Where did the summer go?

Pearson Falls-a local treasure

There just are not enough hours in the day and I'm afraid that the farm blog has suffered as a result. Yes, Our Tiny Farm is alive and well, but due to circumstances outside our control, we did not sell at the tailgate market as we had planned. We did, however, grow lots of great food that we are enjoying immensely and we will have some items for sale shortly, such as garlic and honey.  Here is a brief update on our season. Oh,  I included a picture of the waterfall because I took a trip down to Pearson Falls one summer morning. So beautiful and peaceful there. You should check it out!)

The county we are located in was part of Cherokee nation for thousands of years. We live in the community of Etowah, which is Cherokee name. We have found some artifacts over the years, but this spring my husband found this large, complete, well-tooled arrowhead in our vegetable garden.

This was the season of the cat. Why do people think it is okay to dump cats off at farms? This little sweetheart showed up early in the season. She was so scrawny, but so friendly. We started to feed her and she quickly adopted us. Since we already have four cats, we could not take her into our home. Cats don't seem to last long in the outdoors around us because of predators, so we didn't feel comfortable making her a "barn cat". Fortunately, a friend from work adopted her.

The garden was highly productive this season. The potato, garlic, and pepper crops in particular were quite bountiful!  We grew kohlrabi for the first time in many years and I really enjoyed cooking with it. Cut into match sticks and sauteed in butter with salt and pepper--yum!

We still have horses and a donkey, too. Maybe a few too many for the size of our pastures. Using portable electric fencing to rotate the animals around and let parts of the pasture recover has been a great management practice for us.

To have healthy pastures, you have to take care of them. One of our maintenance items this fall was to lime the field. Southern States showed up with a larger truck than usual and it just fit between the gate posts!

This was the first evening when that golden fall light was evident. The seasons were starting to change and signaled us that it was time to think about stocking up on firewood, hay, and cover crop seed.

This was the third cat to show up this season (the second one didn't stay around long). I was cooking a pot roast on Saturday and had the kitchen window open. I think the smell of the roast attracted her and she hasn't left since. She was SOOOO skinny and disheveled on Saturday; didn't know if she would make it. But we gave her food and water and put the old dog igloo shelter out there for her with a blanket and she is filling out and grooming herself. We would love to have someone adopt her! The no-kill shelters are full, we can't take in another cat, and I don't think she will survive the winter outside.

We are in the process of getting more young steers this fall. So if you are interested in buying a quarter or a half let us know so you will be the first we contact when the meat is ready.

Build Your Own Drag Chain Harrow (Manure Rake for Your Pasture)

We have small pastures on Our Tiny Farm, so good manure management is very important.  For several years, we managed manure by regularly walking the pastures with a wheelbarrow and fork and transporting it all to our compost pile, just like we do with the manure from the barn and paddock.  The manure based compost is one of the keys to our productive gardens, and collecting manure is good exercise (I tell myself as I do it), but it is a time-consuming process and hubby has a bad back which is not cut out for this kind of activity anymore.  During the growing season in particular, there just aren't enough hours in the day, so we began looking for other ways to manage the horse and donkey manure in our pastures.

I learned that if you break up the manure piles and spread them thinly across the field, the manure dries and breaks down quickly, fertilizing the pasture and killing most of the parasites.  Then I looked up "drag chain harrows" and found a great selection available to pull behind a tractor, ATV, or riding lawn mower.  But the prices were $200 and up.  There was no way I could justify that kind of expense.  So, I showed pictures of those drag chains to my son and hubby and they created one for us that didn't cost us a penny.  I love it!  It might not be pretty, but it works great.

We use the drag chain from early spring through late fall.  Once the temperatures are cold enough that the grasses and clovers aren't growing anymore, we resort back to collecting the manure in a wheelbarrow and hauling it out to the compost pile.  This is much easier and faster to do in the winter, however, because the grass is short, the ground is hard, and the manure piles (which are often frozen) are easy to scoop up.

Here are some pictures of the drag chain my we built and us using it for the last time this season.

Our Extension Agent Paid Us a Visit on the Farm

One of the pastures where we plan to put the cattle

My husband is a former county extension agent and I have been a state extension specialist for over 20 years.  In all that time we have never had an extension agent visit our own farm.  Mostly that was because we didn't ever need one since we grow vegetables, fruits, and ornamentals and both of us are horticulturists.  But in recent years, mostly in response to hubby's physical limitations, we have been expanding into animal husbandry and neither of us is trained in that discipline.  We have a horse, a donkey, and six chickens and now we want to add beef cattle.  All our neighbors who raise cattle say how easy it is, but neither of us knows ANYTHING about raising cattle!  We've read books, consulted websites and blogs, and talked to friends and neighbors, but we still have many questions.  Also, we are cooperating with a conservation group to use the cattle for management of some of their property which is adjacent to ours and it is not all in pasture.  We have questions about what the cattle would forage on there and how much we would have to supplement their feed and with what.

So yesterday, the local county extension agent who handles cattle, pastures, and such came out to the farm and spent quite a bit of time with my husband and someone from the conservation group.  He advised them on what kind of cattle management system to use, breeds, marketing, pasture management, supplemental feed, shelter, and resources.  He was very helpful and friendly and my husband said it was kind of fun to be on the receiving end.