This Week on the Farm 2/12
Earlier today we found a rabbit on our farm. Nothing unusual with that. However, normally the rabbits on the farm aren’t wearing pink collars. Our dog, Wash, alerted us to the rabbit and we were able to catch it and put it in a cage until we found out who was missing a rabbit. Tyler went over to our neighbors to the east of us and sure enough it was their’s. Thankfully we were able to return the rabbit to its rightful owners, because with a dog that is half border collie, having a rabbit in the house is not the best idea. Even having the rabbit in the house for the hour or so today was too much for him and he was pacing and whining up a storm.
That was the unusual news of the week. More normal farm activities have kept us busy since our last post. We have been working on a lot of paperwork. I have been entering all of our records from last season into the computer and I am about a third of the way through the pile. After I finish entering a log I have been reformatting the record sheets so that it is easier and more user friendly for this coming season. A lot of the reformatting includes adding more information to the record sheets so all we have to do is check boxes once we come in from the fields at night. Hopefully this makes record keeping a little less onerous.
This past Sunday we went to a Tractor Maintenance workshop hosted by one of our fellow FRESH Food Connection farmers. The workshop was very helpful and reinforced a lot of the things that we have been doing to maintain our tractors. Tyler was able to get a second opinion on some of the issues that we have been having with our Ford 860, and after talking about it later that night we decided that we needed to bite the bullet and send it into the mechanic. We are lucky enough to be about twenty miles from a place that services old Ford tractors. This morning we borrowed a trailer from some conventional farmers down the road (if you ever want access to big equipment, conventional farmers are the people to ask) and loaded up our tractor. Hopefully the repairs will be done in a week or two and we can go pick it up.
This weekend was super rainy and cold, so we weren’t able to get out and recover the smallest greenhouse. We are going to tackle that project tomorrow. It shouldn’t take us more than a day since the house is 12 x12 feet. Once we get it recovered we will clean it out and bleach it down and let it sit for a day. After we check to make sure the heater works, we can start seeding onions!!! We are pretty excited about the new varieties we are going to try this year. My only issue with onions is that they take so long to germinate. It takes awhile for the greenhouse to turn “green.” But it does mean that spring is almost here!
If you live in the Madison area mark your calendars for March 10. We will be at the FairShare CSA Open House at the Monona Terrace from 1pm-4pm. If you stop by our table you may get a little surprise!