The rain comes on Tuesdays as if I set the timer myself on one of the robots.  Then it warms up and dries out for the weekend.  It’s been like that for a month.  I can’t believe it.

The last couple weeks we’ve been working on a number of things, both in infrastructure and planting.  Some of the work we’ve been doing over the winter has been making the off-grid operation able to sustain human life and even field a few off-farm job emails.  Most of the insulation is installed in the field shed.  The radiant barrier needs to go in before the summer kicks in.  It’s like an Easy Bake Oven without it.  (Okay, kids, there was this toy when Dan and Drew were kids.  It was a metal and plastic toy oven with a lightbulb inside that cooked these awful cakes.  No, really.  It was for girls, but boys wanted them too.  At least farmer boys did.).  I’m working on getting a better signal so that I can deal with the off-farm job without running down to McDonald’s for the wifi.  You will be glad to know that coffee and music are fully operational.

But in the field it’s the rabbit fence and deer fence.  Deer fence we’ve covered.  The rabbit fence is simple and went in quickly too.  We just had to make sure we did it when the soil felt like being dug.

We used 4’ chicken wire on t-posts.  We tied the wire to the posts with recycled wire from when we screwed up our well pump installation.  The most important part of putting in a rabbit fence is making sure the rabbits don’t go under it.  To avoid this, we dug a trench about 6” deep.  We put the chicken wire on the posts and bent the bottom edge of the fence into a ‘J’ with the curve facing out.  Then we filled the trench back in.  This will keep the rabbits from coming under at the edge.  We also have no gate.  Not yet.  The fence is short enough for Dan to step over.  I, on the other hand, am built like Charlie Brown, so I’ll use a box or step ladder.  This is a bit inconvenient, but it keeps us from having to put in a gate right away that could provide a weak point for rabbits to get in.  Rabbit are like hackers, but with longer ears and fluffy tails.  And they are a little smaller.  And don’t talk as much.  But other than that, they are just like hackers.

I gave Dan a scythe for Christmas.  I am a romantic devil.  She nearly lopped her thumb off sharpening it.  I dressed it and she kept working.  Dan is tough.  Tougher than our dirt in August.  That is tough.

We also planted 200 basil plants in between the rows of trees in the orchard.  The rabbits won’t eat the basil so we don’t need it to have the fence.  We’re going to put tomatoes inside the rabbit fence and intersew with basil for the pest control properties.  We might even add some carrots since tomatoes and carrots get along so well.

The hoop house is a great idea that is almost there.  The size is perfect for keeping the plants warm and moist in our climate, but the irrigation system needs more work.  The robots are great once you get them tuned.  These are not tuned, and the seedling window has closed.  I’m going to go out to Peaceful Valley this coming weekend and get a bunch of seedlings to plant.  We’ll keep at the hoop house and robots, but there is planting to do.

Actually, I did.  I had been looking forward to our annual inspection and it was worth it.  Debbie was our inspector and she went through our operation.  I got to talk about our farm for an hour to someone who really likes this sort of thing.  She looked at our labels and my farm records.  Some days I can have trouble digging a hole, but by golly can I file records!  We had a great talk and Coyote House Farm got the thumbs up for another year. During our walk around… Read the rest of this article »

The cycle of rain and warm has been amazing for the flora at the farm.  I couldn’t do better if I ordered it up from Amazon.com.  Which is nice, since we didn’t do J. Harold Anything in the dirt this week.  I was off to visit our mad genius, David, at his ice fortress/dorm room at the University of Alaska at Fairbanks. Dave is a 4Her and has won awards for his cooking.  At home we share the cooking between the four (now three) of us so everybody gets to keep sharp. … Read the rest of this article »

The early morning quiet of the Palermo countryside is disrupted by the low rumbling of an engine.  Growling like Kingdom Come, the juggernaut crests the hill.  Is it an Abram’s?  A Panzer?  It is a Ford F350 from the Great American Pump Company bringing in our new 3000 gallon tank.  I am as giddy as a tweenager at a Hannah Montana concert. [singlepic id=1032 w=320 h=240 float=none] Dustin and Daniel do a great job making the pad and hooking up the new tank to our existing… Read the rest of this article »

It’s the little things that make you happy most often.   But sometimes a big thing will do it too. We have a 600’main irrigation line that runs down the middle of our growing field with manifolds every 60 feet.  We built it in the wet season of 2007/2008.  By built I mean we dug the trench by hand, laid the pipe, tested, fixed, and buried it again.  It was good work to do while it was too wet to stuff on the straw bale field shed.  And boy, are we glad to have it now! … Read the rest of this article »

Our new small hoop house is adorable, but is it financially sound? Here is the bottom line on the financials for a 5’x5’ hoop house. Raised bed - recycled scrap wood.  $0 Wood screws to construct raised bed - $8.67. PVC pipes - 1/2” inner diameter, 10’ length (5 at $1.16 each) - $5.80 3/4” copper 2-hole pipe straps, package of 25 (we used all but 1) - $11.12 Wood screws to affix pipe straps - $2.00 So far, the hoop house has cost us $27.59. In addition, the hoop house… Read the rest of this article »

Today we used a plan from groworganics.com to build a small hoop house, where we can start our tomatoes. Check out the plans we used here: http://intheloop.groworganic.com/2009/04/how-to-make-a-hoophouse-on-a-raised-bed/ It was up in about 2 hours and that includes patching together the 4 sides from scrap wood, salvaged from construction of our straw bale field shed.  We had 18 pieces of 2x6, each 27 inches long, sitting around from having trimmed them off the ends of our floor joists, so we bound… Read the rest of this article »

We’ve been working on Orchard 2, the second of our two existing orchards, the past couple of weekends.  The soil is right for digging and our gypsum amendment has had some time to work into the soil, so although we trampled our still-infant cover crop a bit, the time was right to put in this year’s new baby trees. Here’s a picture of Orchard 2, its fledging cover crop, and the new trees. We had a lot of fun with this planting, because we waited for the right time to dig, plus the… Read the rest of this article »

The calendar has turned and we are happy to call our straw bale field shed project complete.  Of course, things are never complete, and the interior walls still need to be finished, but the building is winter-ready and is sound and stable.  In addition, we’ve got a 2400’ vegetable field and two orchards planted with cover crop and some additional unplowed field sown with mustard seed, part of our ongoing efforts to amend and improve our soil and improve drainage by breaking through… Read the rest of this article »