October 2011
Wednesday, October 5
Following a week of a grey and chilled rain, the sun has reappeared and rumor has it itmay be around for a week accompanied by rising and warming temperatures. Kickstarter is not yet launched due to the Amazon maze of accounting requests with tiny deposits made into the business account for verification. I imagine it will be done and launched this week. I imagine.
During this past week in between harvest and other outdoor chores, I retreated in doors to knock the chill off and catch up on the accounting which always seems to be in a state of near completion or falling behind. Glass half empty or half full I guess. During this duty, I did take the time to tabulate the incomes for the months through September and with some reasonable calculations for the final three of this year, I determined that the gross income for Howard's End would come in around $40,000 which is a disappointment if I look at what I had hoped for- $60,000 or more but on the other hand, with the abysmal weather patterns we have suffered and poor luck with the interns (3 of 4 unsatisfactory), we have managed to pay our bills (mostly) and have harvested about three times as much as we did last year. We sold around 6-700 chickens last year whereas this year we have sold none (to date) due to predation and disease which wiped out the first 250. With poor assistance at hand, I had no choice but to abandon the program for this season. We will rebuild and electrify over the winter and into the early spring for next year and add Pekin ducks which I have learned can be raised on foraging alone (or almost). Geese are grass eaters so I will try a few of those as well. As for next year, with the addition of chickens, ducks, etc, hoop houses as season extenders, the addition of a commercial kitchen and subsequent value added products, and arts/crafts catalog we can get our gross into the $80,000 range without a struggle, especially if we can increase our crop production by 30%. The more hoop houses we build (with a goal of 12 currently) the more control we will have over our crops in relation to the weather. Irrigation is still a grave concern which will have to be in place by May. Without it, we may as well pack up and go do something else. Finally, I plan to hire a full time assistant/partner. Without full time assistance- experienced, I can't continue. One farmer with interns doesn't work. Two farmers will. We will limit the interns to two and screen them very carefully and pay them in relation to their work and experience. In all fairness to the interns, with two full time farmers in place, they will recieve a better education and overall planning will be more regulated as opposed to the "crisis management on the verge of constant exhaustion" sort. We are coming to the close of our third year and I personally feel that I am emerging from my own internship. I have a much better overall view of this business now and don't have the deep boned exhaustion that I was experiencing at this time last year. Hopefully I will avoid it this time around.
October 12
Thinking alot about grass fed beef these days. Currently in negotiations to set up the first distribution and friendly chats with one of the local Amish butchers and the owner of the steer are ongoing as I sort out all of the logistics. Reading up on the number and kinds of cuts that can be expected. Also researching raising beef especially the costs- fencing and winter feed primarily. Probably won't be able to do it on this farm but I do have friends who have 8 acres of pasture that might be available but unfenced. The next step will be to chat with a number of farmers who have cattle to get the low down on the whole story... what I can expect. What I'm thinking, currently, is to have a half dozen head at most so that the membership can have a grass fed beef distribution every two months or so.
At some point in the future, it is most likely that Howard's End will have to move off it's current location. The family isn't particularly enamored with it's presence and without a current lease- just a kind of unwritten presumed agreement- it's state is somewhat tenous. I think at some point there will be a written agreement and as soon as I have had the chance to sit down with a real estate/contract lawyer I expect to learn my current rights and those of the owner. If I have to move I will hope to move to a nearby location so the CSA can continue. Moving a farm business is very costly and whenever a move is made or when a new farmer is negotiating a land lease there are many considerations to be made especially if you plan to raise produce organically, include livestock, maintain a commercial kitchen, grow fruits and berries, improve the soil and so on. Farmers make huge labor investments in the land. A long term lease is a must and a thorough and clear understand between the farmer and land owner is an absolute must. Here are some considerations that I think should be included in a farmer/owner contract (or at least in the negotiations): (to be continued)
October 20
In order to make tomato jam you first have to peel the tomatoes and remove the seeds. You do this by dropping them into boiling water for around 15-30 seconds depending on how ripe they are then scooping them out without scalding yourself and into an ice water bath. I've got some ice in the bowl, but just let the water run. Peeling is quick and instead of coring, I just stick a finger in and pop out the seeds. I'm ready for a break so I think I'll go dig potatoes.
Finally got kickstarter going this past Tuesday and am just sending out emails. Might make a big sign to hang at market (today) and will print out flyers. It will be fun whether we are successful or not. In the meantime, hoop house work and fall/winter planting is now a daily affair.
