The tendril end of spring

On these last days of Spring 09, a spring I have much enjoyed, I offer a poem by DH Lawrence (well, an excerpt anyway) in praise of non-summer, pre-summer, the just-before-the-frenzied-showiness-of-summer time, in praise of this time which yet offers on occasion a little bit of shadow and sluggishness(...and peas!)

Grapes

So many fruits come from roses
From the rose of all roses
From the unfolded rose
Rose of all the world.

Admit that apples and strawberries and peaches and pears and blackberries
Are all Rosaceae
Issue of the explicit rose,
The open-countenanced, skyward-smiling rose.

What then of the vine?
Oh, what of the tendrilled vine?

Ours is the universe of the unfolded rose,
The explicit
The candid revelation.

But long ago, oh, long ago
Before the rose began to smile supreme
Before the rose of all roses, rose of all the world, was even in bud

Before the glaciers were gathered up in a bunch out of the unsettled seas and winds
Or else before they had been let down again, in Noah's flood,
There was another world, a dusky, flowerless, tendrilled world
And creatures webbed and marshy,
And on the margin, men soft-footed and pristine
Still and sensitive, and active,
Audile, tactile sensitiveness as of a tendril which orientates and reaches out,
Reaching out and grasping by an instinct more delicate
than the moon's as she feels for the tides.

Of which world, the vine was the invisible rose.
Before petals spread, before colour made its disturbance,
before eyes saw too much.
In a green, muddy, web-foot, utterly songless world
The vine was rose of all roses.
There were no poppies or carnations
Hardly a greenish lily, watery faint.
Green, dim, invisible flourishing of vines
Royally gesticulate.

Look now, even now, how it keeps its power of invisibility!...

The grape is swart, the avenues dusky and tendrilled,
subtly prehensile,
But we, as we start awake, clutch at our vistas
democratic, boulevards, tram-cars, policemen.
Give us our own back
Let us go to the soda-fountain to get sober.

Soberness, sobriety.
It is like the agonised perverseness of a child heavy
with sleep, yet fighting, fighting to keep awake;
Soberness, sobriety, with heavy eyes propped open.

Dusky are the avenues of wine
And we must cross the frontiers, though we will not
Of the lost, fern-scented world:
Take the fern-seed on our lips
Close the eyes, and go
Down the tendrilled avenues of wine and the other-world.

kids garden and more

Our members are in full swing. when we arrived this afternoon there were a few picking flowers and herbs (the herbs remain weedy, but I think we have Hannah and working share members devoted to this task next week). So, new this year, a sign to help you actually get Chez Nous, it was done by Lee, a grad student who we worked with some last year. It looks wonderful and we are psyched to have a more permanent sign (don't worry, it wasn't us who cut down that tree it is attached to, thats a whole 'nother long blog post).





Here are said flowers. The cosmos are the only thing out yet, except for the one sunflower, which I see someone got (I'm very happy it seems like people are going to come down for some flowers this year because); we have a pretty large bed of zinnias on the way, along with some bachelor buttons, statuc and maybe globe amarant if they made it through the frost. In any case, this little rain should be speeding everything along.





Here we have Ciaran hard at work in the Childrens (or Kid's) Garden. Today he put in a few cherry tomato plants and some husk cherries (pictured below), which are a child pleaser, and a Josh pleaser, a nice sweet fruit, related to tomatillos (which we are also growing for the first time this year), which have a taste that I just cant describe, and look cool.

CSA 2009 reminder!!!

Just in case you forgot!!

OPEN HEART FARM CSA 2009 starts NEXT WEEK!

That is, Monday, June 8 for members picking up in the SOUTH END at CHAMPLAIN Elementary.

Thursday, June 11 for members picking up in the NORTH END at HO Wheeler school.

Pick-ups run from 4-6:30pm. Please bring shopping bags if possible. Also, if you want to recycle plastic shopping bags, we will take them for us with the CSA or for our stand at the Shelburne Farmers Market.

BERRY CARDS will be distributed next week. Adam will be sending out emails as each batch of berries become available for picking. (Just in case you don't know: strawberries first, then blueberries towards mid-July, then raspberries late August). STRAWBERRIES are rumored to be opening "June 10th-ish."

