chicks

we got 15 baby chicks yesterday, and are expecting 50 more today or tomorrow. the girls have been very excited. aiyana, especially has not left their side since they arrived. the chicks are currently in our livingroom, in a crate, under heat lamps. we have to maintain a temp of around 95F for the first week, and then lower it gradually until they're ready to be moved outside(by 5 weeks)

midnight, on the other hand, is not too excited about us getting the chicks. we told him that he couldn't eat them, so that's no fun, and then he had to give up his spot on the couch  since it's too risky having him in the house. he moved to the barn... i do miss him though. he's a great teacher of how to just be oneself with no apologies. he knows how to relax and seek comfort, and when he needs to spring into action he does it effortlessly.

peace

Henny Penny

Henny Penny, our oldest and smallest hen died this week of old age. we were really attached to her. she's been through a lot, but always came out tougher on the other side. one time some animal got her leg under the fence when we weren't around, and broke it. when we found her, her leg looked pretty bad, broken and a bloody mess. we brought her in the house and nursed her. it took weeks, but she recovered. at first she just hopped around the yard on her other good leg, but eventually she was able to use the broken one again too.
she was never a great mom, but she had a lot of personality, and even though she was half the size of all the other chickens, she was by far the wisest and most experienced. she also stayed very friendly with us after we helped her with her broken leg. we were all sad when she died...
here is Aiyana with Henny Penny a couple of weeks ago.

peace

in the gound

the soil got dry enough last week and we are able to plant in the ground. thursday and friday were gorgeous, sunny and warm, and working outside again felt blissful. made me feel very happy to be where i am, doing what i'm doing. but anyway, here are some pics showing what's going on in the field and the greenhouse:

lettuces, which we started in soil blocks in the greenhuse, germinated last week. normally we like to start lettuces directly in the ground, bc transplanting them (we have 3000 blocks) is painfuly time consuming. but this year with the snow and wet ground, we could not plant in the ground as early as we would have wanted to, so we decided to give them a jump and start them in soil blocks. 

 cabbages, coming up in the greenhouse (soil blocks also)

 look at the onions. they're cranking!

 more onions...

 2 beds of peas planted on friday. more to come this week, if the weather cooperates.

this is what most of our field looks like right now. we fixed up the hoop tunnels, removing the ripped plastic, and re-covering the beds. even with all the snow load the tunnels saw this winter, the spinach underneath was mostly fine. rodents did some damage though...it's so hard to control them. we're planning to get two more cats for rodent patrol. midnight, our beautiful, friendly cat, has been getting too comfortable on the couch over the winter, and he's been slacking on his rodent duties.

 this is what the spinach looks like under the hoop tunnels. we're pretty happy.

 and this is our garlic, which we planted last fall and had under hay all winter. it's coming up beautifully! very encouraging...

 peace

CSA news

our CSA filled up as of last week. can't believe it! it's only march....
we have 94 families, some with full shares, some with half shares, for a total of 80 shares. very exciting!
now we can just focus on growing the food.

Happy Spring, and Peace!

can't stop thinking about japan. i find the nuclear thing especially overwhelming and upsetting.

snowdrops

the world can be a crazy place, but there are always snowdrops. and spring is here!

the last picture is claytonia, growing in our greenhouse. people love it in our winter salad mix.
peace

we had a lot of rain in the past 2 days, and temperatures have been high enough that most of the snow is gone off our fields. the chickens are very excited to be on the grass again. we are happy too. last year, however, we were planting in the ground at this time. this year that won't be possible, with snow still being on the ground and everything being so wet. we will be delayed by a few weeks, but even so, things look much better now than they did a couple of days ago when everything was still under 2ft of snow. so we are hopeful that the ground will be dry enough to work and plant by the end of the month.

most exciting though, was welcoming the first few snowdrops in our yard yesterday. i always look for the snowdrops at this time of year, and i had been looking all last week, but all i saw was snow. finally, i went to check yesterday, and there they were, poking their beautiful white heads out of the melting snow. is there anything more hopeful than snowdrops on a gray, rainy, slushy kind of day? we were all very excited to see them.

peace