October 21
Another world will end profecy passes by and we're all still here. Rats! A break from the heavy work load would have been welcome! In between dozens of email messages being sent out to everyone I can think of to let them know of kickstarter, I'm making a tomato/basil jam, I have a full harvest schedule to keep and if there's time the quince/lemon marmalade needs to be done as well. Have to run to town to pick up a couple of packages of goat sausage and other supplies such as parchment paper, pectin, and organic flour & sugar. Got the T-shirt design worked out fairly quickly last night which was a relief. Got about 50 feet of a new raised bed dug but had to quit due to the rain and the heaviness of the soil- we picked up an inch and a half of ran last week and have had an inch this week. No sunshine to help everaporation of the moisture. Just gray. Planting is going fairly well though in between the deluges. I'll have to focus on the existing hoop beds and that construction. Framing is nearly complete for three hoops so instead of digging heavy wet clay, I'll finish these first three completing their cover and plant out their beds which are only partially done at this point. I've decided to publish a small pamphlet on this method of hoop house construction which I've devised presuming that it will hold up well in the worst weather with instruction/commentary on the clay ovens I plan to build to heat them (bake bread and heat the hoops at the same time!).
October 24
the forecast for rain has held off with periods of calm and sun. A perfect time to harvest.
Started the morning around 5:30 with accounting work continued from the evening before. Three more distributions to sort and record and then I can tally up. Again, I was a full two months behind. A very busy evening coming with many orders for scones, pizzas along with a jam and a marmade to make. The members are placing full orders which always makes me happy. Already nearly a dozen orders for fennel and many orders for sunchokes- I provided three recipes in the distribution email and that seems to have made the difference. In order to maintain sanity (most of the time), I visit the Bellefonte library to pick up BBC murder mysteries and other series (I recommend "Foyle's War" and "Monarch of the Glen" and the Poirot series with David Suchet), along with cook books and the odd book to read (currently I'm reading "Moonlighting with Einstein" which is about the science of memory). I am learning to cook. I bake bread regularly and dig for recipes. I've just discovered a loadstone in "The Four Star Kitchen" which has many great duck recipes (for next year), deserts (medicine to counter the winter blues) and good all arounds using chicken, vegetables and so on. I've been learning that the more fluent I am with what I am growing- i.e. what one does with it, the easier I can sell it. Helps to develop costumer loyalty too. I'm having a whole wheat pancake for lunch before returning to the field to harvest salad crops.
Fall has proven to be a very difficult time thus far. My moods follow the weather- up with the sun and down with the rainy greys. It's hard not to slip into periods of depression. The stress of the entire season is a strong memory that doesn't fade quickly and with a very tenuous and uncertain financial future all the positive thinking can end up on quicksand quickly stipping into the mire. I have solutions to the challenges but can they be implemented quickly enough? Will Kickstarter work? At this point I have to accept that it may not but I will do everything I can to bring success to it. Money is a huge problem but solvable but I will need some luck. I am developing new income streams and have other options but the current situation is very serious. The truck continues to be a problem and probably needs at least $700 worth of work and I do need cash continue building the hoops. I can't repeat last year. I must be able to grow more crops, and spend far less buying from other local growers. I need to produce more and have reliable workers. There simply won't be room for insubordinates in 2012. I need to manage much better. We need livestock to fill the gaps. I need to feel financially secure. I don't mind the long hours but killing myself and not being able to pay the bills is a place I can no longer be.
Sunday Evening October 30
As the milk slowly heats and makes its' journey towards become the first batch of "Greek" yogurt, I'm poring over the orders for Tuesday, in particular those for the local grass fed beef. I am gauranteed not to have enough sirloins but the hamburger will hold up and I think the soup bones will too. It took awhile for the process of steer to table to reveal itself. I ended up with half a side and paid for 240 pounds dress weight. Once the side was cut up I ended up with about 160 pounds, just over half of it in hamburger (88 lbs) with the rest in short ribs, t-bones, sirloin, pot and chuck roast. Once I had it safely stored in the refrigerator and had lowered the temperature to its' lowest setting I ran off to Wegman's to price their organic grass fed beef. The place was packed as they were having a big Halloween to do for kids but I managed to squeeze myself past the gorilla, the whitch and her cauldron and numerous other frightening scenarios. They had hamburger, happily which I duly noted ($5.15 lb) and then there was rib eye and strip steak and some other cuts which I couldn't relate to the tally the butcher had given me. At some point I will have to go over one of those diagrams of a side of beef cut up in three-d. Maybe next Halloween.
