75th Post

This is my 75th Blog post. Thanks to those of you who follow. I've really enjoyed chronicling the activities of the farm. I'll keep writing. You keep reading.

Time is creeping up on us. The time changes on Sunday, spring is just two weeks away and the farmers market opens in seven weeks. Seven weeks... We hardly have anything in the ground. It's been wet and a little too cool to plant in my opinion. Sometimes it's better to wait. I's hard but I think the end result is better even if you're a few days later at harvest. After this next system rolls through I'll direct sow the beds that are ready to go. We may see snow here over the weekend.

If you recall there I have made mention many times this year the situation of the honey bees. The experts were talking about the almond pollination and how healthy the hives would look after their winter break and long travels to California. I saw a program on the BBC yesterday in regards. Unfortunately it does look like they are still seeing a good deal of colony collapse disorder. We are at a tipping point. There is still no one answer. Most of the scientist are now saying it's a combination of everything. Envioronment, travel, stress, monoculture cropping, gmo, etc. We are asking the bees to do alot within an unnatural set-up. Hope for the best. The one bright spot I can see is it appears at least on Orcas more people are getting into bees. It's a difficult, but worthwhile and fascinating hobby.

Lots of farm clean up going on. I'm getting ready to add to the chicken flock so Im re-doing the coop and run and we are getting pigs again this year so I have a new pig pen going up. We're going to try one of the wooly pigs this year along with some others. The're a european pig, higher fat content but with omega 3 fatty acids. Supposed to be divine. We'll find out. One thing for sure is they are cute. You can check it out at www.woolypigs.com.

The prop house is getting full. Adding flats daily. Going to need to move into one of the other hoop houses here soon. Things are looking good. It's so nice to walk in and see new life happening right before your eyes. I'll get some new pics up soon.

Soil tests are back and I have begun ammending fields as neccessary. Things are looking fairly normal as expected. Really interesting to see the numbers and critical to know how and what to ammend with. also It's nice to see the history and evolution of the fertility increase over the years. I feel like we're on the right track there.

Should be nice today. Cold but sunny. Colder through the weekend. Planting Tuesday!

Farmer John