Week 10, Season 2019-20

The cold finally arrived and we got through it with little damage;  A few burned potato and tomato plants.  We took to the fields with frost cover and wrapped up the greenhouse to protect the crops. Thankfully the cold was just at the edge of danger.  It was however, nice to see some of the "bad-actor" weeds burned by the frost as well.  The weed scientist in me always smiles at weeds in peril, but alas, it will only be for a short while.

We have a few new crops for this season coming online: breakfast radish, butternut squash, snap peas, broccoli, Chinese cabbage, eggplant, and baby bok choy.  Mandarin tangerines and lemons are going home with our members, graciously being provided by Mike and Shelly Sweet of Sweet Dream Amaryllis.  Mike has a nice little fruit block he shares with friends and we made the list this year.  If you are ever in need of amaryllis as a gift or for landscape improvements he is your guy.  They are breeders and nursery growers of some fancy bulbs you can check out    https://sweetdreamamaryllis.com/ at their online store.  They are located in the Bloomingdale area if you want to visit them.  They are great folk and know a ton about amaryllis.

Mike Sweet (Sweet Dream Amaryllis) posing with citrus and his young crop of amaryllis

The half way point of the season is quickly approaching and we are planting the last of the cool season plants; lettuce, kale, mustards, greens, arugula, etc. We'll switch back to the warm season stuff shortly.   Looking forward to corn and beans again!

The Pope Prays for Steed Farm

Well, he is praying for Steed Farm as well as every small farm and farming family trying to cultivate the land.  I was a bit surprised and very grateful that for the month of April, Pope Francis asked the world to pray for small farmers.  The USDA categorizes small farms as those that make below $250,000.  We definitely fit well below that category and we always welcome prayers for our farm.  I'll let the Apostleship of Prayer summarize the global intention of the pope...

 Seventy-two percent of the world’s farms are less than 2.5 acres in size.  In the U.S., 90 percent of the 2.1 million farms are considered small, family farms, and many of them are struggling.

Though prices have gone up in supermarkets, the income of farmers has not. As a result, the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics states that the largest job loss of any occupation is farmers. When the small farms go out of business, often large agri-businesses acquire the land and create greater potential for ecological damage and health risks. For example, a single fast food hamburger may contain meat from more than a hundred different cattle.

For Pope Francis small farmers are essential to caring for the earth and safeguarding it for future generations. He said that “in the work of farmers there is the acceptance of the precious gift of the land which comes to us from God, but there is also its appreciation in the equally precious work of men and women, called to respond to the mandate of tilling and safeguarding the land (Genesis 2: 15).” 

Agricultural workers should receive a just wage. As the pope said, “The labor of those who cultivate the earth, generously dedicating time and energy to it, appears as a genuine vocation. It deserves to be recognized and appropriately appreciated, also in concrete economic policies.”

With the coming of spring, we pray for those on small farms who are busy planting. May they not only have an abundant harvest this year but also “receive a just reward for their precious labor.” 

Thank you Pope Francis for your recognition of our work and thank you everyone who prays for us!

