Arrival of the Goat Kids

We have baby goats!

Florencia, one of our pregnant Spanish Meat Goats over at the Farm House, gave birth a couple days ago to two adorable little goat kids. Mostly they've been hiding behind the hay feeder when I go over there, but I did get a couple pictures yesterday.

The other two goats, Blanca and Juanita, haven't given birth yet, but Blanca looks just about ready to pop.

The Pied Piper of Chickens

Whenever I go to feed the chickens, I feel like the Pied Piper of Hamlin.

Morel Hunting on Easter Sunday - My First Wild Mushroom

After a nice little Easter service at the church down the road, I hopped in my car yesterday and drove an hour and a half southward to go "mirkel hunting".

"Mirkel" is the local term for "morel". The story goes that the locals say when the morels come up, it's a "mirkel"! (Mirkel = Miracle, by the way.)

I was asked along by Josh and Andreas, two extremely nice fellows who I met while they were building a stone patio for Susan. Josh knows a mountain near Wintergreen where he's had luck morel hunting in the past, so that's where we went.

It was actually my first time on a wild mushroom hunt. It was a beautiful day for it - the sun was out, but it wasn't super hot, and I got a nice hike out of the bargain as well.

And while we didn't quite make out like bandits, we found enough for me to enjoy a very nice breakfast this morning.

ATTRA - Another One Bites the Dust

I'm sure everyone remembers when I mentioned ATTRA back in January. (Hah. Hah.)

ATTRA, also known as the National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service,* became another victim of the rambunctious federal budget cuts this week.

This makes me sad. ATTRA was responsible for leading me to what I am now convinced was the best farm choice for me, hands down. Although I researched dozens of farms through many other resources, I found Brightwood Vineyard and Farm on ATTRA's quite comprehensive list of apprenticeships on organic farms, and therefore owe them an emormous debt of gratitude.

The list of organic farming internships is not all they do - ATTRA also has tons of resources for organic farmers and apprentices, including a very nice syllabus that Dean and Susan had printed out for us interns.**

At any rate, that's my sad news for the day. But I did get to read about composting in my new laminated and spiral bound syllabus book, which made me feel better. Sort of.

*I have no idea why they're called ATTRA, when their actual acronym is NSAIS.
**Or is it "we interns"? There needs to be an emergency grammar hotline for moments like this.

Asparagus, Asparagi

I'm delighted to report that the asparagus patch has started to poke out its little green heads!

I think this is actually the first year that Susan's asparagus has come up, which makes it triply exciting. It takes three years for a newly planted asparagus patch to start producing asparagus. And since it's the first year, our pickins have been slim... but delicious nonetheless.

Now we just need to find some of those elusive morels... or "mirkels" as they're called around here. There's a reason why, but I forgot it.

Let's Meet the McFuzzersons - Baby Chicks Galore

For the last few weeks, we've been keeping an eye on a chicken who was sitting on a nest in the pole barn, where the goat kids are located. The eggs started hatching the other day, but we waited until this morning to move them to a safer spot.

But look how fuzzy!

The nest had sixteen eggs, but seven didn't hatch, and two of the chicks didn't make it. So we ended up with seven fuzzy little chicklets running around and cheeping their heads off, in addition to their mama.

Mama Chicken was not pleased when we took her away from the nest. She pooped something quite smelly all over everything and made some very indignant noises. The chicks then freaked out and ran under some nearby machinery, so we spent about twenty minutes moving things around so we could catch them. We used a cardboard box with straw in the bottom to transport them to one of the apiaries, where we'll wait for the little ones to grow up.

Anyways, the McFuzzersons are now happily reunited, safe and sound and fuzzy and warm in the front yard. And here I am in the house, safe and sound and warm and dry, while it rains like the dickens outside. Or perhaps I should say... like the chickens?


UPDATE: Two more chicks were found in the pole barn this afternoon, and the McFuzzersons are now up to nine little peeplets.

Potato, Po-tah-to

Yesterday, I had the supreme pleasure of planting potatoes for the first time in my life.

When I was a kid, I remember harvesting potatoes. It was probably my favorite crop to pick from my grandpa's garden. He would hoist the plant out of the air with his pitchfork while I scrabbled through the dirt to find them... it was like a treasure hunt.

Susan, it seems, loves potatoes. She grows six different types, some of which are heirlooms, and almost all of which will be for the farm, not for sale.

The first order of business was preparing the field. We weeded four rows, and dug a trench in each row for the seed potatoes. (That's Brian below - he's one of the other interns.)

Then came the business of preparing the seed potatoes. We cut them into pieces, each of which needed at least two "nodes" on them. Nodes are what eventually turn into eyes.

Some of the potatoes had faces. I named mine.

Fred



Manny



Hubert

We then sloshed the potatoes around in a mixture of mycorhizal fungi and humic acid - the humic acid acts as food for the fungi, which improves the quality of the soil with its presence by increasing the microbial life there. Appetizing, no?

For the actual planting, one person would lay down the potato pieces, skin side up, in the trough. The second person followed with the hoe, covering the seed potatoes and mounding a hill of dirt over them. (Below is Autumn, the third full-time intern on the farm. We are a merry little group.)

Final note: Normally, potatoes are planted in March. By planting later, Susan hopes to escape the worst of the potato bugs... another (less enjoyable) thing I remember from my childhood. We shall see.