Spring is Here at Our Tiny Farm!

Our girls produce the best tasting eggs!

It is the second full day of spring and it is a GLORIOUS day!  Warm and sunny, with a gentle breeze.  It doesn't get much better than this.  It is perfect weather for working the soil, planting spring crops, cleaning and repairing equipment, picking up branches, etc. 

We hope to expand our tiny farming operation this season. Hubby has serious back, hip, and shoulder issues to deal with, so it is all about finding what works with what we have to give to the place. Hubby is still working out his plans for the steer; how long to keep them and how to sell the meat.  I'm tending towards getting another season of grass feeding in and using a CSA type arrangement to sell eighths, quarters, and halves. But, the grass-fed beef is his thing. 

One of the decisions I have to make is whether we should get into small-scale commercial egg production or just keep 6 to 8 hens to produce eggs for home use with a little left for bartering.  We've pretty much decided not to do meat birds, but I do enjoy the eggs.  I will put a pencil to paper later this week and figure out how many hens we would need to actually make any money at it.

We do want to increase honey, vegetable, berry, and herb production.  And we need to talk to our daughter about whether she wants to do any flower sales or not.  We are increasing production of asparagus, garlic, potatoes, popcorn, and winter squash this year.

We have signed up to be day vendors at the Mills River Farmers Market on Hwy 280.  Being a day vendor means we won't be there every week.  We are easing into this slowly because we don't want to get in over our heads, especially since I have a demanding full-time job that often has me out nights and weekends.  I would love to include some value-added food products to our sales, but our kitchen would never pass inspection for that purpose (because of the dog and cats), so I might look for a commercial kitchen in the community to use.  I have some wonderful recipes using fresh vegetables and herbs that I would love to share with you.   

Here are some pictures from the past few months on Our Tiny Farm

The steer (or is it "steers"?) battling it out on a sunny winter day.

They are growing up nicely, don't you think?

The animals produce lots of "black gold" for our gardens; management of which is made much easier with a little heavy equipment.

Aged manure was worked into the vegetable garden area in February.

The "Anne" magnolia is beautiful with a heavenly scent (March 22).

The garlic looks good for mid-March; ready for the first side-dressing of organic fertilizer.

Prepping the area for potatoes and peas; we all take turns with the tiller.

The steer enjoying the fresh spring grass!

Daffodil season is almost over.

These girls are going into their 4th season and they are still producing LOTS of eggs!

Our Tennessee Walker is a "mature horse", so we are very cautious in the spring to prevent colic and founder. That means restricting access to the pasture when the grass and clover start growing rapidly.  Like right now. He's not too happy about the situation and will do his best to try to open the paddock gate!

Wow, I have some catching up to do!

My on-line presence seems to be getting away from me!  Between my work and home lives, I (try to) maintain two FB accounts, two Twitter accounts, three websites, and three blogs.  Sometimes things fall through the cracks and obviously this time it was this blog.  So, I'll do a little updating on what's been going on around Our Tiny Farm for the past few months.

We built the steer a manger.  A really big manger!  And it works great.  It's positioned close enough to the fence line that we can just toss the hay over the fence into the manger.  Helps us move through the evening chores with ease (especially welcome on those really cold winter nights).

The horse and donkey are also faring well this winter.  By closing the doors on one side of the barn, they have a cozy place to sleep when the wind is howling.

I attended the Carolina Farm Stewardship Association's Sustainable Agriculture Conference in Winston-Salem in early December. We got the first snowfall of the season while we were there.  The snow was really pretty; I took this picture from my hotel room.  And the conference was great, too. 

We've had lots of snow at the farm, too.  It is so beautiful.  Just wish it didn't make getting around so difficult!

We currently live with four cats and a dog in the house.  There is no way to keep up with all the fur these animals shed, but they sure are entertaining.  I just thought this was the cutest shot of three of the felines!

Christmas morning the ground was clear when we went out to do the morning chores.  This is what the front pasture looked like by about 1:00 in the afternoon.  It was truly a "white Christmas"!

Winter evenings are good for cooking yummy meals and creating all kinds of useful crafts.  Right now I'm into knitting and crocheting with soft, hand-dyed yarns.  I crocheted this shawl for my sister-in-law, Bette.  It has lots of mohair in it and is wonderfully warm and cuddly. 

