A father's perspective: Pure And Easy

"We all know success
When we all find our own dreams
and our love is enough
To knock down any walls
And the future's been seen
As men try to realize
The simple secret of the note in us all"

Since last writing the first round of seeding has been completed- tomatoes (50+ varieties), sweet peppers (10+), hot peppers (10+), eggplant (6+), parsley, leeks, and parsley. The greenhouse is basically full. There is room for one more table, but that's it. Whew! The next step is to start moving the 'babies' outside where they can become acclimated to the outside weather as a prelude to being planted. Once this is done, in the next day or so, the next round of seeding will commence. And the cycle of seeding, germinating, developing, moving outdoors, and planting will continue throughout the season. As will harvesting, weeding, selling. While small farmers are living their love and their dream, they do need to make a living and selling the produce at markets, and through CSA memberships, is part of the process.

Finishing the first round of seeding does not mean that we've been resting. There have been any number of time-consuming odds and ends to stay busy. Cleaning the fields of old row cover and plastic mulch being one such task. Another 'issue' was the tractor again needing another repair; sigh, yes. This year's problem was a fluid leak which was not as severe or significant as having the clutch repaired last year. This year's repair was done locally and David went to the repair shop and was able to observe and get some hands on experience is fixing the tractor. While David is not set up to do most repairs on his own, this experience will be beneficial to his ability to take care of some maintenance of the tractor. Things happen for a reason, even if that reason is hidden. The 'good' aspect of this is that the ground has been too wet to do any field work while the the tractor was being repaired. Now that the tractor is back, and the ground has sufficiently dried out (for now), David will be spending the next couple of days spending most of his time preparing the fields for planting.

One big task has been repairing the deer fence. Storm damage and deer damage took a toll on the fence. Fixing the wires, and stabilizing the posts, is not difficult. It is, however, very time consuming. But persistently, and patiently, most of the fence has been repaired and within the next couple of days the repairs should be completed. So it goes. Farming is about going with the flow. As has been mentioned at other times, there are more things over which a farmer has no control than they do.

The simple secret is to do what you love and love what you do.

The first picture shows the first sprouting of garlic. Garlic is planted in the late fall and starts to pop up in late March. It will continue its growth and development until it's harvesting some time in June. The second picture shows some Red Russian kale. Kale is very hardy and the plant itself will survive the winter. It's leaves won't get as large as newly planted kale during the summer, this baby kale will be tender and delicious.

The following three pictures show some of the damage done to the deer fence. In the time since these pictures were taken the post in the first picture has been stabilized and the limbs/branches in the next two pictures have been cut up and removed. Fixing the wires come next.

These two pictures conveys the degree to which the green house has been filled. Keep these images in mind so that you can compare and contrast the growth and development of the plants in the next post.