Last Pickup 2011-2012

Well here it is already.  It is in some ways hard to believe that 24 weeks have elapsed from the start of the season and in some ways I am ready for the end of the season.  Overall it was a pretty good season aside from the weather which was very squirrely, but it proved good for the end of the season with dry weather.  We didn't get as many fungal diseases as we usually do.  Some things from this season to take forward are to plant a bunch of veggies in excess of what we need.  Never ever take more than a two day vacation in the middle of the season.  I really need to reevaluate my fertilizer plan.  Seems like things are running out of steam towards the end of their cycle.  I learned that planting beans behind bok choi is a good thing.  I learned that is a lot of fun to have volunteers out at the farm during picking time (Thank you very much John-Carlo and Dali for your help).  Next year I am going to try strawberries again but I will need to adjust their fertility.  I will need to do something different about the chickens.  We did manage to catch two racoons but only after they killed all the hens.  Here is a picture of the crime scene and the killers.   We used the dead chickens to bait a trap and caught a small raccoon the first night.  Nate was really excited because he got to go with me to pick up the trap and set it up at night staying up until 9:30 on a school night.  But he got to spend some time with Dad and it was an real adventure for him.  I thought there might be more than one culprit and we set it up again and caught a much bigger raccoon.  One that liked to growl.  Handling the cage was difficult because there were no hand holds were the critters couldn't get to you.  The small raccoon we just used a towel to hold on to the cage, but the big one I used the loader on the tractor to get him in the truck.  I then drove down to the river and let them go.  I hope that is the last we will see from those two.
The veggies are finishing up the pumpkins turned out nice and we have two weeks of picking with them.  the corn struggled this year due to fertility and pests which erupted when we were away.  That is why we will not be leaving the farm during the season.  The zucchini are awesome this year and so are the Roma tomatoes.  We will be getting ready for our cover crop which will be cowpeas and sorghum x sudan grass.  We will also be looking forward to a little easier weekend.

Thief in the Night

I arrived at the farm to a terrible sight.  The chicken coop door was open, a few chickens were outside, and a bunch of white feathers everywhere.  Something got into the coop and killed five of the chickens.  Including one of my favorites, the little white leghorn.  That was such a curious, good laying chicken.  All but one of the chickens were eaten down to the bones and dragged away from the coop.  There was one of the original Dixie chicks left inside the coop half eaten.  This is really bad and we have got to do something.  I moved the coop, buried the chicken, and am formulating a plan.  I am going to borrow a live trap from a friend to see if we can catch whatever is doing this.  In the meantime I reinforced the coop.
It was nice to finally get some rain at the farm.  It has been months since we had a drop out there.  But that hasn't been a bad thing with keeping disease at bay.  The weeds are quickly taking over as I usually can't keep up at this point in time with only three weeks left before we begin plowing everything under.  I will keep the weeds down where it matters like the peppers and basil but let them have there day in the sun everywhere else until the tractor and disc are called in to prep the fields for the cover crops.  The okra is starting to form flowers.  The pumpkins are almost ripe.  The corn is struggling this year.  The cucumbers and the yellow squash  are shutting down.  I wish I had planted one more rotation of squash and cucumbers this season.  I figured I could keep them going for the last few weeks but I may have been wrong.  It is a little too early to tell.
The pictures didn't make it again this week as the battery died on the camera while uploading for this blog.  Maybe next week.

One of the special attributes of our farm that we like to cultivate is the community portion of the community supported agriculture operation we run.  I think it is great that some of our farm supporters interact with one another at pickup and beyond.  I mean really, we all see the same people every Saturday for 24 weeks.   It is nice to get to know each other in the community and see where we have common interests or learn new things.  Since I don't have one of my own pictures for this blog post, I do have a picture of one of our supporters doing cool things in the community.  Here is a picture of Danielle with her bowling team raising money for Big Brothers/Big Sisters.  Go Danielle (blue shirt holding the ball)!  Another great way to build community!

Harvest Week #20 2012

A big thank you goes out this week to John-Carlo one of our more adventurous supporters who spent the morning helping me and Nathan harvest the weekend pickup.  It was a lot of fun from my perspective having someone to chat with while you work.  I hope John-Carlo had fun too.  At least he said he did.  Nate did a great job of picking the beans, zucchini, and he even got to use the clippers to harvest the eggplants.  I was impressed that he could do that.  My favorite quote of the day from J-C was "This is a lot of work!" as we finished up harvesting and then started to wash everything.  It made me smile.  Thanks for noticing.  It sure is...but I like doing it.