Earlier this month I particpated in the Southeastern Fruit and Vegetable Conference in Savannah where I took this beautiful winter shot by the river.

One of my employees gave me an amaryllis for Christmas.  It bloomed the other day!

So now I'm caught up.  I'll try to do better in the future.





Our Day Long Thanksgiving Menu

Photo from TasteofHome.com

We don't stand much by tradition at Our Tiny Farm. Matter of fact, we often get bored with it. And making the same thing every holiday is one of those traditions my family decided we could definitely live without.  Last year we made fondue feasts for both Thanksgiving and Christmas.  We had cheese fondues, broth fondues for cooking meats, and chocolate fondues.  This year when we first began discussing it, my daughter suggested doing Breakfast for Thanksgiving.  At first we all went, "What?"  But then we got to talking and planning and before we knew it we had some great ideas going.  A few days later my daughter brought home the Taste of Home Easy Breakfast and Brunch magazine and we quickly created a menu for the day.  Instead of having one big feast, we decided to have six courses spread throughout the day.  The first course was offered at 8 am and the last at 10 pm.  That way, the cooking never got frenzied, we never overstuffed ourselves, and we had time throughout the day to walk, be with the animals, play on the computer, read, etc.  Whenever we could we used vegetables and herbs raised in our own gardens, and of course, we used our own farm-fresh eggs. 

I mentioned this Thanksgiving plan on my work-oriented Facebook account and several people expressed interest in knowing what we were having.  So throughout the day I Twittered our courses.  For posterity's sake, I thought I would also document our menu here.  Most of these recipes came from the magazine described above and I think all of them can be accessed on tasteofhome.com.

First Course:
Sausage egg casserole (put together the night before)
Home fries (hubby's recipe; using our own potatoes and peppers)
Lots of fresh coffee

Second Course
Pumpkin pancakes (made with our own Seminole pumpkins)
Thick cut, pepper bacon
Fresh fruit salad
Screwdrivers

Third Course
Gingerbread waffles
Maple sausage patties
Screwdrivers

Fourth Course
Flaky biscuits with sausage gravy
Savory herbed scrambled eggs (our own eggs and herbs, of course)
Fresh fruit

Fifth Course
Ham-egg paninis (with our own eggs)
Fresh Davis cranberry relish

Sixth Course
Pecan-pumpkin pie (our pumpkins, of course)
Rich chocolate mousse
Coffee

Now I can't wait to see what we'll come up with for Christmas!

Jeanine Will Be Speaking at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens on Nov. 4 and 6

Photo from the Atlanta Botanical Gardens website

This weekend I'm prepping for my presentations at the Atlanta Botanical Gardens on November 4 and 6, 2010. 

On Thursday evening, I will be giving a lecture entitled "Exotic and Edible: Unusual Plants and Fungi for Home Gardens".  My objective is to get my audience of gardeners to "think outside the box".  Often when I talk to people about growing something new and different in their gardens, they mention new varieties or unusual forms of a common vegetable, e.g., purple cauliflower or white tomatoes.  In this presentation I want to introduce people to crops they might never have heard of or never thought about growing themselves.  Some of these plants or fungi are easy to grow, but others are challenging and only a few gardeners will be successful producing them.  But what fun, huh?  Wouldn't you like to be the first in your neighborhood growing wasabi, hops, or truffles?

Free Alston Lecture, Thursday, November 4, 2010 at 7 p.m.  No reservations required.

Then on Saturday, I will be offering a full-day workshop on "Growing Your Own Pharmacy".  This will be directed at home gardeners, but people who are interested in perhaps doing this commercially will also gain a lot from the workshop.  There will be several colorful Powerpoint presentations illustrating 20 or more medicinal herbs to grow in the sun and shade and how to grow, harvest, and dry herbs.  There will also be two hands-on activities.  One on making simple tinctures and another on propagating medicinal herbs.  All attendees will go home with "tinctures in process" and several potted plants.

Workshop is Saturday, November 6, 2010 from 10 am to 3 pm with lunch included.  $75 ($65 for garden members).  Reservations are required.  Contact the Botanical Garden directly for that information.

Atlanta Botanical Garden

Now, off to the stores to buy some of my supplies!  This is going to be so much fun!!!

