Gianni's blog

Last Frost AGAIN?!

  • Posted on: 7 May 2020
  • By: Gianni
Bottomless Juice Jugs

The predicted last frost date was Mid April; yet here we go again.  3 nights this week threaten to kill our seedlings.  Last night it didn't quite get cold enough and tonight is going to be ok.  Friday and Saturday however have predictions that belong in December.  29 degrees with a "feels like"

Covid Operations

  • Posted on: 25 March 2020
  • By: Gianni
Mail intake system
At this time of great lifestyle change for most Americans... curfews, quarantines, stay at home orders.... no bars, restaurants or venues... no IRL entertainment  (In Real Life)... we are being trained to accept a virtual world, a virtual future.  Couples and families forced to spend their full days together are struggling to deal with each others addiction cycles and other habits both good and bad with no escape.  Online gaming, shopping and commutes fill the time.  Wearing masks in public, recently outlawed at protests, is now common place even in rural America.   It's a weird time to live.  This pandemic will bring at least as much change to the world as 911 did. 

The Perpetual Egg & Fertilizer Machine

  • Posted on: 6 February 2020
  • By: Gianni
8-12 eggs a day

Our 1st ever chickens laid their 1st ever eggs for us as Christmas presents.  Since then I've discovered that our organic, free range chicken eggs do not incapacitate me with stomach pain, the way the store bought eggs have been treating me.   For the last 6 years I could not eat more than a egg a week without suffering severe stomach pain.  Now I'm having 2 egg sandwiches for breakfast most days.  hooray!. 

Fall Back

  • Posted on: 2 November 2019
  • By: Gianni
It's Fall

Fall lasted for a couple of weeks, a couple of weeks ago.  It switched abruptly to winter on Halloween Night.  The leaves haven't fallen yet but the temperatures have.

Spring Forward!

  • Posted on: 5 March 2019
  • By: Gianni
Seed starting station full of lettuce, spinach, kale, tomato, peppers  3-5-19

Farmers on your Mark, get set, grow!   At 2 a.m. this Sunday our clocks spring forward to 3 a.m.  The extra hour of daylight at the end of the day comes just in time to help us catch up with all the things that either didn't get done over winter or that were damaged by the winter.  But that hour of sun has to come from somewhere and since we're not really early risers here losing the extra hour of sun in the morning is no big deal.

The Ruth Stout Method

  • Posted on: 13 January 2019
  • By: Gianni

Ruth StoutANaturally Shredded Black Plasticfter a year of experimenting with black plastic to cover and condition planting areas.  We began looking for a better way.  The plastic did a fine job of killing off the grass and beating back weed pressure; however it did not last a full season before beginning to become brittle and disintegrating in our fields.  The cost of plastic and the time cost of clean up were enough to have us seeking a better way to no till bed prepping.  We had already planned to build swales for our food forest with the hay from our fields instead of digging the swales.  We had already decided to use the leftover hay as mulch in the planting areas in the spring.  Then it hit me.... Why wait til spring,  cover the fields now and the hay should do the job of the plastic.

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