Back in the groove

Finally,  new posting after almost a year off not blogging.  One hell of a year it was though.  Great times and a very successful season.  We had a mild winter that has allowed us to basically have a continual harvest throughout the entire winter and even now we still making weekly deliveries to a few accounts and the grocery store.  Quite a bit of ground already direct sown with cold hardy greens.  Peas and favas are in as well with more to be sown very soon. Our propagation houses are filling up fast and we're just about ready to start transplanting into our other big greenhouse at the main field.  We'll be squeezing things in just about anywhere we can fit them at this point.  It'd be nice as I always wish for this time of year to have it dry out a bit more so we could make a little more room so we don't get backed up.It'll be what it'll be though, wet or dry, we'll deal.

We opened up our pizzeria this year too.  It's called Hogstone's Wood Oven.  We've been open just about a month.  We have a lot of work to do but we're finding a groove.  All in good time.  The one thing for sure is the pizza is very good and we're off to a great start.  We're invested into taking our farming to the next level which I know may sound cliche-ish but we love to cook.  It inspires us and we like to share that inspiration with other.  It's also real.  We like real. Real is good.

Katie and I just returned from a week in Tuscany.  It was amazing and I'm very inspired by the things I saw and learned there. I celebrated my 50th birthday while there, I couldn't dream of a better place to do so.  Italians take style, food and drink to an elevated level and it was one of those take a step back and reflect moments.  I'm humble by nature but as I reflect, I just think to myself  "dude...  you've done a lot of cool shit" 

For now,  there is much to do for the new season.  More planning than physical labor, which at times can be frustrating.  Spring time tends to toy with your emotions and patience is a virtue.  I'm ready, a new season, spring in step and intently focused on being the best we can be.

Ciao,

Farmer John

Open House and Plant Sale

Come out this Saturday the 21st of April and the following Saturday the 28th for our annual open house and plant sale. We have a ton of great garden ready starts and we'll have the wood oven fired up cranking out some great pizza. Jp and the OK rythym Boys will be playing at noon. Come on out and see what your farmers are up to.

Farmer John

Rabbit Rabbit

Happy April! Sheesh is it wet. We have not been able to do as much as we would like to be but we are making progress. This spring appears to be even more wet/cold than last however I think we are doing better job dealing with it than we did last year. We've maxed out our greenhouses with both crops in the ground and newly sown flats. We've been able to get a few things in the ground outside such as leeks, onions, lettuce and Asian salad greens greens. we did get a few potatoes in however not in a traditional manner. Since it's been so wet we took to planting spuds above ground and are covering them in hay mulch. We'll see how well it works.

I had a nice chat with a fellow farmer the other day. So great to bounce ideas back and forth. She's doing no-till which is something I've been thinking about. The above mentioned potato plot is a start. We have one field in particular that is very wet that could be a good candidate for further exploration of this idea.

My computer acting up, gotta go.

Farmer John

It Could Happen

What a nice sunny day we had yesterday. Earlier in the week it stayed fairly dry and was quite windy. Things actually dried out quite a bit. If we could link a few days like this together we'd be able to get into the field and prep some ground. Fortunately we have a couple of dry areas that we have been able to plant into. We're also thankful for our greenhouse space. It's kept us in salad greens during this difficult time of year we commonly refer to as the dirth. Over-wintered crops are done and new crops are struggling with the cold wet ground. It is officially spring though and things will begin to change fast. We'll still be spending most of our time in the greenhouse houses but hopefully by this weekend we'll have our dry field completely planted out. We have a few beds of leeks in there now and we'll be adding peas, favas, greens and onions, maybe a bed of radishes and beets if we have room. It's going to be a slow start again, pretty much what we've become accustomed to. We're actually using row cover (agribon) again after many years of not. I hate it but this time of year it can really make a big difference. It's practically impossible to keep on in the spring winds though.

I'll keep it short today. More to come as we progress.

Farmer John

Wet Leap Day

Damn it is wet out there and getting wetter. It's actually snowing at the moment. As a farmer we're always hoping for a dry spell in February so we can get in and do a little field work to get our cover crop turned under and start prepping beds for our earliest crops such as greens, peas, favas and early potatoes. We did get in for one day early this month. We have a few beds prepped but's too wet to think about planting. Most of our ground tends to stay wet well into the spring. If we miss that early window it normally delays production a bit. The forecast is for rain through the week. We'll wait it out. We have more we can sow in the greenhouses and in fact we direct sowed two beds of greens yesterday.

