Bees, Blueberries & Blisters

Experiences beyond farming....

It has been another great week on the farm. The weeks are passing fast, yet so packed full it's weird when I bike out of the bubble and come into a world that sells blue organic corn chips, has curbside recycling and uses internet technology on a regular basis. Familiar things that seem odd and striking all of a sudden.

Though our days are full of farming (and specifically for me, propagation), soil lectures, farm chores and good food there are also other activities and workshops packed into an already overloaded day.

Thursday I joined a group of farmies as we got our hands sticky getting into some of our bee hives on the farm. It was exciting and amazing to pull out (surprisingly heavy) trays loaded with worker bees, brood, honey, worker and drone larva and wax. Actually quite cuddle looking creatures. More on that as the time goes on..

And the blueberries... they are in full harvest right now and let me tell you- there is NOTHING like a warm, plump blueberry right off the bush popped into a sweaty farm workers mouth. My past experience has taught me that organic blueberries are the size of frozen peas. Well it seems that done right they are easily the size of nickels and dimes!
I continue to find new gems amidst the obvious beauty on the farm. Tuesday I learned that a tree I've sat under a half dozen times is a Bing cherry tree. We climbed the branches to get at the ripe, juicy, red berries. Mulberry bushes are almost ready to drop. We have both purple and sweet white mulberries at our finger tips. I'm counting down the days until the bursting avocado trees are ripe and ready....

So the blisters... I actually don't have any, it just left a nice ring as I wrote the title. But what I DO have is some homemade salve we made Thursday night out of our own herbs and bees wax to prevent any blisters from forming and to help sooth my rough, dirty farm hands. Organic beeswax straight from our hives melted down with some homemade infused oils. It's amazingly simple really.

So- what else? I guess more on the food (because really- it's always about food, right?). The meals continue to be amazing. A couple nights ago the cooks splurged on outsourced goods. They bought some cheese, tomatoes and potatoes (common to some, but delicacies when you don't have them for a month or more...). Friday we were treated to an entire day of raw food. On the menu: raw granola, chia porridge, fresh berries and fruit, goji berry/walnut balls, persimmon smoothie & prickly pear juice for breakfast. Lunch: sushi with sunflower seed pate, sprouted lentils & mung beans, cabbage salad, flax seed crackers, locally harvested seaweed miso soup and dinner time gave us raw pizzas with salad and green goddess juice. The cooks really out did themselves for sure.

And as if I hadn't gardened in a while, I decided to join a group that volunteered this morning at the Homeless Garden Project in town. It's a project my friend Chrissi has been involved with in the past which helps support homeless/low income people with social justice issues while gardening and running a CSA. Fantastic program with beautiful gardens to boot. Not to mention I witnessed a guy catch a gopher with his bare hands to relocate him to the field across the street. Not the most common (dare I say effective) method of gopher management, but there you go for bleeding hearts Bill.
On that note- I think I'll call it a night and get some rest for another farm filled week.
Take good care- lots of love and many hugs.

Wind, Laughter & Peacocks

My days continue. Filled with wonder, awe, dirt and laughter. So long they feel- that as I recall what I did on any given morning during the afternoon- I feel as if it was a full 3 days earlier and not merely a few hrs ago. It's amazing so much can be crammed into one 24 hr period (and believe me, many of those hrs are spent crashed out head in pillow).

What do those days contain? Well- this week it's been mostly talk of irrigation and propagation- mostly followed by a plethora of good food and loads of laughter. That's just the way we roll here at the farm.

The three week rotation I'm currently in is in prop with three fellow farmies. We're in charge of making sure the potting mixes get made, the seeds get sown and the babies get watered (think greenhouse and nursery). It's been a different pace for sure, but lots to learn and plenty to juggle. We also alternate watering duties over the weekends since the plants don't know it's a holiday- so I was on watering duty this weekend. Which gave me plenty of time to re-adjust my tent. ...But I'm getting ahead of myself.
Did I mention that tent site #37 in tent row happens to lie in the windy wind corridor? Well- rest assured, it does. I showed up for breakfast Thursday morning to the sad faces and condolences of my comrades, many expressing concern for my well being.. and oh, had I seen my tent yet? Apparently the evening before it forgot it was a tent and instead thought it was a parachute trying it's damnedest to launch into a flight pattern over the Monterrey Bay. My dear friend Maggie halted that action by throwing a wooden pallet over it, but not before it went through a simulated washing machine. Even with all the forewarning and concerned looks I received at breakfast- I was mislead as I headed out to tent row with a half hour before class to take care of whatever had happened the night before to my dear camo-tent. As I approached, it looked as if someone had nicely laid out their tent on the ground- getting ready to set it up. As I got closer it appeared as if a giant had stepped on and squashed my tent, and as I got even closer still I could see that it indeed had been thrown through the ringer- with poles in every direction, the bottom on the top all the stuff inside a jumbled mess. I just sat there laughing hysterically, got out my camera snapped off a photo and walked back to the farm center. Nothing to be done. Though I did manage to right my tent before the day was done- I was basically laughing the rest of the day. The only unfunny part of the day was hearing about the destruction of much land and many houses in the Santa Cruz mtns from the fire that is currently blazing near here. That night we could see the fire from the Farm Center porch. Makes you think- you're really lucky to merely have your tent blown apart and not have your house burnt to the ground (as happened to one of our Farm Center directors).

The following day my fellow propies pulled off a Fun Fancy Pants day. On my inspiration from my new favorite peacock pants we decided to have a Fun Pants day and not tell the rest of our cronies. It was an amazing showing at breakfast when multiple times you could hear, "Wow, everyone is wearing fun pants today..." not realizing that is was only 4 people. It could easily have started something... Oh I hope so!!

