Cheap Chickens: More reasons to keep your layer hens in a winter greenhouse

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Another valuable discovery about winter greenhouse usage for...

Simple Greenhouse Innovations: Growing incredible corn, delicious eggs and improving your land

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Fifteen foot vibrant stalks of corn, delicious eggs all year round, compost, fertilizer, cheaper feed costs and improvement to the soil in the process?  Too good to be true?  Actually, too good not be done.  Eliot has impressed me with his variety of efficient and sustainable models and this one is definitely at the top of the list.  For agriculture to be sustainable, an ever-evolving relationship with the land must develop.  It has to progress over time through the study of past attempts and future predictions.  I've learned that agriculture is not a perfect science, rather, it is a great scientific experiment and as with all science, it is only as good as the evidence suggests.  A hypothesis waiting to be disproved.  This requires attention to detail, willingness to adjust and simply being there.  Today's cheap and innovative greenhouse solution involves taking one of the summer greenhouses and turning it into a winter resort for pasture raised winter layer hens.  One of the byproducts of this is to simultaneously create...

High Tunnel Quick Hoops: More quick and inexpensive greenhouse solutions

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Fall is in full flush and I can honestly say that I have never see such beauty and color in my life. Maine has lived up to its reputation as the epicenter of fall foliage.  The abundance of reds greens, orange and yellows mixed with everything in between are visible from every vantage point, whether it be a simple drive to work the winter farmers' market or all the way up north to Acadia national park for a hike.  Discussing my plan for a late summer and fall apprenticeship, I was often told how bitter and cold Maine is.  I've learned that winter is only stubborn and harsh on the way out, yet majestic and slow going in.  The ocean, only a light jog away from the farm, takes time to cool down from the summer warmth and equally as long to warm up during the spring or elongated winter as so many Mainers dreadfully refer to it.  Nevertheless, there is always work to be done on the farm and at Four Season Farm, always something new and interesting.  With my intro to farming being in a massive greenhouse, I have grown to love greenhouse technology and the concept behind season extension.  Today we are going to take a...

Low Tunnel Quick Hoops: Minimum expense, maximum efficiency

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Before the farm became a part of our reality, before we learned that carrots didn't grow in the back of supermarkets, farming was always something we believed was done in the summer. Nevertheless, it was a cold, snow-filled November morning in 2009 that we decided to set out on a simple task...if we want to learn about food, why not ask some farmers?  Although we believed the growing season must have been nearing its end, we were surprised to learn that this was far from the case.  This curiosity shifted our perception, the earth came alive and so did food.  It became individualized and we began to understand that not all food was the same.  To our surprise and enjoyment, it turns out there is a huge amount of food that can be grown all year round and some that even surpasses its summer counterpart.  Looks can be deceiving and while winter carrots may look like summer carrots, when you taste them you might think they are completely different vegetables.  Today we are going to look at the simple innovation and advantage of...

Dried Black Peppermint Tea: Saving a little summer

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Curiosity and the desire to learn originally led Matt and I to the farm each weekend and since making the leap out of the corporate environment and into the agricultural industry these feelings continue to be my driving force.  Finishing the day and realizing that I've learned something new, something I find useful to living a good life is an incredible feeling.  It's not everyday, but it's a lot closer to it than I've ever felt before.  Sometimes the list of new projects I want to try exceeds the amount of time I think I have, but then surprisingly enough the motivation, the tools and the spark of energy come together and it's important to take advantage of those moments when possible.  I have been diving into a lot of different food related activities lately from preserving to fermenting.  What I keep learning is that most tasks are not that hard or at least not impossible, but require persistance.  Whether it's the passion to achieve something or the curiosity to try something new, the action of doing will offer an opportunity to learn and enhance with each attempt.  To generalize, doing things myself instead of simply purchasing them.  This requires the time to analyze, deconstruct and finally rebuild whether it be a product, a recipe or even a structure.  With the famous and colorful...

Saving Tomato Seeds...Natures Version

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Last year I shared what I had learned about saving tomato seeds, a relatively easy yet technical process.  By selecting your favorite tomatoes based on flavor, size, shape, disease resistance, etc, you can continue to regrow and pass them on from season to season.  This year I witnessed the natural process without plucking a tomato off the vine.  To simplify the steps involved in saving tomato seeds,...

What Did You Do Today? Mulching cucumbers and spring tomato preparation all in one.

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Weeding, a plague to farmers and their families for centuries.  There are many sides in the war on weeds and although the spectrum ranges from those who choose to leave their weeds be and others who choose to spray highly toxic chemicals, there is always an investment of time and energy into this inevitable battle.  While there is no one "right" way of taking on weeds, some methods offer more benefits than just simply suppressing weed growth.  Some techniques actually...

Soil Block Party: The basics of propagation without the plastic

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For the last year I've spent my time working in a greenhouse at Stone Barns, persistent in my desire to learn and understand that complex space and all that went with it, I didn't take time venturing into other places on the farm.  I honed in on a specific set of skills that helped me dig deep into my initial understanding of farming.  One of the gratifying parts of working at Four Season Farm is the variety and range of tasks I have had the opportunity to participate in.  Everyone is involved with every aspect on the farm.   In the two weeks I've been here, I've had the opportunity to work on many projects ranging from standard vegetable harvests for markets and restaurants to rare tasks such as roof building for the new chicken slaughter house.  The philosophy involves everyone being able to do anything on the farm when it's needed most.  The skills and concepts come from Eliot Coleman's methods, which he has been perfecting for decades (over forty years and going strong) and his wife Barbara Damrosch, who has been a leading voice in horticulture since the 1970's. Our development and understanding of these methods come through the experience of working, but also by clearly explaining the information and guiding others as we work.  The beauty of this layered teaching method is that information is shared through necessity, which helps develop an understanding of the why.  Skills are taught and directly applied under the pressure of a "real life" situation i.e. restaurants need their weekly orders filled and delivered, market stands need to be filled, customers are waiting for freshly cut herbs, weeds are growing out of control and transplants and seeds need to go in the ground.  There's no orientation week or handbook that preps us on the inner workings of a farm, you drop your stuff off in your little room above the wood shop and dive right in.  One of the rolls I've been wanting more exposure to is...

Rhizome Clones: The proliferation of a low bush blueberry plant

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One of the most interesting facts I've learned about low bush blueberries is the extension of each plant.  To my surprise, in a 10 acre field there may only be about 10 blueberry plants in total.  Through their wide reaching network of rhizomes, each plant continuously produces thousands of stems underground that sprout up little branches producing the vegetative growth and eventually plump clusters of berries.  Any growth coming from the same set of rhizomes is called a clone. Think about it sort of like an underground tree, there is one main stem that branches off into all these little green leafy plants that eventually produce incredible fruit.

In the 15 acres of fields that we raked and picked blueberries, it was interesting to see how different the berries could taste from different sections.  All different weeds growing, insects and animals inhabiting, all affect the growth and flavor of each berry.  The flavor could range dramtically from sweet to tart, hints of earth etc.  No matter where I've encountered good food or drinks, it is always from a source with incredibly good soil.  Good Food is definitely good dirt.