It'll all come together in the end. It's mostly mother nature just toying with our emotions and you know what they say about March, in like a lion, out like a lamb. There's plenty to do in the mean time. After the last few years, we've learned to just deal with the flukey spring weather. I'm just happy we have precipitation! So many places are experiencing drought right now. It's scary.

It's all coming together. Looking good for the new year. Ready to grow!

farmer John

Return To Normal

The weather has been just a bit fickle, in coordination with the forecsast anyway. We went from pretty dry to pretty wet in the field. A little different than what the weather cafe forecast was calling for. We did get a few beds worked up and ready to plant in the sunnier / drier days of this week, so no worries. I'm actually glad to see it cool down and precipiate a bit. That's what its supposed to be doing right now.

Still harvesting beautiful salad and braising greens from the fields and a few beets too and lots of turnips. The radichhio is beautiful right now and the kale and chard are starting to re-grow and look great. Garlic is up and the daffodils are rapidly growing. Looking good. peas, fava's and the earliest potatoes going in the ground soon. Lore says presidents day, thats a little early for us, but not far after that.

Lots happening in the greenhouse's right now too. Tables filling up with trays of starts, some beds direct sown. This season is starting to takes shape!

farmer John

60 Degrees

Thats right, the forecasted high temp in the region today is 60 degrees. It's the first week of february. Damn, thats pretty nice, you have to admit; We'll take it. Of course we know it could be snowing again next week but who cares. We're beginning to go ahead with sowing flats in the greenhouse just slightly earlier than normal. It's an exciting time of year filled with hope of the on-comming season. For us, it's like the season never ended. We are still harvesting from beds we planted last year. The outdoor salad greens we sowed in September have continued to pump out beautiful salad greens all winter long. Theyr'e the nicest winter greens we've ever grown. The braising greens are also continuing and are just delicious. We just give them a quick two minute hit in an oiled skillet after they've been rinsed and chopped. Throw in a little sambal and a couple cloves of garlic and you're good to go. That's good eats right there.

I'm hoping to get in the field today to do a little tractor work. Forming up some beds in our dry fallow plot for both direct sowing and transplanting. We'll be clearing out some old beds to make room for the new sowing of fava beans and with any luck we'll be plowing up another acre of new ground. Still completing a few seed and supply orders and continuing to plan out the year. So there's your answer to the oft asked question "so what do you do in the winter when your not farming?" Dude.... we're always farming.

Most of you know I had ankle surgery back in early December. Making good progress, down to one crutch and should begin walking on my own in about a week or so. That wasn't so bad now was it? In reality it was a pretty quick ten weeks. Still, Lots to do for one guy on a crutch.

See you out there,

Farmer John

Away We Go

Here we go peeps. The 2012 growing season is under Way. Seeds and supplies are coming in everyday and we are pretty much moving forward with some kind of proccess being made each day. We're still harvest a bit here and there and keeping the store open once or twice a week.

Still hobbling on the crutches but hopefully coming off of them very soon. I actually find out this week from the Doctor how its looking on the inside. Feels pretty good though. I'm seriously hoping for good news here. I'm getting pretty antsy. I'm seven weeks out from fusion surgery.

I've had quite a bit of time to devote to the farm plan, things are looking pretty organized. It's all coming together. We have a few things coming up in the greenhouses but its mostly a blank slate right now. We'll be firing it up here pretty quick. We've been puttering here and there a bit. Jay made up some potting soil today, we'll be seeding in flats here by next week.

We seem to have erradicated our rabbit issue but not before they completely wiped out one whole greenhouse full of lettuce. Just as a side note, the rabbit braised in mustard and creme freche over wilted Asian greens is to die for.

We've had a few CSA renewals come in and are counting on more. Would like to see it hit a new level this year. We need it. Seems like most everyone I talk to is just treading water. We're all ready to swim.

Consolidating fileds this year. Dropping one site entirely but expanding another. We're basically down to three. I'm looking forward to that for sure. Hopefully next year we'll be down to two.