The pumpkins are ripening nicely.  The corn has been attacked by European corn borer.  This is the first year that we had them that bad.  Things are terribly dry.  The orange trees are shedding all their leaves to stay alive.  The dryness that we have been experiencing has been good for the pumpkins and onions during ripening and in general we have seen less disease.  I am starting to see hoards of stink bugs.  More than past years.  Those guys are a terror.  I haven't found a way to control them yet.  I am not sure where they come from either.

Something ate all our stone fruits.  They were almost ripe and I only harvested  a handful of nectarines, a few plums, and a couple of peaches.  The nighttime menace got everything else.Very disappointing this year.  I think it was a raccoon.

Cucumbers are looking bad.  Kidney bean trial looked OK.  I might do a bigger trial next year.  I will wait for them to dry out before I harvest them.  Just a few more weeks to go.  I will post some pictures with our next post.

What is a Normal Winter?

I'm not sure I know what the answer to that question after growing plants in this area for 11 years.  Maybe the answer is "abnormal is the normal winter"  We have had a frost followed by 80 temps again.  I am glad that we get the frosts, it gets rid of some of the new spring weeds that are just popping up.  The potatoes didn't like it though and the regrowth we had is gone again.  We did cover up the Swiss chard this time and protected them.  Also, for the first time on the trees life, I see lemon blossoms and we were able to save those so hopefully we might get some lemons next year.  The tree has been there eight years and the cold weather steals the blossoms off.  We will see if we can keep them on this year.

Tomatoes have produced one fruit so far and it was delicious.  The excellent vine ripe, old-timey tomato taste.  There are a bunch more ripening up.  I can't wait.  One of our supporters mentioned that his dad prayed over his plants and they produced well.  I figure it never hurts to pray.  That might just be the key ingredient needed to produce abundant fruit. :)

We planted eggplants, more lettuce, more carrots, more collards, red mizuna, more kohlrabi, cilantro, tropical pumpkin in the field and cucumbers in the greenhouse.  I again held myself back from planting beans.  This is the second time I got close to planting green beans and having them froze to the ground.  I'm not taking anymore chances and will wait one more week.  Then I will plant them with corn.  My favorite crop to grow!  I love to watch corn grow.  I'm not sure what it is but I really enjoy watching the crop.  We will be planting some cabbage, leeks, peppers, more tomatoes, bok choi, to the field and some basil in trays to transplant later.

The loquats are starting to ripen.  There is not much on the tree this year.  The stonefruits are blossoming.  Maybe there will be no more freezes...Maybe I could plant beans this weekend.

We would also like to welcome our newest and also our youngest supporter. Congratulations to the Pridgeon's on the arrival of Ethan. 7lbs 10 oz on Feb 1st at 1740. I know his momma is glad he is here at last! What a beautiful little baby! Congratulations guys! I hope he likes red mustard greens :)

Season's Start 2011

I've been somewhat dragging me feet to start the blog back because it is one of those things that will need to be done late at night when the kiddos are in bed and I have a few minutes to myself.  Well, we are off on our way to our 4th season at Steed Farms and the veggies are doing good.  Rain was well timed with our first planting and things got a good start.  Things have dried up considerably since mid October and we could use a few soaking rains.  Plants just do so much better with a rain instead of irrigation water.  We have had a few issues with some fungus on broccoli raab and some mites on our red kale but nothing too overwhelming. 

We planted two cover crops the first one has done well with perfect timing of rain.  I always try to sow the seeds before the rain.  The next cover crop was sown but the rain prediction was entirely wrong and we only got a fraction of the rain and the seeds that germinated died off.  So I'm not sure what I am going to do just yet. 

We added goats to the farm.  Well, at least a neighbor is leasing some of our back 1.5 acres for his goats.  I need to take a picture of them.  He did a great job of putting the fence up and is willing to offer goat meat to us.  I believe that the minimum amount he is allowed to sell under USDA rules is 1/4 of a butchered goat.  He would sell 1/2 to a whole butchered goat if you like.  We will send out an email if you are interested with prices.

