Some breakfast reading material

If you get a chance, check out this very powerful blog by Lauren Petracca, RIT student of photojournalism. The photos are quite beautiful, and it brings a personal touch to the whole Hydrofracking issue. She went down to Dimock, PA, and stayed with families whose water has been affected by gas drilling. I suggest scrolling to the bottom, and starting with Sunday, Feb. 5th.

http://laurensjournalonfracking.tumblr.com/

I think it's very important that these families stories are told. Thanks, Lauren!

April showers: It's time, please! At least an inch?

Things are happening. The dark rich chocolate-colored soil of Mud Creek Farm is being turned over. Soon the fields will all be in green crops, or combed meticulously with tractors to reduce the weed pressure until later summer plantings, or a fall cover crop.
The onions have gone in! Boy, did we plant a lot of onions this year!Thanks to the AWESOME crew of volunteers who came out to lend a hand!
Even small hands were appreciated.We worked for almost two whole days on it. About 1/3 of an acre, the most you'd EVER want to plant by hand on ANY farm.
But we made conversation in the fields, stretched a lot, drank water, and of course, the interns and I treated ourselves to ice cream afterwards! From the left to the right: Jon, Deanna, Mike -- a great crew this year.
This was the Mud Creek Farm interns' fourth day of work, looks like they're still smiling, so that's a good sign. The first whole day of their employment was an orientation and safety training workshop. I created this chart, below, to remind us of the basic six rules that many farmers forget while they're running around tending the crops!
I've sown the first seeds in the ground: peas, carrots, beets, and spinach. Found this cool bottle in the field, "Hind's Honey & Almond Cream", made in nearby Bloomfield.
The greenhouse is full to the brim with germinating seeds, and some of the plants will be ready to go in the field next week!
And Bob Bowman came out to help us install our electric deer fence across the street, where we don't have access to electricity. This solar panel should do the trick.
Alright, that's it for now. I am taking a day off! Everyone pray for rain, or else I'll be out there irrigating for the next 3 days.

-Farmer Erin

Joys of a farmer in the spring

My days have been long! I usually get up and out of the house, after stretching and eating a hearty breakfast, in time to see the sun rise. Sunglasses go on, and generally stay on until the sun dips below the trees again. I'm clocking about 9 or 10 hr days, with a few hours of office work in the evenings.
My TO-DO list gets longer every day. On a good day, I'll cross off a thing or two, but there's always about 5 or 6 new items added. I am spending a lot of time organizing the farm for the season, getting systems in place to make the operation go smoothly once the planting and harvest times hit!
Machines all must be tuned up -- greased, bolts tightened, rust polished off, new parts ordered.
Thousands of seeds must be planted in the greenhouse, all by hand! And then the task of keeping them watered, and nice and cozy at 55-75 degrees.I did get out to the woods to collect some delicious wild ramps!
I do enjoy foraging for the early spring greens. They are such a healthy tonic, and just what I need this time of year to fortify my blood and give me strength for all this hard work. Below, a nice hot bowl of dandelion greens soup! Did you know dandelion greens are better for you than even spinach, broccoli, or kale? They are loaded with vitamins and minerals, and are a great detox. And they grow everywhere for free! If anyone wants to come out and forage on the farm, at least you know ours are organic.
And stinging nettles! A nutritional workhorse. http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Stinging_nettle
Sometimes I look at these hardy spring foods and wonder why I put so much work into delicate vegetables like spinach! Maybe someday I will have a wild-foraged CSA, complete with all the foods that grow wild and don't need to be planted or tended by anyone. Venison would be on the menu for sure. But I'd still like to have tomatoes.

Springtime plowin', planting', and parsnips!

