Worcester Woods Farm

Hello there, 
   Well, it’s Tuesday, 9PM, and Bonnie and I just came in from planting up in the field. I was all excited to eat the nice big sandwich I had in the truck, but this is now out of reach because I broke Rule No. 49 of the farm code.
Rule No. 49  Never leave a sandwich in the truck unattended when your Corgi is also in the truck pretending to sleep. 
   So now it is a giant bowl of cereal complimented by the strong odor of bug spray on my clothes, followed by a couple Mike’s Hard Lemonades and a few handfuls of pretzels. Does it matter to you if your farmer is not as organic as the food he produces? Granted, it is a healthier lifestyle than most that he leads, fueled by copious sunshine and rain, fresh meats and vegetables and loads of physical activity, but often the distance and flurry of a 16 hour work day dictate certain practices one is not proud of, nor ashamed of either. I’m all but certain our produce would pass organic certification, but doubt I would myself. Would you? It does not seem improbable that we may one day begin applying a certified “organic” or “green” label upon ourselves to assist in finding the right job, moving into a community or finding our true love on the internet. Think of the opportunities such a document might afford!
   Old Roger Hill says on the radio that it has rained 22 out of the 29 days in June so far. This is probably true, but I haven’t seen too much damage from it. Compared to the last couple years, I would say we are off to a pretty good start. The colder temperatures have prevented some of the warm loving crops from taking off yet, but there is plenty of time left for that. There are hundreds of little zuchinnis on the plants out there that seem cautious of growing any bigger than a finger in the last five or six days.  I was sure last week that we would have them for this week, but nope. Also, one of our greatest foes, the Striped Cucumber Beetle, has been oddly absent until very recently. Usually they are trying to destroy everything I plant in the first week of June, but this year the lack of steady warmth must have kept them down on the beaches in Florida just a couple weeks longer. But now they are home, crawling all over my squash doing the whole “piggyback-copulating” thing. At least they have the decency to do it on the underside of the leaves.
   The last couple days have been stressful. It all started with me popping two tires on the mower and two tires on the truck in about an hour a couple days ago ( It almost takes talent to pull something off like that). Then Bonnie tried to drive to town in the truck and had to turn around because the thing was all over the road. Turns out when I went to transfer a couple tires from the old truck the other day, then got sidetracked, I forgot to tighten the lug nuts on the back tires of the truck. Whoops? Then, yesterday I went out to do my animal chores and found that we had no water. A farm needs water like a skier needs snow. All signs pointed to a burned out well pump. It appeared we had just raised those 225 chickens to pay for a stupid well pump. So I called the guys from Manosh, and they came over and told me I had only raised about 20 chickens to pay for something called a “starting capacitor”.  Whew. Then, when I went down cellar to turn everything back on, I found the basement in about four inches of water. As of this writing, the cause is still fairly unknown, but I am quite certain it is retribution for what I did to the truck and the mower. To top it all off, this morning I had to put down a poor little pig who has been sick for a couple weeks and did not respond to the treatments we gave it. “Shipping Fever” (basically pneumonia) is a common problem for piglets who don’t travel well from the piggery to the farm.  We did our best to make him better, but sometimes there isn’t much that will help. It’s frustrating and disappointing, as well as pretty sad. Sorry pig.
   So hopefully the storm of bad luck and karmic retribution has passed over us and moved on out to sea. The next couple weeks are mostly going to be spent keeping up with the weeds, putting in all the fall brassicas, thinning the tons of carrots, beets and rutabagas popping out of the ground, picking almost a half mile of peas (holy crap), staking and pruning 600 tomato plants, hilling potatoes, trying to eradicate the witch grass taking over in one of our plots, setting up new batches of baby chicks and baby turkeys, moving the pigs to the upper field, trying to consolidate all the piles of composting material I have all over the place, moving a 50’ hoop house over 750 heads of celery, sidedressing the corn, planting cover crops in the early greens beds, building a permanent home for the hens, keeping sandwiches away from Corgis, hitting a few golf balls here and there, spreading our last 16 yards of compost,  burning piles of brush that have been accumulating, picking green beans, cleaning up the yard and a couple hundred other things. I better make a list.
   Hope you all have a good 4^th O’July.

Ten good things that happened on the farm this season: 

1. Even though getting killed by fusarium wilt, we got a fair amount of tomatoes from what we planted this year. At one point it didn’t look like we would even get 20 lbs, but somehow a lot of fruits ripened and we probably got around 400 lbs.  

2. No meat chickens were killed by predators. This can be a very discouraging and frustrating problem to have, and we lucked out this year. I think raccoons might be the worst, as we have seen them kill 75 birds in a night (they just pulled the heads through the fencing and ate them off– I know its gross, but that’s what happens) 

3. We weathered the cucumber beetle invasion. We got hit hard early on, and this can often be fatal, but we sprayed a couple of times (”organic approved” stuff, of course), and everything turned out fine. Squash and cukes are easy money for the small market grower, and we count on them to round out the veggies that don’t pay (green beans, peas, corn).  