Our pine trees that we planted all died again this year as our ground is so high and dry.  We got too dry in spring and early summer for them to establish.  So I am thinking of adding grass fed beef to our farm.  Stay tuned in to see how that goes.

On a sad note...my last blog post mentioned how we probably would not see some of our community members with the start of the fall season.  I didn't realize how prophetic that would be.  Many of our members will probably remember Karl Rossa.  The friendly gentleman who wore a Navy hat and loved to talk about the latest ongoings.  He passed away this October from a heart attack.  We are deeply saddened by his passing and he will be missed not only from our farm community but also our larger community.  Please keep Audrey and his family in your thoughts and prayers.  I was looking forward to giving him back a book he lent me over the summer "Internal Combustion".  I thought it might be nice to plant tree this weekend to celebrate his life.  We will miss you Karl.  I've included his obituary.  http://obits.dignitymemorial.com/dignity-memorial/obituary-print.aspx?n=Karl-Rossa&lc=1543&pid=153998083&mid=4841434

The New Pine Forest

We are almost done with our pine plantings on about 12 acres of our land. We had to act quickly to preserve our agricultural exemption because our citrus grove was declining rapidly. Sometimes the farming is about maximizing yields and returns, and sometimes it is about tax strategies and conserving your cash. We planted on last Saturday after getting our long leaf pines on the Friday night before. The pines came from Andrews Nursery a state of Florida Forestry Nursery. I opted for the long leaf trees because their habitat has dwindled because of their usefulness to man and the lessening of the fires that they have evolved with for thousands of years. They are somewhat slower than the other pines but catch up in later years and have a higher quality wood timber. We have pushed all the citrus trees over to help them dry out and die and have been working for a few months on the tedious process of pushing them into piles to burn. The heavy work of pushing was done on contract with a friend's dad and then we piled them with our tractor. Mostly my Dad has done this work. Then we disked the ground to eliminate weeds. But we have finally burned the last of the trees in the area we are to plant the pines and will be planting tomorrow.

We had the wonderful help of our friends and family to help plant and everybody came out on the coldest day of the year. A record setting day with sleet in the afternoon. That is one of the coldest days I can remember at the farm. It rained and barely got over the mid 30's. We rented a tranplanter machine that cuts the ground with a rolling blade and has a planting shoe where you place the bareroot pine seedling. Then two wheels pack in the soil around the tree. It was able to attach to the good ole Massey 431.

The good news is that we are planting about 9000 pines which we will now refer to as the Andrew Steed Pine Forest at Steed Farms. In acknowledgement to all the hard work that he has done. That is going to be a heck of a lot of carbon sequestration. It was even done organically! It makes me feel great to know that we are being good stewards of our land. I converse with a colleague at work about the fact that so few people take any notice of the environment around them. I had a neighbor walk through about 6 acres of pines to introduce himself and ask what we were doing with the land. It is laughable and quite sad at the same time. He probably stepped on quiet a few newly planted pines to get to me on the tractor.

The farm looks exceptionally large now and so clean. Bare soil and baby pine trees. I love it. Now just wait 30+ years for the trees to grow!

Our First CSA Member!

Congratulations to Heidi and her son Donovan for becoming our first CSA customers!

A CSA or community supported agriculture is a share of a harvest of the produce that we grow. The member takes some of the risk by paying up front for the produce that will be grown and harvested at a later time. It connects produce consumers with produce growers. It helps link farmers with the home dinner table and gives people an appreciation of where their food comes from. Heidi picked up her first share this past weekend. She found out about us through our local harvest website. I asked her what made her want to sign up and she said that she thought that our produce would be better than store bought produce. She conveyed that you never really know where the produce from the store has come from and how it was produced. I am really glad that she cares so much for where her produce comes from and how it was grown. It is wonderful to meet people that want to make a difference in their lives through what they eat and appreciating who grows the food they eat. Heidi paid $80.00 for four weeks of organically grown and freshly picked produce that she will pick up at the farm on Saturdays. I am glad that the joy and efforts of growing produce in a responsible manner can be appreciated beyond the farm. Donovan also learned where his carrots come from and had a great time pulling them out of the ground.

