High Tunnel II

Since I last wrote in this blog, we had a nice "little" March snowstorm of about 18 inches.  The weather did warm up enough to melt the snow and while it has not snowed much more, we have plunged into the proverbial deep freeze.  Normal highs this time of year are around 50 degrees and normal lows are around 32 degrees.  For the past week, temps have been running a good 15 to 20 degrees below normal.  Next week the forecast is for more of the same.  March is usually my least favorite month because of all the mud.  Who would have ever thought they I would craving for a little bit of mud?  Dang it is cold outside.

But farming must go on.  Living up north on the frozen tundra of Ohio, farmers have to be creative in order to grow crops more than the 4 months of good weather that we have.  One of the solutions is to erect something called a "high tunnel".  A high tunnel is basically an unheated greenhouse.  PCF High Tunnel I was built with loving care and lots of extra supports in the fall of 2009.  January of 2010 it collapsed under the weight of a typical winter snow storm.  Today it still stands all mushed and collapsed in one corner of the field.  The rabbits sure did appreciate the shelter all winter though.

Last week, High Tunnel II was built.  Different design and hopefully a different outcome.  Here the posts are being set in the ground next to High Tunnel I.  The guys had fun starting their work in the field the day after we got 2 inches of rain.  They should have waited until this week with everything frozen.  I'm sure they are somewhat used to this though.  March does equal "mud" after all.

Ta Da!!!!!!!!!  High Tunnel II.

Yesterday Mike and I took a walk around the farm and got to take a good look at our new addition to the farm.  Mike took a thermometer with him.  The outside temps were around 30 degrees with windchill around 20 degrees, but the sun was shining.  As soon as we stepped inside, we were greeted by gloriously warm air and instantly fogged up glasses.  The thermometer read 80 degrees.  Of course with no heat, the temperature will drop as soon as the sun goes down, but boy it felt good to stand inside there for a few minutes.

Doing my best Vanna White.  So now we can extend our growing season.  Mike is already talking about trying some early radishes.  Fingers crossed that this new design will withstand our winter snows.

Hellooooooooooo? Spring where are you?

You may think that asking for spring weather on March 3rd is a little presumptuous.  After all, the spring equinox does not occur until March 20th.  The solstices and equinoxes define astrological seasons.  If you want to map out climatologic changes, you need to follow meteorlogical seasons.  Meteorlogical winter is the time of the coldest temperatures of the year.  Generally around these parts, meteorlogical winter runs from November 1st to February 28th.   March 1st is first day of meteorlogical spring.  And since the average daily temperatures are getting warmer (up to around 40 degrees now for the average high temperature and around 25 for average low temperature), well then, I would like to actually have warmer temperatures.  Oh we've had a day here and there above average, but overall the cold has been hanging on.

This morning when I left the warmth of the house to shuffle to the barn to feed the cats and chickens, it was 12 degrees outside.  As I made my way back to the house, the sun was just starting to rise.  For the first time this year, I heard gobbling from the toms that live in the resident flock of wild turkeys that live across the road.  The male redwing blackbirds were singing loudly.  The cardnals joined in with their "birdy birdy birdy" song.  There was no doubt to any wild bird that the days are getting longer and breeding season is not far away.  The only thing missing this morning was the tiniest hint of warmth in the air.

After work I took the dogs for a walk through the garden area.  I needed to get them some exercise and Mike asked me to take a measuring tape and measure the spacing between last year's plants that had been planted in double rows on plastic.  So to kill two birds with one stone so to speak, the garden became the dog walking destination.  Obviously Mike is plotting out something for this year's garden.  I didn't ask him what.  I certainly didn't want to get involved in a math problem.  After about 3 attempts and nearly falling and breaking a hip on the ice that had formed in between the crop rows, I settled for "about 16 inches" as my answer to Mike's question.  Close enough.

As I turned to cross the middle of the field and start working back to the house, I noticed some deer in the very back of the field.  Then they noticed me.  Then I noticed it was not "some" deer, but "MANY" deer.  This time of year, the whitetail deer is known for a behavior known as "yarding up".  Most of the bucks have lost their antlers.  The bucks are neither concerned with fighting with other bucks or chasing does.  So does and bucks harmoniously gather together around food sources.  As the deer bounded across the field away from me, I did pretty good counting to 29 and then I lost count.  I figure there were somewhere between 35 and 40 deer out in our field tonight.  A beautiful sight for sure.