Re: flowers and herbs. Chives, peppermint, "regular" mint, and cosmos are currently open! If you'd like to pick some, give us a call at 881-8125, as we haven't yet posted signage but we'd like to help you help yourself!

If you have any questions, please call or email us at openheartfarm@yahoo.com.

See you soon!!

RD summer 09 chronicle 01

Ciaran made his first trip to the farm about a week ago. Luckily, I chose a day when we had the good fortune to be witness to lots of Josh-on-tractor business, specifically, Josh laying down almost 20 rows of bio-mulch for tomatoes, melons, winter squash. Fun with big loud machinery!

...the fact of thinking about winter crops pre-June used to startle me some, but I guess after 7 years of farm-season scheduling, not so much anymore...

Ciaran, however, is startled and engaged with almost anything outside at this point. Earlier this spring, we had a crash course in birdology and we found the Cornell website to be fantastic for many indoor-birding pleasures:

http://www.allaboutbirds.org/NetCommunity/Page.aspx?pid=1189

Baba and Joshers had to reel-in the monitor-watching, though. No more than 7 minutes in one sitting. But we got very familiar with red-wing blackbird, chickadee, blue jay, cedar waxwing, pileated woodpecker, goose, turkey, robin, cardinal, mourning dove, mockingbird, crow, gull..(also chickens ducks and sheep on YouTube). Ciaran has startled me all spring by identifying many of the birds we heard and saw online while walking down the street or playing in Leddy or Ethan Allen Parks, or even just in our parking lot or outside our window (many blue jays and robins).

Being able to go outside, though has made our computer searches for wildlife a thing of the past. Though some may think it odd or even crazy, I leased a small plot at the Starr Farm Community Gardens, and C and I do our thing there a couple times a week, just a quick jaunt down North Ave. So far we've put in morning glories, beans, zinnias, and are to plant corn, sunflowers, some tomatoes and husk cherries today. Whatever. It's nice to have a whatever garden.

Though, the farmy farm will quickly become The Place To Be. Plans for a children's garden are in the making, to include fun flowers and edibles in the landscape, shady spots, a water cooler, digging implements and insect havens. Of course, more birds.


But for the day, our work is done.

Farm Share

Wanted to say a brief word about NOFA's Farm Share Program, since this is the second year running they have supported us in helping someone who couldn't otherwise afford it, get vegetables from our farm. Um, I've basically explained the whole gist of the program. It's not complicated, just great. They even keep a little bank of donations made by our farm members to go directly to other people who want to become our farm members, then NOFA has paid the difference that cannot be met. Just one of the programs they organize, and if you haven't checked out their site, they organize lots of programs, for farmers, gardeners, and eaters of Organic food. Every year they also hepl organize small farms like ours into a bulk order to make thinks like chicken manure and cover crops more affordable.

OUR ROAD IS MUCH BETTER!!! - I also wanted to get that out there. I know this has been a deterent for people wanting to cut flowers, so I am excited that the ride will be less bumpy, and that it may help the farm be a more open space for everyone. We have already planted two beds of flowers, including tons of Zinnias and Sun-Flowers, cosmos, bachelor buttons, and more. I also am planning a little kids garden with husk cherries, a delicious little fruit each wrapped in its own paper lantern, so . . .

So, I probably mentioned our new shed before, but if you haven't seen it, it is an eye-popper. The shed and paint job is courtesy of Kolya, who ran Troika farm for two years on the piece of ground open heart is moving onto (which is adjacent to the original piece, which I should mention we are keeping. We are just adding his piece to come to an approximate 3.5 acres. The addition is mostly to aid us in cover cropping and rotation, ie general soil health.). We have a very pretty layout now so I encourage all to visit.

This second picture is of our red gold see potato. I haven't planted red golds for the past few years, but had a hankering for them and hence we shall (I hope). In worse potato news, Adirondack Blue seed from Johnny's was recalled due to fusarium wilt. I really liked both the flavor and yeild of it, but, them's the breaks, and we will try all blue, which is more of the standard one, and I'm sure will taste fine. You can be the judge.