Go Gator Nation!

I visited my Alma mater last week as part of a job interview for Hillsborough county environmental horticulture extension agent. Which is an off-campus faculty member for UF. It is also nice to get another national championship title and have our star quarterback returning next year! I love to go to the Univ. of FL to see what has changed. I got to interview with some of the professors that taught me. It was a good experience. I also visited the student organic gardens next to Lake Alice and the Bat House. I arrived at the gardens at about 7:30 am and it was about 35 degrees F. But is was really nice to see what is growing out there. I saw some beautiful broccoli, cabbage, and a giant red mustard. I am going to try to grow some of those things at my farm. I also was able to break a piece of sugarcane off to grow out at my farm. I also picked some asparagus seeds and some dried luffa seeds. I will just play with them at the farm to see how they do. I also caught up with some advisers and I was introduced to a new professor, Dr. Danielle Treadwell. She spent a good while with me discussing organic vegetables and sustainability which is her area of expertise. I got some good ideas from her and a good bit of information which I will add to the next few posts just to spread it out.

I have ordered our seeds from Johhny's and Southern Exposure Seed Exchange. I am already looking forward to try out some new things and some new cultivars. I have also planted our some of our red onions and red potatoes this week. I have also planted some more mustard, kale, romaine lettuce (just to use up the seeds), and some butterhead lettuce.

This is a list of National resources from Dr. Treadwell of the University of Florida:

AFSIC. Alternative Farming Systems Information Center. http://afsic.nal.usda.gov/
The sustainable agriculture component of the National Agriculture Library.

ATTRA .(Formerly Appropriate Technology Transfer for Rural Areas and now known as the National Sustainable Agriculture Information Service) website: http://www.attra.org/
This site is sponsored by the USDA, and contains a wealth of information on sustainable agriculture, including organic production. Visit the pest management database (see below)

IFOAM International Federation of Organic Agriculture Movements. http://www.ifoam.org/
The premier international body of organic agriculture professionals. They publish an annual report on global organic statistics and provide guidance to certifying agencies world-wide.

National Organic Program. http://www.ams.usda.gov/nop/indexIE.htm
This site has information for consumers and growers on organic production in the US, including a complete copy of the standards.

NCAT Organic Crops Workbook. http://www.blogger.com/TALKS_2007/GardensGroves_BrevardCo_March31_07/www.attra.ncat.org
In collaboration with ATTRA, a very helpful workbook that guides producers through the process of certification, including creating an organic system plan for your operation.

OFRF Organic Farming Research Foundation http://www.ofrf.org/
From California, this non-profit organization serves the national organic community by providing research updates and grower survey results. They also offer small grants to growers for on-farm research projects.

SARE Sustainable Agriculture Research and Education http://www.sare.org/
SARE is a federally-funded program administered regionally in the U.S. The educational outreach component of SARE is SAN (Sustainable Agriculture Network). They have several online books that are very popular (see below)

Soil Quality Institute. http://soils.usda.gov/sqi/soil_quality/what_is/sqiinfo.html This website features information sheets on a variety of soil quality topics from the Natural Resource Conservation Service (NRCS)

Pumpkin Recipe

One of our blog readers who also ordered some pumpkin seeds sent us a recipe for pumpkin soup. He says it's like Texas Chili, you can tweak to your own taste. Use one large pot (3-4 qt) filled with peeled, cubed pumpkin. Add 5 cups water and 5 cubes of chicken bullion. 1 large onion, quartered. Boil for 30-40 minutes. Puree adding add 1 stick margarine or butter, about 1 tsp fresh ground pepper and 1/2 cup half and half or whole milk. You can add garlic, parsley or other spices to change.
We still have seeds if you would like them. Refer to our previous post on how to get them.