Alright, thats a peek at whats happening. More to come later,


Farmer John

Why We Farm

People often ask me how I got into farming. Well.... When I was growing up we alway had a big garden. Some of my first food memories came from that experience. I can remember especially what real tomatoes tasted like and other great things too like sqash, beans, strawberries, scallions, radishes and much more. One time, when we were visiting Oklahoma, where my parents are from, we had a meal at my aunt Dovies. It was wonderful, fresh black eyed peas, okra, yellow crookneck squash, big fat slices of tomatoes with salt and boiled potatoes. this was all right out of the garden and I even remember helping pick all of that. I was maybe nine or ten. Of course I didn't know then just how influencial that trip would be on me but it might be the first time I recall liking vegetables. Don't get me wrong, I'm no vegetarian by any means. We raise hogs here occasianlly and there is nothing better. It's not uncommon around here to have beast on a stick in one form or another. (one of my other passions is cooking with live fire) Lately, the rabbits have been mighty tasty.

The jist here is we like to eat and we like to eat well. There's just nothing like being able to have the best of the best available to cook with and having lots of it. One thing you'll never see at our home is a lack of good food and hospitality. We really like sharing what we do with our friends, family and neighbors and farming dovetails with that pretty well. So many of my fondest memories through my life revolve around food. My mom in particular was a big influence on the way I cook today. Mostly southern influenced comfort food. The other big influence is from my wife / partner Katie. She's a slightly more refined cook than I am and more inclined to use a recipe, in fact, her forte is being able to spot out a great recipe. She's very good at coming up with standards that we use in our everyday cooking. Here's a few of our seasonal favorites.

Green garlic pesto.. We make this from the whole adolescant garlic. Just chop it up and give it a whiz in the cuisinart with a nice olive oil and a little salt. Jar it up in small containers and pop it in the freezer. We keep one in the fridge at all times and use it daily.

Sambal.. Katie use's her friend Ming Tsai's recipe. It's basically red jalapeno's with lots of garlic and reduced in rice wine vinegar. Food wouldn't be the same around here without it. Seriously awesome.

Tomato paste... Homemade, it resembles nothing of store bought. Lightly cook a huge pot of toms, run the whole thing through a food mill to remove seed and skin. Reuce on the stove for a couple hours then pour onto sheet pans and bake for about three hours at 350. Stir in a little olive oil. Jar and freeze. we again use this one daily, it's unreal.

There's so much more but we'll leave it there for today.

Keep well friends, we're enjoying a nice snow day here. maybe we'll make chili!

Farmer John

End Of An Era

I've written about my grandpa here before but I've just been thinking about him alot lately. Mostly because I'm laid up and enjoy watching history programs. His name was John Gideon Anderson. he was born in 1872 and died in 1956. I didn't come along until 1963 so unfortunately I never had the chance to meet the man. He had a section of land in Roger Mills county close to Meridian in western Oklahoma. I'm not for sure what year he arrived there but apparently he came up from Texas, must have been the early 1900's. He was a cowboy in his earlier day but took up farming and was the local blacksmith in his area. I know from stories that the Anderson farm was a place where people congregated. Farmers would bring their plowshares to grandpa for sharpening and I'm sure he fixed all kinds of other stuff too. He was a pretty jovial guy and was pretty good on the fiddle. I reckon he liked to take a little moonshine here and there and take a chaw or smoke a pipe. Grandma Mitty was a happy person who always took in a stranger and I think was pretty widly known as being a real good cook. She often cooked for the farm hands during the harvest. I know she'd go out and round up and butcher her own chickens and grandpa I heard could eat about a dozen biscuits in one sitting so I bet she could make e'm tasty. My mom was born there in 1917. She's still alive and doing pretty well for someone in their mid 90's. She was the last of six kids. I am the last of five. I was born 91 years after o'l John Gideon. That's a long time. Wish like hell I could have spent some time with him. It's all history now. We still have the farm in the family, not much going on there these days other than gas and oil drilling. Used to be a right lively place. Times are changing but I still have the history. My sister Paulette is real good about keeping the past alive. I appreciate the fact she has all the knowledge and is passing it on. It may all seem like such a long time ago but then again, not really that long at all.

I'll post some more stories later, thanks sis.

Farmer John

Yah Te Hay

Hola Compadres and Happy Holidays. Recovery from ankle surgery is coming along fine. Sutures are out and x rays show that everything is looking about as well as it can. I still have one ugly looking foot. It's More ugly on the inside than out. So much for beauty being skin deep. I'm house bound for another 5 weeks or so before I can start to put any weight on it.