In the ground are onions, spinach, asparagus, carrots, parsnips, chard, and maybe one or two other things. Planting season is upon us, and lots of the rest of things will be going out in the next two to three weeks. Open Heart's field help is starting early this year, Rrahke, who I have no current picture of, has already put in a few hours, and is the only reason we are remotely close to on schedule. Enjoy the Weather.

The photos I spoke of, the new van, Adam's Berry Card Update, and possibly more

So, I found my camera, and now you can see if my description of them at all matches the mental image you conjured up from my attempts at description:


The First Spring Rain
The Accidentally Well-Dried Peppers



And this is the new OH Van. It is not the traditional farmer model, and yes, it did come with an oriental rug and futon inside. I bought it so that we could expand our CSA and possibly Shelburne market. The Toyota that you see next to it was basically bursting at the seams every week. I can't help but mention that the Creampuff, as our mechanic calls it, saved our butts the past two years and was the generous gift of Shana and Seth, who since then are have had two babies, James & Zephyr. Thanks to you and any Haines' born in the future.


We have a bit more of a fleet than I ever would have guessed, but . . .

News about Adam's berry cards, they are going to go up in price, and I will have to retroactively refund or get a few bucks, this is mostly due to my eagerness to get the brochure out. Just wanted to let anyone who bought one or was thinking about it know, definitely a solvable problem.

Just reposting the link to the Brochure: http://www.intervale.org/programs/agricultural_development/documents/OpenHeartCSAbrochure.pdf

and rachel and ciaran with the last of the snow

Spring Rain

I know blogs are supposed to have pictures, but in the spirit of the prologues in King Henry 5, let my words paint the pictures (and, because I have temporarily (hopefully) misplaced my camera): the first picture is a wet shimmering dark street, the shimmers are neon signs on the glistening on North Street, taken from our apartment during the first Spring Rain. Now when I go down to the Intervale to water plants, or to the parks with Ciaran, I see litile sprigs of green grass, as opposed to the snow of a month ago, and the straight brown of 2 weeks. I think its going to cool down a little, but this warmth is making me think i should be tractoring and mulching our new asparagus beds.

The second picture was of some found objects in the greenhouse, where I spend most of my farming hours right now: three or four dried yellow and red peppers. not perfectly dried. but I had just left them on the table over the winter. two kinds, the long red cayenne and the ho chi minh. definitely inspired me to more intentionally dry this year. It kind of strikes me that the theme of this season might be intentionality. Last year we kind of sailed through the season by our lucky or graced seat pants. I feel like its going to be more planned and effective work this year that really pays off, But as they say in the Ivory Coast: on va voir.

Well, I bet now your hoping I find my camera as much as I, for I'm no Shakespeare with the images, which, when I find my camera I will stick up, and you'll go wow!

Important CSA news: we are filling up steadily. If you are interested I would think of the next two or three weeks as a very good time to sign up, see a link to our brochure below.

Farm News

After a slow start things are really picking up quick regarding our membership. Kinda mirrors the weather, huh. I also noticed that someone has found a way to spam blogs via the comments. Oh well.

The onions are up, I'll get a picture on Tuesday.

I wanted to say a few words about Biodynamics w/r/t Open Heart Farm. It seems timely, because I am getting more involved in certain aspects of Steiner's philosophy (for more on Rudolph Steiner click now) I realize how un-deep I am in to some of it, at least as of yet. The farm does plant by the cycles of the moon and use two very simple versions of compost tea. I'm realizing as I describe this that you kind of have to know what's lacking to understand that Open Heart is a loose interpretation. Many biodynamic preps call for very specific measurements of like up to ten or more things, some of which could be powdered alminum, ground bone of importantly different animals, certain plants at special time of the year (that's the part we come closest to). Anyways, didn't want to give any false impressions that we did the steer horn. I have my own ill-informed beefs with Anthroposophy and Biodynamic which basically come down to not being local enough. I feel, nay, guess, that, for instance, Steiner didn't take into account the sheer amount of electro-magnetics we are dealing with, especially in urban ag.