Our new plot is doing alright. We have been harvesting cucumbers, mustards, mint (first harvest this week), oregano, and bok choy. I planted more mustards, collards, kale, lettuce again, carrots again, and cilantro. The older collards are starting to get bigger and will be harvesting soon. The cucumbers got hurt by an early frost last week. I'm not sure how much longer they will produce. I also planted a cover crop of a fall mix from Johnny's seeds and a crimson clover crop. I want to try the two to see which works best. That really was good for our summer crop. It helped me identify a real winner.

The Future of Our Food

The Corner Store hosted a movie night and the starring attraction was the movie The Future of Our Food. We sat down with our root beer floats and our popcorn and gathered round the television in the dining area of the store. It was a great movie and made me even stronger in my commitment to produce organic vegetables and save our own seeds from our crops. The movie showcased the consolidation of seed companies by chemical companies like Monsanto and the bioengineering of our crop plants. These transformed plants are called genetically modified organisms. They have transformed plant genetics with virus, bacteria, and other organisms incorporated into the plant genome to create new species of life. This is to create a better agribusiness organism with better economic returns to the farmer and the chemical/seed companies. They however are running roughshod over the genetics of plants and are not being forthcoming on the impacts to the environment and other life forms including what the GMO's are doing to people eating those products. The movie highlighted a Canadian farmer who was saving his seed for a generation of farming and some of Monsanto's GMO Roundup Ready canola patented genes got into the genetics of this farmers seeds. He was sued by Monsanto and after a court battle to the Canadian Supreme Court lost to the biotech company. The court ruled that this farmer had infringed on the plant patent. And yet there was no explanation by Monsanto how their genetics got into his plant seeds and the court didn't care about this seemingly trivial fact. The future of our food supply looks bleak if corporate greed will be controlling our seeds and genetics of our crop plants. I think as Americans we should require labeling of GMO food inputs into our food supply. We should ask Congress to pass legislation that will change how GMO products become ingredients into our food supply. It should say on the packaging ingredients whether or not that products we buy contain GMO ingredients. We should also hold responsible companies that make GMO crops and make them pay for cleaning up the environment when their genetic patents escape the intended plants and are found elsewhere. If you get the chance please watch this movie, discuss, and then act!

Summer trials

Warm season trials

It has been a hectic couple of weeks at Steed Farms. Our whole family has been sick for the last couple of weeks, and I have flown to New York to share in the wedding of my cousin Bridget Steed. I met my brother Kevin, Dad, and four cousins from NY and two cousins that flew over from Ireland (Micheal Steed and his wife and Gavin Steed). Had a great time catching up. I designed my Brothers back corner for a garden and small orchard while I was visiting. He has a beautiful spread to work with. It is not too large to be much to manage but just the right size to be very quaint and productive.

After coming home I sold all our carrots to the Corner Store where they were having carrots as the featured item on a cooking class. I will miss not looking at them anymore and being impressed that I grew such a great carrot crop. I also sold them some cucumbers. We are at about 4 marketable cucumbers per plant at about .5 lbs per cucumber. That's not bad yields. They still look like they are going strong.

We are harvesting blackberries, blueberries, zucchini, and some tiny peaches. I can't seem to get my peaches to size up on the trees. They keep dropping off at about 1.5 - 2 inches. The bad thing is that they seem ripe. If any one knows what I am doing wrong please let me know. Our squashes are all virus infected and the melons are starting to go downhill from powdery and downy mildews. That happens every year. They form great fruit and almost make it to maturity and then the vines die. Cucurbit crops are hard to grow down hear organically. Our tomatoes are the best tomatoes I have ever grown. they look great and have a load of fruit on them now. The pepper and eggplant look fine now as well. The topical pumpkins are doing very well right now. They have huge flowers as big as my hand and tiny pumpkins started.

