farmer-pauls-blog

The First Baby Chicks

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 19:26:56 +0100

All organic from day 1 here on the farm. We started with 105 and as of today we have 88 healthy looking 16 day old chicks. They look very healthy. We have done everything with all organic feeds and no antibiotics in the feed. These birds should be ready for sale the first week of july. I will keep you posted.

Spring is Here

Fri, 20 Apr 2012 19:26:48 +0100

Well this is my first time doing a post and I just want to thank my beautiful wife Jenny for all her hard word making this web site. She has done something so amazing I can't stop thanking her for what she has done and continues to work hard at.
We are gearing up for another great year of producing some of the best organic food in the area. All our beef is raised on dry hay in the winter months and grass pasture in the summer. All our poultry is being fed the very best in organic grains and lots of pasture as the days get warm enough to put them out. Our egg layers are still in because we have a problem with foxes. Also new for 2012 a weasel which comes right in to the barn to try or egg layers. I won't go into any more detail. When you see me if you really want to know I will tell you. This little guy can squeeze through a two inch hole or tunnel under ground.
Our vegetables that were covered last fall are almost ready to harvest and as the weather gets warmer I know lot of people are asking when are they coming. I will do my best to have some vegetables picked for you. This is a very busy time on the farm with all the planting that needs to be done.

Enjoy the great outdoors and I hope to see you here at the farm or at our farmers market on tuesday in Toronto. I will be at Sick Kids in the morning and Ryerson in the afternoon.

June Planting

Fri, 03 Jun 2011 23:33:08 +0100

It's been a week of sunshine. Zucchini's almost a foot tall and flowering undering the row covers and low tunnels that Dubois have been helping us with. Spinach is looking good, as well as the kale. Beans are slowly coming, and I have been planting all week long.

Everything takes time. To get the land ready to plant, first I have to bust up the soil with the chisel plow . Then I loosen the soil further with the tiller. Finally I pass through the soil with the 2550 Plastic Mulch Layer, which shoves the soil into beds, lays down the irrigation tapes, and tucks the bio plastic neatly into the bed, like long 100 ft black rows, ready for planting.

This week the team will plant watermelon, cucumbers, squash, zucchini and tomatoes into these raised beds, which keep the plants extra warm and moist for accelerated growing.

Happy the rain is done for now and we have had some sunshine. Long days, though. Start up is around 5am and often I am comin in past ten at night.

Miss those kids of mine. I grab supper with them, and hope that Jenny tells me all their stories at the end of the day.

Back to planting....

Too cold, too wet, too late

Tue, 10 May 2011 16:40:13 +0100

As a farmer, I have seen this before. Rain almost every day in April. Not a farmer's favourite, for sure. Usually, the guys are out planting, or at least turning up the soil, by April 15th. Not this year. Last month I tried. The soil was still frozen.

Been planting just under 20,000 strawberries this week in cold, wet soil. Sun is supposed to stay this week, and I start planting the cold crops today. Hopefully we'll be ready to launch first week of June. We'll see. That's just how it is with farming. Patience, patience. More patience.

Jenny is chomping to see the veggies growing, and can't see how they'll be ready in time. She might be right. Or she might be wrong. I have see two weeks of sunshine change everything....

Welcome to farming. Now back out to the field...

New Season

Thu, 28 Apr 2011 15:24:28 +0100

Well, it's April 28th and it's windy out there. The greenhouse is growing nicely. There's lots of things growing for transplants, as well as some greens growing right in the ground (turnips, lettuce, kale, collards). All of our organic transplants are doing quite qwell in the greenhouse.

With winds at 90/km, the boys are out in the field dumping dirt on the plastic to keep it from flying away.

Next week, weather permitting, we start planting strawberries. 10,000 come this Wed.

We are trying to get everything ready and cleaned up for the Open House on May 14th.

Chickens are here, 2 week olds, doing well. Lost many ducks already - probably an incubation problem from the hatchery, so 120 new birds come next week.

Looking forward to a new season but quite overwhelmed by all the tasks ahead. The fresh new harvesters, and their enthusiasm, even on a windy day, really helps.

TRANSPLANTS!!!!!!

Mon, 31 May 2010 20:45:11 +0100

At 5:40 on Thursday morning, Jenny and I were slowly waking and discussing the next phase of planting season. We had just made a huge order with Rekkers, a local greenhouse, and were both wondering what kind of manpower would be needed to get the job done. The kids strolled in around 6 and did their usual dive between the covers as Jenny and I kept working on the details of how we would get those plants in. Would we use raised beds? Mulch? What plants needed to get in the ground first? How many of our employees would be needed? Between thumps,giggles, tickles and kisses, our planning continued. Jenny finally commented, "We better get out of this bed before those transplants arrive."

When Jenny pulled up the blind at 6:45, she suddenly said, "They've already arrived!"

Stumbling outside, we started unloading 7 carts of transplants from the Rekker's transport, one tray of 1204 plants at a time. The gravel made the carts unnavigatable, so we were stuck pulling the trays from the carts one by one. After about twenty minutes of unloading with the very kind Don, who only asked quietly,"Are you guys new to this thing?", Jenny exclaimed, "Paul, go get some wood! We can't do this one at a time!"

I agreed. I started up the loader and brought down the wood planks.

Soon we had unloaded all seven carts. Once Don had roared down the lane, Jenny and I took a deep breath at the sight of the 35,000 plants before us.

Finally I said, "Go call in every hand we've got."

Today is Monday. After sixteen hour shifts Thurs,Friday and Saturday, we have five of the carts emptied. I am setting up the much needed water systems today, and tomorrow we should just about finish the transplants.

The water wheel works great. With Tim on the tractor, the boys have worked out a system that only increases in efficiency every day. The tool pokes a hole in the plastic mulch, dumps in water and then the boys place the plant and cover it with soil. They were boasting that they were planting at almost a one very 3 second rate by the end of Saturday.

(Those boys are amazing. Cracking jokes in 35C weather, they just keep going and going and going. They make our team look good. Real good.)

If the weather keeps cooperating, we should be done this stage by Wednesday. So far, God has been real kind with the weather!

In the meantime, I better head back to the fields. Carrot seed is being laid down, onions and potatoes are being hand planted, and another team is busy putting those pasture coops together. It's been a great day. It's a great adventure. But the work just never ends....

The Great Adventure

Thu, 13 May 2010 16:12:42 +0100

Planting 20 acres of produce can be an overwhelming task. It almost makes putting in 19,000 strawberry bushes seem easy.

To plant this year's all-natural produce, we have to get the soil ready, organize all the seed, get the planter ready, attach the right seed rollers, mark the fields with the right markers, and then hope for great weather to do so. This is our first year planting produce.

Usually I buy my seed in tons, load it into the seed drill or corn planter and just plant. Rather simple really. The whole transition from cash crops to all-natural produce has been a huge shift. I am rading as much as I can to cope with the new way of farming. I am still trying to figure out how to farm organically. I am still looking for ways to naturally fight the bugs, the disease, the birds. All this is a huge learning curve.

Happily people keep coming along to help, like Walter Pingle, from Pingle Farms, who patiently gave me tip after tip in how to lay the mulch plastic down for the strawberries, how to use a board marked with foot lengths so the planting was uniform, how to ensure that the irrigation was put in right.
People are just plain kind. Between this hard working team I have working with me, and the kindness of neighbours, somehow we are getting the job done. Now back to the fields....

Planting starts today

Thu, 15 Apr 2010 16:06:31 +0100

Out on the tractor, getting the fields ready and loving it. Potatoes go in today with our new crew. Enjoying this amazing weather and gearing up for a great season