It's solstice. Love it, cant wait for the return of light and long days. Very excited about farming this up-coming season. Things are already shaping up and we can't hardly wait to get into the fields. Not that we've been out of the fields. Well I have, but Jay has been out there several times a week. Still harvesting for our farm store, restaurant and grocery store accounts. it's been a phenominal fall season. Everything coming out of the fields right now Tastes so good.

The good thing about being down right now is that I have lots of time to plan things out for next year. Seed catalogs are starting to arrive dailyand we're planning layouts and strategizing on what we're planning on growing. We're still expanding at our new site and are working on eventually having all of our production at one site. It takes a while to get a field into production. Anyway, Lots of behind the scenes action happening and we're stoked, things are coming together smoothly right now and spirits are high.

Lots of good energy out there from prospective young farmers. Things are shifting in the right direction it feels. Seems like this is the time we've been waiting for.

Happy new year y'all.

Farmer John



Take care,

Farmer John

I Got Screwed

Literally... Back in the day, 1996 I took an ugly spill out of bounds at Mt. Hood while snowboarding and did some serious damge to my lower right leg and ankle. After a 5 hour surgery to put it back together and another year of recovery I was doing OK. Recently It's been acting up so I had a specialist take a look and was told I would need surgery. So I had it done this last Friday. I'm out for the next 12 weeks recuperating. Basically they had to fuse my lower joint as it was super arthritic and bone on bone. They cleaned all that out and put a big ass screw right through the bottom of my heel, up into the joint, I have to stay off of it so long because it has to knit together just the same as if I had broken a bone. There were a couple of other issues they handled as well. So hopefully I'll be able to get around much better and without the pain.

Luckily I'm my own boss and can get the time off! I'll be back in the field come early February which is right on schedule for what we normally do. Until then there is much indoor work to be accomplished. Farm plans, seed ordering and organizing are just a few things we're working on this time of year. Were still expanding while also trying to keep a hold of what we're currently doing. We have some fertility issues to address and we'll have more fencing to build and more ground to work up. We're trying to consolidate our efforts into our Stonebridge site which is where we're doing most of our production these days. It's kind of an evolving proccess for us here and we're still adapting. We'll get there soon.

I'm a little tipsy from my meds and the page is getting fuzzy, better sign off now.

Keep well,

Farmer John

Change

Everything is changing. So many people moving on right now. good people, young folk mostly, headed for distant horizons and unknown opportunity. Many of these people I have been friends with for years now and have seen them grow from greenhorns to experienced farmer types. They've become fixtures in our community and It's almost as though I've begun to take it for granted that they would be here forever. I"m both happy and sad for them leaving, maybe even a little jealous. I understand, this is a hard place to make it. Opportunities are limited both on the job and social front. I wish all of you well. Go forth and conquer. Spread your knowledge and youthfull enthusiasm. the world needs you.

We'll have a couple less farmers at the market next year. You could argue thats good for our business. You could also argue it will make our market less vibrant and not quite as quaint as its been. We'll see, I think it's up to us to keep it lively and diverse. Hopefully more cool people come on island and participate in our market. We could us some new blood.

It's November and we are still farming. We've had a great fall. the weather has held in nicely and we're still harvesting lots of beautiful produce from the fields. Without question, this is my favorite time of year. Absolutely bountiful. In addition to our normal sales, we've been making weekly deliveris to the food bank. We're dropping of about 200lbs a week of assorted produce. We'll keep it up as long as we can.

Not too much changing here at the moment. Wrapping up one season and looking forward to next year already.

Keep well,

Farmer John

Fall Frenzy

Fall is here and we are as busy as we get. Harvesting great quantities of produce out of the fields right now. Market traffic has slowed a tad but our great loyal customers are allowing us to harvest as much as we can. We've been maiking weekly deliveries to the food bank as well. thank you to all who have contributed. Wholesale sales have remained fairly strong but we'll see a big drop this week I'm guessing as fall sets in for real. Weather is looking stormy for the next couple of weeks.

besides our normal harvest/market and delivery schedule, we're working on getting everything put to bed for the winter. Still sowing a few last minute fall/winter greens but most fields are getting cover crop after we complete harvest. We just wrapped up our outdoor market season and next week we move indoors to the Oddfellows hall for the remainder of the month. It was an OK market season. I have not tallied up the numbers but I know we're down a little from last year. In my opinion the market in general was a little quieter this year. One can only assume it's due to the economy. Price perception could be a factor. If you shop with us you've noticed we have not raised prices in a while. Some specialty items will always be more at the market. Because they are special and can't be obtained at the grocery they of course will be at a premium (like vine ripened heirloom tomates for example) Other than that though our prices are competitive with Island Market. We sell product there as well now which makes it more convenient for folks to buy local.