I think the Flack Family may practice a few more of these things, but one thing I wanted to stress, is that I bet all farms use a combination of proactices that are all their own. Even alot of conventional farmers do one or two things that are technically organic, or are intentionally a hybrid.

Um, maybe more on t his topic later.

For those looking to a link to our CSA flyer, it is in the post below. We still have shares available.

So, this is what it looked like the day we started seeding in the greenhouse this year. I could pretend I'm surprised, but a quick look back at blog posts from previous seasons will show similar pictures. In fact, last year there were quite a few more inches. So far I have done about half of the alliums (leeks, onions, shallots). Things seem to be progressing smoothly, if slowly.

Looking back at the blog I saw that Spencer from Half Pint Farm found out that Johnny's is not in fact owned by Monsanto, which is good to know, and I'm happy to have the facts straight. They do still sell seminis seeds, which I think (now I'm realizing I'm not even sure of this) is owned by Monsanto, that is some, not all of there seeds. It should also be said for Johnny's that they have developed alot of award winning seeds through breeding, bright lights chard being an example of one that I use on the farm. Anyways, all to say that the relationships between these entities are probably not as black and white as I would have them be.

In other news, I just did my first winter sport ever today, cross country skiing. Uh, I fell alot, despite being on perfectly flat ground. But it was fun.

Have to include this one of Ciaran looking so grown up.

CSA Brochure online and pumpkins (still!)

I think I have found a way to get the CSA brochure online: click here. (Thank you Mandy for the Brainstorm.)


Just today I finished making pumpkin bread from the Marina di Chiogga pumpkin shown in various views here. I was wondering if any other CSA members still had theirs. I know I sound silly in October saying "Oh, just keep it on your table as decoration for a few months, it will keep fine." But, here we are in February and this one smelled so fresh when I cut it. I still have two Queensland blue pumpkins in the basement, which is far from ideal storage.

This pumpkin is known as a great tasting dry fleshed one, which would have been great for soup, but I was souped out. When I split it open there was alot more space in the cavity than I thought, so I thought there was not going to be alot of flesh, but somehow or another it produced more usable pumpkin than any other variety I have used, and was extremely sweet. It also had over 100 beautiful seeds and I started wondering why I wasn't saving them, especially as it is an open-pollinated heirloom, which I think would stay true (look the same next year and not revert to one of its parents), but I also know squash cross pretty easily, and that now I've got a project for next year.

and, I have to put up a picture of Ciaran, pre-haircut

Farming without a Computer

No, I don't use it to make furrows, I don't take it into the field to cultivate, not even to the green house as a thermometer, but, still near impossible to farm without it. How would I know, you ask. It's simple, our brand new hp went kablewy last weekend. It seems to be the hard-drive. Made by seagate, just to give everyone a heads up. So many many pictures are gone, and songs and even some hard data re the farm. It's also, as you probably know, extremely hard to get in touch with anyone today without one of these things. Certainly can't post a blog without it (uh, that may show how out of it i am blackberry crowd).

Well, Rachel has a labtop that I feel we've turned into a rube goldberg machine, with disc drives and printers, and well, do-hickeys with wires, sticking out every which way, on top of old computers parts. And amazingly, data has been recovered from hither and yon (or there are plans for same anyways) - enough that I've just finished this year's brochure, with a picture of fresh heirloom tomatoes, different sizes, shapes, pretty, ugly and all delicious, on the cover.

So, with that finished, I'll first send it to last year's members, then start getting it out to the rest of you as I walk around town with hard copies. I would link to it right here, but I don't think blogger does that. I guess that is the difference between a website and a blog. I think it will be up at the Intervale site soon (More computers!)

I'm pretty eager to get into the dirt, it's hardrive can't break.

seeds of change, seeds of tradition

Last week I finished ordering the seeds last week and already the first shipment has arrived from Johnny's*.

As I'm sure it is often noted, ordering seeds is as emotional as it is a question of numbers (of heads you need, carrots, how many days does it take to mature, what temp does it germinate at). As I was flipping back and forth, mainly between Johnny's and Fedco and side ventures into Baker Creek and Seed Savers Exchange, I was definitely watching my hopes for next year take shape, in part via reflections of what has and hasn't worked in years past.

