Wednesday, February 4, 2009

Thank goodness for moles!



It has been quite a busy week here at the farm. After some long days put in down in our greenhouse, we finally finished one set of shelving. We are pretty proud of our accomplishment, and are really looking forward to getting our seed blocks out there.



Mother Nature has been trying to convince us that winter is over...it has been sunny here for days, not a cloud to be seen in the sky. But it surely is cold at night, and frozen every morning, so we're just not falling for it! We are going to start some of our cold hardy seeds, like cabbage, onions, and kale and see how it goes, but we'll just have to be patient for the others.

Today we set about making potting soil for the seeds we will be planting. Last year this was a chore that took hours to accomplish. This year, we came across an inexpensive mortar mixer being sold on Craigslist, snatched it up and brought it back to the farm. If it can mix concrete, it can mix dirt! We put it through it's paces today, and are quite pleased with it's performance...we were able to cut our mixing time in half, and no back pain! Yeah for mortar mixers.

To top it off, we got a little help from those usually-not-so-helpful guys the moles. Field soil is an ingredient in our potting mix, and the daunting task of digging it up was not something we were looking forward to. That's when we took notice of all the little mounds of dirt that have been springing up in the past week...hey...somebody dig the digging for us...and we don't have to screen out any weeds or grass! So a big thanks guys!! Now if we could just convince them to leave our root crops alone! :-)

Speaking of help...we were wondering if any gardeners out there had any of these little gizmos (pictures) lying around that you would like to get rid of? Many nurseries and garden centers give them out when you buy a flat of flowers etc. They are incredibly helpful as seed flats here at the farm, and we would be more than willing to pick them up. Drop us a line or give us a call if you would like to get rid of some, and a big THANKS in advance!
Hope everyone has a great week!

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