Early Fall on Our Tiny Farm

 Beautybush

What a glorious fall we are having in western North Carolina!  After the hottest summer on record, I think we are all enjoying the cool temperatures, gentle breezes, clear blue skies, and the brilliant colors that our area is so well known for.  If you have never visited western North Carolina, this is the time of year you should choose to come.  This is when those of us who live here walk around thinking to ourselves, THIS is why we live here. It is SO BEAUTIFUL!

Our chickens enjoying fresh corn from the garden.

Life on the farm keeps us all busy.  The chickens are in various stages of molting.  They look so pitiful at this stage.  Makes some of them a little nasty, too.  We are fortunate this year that they aren't all molting at one time (that's what they did last year), so we are still getting some egg production. We have already replaced the chicken wire and sheet plastic on the coop and run, so all we have to do for the winter yet is throw a fresh coat of paint on. 

Our own Japanese hulless popcorn.

We grew our own popcorn for the first time this year.  We grew a heirloom variety that I picked up at a seed swap.  It is called "Japanese Hulless Popcorn".  It did great!  Easy to grow; no worms.  We harvested it all when we thought it was dry.  Then we spread it out on a table in the house and test popped a few kernels every few days.  When better than 90% popped, we shucked it and put it into the glass jars like you see in the picture.  It is very good popcorn.  One ear is ruby red, so we are saving most of it for planting next year.

The fall garden is producing spectacularly!  We have an abundance of Seminole pumpkins, butternut squash, bok choy, lettuce, peppers, end of season tomatoes, and leeks coming off right now.  The basil, broccoli, cauliflower, and summer squash are still growing.  And there are lots of herbs tucked up close to the house where they are protected from the early frosts.  The cellar is packed with pumpkins, winter squash, and potatoes. The freezers have a rainbow of great looking vegetables stacked neatly inside. The honey is in jars and waiting on the shelves for hot biscuits and cups of tea.  Life is good.

  Donkey had an abscess!

I'm happy to report that Murphy's Law is still functioning well at Our Tiny Farm.  Early in the month my dear hubby and I were all packed and ready to head to Charlottesville, VA for the Heritage Harvest Festival.  We went out to feed the animals before we left when we discovered the donkey was lame.  This is the donkey who has never been sick or hurt in his entire life.  But the one and only day this year that we both plan to "get away for the weekend", the donkey is lame.  We were so fortunate that the vet could come right out, find and treat the abscess, and reassure us that it really was okay for us to leave for a few days.  The fun would be when we got home and had to soak his foot for fifteen minutes twice a day for about five days.  That was an interesting experience, but no one got hurt!

  New flashing put on the barn.

Last winter was long, cold, and very wet.  We had snow on the ground from mid December through mid March.  That is very unusual for us here in the southern mountains and we really weren't prepared for it. Much of the winter the barn floor was a muddy mess.  It was not comfortable for the animals and I worried about their feet all winter.  So we decided to remedy that problem.  We are raising the floor of the barn.  We put more treated lumber on the bottom of the walls, put on flashing to prevent moisture damage, raised all the doors, graded away from the building, put a very thick layer of fine gravel inside, and built new ramps to the doors.  Tomorrow the new sawdust arrives to spread over the gravel.  It was quite a task, but now it is a very nice barn!.  

 

The big pile of "screenings" used to build up the barn floor. 

The next tasks on the list include building a run-in for the cattle, getting in our hay, and putting up a small greenhouse.  We never seem to run out of things to do around here! 

It's been a busy time at the farm.

It's been a busy time at the farm and work the past few weeks.  Here are a few photos to show what we've been up to and the beauty of this time of year in western North Carolina.

You can see how big the calves have grown.  Hubby has them trained to come when he whistles or shakes a bucket with feed.

 

The hens love fresh sweet corn. I like this picture because all the white hens are on one ear and the Cornish are all on the other.

This is a picture of some of the Beautyberry on our farm; purple and white varieties.

I took a hike at DuPont State Forest yesterday. Here are a few pictures I snapped.

Donkeys are Just SO CUTE!

If you follow my blog you know I have a standard sized donkey and I think he is the greatest donkey in the world and I tell him so every day.  But tonight I took a stroll down our lane and discovered that our neighbor's miniature donkeys had babies!!!  They are so cute, I just had to share some pictures.