New Farmer for Common Roots Urban Farm

There are big changes coming to Lake City Farm this season.  I am very excited to share the great news.  It’s great for our city and it’s super great for me as a struggling farmer.

Halifax has about 3 acres of land from demolishing an old high school right in the centre of the city.  It is Capital Health property but they won’t be building on it for some time, so instead of using it for parking or not using it at all, they decided to build an urban farm.  For the last year or so there has been public meetings to get input and many hours of negotiating and two weeks ago we were told that money for hiring a farmer had been approved.  I have been volunteering on the steering committee for a “hub” of the farm that is planned for agriculture – food production.  I let it be known that I was very interested in applying for the farmer job and lo and behold on March 5^th I got the call!  For now there are two full time positions, I start April 1^st, and the other started already.  That position is the Community Projects Coordinator.  There are future possibilities for many things at this site and we will create them as we go along.

As far as Lake City Farm this season, I had already decided to cut back on the amount of farming because I needed to work off farm at least on a part time basis.  So this works so perfect with my plans.  I’ll continue to farm my property (front and back yards) and most likely one other property.  I’ll grow food for our family and the other property on a part time basis.  We haven’t always grown enough food for us when the CSA needed the food because of a bad season.  Last year was quite brutal with all the rain we had in May and June.  I’ll need to plan my gardens quite differently to produce for a family instead of for 15 families!

I’ll get to be doing what I love to do and get paid to do it.  There will be lots of public involvement with teaching, volunteers, building structures, workshops, work parties, marketing the food and, I’m sure, wonderful sharing of skills and talents.

The farm is called Common Roots Urban Farm.  I’ll be updating this blog so others can follow along in this exciting adventure.  I’m sure we will be creating an amazing space for residents and visitors and I can’t wait to get started.

Today I inventoried my own seeds and will be buying a few more on Saturday at the Seaport Market from Annapolis Valley Seeds.  http://www.annapolisseeds.com/  Before I start work, I want to have my tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, some herbs and some flowers started.  I have a light stand that I will be turning on when they emerge. Other loose ends will be looked after and hopefully the transit strike will be over so I can get to my work place come April 1^st!  Things have a way or working out…

Surviving The Snow Storm

So, I guess you can call what we had last week a snow storm, mainly because it was the first snow of the season.  We did have major snow accumulation and all the produce was under the snow.  Before it snowed the temperature dropped for a couple of days and then we got this massive snow dump. I was thinking at the time, too bad the snow didn't come first for insulation.  Today I went out to take pictures to prove how amazing these greens are. The front yard has Mustard Greens (Red), Rainbow Swiss Chard and Cilantro.

Mustard Greens

Rainbow Swiss Chard and Cilantro 

As you can see, they are still beautiful and what I can tell you is that they taste beautiful also. They were completely buried under the snow for a couple of days.  I'm sure my neighbours are quite surprised to see me out there harvesting after all that severe weather.

I went to the back yard and to take some pictures of the kale and the cold frame.  Yesterday, I had to thin the greens in the cold frame so I took those in to eat.  I also harvested what I think will be the last of the beets. I said that the last time I harvested 22 beets but I'm pretty sure this is the last time for the beets. I can't imagine that they will grow any at this time.

Greens inside cold frame

Kale with carrots up front

I love harvesting at any time of the year but especially in December!

Happy harvesting to those who still have produce in their gardens.

Green Living Fair

On Saturday the Green Living Fair in Truro hired me to come give a presentation about urban farming.  I contacted a Truro city planner before the fair to ask about the by-laws for urban farming for their town. So at the presentation I was able to discuss with them their situation which is not unlike ours in Dartmouth. The by-laws in place do not allow for urban farming but their planner unlike Dartmouth's was already working on making better by-laws (I can only assume they will turn out better). I received positive feedback plus there were many questions about different issues from my presentation. It was a very small fair but the people who came out were interested and in my opinion it was a success.

The funny thing that happened was my daughter and I discussed that I would need the car and she was going to work for Bullfrog and would be picked up so she didn't need the car.  I am sure I told her I was going to Truro but she doesn't remember that part.  Anyway we live at the same house and were both very surprised to see each other at the same fair. It gave us a little chuckle.

Pointing out my garlic

It helps to be hired and paid to give presentations during the winter months. Most places I have presented have had at least one or two people come up to me afterward and thank me for the information.

