ONE MILE IS 5280 FEET

the garlic is doing well. it is growing fast and looks monstrous next to the beds of the puny onions we planted today. i am going to go through it with the hoe before i put the mulch back on.

today was a huge planting day. we were lucky enough to have a friend come and volunteer for half the day. we planted 800 bed feet of onions. this translates to 4,800 lineal feet of onions which is almost a mile of onions transplanted 6" apart. one mile is 5,280 feet. we had to get the irrigation going right away. super dry, super warm, super sunny, super windy.

too tired to write anymore. however, before i get off the computer, i am going to add a new list to our blog. it is a list of all the wonderful people who have given us their time to help on the elmer farm this year. we are so appreciative.

A FULL DAY'S WORK

yesterday, i spent the entire day working at the farm while spencer took angus to his first farm auction. it felt great to put in a full day working on various projects. i feared that with all of this time to myself i would be overwelmed by my endless "to do" list. i just started with first things first and let the day unfold. it was fabulous.

i spent a little time in the greenhouse, mostly watering and looking for signs of germination in the peppers. it looks like some of the hots are coming up... serrano del sol. the peppers are seeded on trays set on heat mats to keep the soil temps higher but germination is taking longer than expected. seeing the hots come up today was a good sign.

i removed all of the mulch from the garlic. i found tons of earthworms which made me happy and lots of deer prints which didn't make me happy. the garlic looks pretty good. we planted 6 different varieties. the two most vigorous varieties at this stage are what we call ann elise stock (seed saved over the years from a former intervale farmer) and german white. the softneck is coming up fairly well while the ukranian red, phillips and an unknown variety that i have been saving from seed are slower. i originally bought this seed i have been saving from a garlic farmer about 7 years ago who is no longer vending at the burlington market. once the soil warms up a bit more and the garlic really emerges, i will put the mulch back on the bed around the plants. the mulch helps with retaining moisture and keeping the weed pressure down.

i finally assembled the seeder we bought with our wedding gift certificates from johnny's selected seeds. the seeder is alot like a planet junior. i like the heaviness of it and the hopper & seed plate configuration. the planet junior seems to have more sophisticated options such as using a scattershoe to plant peas, but over all i think this european push seeder is a nice option for us... far superior to the earthway.

then i used our new seeder in several beds that spencer prepped the other day. the small field north of our house has our best soils due to the soil structure and organic content. i planted peas, radishes, spinach and some hakurei turnips. i don't think any of these will be ready for our first market... may 10th.

and i did a little farm computer work... not as glorious.

spencer and angus had a great time at the auction. sounds like there is over a solid foot of snow just on the ground just to the east of the mountains and a mere 10 miles away. spencer purchased a stick welder. welding is another perfectly useful skill to have when farming.

SEEDLINGS

i spent a few hours seeding this morning... eggplant, cherry tomatoes, more brassicas, lettuce. the parsley and tomatoes aren't quite ready for potting up. other exciting news... the garlic is starting to come up. i pushed away the mulch in several places to check. we planted over 1,000 cloves last fall. we are growing a softneck variety for the first time. i hope to make braids this year. when i apprenticed at approvecho in oregon, i learned to make them. that is also where i learned to bake bread and knit among many other usefull skills. a great opportunity to learn a little bit about forestry, alternative cooking technologies, gardening and homesteading.

this morning, angus was walking through the fields on the way to the greenhouse. though he is only 15 months old, i think he has deep inner wisdom to be a dowser. he strayed all over the field finding the largest pools of water.