Mike loaded up some cell packs to take over to the neighbor lady's greenhouse tonight.  The cell packs are where vegetables such as tomatoes and broccoli and cabbage will grow until they are ready to be transplanted into the ground.  The plants won't be started for another month, but Betty, who owns the greenhouses, will be able to fill the cell packs with dirt and store them until they are needed.  It is always good to be able to get whatever work can be done now before the growing season gets busy.

Spring is now the time to keep the blog in line.  Lots has been happening around here.  I missed the opportunity to blog about the great deer, dog, cross country ski adventure.  The flood through the back yard was somewhat notible too.  The new baby layer chicks arrived over a week ago and they are all settled in and growing.  This evening when I went to collect eggs from the 4 mature laying hens, I collect 3 eggs for the first time since the hens started molting last fall.  You see, even they know it is spring.  Someone just needs to come and fix the outdoor thermostat.  I am ready for 40 degree days.

It is only February after all

There has actually be some "farming" activity the past couple of weeks.  I guess it is more like "farming prep", but it reminds me that the cold and snow will eventually end.  Sometime.  In the meantime, winter continues.  More on the farming prep work in a minute.

We had a nice thaw last week though.  The winter of 2010-2011 will be remembered for the never ending snow pack.  Even though we average over 120"of snow each winter, there are usually a few weeks of December or January where the ground is snow free.  Not this winter.  The snow started December 1st and continued right on through.  Thursday, February 17th, was the first day I had seen the grass in over 2 months.  On day one of the thaw, the creek behind the house overflowed into the yard as usual.  Little ol' Peters Creek was not made to hold THAT much snow.  By Friday the water had receded back into the creek banks.  I always wonder about all the rabbits and mice and moles that normally live in the creek's little flood plain and have to scramble for higher ground during snow melt season. They definitely have to adapt to what nature throws their way.

After 3 straight days with temperatures above freezing, we woke up Saturday morning to temps in the mid 20's.  The wind was gusting up near 40mph too.  I guess Mother Nature didn't want us to be too comfortable with any hint of warmth.  The creek which had been flowing freely, now had a thin covering of ice once again.  I love the patterns the ice makes and well, I could just listen to the sound of the water bubbling over the rocks for hours on end.  The three dogs and I did make it out to the woods for a hike though.  We actually spent from 10am to 3pm out and about.  As long as we stayed in the woods protected from the wind, it wasn't too cold, but after 5 hours, the dogs were happy and tired when we got back to the house. 

With the grass showing, the laying hens got to spend a couple days foraging in the yard.  I've heard from other people who have chickens that go out in the snow, but I have never had a chicken that liked the snow.  Maybe it is because our snow is so deep and fluffy that they sink in.   Maybe they would go out more if we had the type of snow that sets up a crust on top.  So on Friday and Saturday when the grass was showing, the hens happily trotted out the front door of the coop into the sunshine.  I'm sure they were wondering if they were ever going to leave the coop again.  It didn't take them very long to start hanging out in their favorite spots like under the pine trees in the front yard.  And when I got back to the house on Saturday, I had a welcoming committee on the front porch.  I am not so thrilled that they seem to like our front porch, but the dogs love the little "presents" the chickens leave behind.  I guess I am not so thrilled with that either.  No matter, there is something very satisfyingly country about having chickens hanging out on the front porch.

On the farming front, winter and spring is sprouting season.  Mike grows a variety of sprouts such as alfalfa, broccoli, garlic chives, peas, clover, corn and beans.  He sells these on the weeks that Mick and Kay go to the Shaker Winter market.  I look at sprouts as a little taste of summer goodness in the middle of winter.  A nice way to add some fresh greenery to your winter diet without having to rely on veggies trucked in from a couple thousand miles away.

Mike has also been busy pouring over seed catalogs and ordering for this year's crop.  Winter and spring is also farm auction season.  So far Mike has bought a front end loader for one of the tractors and about 60 brand new 5 gallon buckets for picking produce. 