Some of the excitement? Melons! This little picture here is of Hanna's Choice, which, to show you the rationality (or lack thereof) of the whole thing, was chosen primarily to honor Hannah Beal, who was pretty much the whole labor force at open heart last year. Why Else? Cause I have not yet found a good combination of melons, and this one sounded good. Check out the catalogue description:

Hannah’s Choice Muskmelon (87 days) With more than 30 years’ experience growing awesome melons, Adam Tomash of W. Gardiner, ME, knows when he’s found a good one. Tomash “was mightily impressed with all aspects of Hannah’s Choice. I’ve grown a lot of different kinds of melons and this is clearly a superior variety.” He reports that in 2007 two hills with 2–3 plants per hill produced 22 melons of about 4 lb. or more each. 20 of the 22 were perfect, marketable and almost all were uniform in size. “Flavor is rich and perfumed without the strong chemical smell that some melons have.” Nikos, our trials manager, describes it as a tropical fruit cherimoya “custard apple” flavor—smooth, perfumy, juicy with syrupy sweetness. The 6-1/2 x 5-1/2" large netted oval muskmelons average 3–5 lb. with a high Brix rating of 13. As stunning on the inside as it is imposing on the outside, its rich green rind contrasts with the deep orange flesh. Kudos to the Cornell University breeding program for developing this gourmet melon rated #1 at trials in both Freeville and Jamesport, NY, where it had an astonishing 96% marketable fruits by weight. At Freeville it bested Delicious 51, Earliqueen, Athena and Burpee Hybrid in color, depth, Brix and over-all quality. Resistant to PM, tolerant to F2, ZYMV, PRSV, WMV.

So, things I liked about that description were a) flavorful b)decent amount of production per plant c) of those many melons, many matured without blemish or rot (some varieties can be closer to 60% than 96% (esp in wet year), and d) lots of disease resistance (definitely more important with cucurbits than other things)

I am now noticing an additional thing to like: it was bred at Cornell, which means not a totally different environment from ours. Sadly, I am also noticing one negative now: its a little long on the days to maturity, which can be bad if the temps drop off early

Those are the considerations, imagine hashing those out 200+ times, plus a few extra ones like how many seeds do I need. Haven't I already bought way too many varieties of lettuce already, etc., etc.

On a note of sad seeds of change, the melon sweetie number 6 is no longer with us, last year was johnny's last year for it, and our last season were taken over by winter squash. This was one of the seeds of tradition, gotten from Quail Hill. Still alot of those traditions carried on at Open Heart, and as I note them, I'll pass it along.

Anyways, while the break has been short I am excited to be farming again, and 09 seems full of possibilities (we probably all agree on that), not the least of which is Asparagus! (In my head I'm yelling these things in my Oprah voice)

Part of ought-nine, I foretell, is a bit more blogging, both by Rachel and myself.

CSA BULLETIN CSA BULLETIN CSA BULLETIN

The brochures will probably be ready the first of the month, at least for e-consumption, so any of you anxious to sign up and get the early bird discount will not have long to wait.

Have a fun day tomorrow!


* I am trying to buy less from Johnny's each year, and we are. Not only are the owned by Monsanto but they are expensive. Why get stuff from them at all, you may be wondering: there are just some things that only they have (at least without ordering from thirty places).

I saw the last picture on there and . . .

Ciaran looks nothing like that now so

of babies and blogs

so, uh, it's been awhile. to make a long story short we had a very successful growing season (more details on minor mishaps survey results etc following), but a less successful blog season. Given Ciaran, I was happy to keep the garden going this year, but I do hope for a little more blogging soon. Including pictures.

anyways, there are lots of specifics abut the season past that I will be re-hashing as I get ready for the new one, and I'll try to share the details right here.

ps it makes me feel slightly better that I have learned you need not check the blog daily, Ara told me that you can set blogs up as "RSS Feeds" (I think thats the name), so that your computer will tell you when we've updated the blog, - thank god for the modern - so if you don't have that feature hooked up yet (am i the only one?!?!?), try it out