4. No fires. No floods. No major wind damage. No frost in June. No drought.  

5. There were no real complaints by any customers. We do our best to make sure nothing gets sold or delivered that is not clean, totally fresh, and worth the price we are selling it for. I think the local grower has to have this kind of attitude to run a good business. Sometimes we have to throw out food that is perfectly fine to eat despite a few blemishes, but the pigs will enjoy them or the compost piles will grow. In the end I think it’s the best way to go.  

 6. The composting efforts we have put forth over the last few years are starting to pay off, as next year we will primarily be feeding our soil nutrients that were made here, grown here and broken down here. This is a big cost cutter for us, and our soil can use everything we can give it.  

7. The new pump we bought allowed us to irrigate parts of the farm that previously needed to rely solely on rain before. Although there is a lot of extra work involved in lugging around hoses and sprinklers, it really has opened up our crop rotations to new possibilities, and it allows us to not have to rely so heavily on transplants (also labor intensive) to assure good germination.  

8. There were no real problems with foragers this year. Very little damage was done by deer, woodchucks, rabbits or moose. Mice, however, continue to be a problem in the greenhouse and with winter squash/pumpkins. There does not seem to be many practical solutions.  I suppose we can co-habitate with mice, as long as there are no rats. Rats are the worst thing in the world. I’m a fairly tough guy, but a fat disgusting rat popping up in the barn will make me run like a little girl all the way back to the house. We haven’t had them for four or five years, but still….they are awful. Not that this has anything to do with farming, but I always say my two biggest fears are rats and prison. I hate rats.  

9. Although we made about the same amount of money as last year, I feel we have gotten a lot better idea of which direction to pursue in making this business sustainable for the future. A mix of animals, CSA and a group of small restaurants really seem to be the way to go. For the first time I have a great idea of what to grow for next year, and how much of each product. This is why I think we can do an ordering system for the CSA next year. The trick is to grow a wide assortment of things, and then sell a high percentage of them.  We have little interest in trying to grow and sell 20,000 lbs of carrots.  

10. We made it to the end of the season. Woo hoo! We are tired and need a break. 

  There are a couple moose that have been walking through the lower field in the evening lately. Bonnie and I saw them a few days ago, and then I saw them again tonight. It’s a bull and a cow, and the bull is so big you can just about see his rack over the top of the greenhouse when he walks by. Their coats are almost black right now, and in a couple months they will disappear up high into the hills for better browsing. We have very few deer around the fields here, but there are a lot of moose. A game warden once told me that this five mile stretch of woods is in the top three most populated areas in the state for Bullwinkles (that’s the name he used). There is a great beaver dam just north of the house, there are a couple bear hanging around between here and the neighbors, and most nights you can hear the coyotes going crazy down by the river. With no bugs and the color popping out of the trees I am so anxious not to have tons of work to do so I can get out into the woods. We have 300 acres here on the farm, and thousands more surrounding us. You can walk five miles in three different directions from our porch with no houses, roads or people. I don’t get to do that as much as I used to, but it’s comforting to know that its there whenever I need it. With the freezers filling up and storage crops moving into the barn, we are so ready to enjoy the winter months. Unless the wood stove has something to do with it, I might even be able to read a book after 7 O’ clock without falling asleep.
         One of the better things about fall is of course the food. Roast pork, pumpkin pie, caramelized onions, potato-leek soup, bacon eggs and home fries, maple glazed carrots, chicken broth, winter greens from the greenhouse, braised cabbage, big fat chicken thighs cooked in red wine, zucchini bread, lots of garlic, steamed kale, tomato sauces, apple everything, spare ribs that have been in the crock pot all day, mashed potatoes and gravy, baked beans, rutabaga french fries, stuffed turkey breast, grilled teriyaki wings, parsley pesto, buttermilk doughnuts cooked in pork lard…..who could say New England doesn’t have the best comfort food? To some this might seem very fattening and unhealthy, but I’ll take my chances. How could well grown food that comes from right outside your kitchen be unhealthy. I don’t know many fat farmers, do you?
 