My project this past weekend was to get the "brooding pen" in the barn ready for some day old laying chicks scheduled to arrive this week.  Due to our cold weather, I have never started chicks earlier than April.  But I've also never butchered my entire laying flock in the fall before.  I really need to get chicks started so that they will start laying by midsummer.  So this is a total experiment.  I used to start my April chicks in a set-up I had in the basement, but it is so much nicer to just have them in the barn.  But how to maintain 95-100 degrees when the outside temperatures are well below freezing?  Several years back, Mike picked up an electric brooder at an auction for around $20.  I never could get that brooder to keep a 95+ degree temp if the outside temps were cold so I've always just used a 250 watt red light heat lamp. But when Mike bought the brooder, the auction threw in this miscellaneous "hood" that went to something else.  This big clunky hood has been sitting unused in the barn until now.  I am now using it to help reflect and hold in heat from a 250 watt heat lamp.  The test run was today (outside temperature 22 degrees winds gusting over 20mph) and temps under the hood are staying right up near 100 degrees.  Ok baby chicks, your room is ready.

And because it is only February after all, this is how the backyard looked this morning.  About 5 inches of snow overnight.  So much for seeing the grass.

Give and take

The last three days the weather moderated with temperatures in the twenties and varying amounts of sunshine.  Even though we still have more than a foot of snow on the ground, I snatched up the opportunity for some long walks in the woods.  2 1/2 hours on Saturday with the three dogs, 5 hours on Sunday by myself and 3 1/2 hours today with the dogs.  My legs feel like Jello, but my mind and spirit have definitely been rejuvenated. 

You have to look carefully at the picture to see this.  I came across this "track" in the snow.  These parallel lines in the snow looked like someone had taken a giant comb and raked the top of the snow.  The marks continued on the top of the snow 6 to 8 feet in length and then ended in a set of tracks.   My first thought was impressions in the snow made by a bird's wing as I have seen wing prints in the snow many times.  But this was too long and too straight to be made with a wing. With the snow being so deep, I have to admit that it took me a minute or two to read the story that the land was telling me.  Those tracks were turkey tracks.  The parallel lines in the snow were made by the turkey's tail is it flew over to the edge of the woods and landed in the snow.  I followed the turkey tracks as the turkey walked into the woods for a little ways.  A cool finding to be sure.  I've seen wild turkeys out and about twice in the last two days.  Molly, the brittany, came across a carcass of a turkey that had died and was buried in the snow.  I had to put the remains in a tree so she wouldn't lay there and chew on it.  It was mostly eaten and mostly gone so I have no idea if it was left over from a coyote or dog attack or if it just died natural.  As I was putting the parts in a tree, I was reminded as a story that appeared in the newspaper back when I was in college.  Someone was walking in the woods and found several rabbit skins and rabbit parts hanging in a tree.  They reported the finding to local authorities and the story was that Satan worshippers had a ceremony and the rabbits were hung and offered as a sacrifice.  Fortunately calmer heads prevailed and it was determined that the rabbit hides and intestines had been placed there by rabbit hunters.  This is something that is commonly done after field dressing the rabbit so that the hunter's dogs don't get into all the left over parts and eat them.  The Satan worshipper story sure was a lot more fun.

Toward the end of today's walk, I decided to cut across the middle of the field right through the garden area.  As I got closer, I could see a huge patch of bright red in the snow.  Hmmmmmm? I thought perhaps an animal had provide a meal for something else so I walked on over.  It was a watermelon.  As I looked down the row where the watermelons had grown, there was melon after melon after melon that had been dug up and eaten by the deer.  It was a regular watermelon slaughter.  I smiled thinking about even in the depth of winter, the garden is still providing.

About 15 minutes before sunset tonight, I took the dogs past a brushy spot in the corner of the pasture.  We had been out almost three hours and technically had been rabbit hunting, but the deep snow makes the rabbits want to stay deep in their holes during the day.  But quite often, the dogs can get a rabbit up and running in this spot by the pasture and they did.  They circled the rabbit perfectly and I was able to take a shot and bring home a rabbit for supper.  The picture with the young beagle Buddy was taken after we got back to the house and it was starting to get dark hence the flash.  I think the rabbit dressed out quite nicely and will make a good meal for Mike and I.

Living on a farm, one becomes intimately aware of the give and take that is necessary for life.  And I am not just talking about us humans.  The plants soak up nutrients from the soil.  The animals eat the plants.  Some animals like the turkey that I found in the woods died so that something else could live.  We take care of the land.  The land gives back to us.  The deer, turkey and rabbits have been eating the leftovers from the garden.  We provide them with food and they in turn are food for us.  We are all connected.  Give and take. That is how it has been since the beginning of life on this planet.  I am blessed to be living life in the front row.