Spring means time in the greenhouse, and time on the tractor! Check out my new disc-harrow:
It does a nice job working up the soil. I got excited that the ground was dry and plowed up about 4 acres this week. Some of those will be planted into veggies soon: peas, carrots, spinach, kale, lettuce, and more. Some of those acres will be planted into cover crops, to rest and restore the soil.
Look at these cute baby cabbages!
And finally all the spring parsnips have been dug up! We'll be distributing them, as well as stored carrots, Thursday night in Rochester, and Friday morning on the farm. Email me at erin@mudcreekfarm.com if you want to purchase some. Thanks to all the helpers who got a work-out with me digging them up!

Greenhouse work begins

This summery weather has been nothing but GREAT for starting seeds and getting the farm up-and-running for the 2012 season. Usually I spend hundreds of dollars on propane to heat our greenhouse, and I haven't had to turn the heater on yet! Most seeds like it around 75 degrees during the day, and 55 degrees at night. This has been exactly the weather for the past 2 weeks! I just open all the doors and vents, and put a couple fans in there during the day, and I don't even need to close up at night. It is pretty toasty in there in the day, but I like to see it as a beneficial sauna-esque sweat when I'm working in there. I just make sure to drink lots of water.
The plants drink a lot too, we water them about twice a day. All the flower and herb seeds are very tiny, so they are started in these rows and then carefully transplanted out into larger-celled trays.
These gloves get to do some work again!

The farm is a bit chaotic right now, as everything was put away for the winter, and now things are being pulled out and re-organized. This old Ontario grain drill is a spring project, it's about 100 years old and I intend to fix it up and sow cover crops with it.
The garlic has grown about an inch a night for the past few weeks.
It's really beautiful. Soon we will lay irrigation tape on it and mulch it with straw.

Mud Creek Farm Spring Parsnips Available!!!

Planted May 1st, 2011, these guys almost made it around the entire calendar. Today, St. Patrick's Day, we dug up the first of our overwintered parsnips (an experiment I tried out this year for the first time). Quite amazing to think about actually -- that anything left in the ground for over 10 months would still be edible! I roasted some up for dinner with olive oil & salt, and they are incredibly sweet! Apparently this is the way to grow/eat parsnips. And imagine the nutrients from a crop that is in that rich organic soil for that long. My father remarked that it's amazing that they haven't been eaten by bugs or something in all that time... I think they must have their own plant defense system somehow, and that's got to be good for us too.

Enjoy these photos of the harvest, and if you want to purchase some of these hearty delicacies, email erin@mudcreekfarm.com. We also have carrots left too!

Parsnip Bisque:

• 1 pound parsnips, peeled and trimmed
• 1 tablespoon olive oil
• 1/2 medium onion, chopped coarse
• 2 celery ribs, chopped coarse
• 1 medium leek (white and pale green parts only), washed and chopped coarse
• 4 1/2 cups chicken broth
• 3/4 cup heavy cream
• 2 teaspoons packed light brown sugar

Preheat oven to 350°F..

In a shallow baking pan toss parsnips with 1/2 tablespoon oil to coat and arrange in one layer. Roast parsnips in middle of oven, turning occasionally, 30 minutes.

In a bowl toss onion, celery, and leek with remaining 1/2 tablespoon oil and add to pan. Return pan to oven and roast vegetables, turning parsnips and stirring vegetables occasionally, 30 minutes, or until golden. Cool vegetables slightly and chop parsnips coarse.

In a large saucepan simmer broth with vegetables, covered, 20 minutes. In a blender pureé mixture in batches with cream (use caution when blending hot liquids) and transfer soup to cleaned saucepan. Stir in brown sugar and salt and pepper to taste.

...and they're off!

The potting soil has arrived. The weeds are growing already in the fields. The birds and the spring peepers are singing with all their might. The tractor shed has a roof (billboard) now! These sunshine-filled days are great. Here we go...
Join us one of these nice weekends for a few hours of good ol' farmwork -- get on our volunteer email list to be kept up-to-date with volunteering opportunities. Email me at erin@mudcreekfarm.com

Erin