Winter Greens Part 2

After I planted the cold frame and wrote the first blog about it, I attended the Atlantic Canada Organic Regional Network's conference  http://www.acornorganic.org/ and learned from Niki Jabbour's workshop http://yearroundveggiegardener.blogspot.com/ that winter greens need to be started about 45 days before November 5th for our area.  The 45 days was for lettuce she plants, so I am assuming other greens are similar to that amount of time.  I guess I need to look up the days for each cultivar I am planting.  Anyway at the time during the workshop I thought "oops" to myself but then a man in the room asked whether you could plant things now or not.  Her answer was "sure go right ahead.  If things don't get as big as you want, come February they'll start to grow again because the sunlight starts to last longer then."   Phew.  I thought I had made a mistake and did all that planting and preparation for nothing.  The beauty of the work I do is that most of the time experiments work - seeds just want to grow - and the rest of the time mistakes are pretty easy to fix.

 The Sunday of the conference I went out to check on my frame and low and behold, I had emerging greens.  Woo Hoo!

13Nov11

  So that date was November 13.  Every now and then I open the frame on a warm day but mostly I keep it closed so I don't forget and leave it open later than I want.  These are very hearty greens but I want them to really grow as much as possible before the winter sets in for good.  We have had an amazing warm fall but right now it is getting cold.  Today is November 21 and the temperature is hovering around freezing.  The sun is out so it is probably a lot warmer in the sun.  I opened it today but I'll go out and close it pretty soon.  For some strange reason I think I'm giving it fresh air.  The warm fall has caused my garlic to sprout and that is NOT a good thing.  I'll have to find out if I need to snip the sprouts or if there is anything I should do.  I love being able to put the question out to my other farmer friends and see what their answers are to my questions. I love it especially when they differ because that's how this all works.  Experiments and personal choices!  So I took today's picture and things are getting bigger.

21Nov11

Close up same day

The right side of the frame is seeded with mache which takes a lot longer to emerge but I am optimistic it is coming along,  Mache is probably the hardiest of the plants so once it gets going it should be the easiest to harvest on the coldest days.

I've been getting hired to do presentations at different venues and it's fun to spread the word of urban farming. I was at an elementary school last week and this weekend I will be at a Green Living Fair.  Besides my presentation, I showed the school kids my vermicomposter and the worms, of course.  I left them with some worms and a container to get them started composting with them.  I'm meeting with some university students this week regarding their project on Food Sustainability in Dartmouth.  They are collecting information about what is happening in Dartmouth around food security.  I really should be working on my presentation coming up so I'll end this here.  

Happy fall time to all.

Growing Winter Greens

I have used a cold frame in the spring only and decided this fall to try my hand at using the cold frame to have greens during the winter months.  I don’t know if it will work, but I’m giving it a try.

First thing I did was move my cold frame from the outside of the garden to sit in an actual bed.  I had just removed my tomatoes from the row so there was some unused space.  I have only put trays of seedlings in the frame before, never used it to have plants growing in the ground inside it.    

Setting Frame Inside Garden

 

The dates of this set up were November 2^nd and 3^rd.  I filled the bottom half of the frame with manure, soil and composted seaweed.  I had just chipped some brush and used that to line the outside of the frame to insulate it.  As I was working with the frame, I noticed that there was a lot of shade inside so I turned it more  to be at the angle of the sun’s path.  I put more manure for insulation around the outside edges.  There are bags of leaves from a neighbour and I don’t have a mower to chop them up.  Keeping the leaves in the bags, I put manure and soil in the bags and tried to sift the materials down the bags.  After I poked lots of holes in a bunch of bags, I lined them around the northish sides of the frame on top of the manure and chips.  The window was quite dirty so I got a window cleaner and gave it a good wiping. 

Cleaning Glass

Seed Selection

 

Now to choose the seeds; I have kale and arugula already growing in the garden, so I could eliminate those.  I chose purple mizuna, mache, red lettuce and mustard greens.   After I broadcasted the seeds I sprinkled more manure/soil mixture to cover the seeds and filled my watering can with rainwater and watered it all.  I’m hoping the front side of the frame isn’t too high and causes too much shadow.  Another thing I could do is put a white poster board along the back wall to give it more light and I have in the past put in water jugs painted black to store the daytime heat.  Maybe I’ll get to those things.   I hope I am not starting this too late.  We are having very sunny days and not too cold nights right now, so maybe the seeds will get started before the real cold sets in.  It is all an experiment and I’ll keep you posted.  Just picture me heading out fully clothed in winter attire to get some fresh greens for supper.  Occasionally I’ll look after it by making sure the snow doesn’t cover the window and I guess I won’t need to water it??  Wish me luck!