Tropical pumpkin female flowers

I have tied up the pole beans, eggplants, and tomatoes. I have also top dressed with the 8-2-4 over most of the plants. My daughter also helped me plant the ornamental corn.

Spring Blossoms Forth New Life

Welcome Baby Nathan!

Welcome to the newest member of the Steed Farm and clan! Nathan Thomas Steed came into this world on March 31, 2008 16:05. He weighed 7lbs, 13 oz. and was 20.5 inches long. He is doing very well and Jennifer is doing great as well. His big sister Anna (20 months old) is handling her role quite well. Thank God everything went well. Jenn gave birth entirely natural. I am extremely proud of how well she did through the whole process. I had forgotten how little sleep we get in the beginning. I find it so miraculous that a child can go from not breathing air to inhaling his first breath in seconds. There will be plenty of work and play waiting for you Nathan as soon as you are ready for it!

A Carolina wren hiding in her nest.

Each year, much the same way that the return of the swallows at San Juan Capistrano, or the first Robins of the spring appear, or the return of the monarch butterflies are heralded, I too have inflection points throughout the year. Signposts of the season that remind me of the cyclical nature of the year. At our farm I always anticipate the finding of the Carolina wren nests in spring time. You can usually see them darting to and fro in the late winter hunting for a meal and nest sites. I have had them nest in tractors, one gallon stacked pots, and mostly in our shop. We have had them every year that I have occupied this farm. Sometimes they will have a couple of nest in a year. This year my father went to grab those pruners that you see in the picture and the mother wren flew out from her nest and scared the daylights out of him. I almost did the same thing until I caught sight of the nest. You can barely see her, but I assure you there is a mother wren sitting on four eggs in this nest. We always work around the nesting mothers since I like having them about. They are after all fun to watch and free pest control.

Goodbye Leo

Leo chilling out in the ryegrass cover crop

Our market booth this last week.

We had a loss of a good friend at our farm this last week. Leo our 9 month old cat was struck by a car on the highway that borders our farm. I don't particularly like cats since I am allergic to them, but this cat was very special. He showed up at our house after a semi had crashed into our tree out front. He was very friendly and not the least bit shy. Leo was very cannine like. He would walk with me and Copper around the perimeter of our farm twice a day while I checked everything in the morning and evening. He would just trot along side of us as we did the rounds. I had just started to warm up to him when I saw him catching and eating grasshoppers in the organic trials. The day before he died he came over and sat underneath me as I harvested crops. He just sat there being as nice as could be and nuzzled my hands as I worked. I even began to think that I was really getting to like this cat. He got along great with the whole family as well as Copper. He did not show up in the morning for our walk. It was not highly unusual for him to miss our morning walk but it was odd none-the-less. Jenn confirmed the death before I could get home. I retrieved him from the road and buried him beneath the oak tree he used to hang out by and ambush squirels and Copper. You will be missed Leo. I am still trying to find a picture of him to post.

This past week I planted out the red lettuce and escarole. We have almost finished planting all our seed trays. We are still waiting on one last order of herbs. I have been trying to line up getting some horse manure for the fruit trees and the spring/summer trials. It has been difficult with the lack of a proper dump trailer. I might have to break down and buy one. I have mowed down the cover crop. It was amazing how much underground biomass was created with the crop. I pulled a clup of the earth out and it was covered with roots. I never really thought about how much the underground parts of the plant contribute to the whole picture. I guess it is a bit of out of sight, out of mind. I was very impressed.

I have all the seeds in for the next crop and am itching to plantinto the field. We have been planting the seeds in seedling trays and peat pots. They have been emerging over the course of the week. I will begin to pull them from the house this week and move them outside to get a little stronger.

The market faired a little better. We only sold half of the oranges we brought and all the veggies, which wasn't very much. I sold some plants which helped the over all picture. Increasing our prices seemed to help the overall economics.