The day ended with Dancing Pants- as one of our farm managers' bluegrass band (the Rolling Cultivators) played for us at the Farm Center. How hilarious is it to watch so many people be introduced to bluegrass and contra dancing in the same night? VERY!

And today FINALLY Chrissi and Stephen are home from the Emerald Isle so that is a welcome sight!!

Well, I'm back at it early in the morning. I hope you all enjoyed your Memorial Day where ever you are.

Loads of love and may you all find your personal quota for hugs each and every day!

oh and ps- If you're ever presented with the notion that you can open a bottle of wine with a shoe don't doubt it. It CAN be done. Please inquire for more details...

The Life of a Day -Tom Hennen

Like people or dogs, each day is unique and has its own personality quirks which can easily be seen if you look closely. But there are so few days as compared to people, not to mention dogs, that it would be surprising if a day were not a hundred times more interesting than most people. But usually they just pass, mostly unnoticed, unless they are wildly nice, like autumn ones full of red maple trees and hazy sunlight, or if they are grimly awful ones in a winter blizzard that kills the lost traveler and bunches of cattle. For some reason we like to see days pass, even though most of us claim we don't want to reach our last one for long time. We examine each day before us with barely a glance and say, no, this isn't the one I've been looking for, and wait in a bored sort of way for the next, when, we are convinced, our lives will start for real. Meanwhile, this day is going by perfectly well-adjusted, as some days are, with the right amounts of sunlight and shade, and a light breeze scented with a perfume made from the mixture of fallen apples, corn stubble, dry oak leaves, and the faint odor of last nights meandering skunk.

Where does the time go?

How have four weeks at the farm already slipped by?

Our first rotation called Basic Block has ended and Monday will start our Rotation I in which I'll switch locations from the Up Garden to the Down (... a bit of garden speak for you). The weeks have been full. So have the sinuses. At the farm we share most everything- including the hacking cough and sinus congestion that has been going around. I caught the fever the beginning of last week- and fought it off with vigor (and loads of ginger, lemon, garlic & some Chinese herbs). Meanwhile I continued with some work and many lectures- specifically learning of mechanical tillage, the ever loving cover crop and the trials and joys of fruit trees. We've thinned, thinned and thinned some more. The descriptions of the tastes, flavors and textures of over 150 apple varieties at the farm lend their ear to discriptives of a wine tasting. Who would think past the 5 or 6 familiar varieties on the super market shelf? I can't wait to delight my taste buds come September. Peaches, pears, apricots, plums... the lists continue. Stone fruits, poms, thinning, pruning, leaf curl, dwarf trees, aphids, codling moth, M111, rootstock, scion, fruit baring capacity and alternate baring... Ask me anything! I can't promise I can regurgitate an answer just yet, but chances are the answer has filtered through my ears at some point in the past few weeks.

Sunday night I ventured with some fellow farmies out and about to Monterey to catch some Po'Girls live music. I never imagined the clarinet could look so sexy and sound so soothing. Nothing like a good venue, some tasty beer and sweet music to soothe the soul.

At the farm we rotate chores and duties. We also take turns with cooking responsibilities. Monday was my first day to cook- tag teaming with my friend Corey. I'm not sure which is more tiring, double digging beds in the UP garden or cooking all day for 40+ people. A day of cooking involves waking up before 5am, heating up the water at the farm center and getting breakfast out by 6:30am. Who would have thought a simple breakfast of oatmeal and tea could have been so challenging? I not only managed to burn the oatmeal once.. but twice!! (where is Sonya when you need her?) Nothing a bit of rice milk, spices and honey couldn't (mostly) mask. On the menu: homemade chai, (slightly burnt) oatmeal, strawberries with fresh mint, kiwis, and matzah brei. Despite the power going out around 9:37am and our progressively complicated menu, the day only got better and the meals more successful despite the rough start. Lunch time: Lentil salad, brown rice with mint, green salad & very popular squash bread. Cookie Fairy treats entailed raw seed balls (nice energy boost!) and as I returned from delivering cookies to the various sites I found the power back on!! By 4:20pm or so I was so tired and my feet so sore I would have easily cashed it in there... but dinner still had to get done and out by 6:30pm. Dinner: caramelized onion & fennel flat bread, chard/kale soup, rosemary croutons & quinoa salad. Delicious! I REALLY appreciate the cooks each and every day- especially since the heat is settling in.

Wednesday was another outing- as far as Seabright beach in SC- to do some birthday celebrating complete with a bonfire. So all the exhaustion doesn't necessarily come from back breaking garden labor.... but a fair amount does come from the fact that it's warmed up 20-30 degrees in the last week. I'm not complaining as this won't be the norm all summer, but so much sun and sweat does make farm work a bit more challenging. Though nothing a break of cool kiwis can't cure.

Thursday I was lucky enough to go get a bee swarm that had landed in town. Truly amazing to watch those bees marching into the hive as we set the box on the ground.

I boogied down to San Fran this weekend to meet up with my friend Rob and experience Bay2Breakers. Nothing like a little San Francisco fun. I've now had my fill of crazy druckin' debauchery and am ready to settle back into farm life for another week. Back to hands in the soil.

Until next time- I hope your days are happy, healthy and piled with loads of good food.

love and hugs all around-

ps- I've attached more links to my pictures. My only regret is that I can't take a picture of the lovely smells the citrus trees are throwing around and the incredibly sweet, soft roses. Hope you can come visit soon!