We are closing in on some more infrastructure projects too. This week we should have water flowing from the new well at our Stonebridge site. Also installing a curtain drain around the new greenhouse which we are just putting the finishing touches on today.

So, you can see we are pretty busy here. Just two of us on right now which makes it even more interesting which is just how I like it. We have an open house/farm pizza night this week on Friday afternoon/evening. No shortage of things to do for sure.

I'll post some new pics soon.

Keep well and thanks for following us.

farmer John

It Is Not Fall

Lets not rush it here. Last night I actually came home a built a fire in the woodstove. It was'nt really cold out but it definately felt fall like. If nothing else a good chance to check out the stove and make sure it's in proper working order. Soon it will be lit and pretty much burning 24/7 til May. Just two days ago we had maybe the hottest day of the entire year. Nothing too unusual for this year as there has been no rhyme or reason to anything it seems.

Despite the weirdness, it's actually shaping up to be a pretty good year for us. The tomatoes have really kicked in and have been just great. Good production and great flavors. Some of our old favorites like Paul Robeson, sungold cherry and stupice have out-performed as always. Some new varieties this year have also done well . Arbrason, mountain crest and persimmon are earning permanent slots in the line up. The highly touted and expensive "Temptation" turned out in my opinion to be more hype than go. You never know about toms. It's always fun to try some new varieties and we'd never find favorites without experimenting. Tomatoes are my totem veg.

Lots of other goodness happening now too. A little later for us this year than normal but none the less, the summer bounty is here. I think all of the farmers in the northwest are hoping for a long and mild fall season, I know we are. We have late sowings of peas, squash and many others that we are hoping will hang on into October. Lots of late fall and over-wintering varieties in the ground too.

Some fields are getting wrapped up and cover cropped for the winter as mature crops are harvested. Actually hoping for a little rain to help the newly sown seed to germinate. We are still sowing a few things, winter greens, over-wintering carrots and beets and more.

That's all for now, time to roll.

farmer john

Big Week

Thanks to everyone who lent a hand last week, We were able to get a lot done. Another big couple of weeks around here coming up too. Lots of transplanting and sowing which also requires quite a bit of tractor work to prepare new beds. Weeding, watering and cultivating is also big on the list. Add to that a busy harvest and market schedule and you've got yourself a full plate. I'm feeling pretty good about where we're at right now. We have our work cut out for us but we're on it. Not a lot of time for goofing off though.

The weather's been much better. A little cool in the night but toasty in the day. Tomatoes are coming around. They'll be full on soon. I'm expecting a short timeline for harvesting but there's lots of fruit on right now. Lookin good. Potatoes have been great and we have lots more to harvest. It's been a bright spot this year. We'll be cover cropping as we go. Just waiting for a little rain to sow the seed so we can do it without irrigation.

Thats all for now, returning to bed!

Farmer John

August

Wow, here we are already at the end of July, It's been a busy, scrambled year for us here. A year where we appear to just be finding our groove. Consistently we've been about 30 days off of normal due to the poor weather we experienced in the spring. But alas the tomatoes are starting to ripen and things are growing well in the field. Other Summer crops like squash and cucumbers are coming on too. Hopefully with any luck, we'll have a long fall/winter season. Most of what we are doing right now is efffectively planning for just that. Lots of newly sewn seed in the fields and this week we'll be busy transplnting seedlings into the fields. This has been a year that has given us experience that hopefully we won't have to fall back on in the future. I've talked to many of the old timers and they all say they cannot recall a year like this. So This year has been different that what we were hoping for and I'm hopefull we don't have another like this but am confident we can ride it out and perservere if we do. The one lesson I have learned is that consistency pays and try not to beat yourself up too much over issues that are out of your hands. Patience and a positive attidude basically. So enough is enough about lamenting the tough year. It's time to move on. We've got work to do!