Finishing By Watering

A couple of days later I decided it needed more light so I stapled white sheets of paper on the back of the inside wall.

Winding Down For Winter and Planning For Spring

We are having a monsoon season this past week.  We finally got the garlic in the ground and figured the warm weather and rain would be fantastic at getting the garlic started before winter.  So, okay now, it can stop raining before it drowns the garlic.  How much rain does garlic need or should I say when is it too much rain?  As usual, we just have to wait and see.

We have great news and exciting things happening here.  It has been an extremely busy fall but very productive.  My fall part time job started earlier than usual and it overlapped with my last week of the CSA box production.  So, that week was crazy but we got through it fine.  I really have two part time jobs besides the farming.  I sell advertising for the Ecology Action Centre’s magazine, Between the Issues, and I work on membership with the EAC.  So both the magazine and the fall canvass overlapped with the last weeks.  They are great jobs that go well with the farming and it’s usually happening when I’m at a slow time – but not this fall.  Along with those things, we needed to start planning for next year and continue our expanding that we have done every year.  This last year’s evaluation and final compilation of stats of everything plus just the regular taking care of the gardens that still needs to be done were two more things we needed to keep doing also.

One of the first things we needed to do was to find another person to work with me.  Bob has always done most of the building and construction projects that needed doing around the farm, but with his work schedule and being on the road he hasn’t really been available for the day to day work on the farm.  The new projects and just the work alone were getting too much for just one person to manage, even with the tireless help of our wonderful volunteers.  So I’ve been keeping my eye out for just the right person who might want to join in the precariousness of farming with Lake City Farm.  Great news!  You might have already heard by now that we have found her – Benna Keoghoe.  She is now an associate with LCF and will be working over the winter with us getting everything ready for the next season.  (the season doesn’t really “start and end” but does have slower months)  We have already worked on one project that we completed and it was a complete success!  We gave a presentation at PechaKucha Night  http://4days.ca/ and from the feedback I think we were a hit.
We have complimentary strengths and best of all, Benna loves working with data and numbers!  Wooo Hooo!!!  And of course she loves the farming and getting her hands dirty.  Look for more information about our new addition in further blog updates and on the website.  You’ll be hearing lots!

On to the next projects; we are working on the expansion of our business to keep up with the demands of building food producing gardens in the HRM.  Soon we will have all the details on the website but here is a bit of a preview.

Customers can contract with us to install a vegetable garden on their property complete with soil, beds and seeds planted.  Seeds will be of the customer’s choice.  After that the customer can contract us to maintain the gardens throughout the season and we highly recommend this to keep the gardens in tip top shape.  We will visit each personal garden weekly and if there is harvest to be had, we will leave it at the customer’s back door.  How cool is that!  If the customer wishes to work in the garden, no problem, it’s their garden.  If they wish to have some guidance we will be around for consultation.  The customer can choose to keep all the harvest or share the harvest for a discount.  The food will go to others in the neighbourhood or possibly the Farmer’s Market.

We also looking to build vegetable gardens in other capacities but we will bring you up to date on that later.  We have lots to work out and plan but it is all very exciting.

The Cucumbers Get A Lift

Today we finally put some A frame trellis supports into the Hawthorne garden to take the cucumber plants vertical.  Like all good projects, we had talked about it for some time before actually putting our plans into action.  There are probably lots of ways to do something like this but we like the plan we came up with.


We originally planned to have four separate free-standing A frames, each roughly 8 feet long, straddling about 30 linear feet of growing beds.  However, once the lumber was cut and we started assembly, it made more sense to join them all together to make a continuous A frame tunnel on each side of the central path.




Each A frame was built using using two pieces of eight foot long 2×4 pine lumber.  One of these was ripped down its long dimension on the table saw and then each resulting piece was cut in half to produce four 2×2 pieces each four feet long for the two end A frames.  The other 2×4 was ripped lengthwise to produce four pieces each eight feet long and 2 x 7/8 inches for the cross pieces.  5/16 x 3 1/2 inch galvanized carriage bolts with washers and nuts were used to join the A frame legs together at the top.  This also allowed us to adjust the footprint of the assembled structure by spreading the A frame legs.  This was repeated for each of the four A frames and the total cost of materials for each frame was about $9.   Twine threaded through the cross pieces completed the installation.

The view down the A frame tunnel, covered in cucumber vines in another few weeks we hope.