I burned the tomato/basil jam later that night as I tried to reduce it down a bit. Charred tomato jam. A halloween treat. The pepper plants froze. I was picking peppers in the snows of Saturday. Three bushels- one bushel diced and frozen for winter and spring pizzas, one bushel of the very large for stuffing duty (sausage, cheese, etc) and one for everday. Picked the Marvel of Venice beans that I had left on the vine for seed. When the pods are dried and dehydrated, I will open them and collect the seed. The fennel lives on. i'm going to cover the bulbs with a heavy mulch of staw and give it a plastic cover to see how long I can keep it going. The other hope is that with a heavy mulch, I might be able to keep the roots alive through the winter. I discovered that when the bulb is cut, new shoots appear for more fennel bulbs. I will be saving seed from those plants that have bolted. I have Brandywine and Striped German tomatoes, Turkish Eggplant and squash all happily rotting. As the fruit rots, it activates the seed. Once the fruit is a rotted mess, the seed is removed and left to dry and then stored. I have seed for three sweet peppers and two hots as well.
The potatoes are being dug. The results are poor because they weren't hilled soon enough so there are only spuds at the base. The red Norlands are a bright pink however and the beds are full of worms! So they were worth it. The beds are being widened and dressed with more compost. Where the potatoes where this year, there will be leeks next year except instead of two rows of 50 feet, there will be 6 and they will be planted much earlier. This will permit a continuous harvest well into the spring of the following year. As for garlic which was a disaster this year (I planted an unkown variety), I will plant 600 garlic cloves which will produce 600 bulbs of which half will be sold and the remaining 300 divided to make a planting of around 1500. I would plant more if I wasn't so broke. It's a reasonable start. I calculated that for a CSA of 100 families a planting of about 7,000 cloves would be about right if you wanted to keep everyone in garlic through the year. That's only 6 bulbs of garlic per family per month. The milk is approaching 150 F. Once it gets to 185, I will put it in a cold water bath and bring the temp down to 115-110. The yogurt culture is gently stirred in, the oven is set on warm for a few minutes and the pot is covered, set in the oven and left overnight. By morning it will be yogurt. That's when the fun begins. It will go into fabric and into the cheese press so that all of the whey is removed (a few hours later). It should lose about half of its' mass in the process. Et voila, Greek yogurt. That's the theory. We'll see. Found an Amish farmer who sells Jersey cow milk. Jersey milk is different from Holstein milk. High solids content and yellower in color. Planning on getting a few gallons to make Gouda cheese and perhaps a blue (Stilton or Gorgonzola) with some this winter. Winter is a good time to make cheese if your cheese cave isn't up and running but you happen to have a basement. I will make a "temporary" cheese cave environment and use a heater to keep the temp at 50 - 52. I also plan to force the chicory that I've planted for Belgian endive. I may even be able to start Oyster mushrooms. I am going to start 50 hens and 50 meat birds so that we will have predator free chicken by February and a enough hens giving eggs by May. The coldest weather arrives in January and by then the chicks will have their feathers at 8 weeks old. On warm days I will put them in the heated hoops so they can get some greens.
November is the month to set all of the posts for the hoop houses that aren't yet up. Then it won't matter whether the ground is frozen or not. I will be able to raise them. I'll have to set the oven foundation pads in them at the same time- for those that I plan to heat. Black raspberry and red raspberry bushes will be transplanted in early November and globe artichokes will be planted, heavily mulched and covered in hoop house beds in a bid to get them through the winter. I'll start more artichokes in December and put the figs and ginger in the hot house (sun pit) to get them through the winter. I hope to prepare and compost a few hundred feet of beds which will have to be covered with plastic mulch, weed block or row cover to eliminate any chance of erosion.
I'm negotiating for a Gravely walk behind- actually two of them for $275. One works the second is for parts. They come with a plow. If I can manage the expense we will finally begin to get an upper hand on the weeds. I will be very busy these cold months. The 2012 festival for the arts artisan's application deadline is January 31 and I plan to apply. My application will include a very large painted screen as a backdrop, a table, a lamp (sculpted stone with free form shade) and ceramic tiles, pots, plates and bowls all of which will be in the new catalog. Woodcut notecards will be there too. And T-shirts. I don't think the kickstarter campaign will succeed but at least it will have launched the catalog and get me back into art work.