Farmer John

Rockin

There is a lot going on right now. Mostly working on getting planted out. We are finally working all of our land as things have dried out. By the end of the week we should have most of our plots planted out. Some transplanted, some direct sown. At this point we're thinking about our summer and fall crops. We have summer squash planted in one of our greenhouses that'll be ready for harvest next week. We have a second main sowing outside that's just in and another sowing planned for the 1st of July. Winter squash should be direct sown today and we'll have our new planting of strawberries in. It's late to be putting them in but we'll reap a nice late summer & fall harvest. Late seems to be the theme this year. We have alot of crops in the field slowly growing and just waiting for some warmer weather. The weather is still cool but it's been dry. We're irrigating most of our plots but not all. We have one plot of potatoes in a field that has no water source at this point so I'm hoping we'll get a little rain here and there. Irrigation takes us a good bit of time to set up and maintain, we often refer to it jokingly as "irritation" We use drip tape which works great but we are constantly setting and re-setting beds to take them on or off line.

Despite the slow season, things are looking pretty good in the field. You've heard me say many times by this point, that its been a difficult year. We're slowly working out of that and hopefully the slow start will soon be a distant memory. It's been making me feel quite introspective. What have we learned from the experience? How could we have handled it differently? What are we going to do in the future? The weather has been throwing us some curve balls in the last few years and I think it's a fair assesment to assume this is our new future. We're going to have to adapt. On the same hand I feel we're going to have to adapt to this new economy. Things are changing despite the fact our leaders are telling us we're out of the reccession and this latest down turn is only a blip. I'm seeing it a little differently here from my view as a small business owner.

Yesterday, we began sowing our earliest fall and overwinter crops. We'll be working at this for a bit. We're starting a little earlier this year to adjust for the cooler temps. Having product in the shoulder seasons is a big deal for us. It often represents our profit. Good planning and solid execution are key. Having some good fall weather is a bonus. It's safe to say all the farmers in the northwest are hoping for a long, mild fall season.

It's a new day out there, better get an early start.

Keep well,

Farmer john

The Tide Turns

The absence of any recent blog posts should be a hint that perhaps things are ramping up a bit. We still don't have a ton of product coming out of the fields but at least we have a decent selection of spring greens. Much of our field area is still too wet to work but should be dry by this week. At this time we have all of our dry beds planted out and are just waiting so we can really get planted. Honestly it's been a frustrating season. We're a good month off of normal and I have so much too do there is just simply not enough time in the day to accomplish all that needs to be done. Sales have suffered from our lack of variety and quantity. This weeks market was much better than earlier and traffic appeared to be normal.

Big news for this week was we got the cover put on our new greenhouse. We still have some work to do but at least we're covered and planted out. We filled this house up with tomatoes and basil. Looks good.

Outdoor sowings have performed poorly so we're still mostly transplanting. Soon we'll be direct sowing most of our beds. Potatoes are up and looking good.

So in general, not a lot of details, just hard work and persistence.

Keep well,

Farmer John

Still Frosty

May 12th; Heavy frost this morning after a very rainy day yesterday. Quite unusual. After looking at a satelite pic it is all quite clear. basically a huge front passed us with an unstable cold trough following. Unfortunately there's another one coming right on the heels of this one. We were drying out fast too and I was feeling hopeful we might get a break. Not to be.

This is starting to turn into a situation and not a good one at that. Maybe we should use remay?:) I'm not even sure what to do at this point. We have alot of things to direct sow and alot of things to transplant but only a very small amount of space to do anything. Germination has been so spotty so far this season so I guess I'm leaning towards transplanting but that will make us short on some crops later in the early summer. Conundrum. Still we have it better than most other places in the country right now so I can't really complain too much.

One good thing is we basically finished our fencing project this week. Just a couple minor details to attend to and we're there. Next, we'll focus on wrapping up the new greenhouse. It's still quite wet at the site and I have a little more tillage to do. We have some drainage issue's we need to address there but I think we can get a handle on it. I'm shooting to have the project completed by the end of the month. This house is getting planted out in Tomatoes and there's no way I'm putting them in before June 1st so the timing should not be an issue. This is going to be a late tomato year but we will have them.

I think the big thing for us right now is to just carry on and not get too excited about the weather hype. It'll come around eventually and we'll have a great year when it's all said and done. Definately a slow start. Hopefully we'll have a long fall.

That's it for now.

Keep well,

Farmer John