers. In the afternoon, Mara and I met up with cooperative instructor Dan for beekeeping. 

Saturday: Today was a very busy/productive day of finally catching up. I worked on shaping beds and planted mustard greens (three varieties including red giant, tatsoi and mizuna). After that was finished I moved on to planting arugula. Other students worked on mulching the walkways between onion beds, setting up trellises for the peas and planting pac choi.  

April 20-25 (What's Growing)

Lettuce

Rhubarb

Brassicas (Cabbage, Broccoli, Cauliflower)

Garlic

Asparagus

Chard

Onions

April 20-25 (Day to Day)

Monday: Transplanted tomato seedlings into four packs, for sale and for future field plantings. Lecture series, with Janet, on biodynamics in the afternoon.

Tuesday: Finished transplanting tomato seedlings and worked on weeding the greenhouse floor. Went to Ela Orchard in the afternoon and planted newly grafted Honeycrisp apples into pots.

Wednesday: Worked on the hoop house in the morning, which should be finished next week! Transplanted raspberries, mulched currant bushes, and pruned/propagated rose bushes in the afternoon. 

Thursday: This morning we began shaping beds in the main garden, and transplanted one bed of New York Early onions. In the afternoon, we began transplanting eggplants(Rosa Bianca, Nadia and Oriental Express) and hot peppers(jalapeno, anaheim, poblano, bulgarian, habanero and serrano) into four packs. The chickens also just arrived and we have 23 laying hens and 1 rooster. And to make things even better the first egg was laid at about 8 PM tonight.

Friday: Today we went to the class tractor safety II (part of the Whole Farm Workshops) and practiced driving the John Deere 5320 and 6420. In the afternoon, bed shaping continued and Red Wing, Copra and Cortland onions were planted. I also was able to drive the JD 5320 from the North Farm down to Stella Gardens(on County Road ES) and used the rotary tiller to begin bed shaping in the hoop house!!!

Saturday: On Saturday morning we split into groups and tried to get as much work done as possible before the rain. I continued to work with the 5320(tractor and rotary tiller) and prepared beds in Field A, B and the Old Intern Gardens. These beds will be used for peas, which were planted today, spinach and salad mix. Other students weeded the bed planted with chard, and planted peas in Field A. Then the rain came, and we spent the rest of the morning in the greenhouse transplanting sweet peppers, thinning brussles sprouts and lettuce and much more. In the afternoon all the students got a break from work, however the rain continued and several escaped chickens needed to be caught. 

New Format / Ideas

Hello and Welcome, 

I have decided that I am going to use this blog as an online journal for me to record my experiences here at Michael Fields. I plan on making updates once a week that will attempt to include everything that happened on the farm. The purpose of the blog is to update friends and family members, document my experiences for prospective students and hopefully to connect CSA shareholders with events and happenings on the farm. I plan to include photos that seem appropriate for each week as well as a day to day synopsis of activities. Please feel free to contact me with any questions, suggestions or words of encouragement. I also encourage visitors to join this blog community by signing up to follow this blog. This will help me stay in contact with everyone and let me know if this is an effective community outreach tool.

Thanks and more to come,

Alex