     We had a couple frosts this week. You probably did too. Squash, cukes, eggplant, melon, peppers…all dead. Basil, cilantro, and many flowers gone as well. Some of these I had hoped to squeeze a little more food out of, others I am happy to see gone. Now comes the process of pulling weeds, tilling in or composting most of the vegetation and planting cover crops where applicable. Even at this point we should still be able to get some decent growth out of a winter rye to protect the soil from the winter and provide nutrients for the spring. There is less time to work than there was before, as dark makes it so I can no longer get anything done after supper. But I’m not really complaining. We are beat. Tired. Sore. We want to watch movies, read books, take walks in the woods and eat a lot of pork. The only problem is that there is a good month and a half of work still to be done if we want to come into the winter feeling organized, cleaned up and prepared for next spring. I need to pull in the rest of the piles of firewood I have laying around the woods and burn a ton of brush. We need to set up a good spot for the hens and the ducks for the winter. We still have five pigs to tend to, and hopefully find all the tools I let get buried in the grass. There are wheelbarrow loads of squishy rotten tomatoes to pick up (gross), sunflower stalks to pull, onions and potatoes to be brought in and broken windows to fix. Worst of all, I need to find a job for the winter. It will be some time yet before this isn’t necessary, and man do I look forward to that day. It’s not like I ever picture Bonnie and I sitting on some beach in the Caribbean, healing our cuts and bruises and relaxing for a couple months (although she may), but after working umpteen days in a row without a break, it would be nice to catch our breath.
                 We need to make money, and we want to start a family and either buy this place or make a move onto something else. Since my shot at being a rock star or playing professional golf is decreasing by the hour, we really only have a couple options left. The most likely one would be to just keep our heads down and continue to push forward, paycheck by paycheck. We both believe deeply in earning what you have, and I think we have the strong backs and discipline to keep at it for a long time to come. The other one would be to organize all the philosophies I have been working on for the last ten years into a best selling book that someone like Kevin Costner would make into a movie. He would fall in love with Jessica Lange, and they would set out to build some admirable life together in the mountains of New England. They would of course have to go through really tough times, like avoiding being run out of town by evil ag-business executives, and almost dying while rescuing some stranded pigs in flood waters. But in the end they would triumph by designing the perfect food system where all the townspeople could have bountiful CSA share for 50 bucks a year. The End.
                 So I hope you can all make it to our little pig roast on the 29th. If you plan on it, please let us know so that we can figure out how much food needs to be made. We need to figure out how many cases to order of Kraft macaroni and cheese and Little Debbie Cakes. Just kidding. And sorry about the celery. It’s a little crappy, but there should be a few good stalks to munch on and put in your soup. See ya…
 

     We have a fair amount of tools on the farm here to achieve most tasks. Granted, many of them are semi-broken and in need of replacement or serious attention, but all in all most provide some relief in alleviating the amount of physical effort needed to complete the job. Pitchforks break most often, followed by shovels, and then rakes. Actually, the lawnmower has broken the most this summer, but this is mainly because I like to pretend it is my tractor. I’m sure the good people down at Craftsman never envisioned their little green riding mower cutting down four foot high brush or dragging  a 300 pound hog from up in the field. My father always shakes his head in disbelief (and bordering on disappointment) when I call him up for help fixing yet another part on this poor machine. Bonnie always tells me now to “at least get the lawn mowed first before you go and break it again”. Fair enough. It’s like this obsessive urge that I get to make something look nicer or save some time by avoiding doing something by hand. Even though I know I will probably break the mower, I can somehow convince myself that if I’m careful enough all will be safe. And then there is always that one rock that I didn’t see, or small tree stump I forgot about, or just simply utter fatigue (on the mower’s part) that will bring my project to an abrupt end. Then comes the grumpy walk from the field to the house, which gives way to the complete feeling of idiocy as I open the door and announce “well, I broke the mower again”.
          My most valuable tool this summer might have to be the radio in the truck. When you work alone all day, and I think especially when it is physical labor, the radio provides much needed relief from boredom or loneliness. It doesn’t separate me from the world like an Ipod does, and it often keeps me from talking myself out of finishing the job by redirecting my attention. I mostly listen to news and local talk shows in the morning, and then whatever floats my boat for music in the afternoon. There have been many embarrassing moments when a biker pedals by and I am singing along with some horrible hard rock ballad to my dogs, who are just using the shade the truck provides. And through some amazing Darwinian adaptation I no longer hear the “ding ding ding” that results from leaving the truck door open so that the radio can be heard.
           So far we have brought you over thirty different veggies this summer, but there are others that I have really been counting on sending out. Namely eggplant, celery, peppers and melons. We usually have pretty good luck with these crops, even though we are noticeably colder that most spots around the area. The peppers are just coming on, the eggplant plants are big and beautiful, but they just aren’t setting fruit. The melons are getting close, but it’s tricky to get them picked at just the right time, which is pretty important. There is little more disappointing that an unripe or overripe melon. The celery is almost always strong, but not this year. I got my starts in late, then they got weeded in, they need tons of water, etc. Hopefully we will salvage something out of it. There are some nice pumpkins out in the field, but the winter squash seems not as strong as usual. I guess you can’t win ‘em all, but we would sure like to. This is the first year in a few that we have gone light on the amount of compost or manure we’ve spread on the beds. It’s very expensive to buy a lot from VT. Compost (although it’s excellent stuff), and we needed to wait another season or two before a lot of our own piles were ready. It has taken a few years, but after this growing season I think we will have a steady supply to cover all of our own needs. This may be the reason why things have not grown perfect, but I think that it is a combination of stuff…some controllable and some not. Things haven’t necessarily grown poorly, but something is a little off. It must be that damn global warming!