Picked a couple of hundred pak choi in the (11 degrees C) greenhouse. Seedlings coming on on the heat table (20 degree C) for the lettuce (similar to Cos). Pak Choi really lush and green, sometimes have a yellowing on the underside (mildew) so need to be cleaned up a tad and sometimes 3 in a bag if small. Baby chicks arrived and put on heat, nice drip feeder for the bigger chickens. Picked loads of lush Kale today, easy crop to harvest and lovely snapping sound when picking. Here's a pick of the crop;

It's a Kale forest!!

                                         
                                                                 Bagging up for an order

Just a small detraction from growing and a picture from Ella to celebrate True God's Day 2012...

Ella is year of tiger, Gloria year of the ox, Olly the dragon, Lily the rabbit, Archie the horse and Merlin the rooster as is Bogusia. I'm a pig but enough said about that ;)

And I cannot resist Archie's picture just before his up and coming haircut. Einstein and go go?

Back to the growing. I sowed some lettuce and radish in our unheated greenhouse and they are sprouting forth, hurrah. Also have some early onion seeds in the propagator in the garage. Will see what happens there. Got a visit from Martin Macky from Ripple Farm today. They are a very good local supplying organic set up near Canterbury (Godmersham) which incidentally has links with Jane Austen I believe.

The Zoltanator

I worked my first season with Zoltan from Hungary and we were a very good team. He's moved on now to be a chef but I'll never forget the times we sweated like crazy (40 degrees plus) whilst winding on and de-sideshooting the toms in the greenhouse, winding on and picking the cucs. And also freezing our fingers

 off cutting caulis in sub zero temperatures in the field.

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            It's amazing what you do in one season on a farm. I can also remember picking up potatoes into sacks, loading bales of hay, picking up pumpkins for harvest, weeding leeks (back breaking), picking broad beans amongst a ton of may weed, picking up onions into boxes, steerage hoeing (good fun but difficult), planting on the planter, moving the irrigation system, putting the strings up for cucs and toms, picking cherry tomatoes into November, clearing the greenhouses, wrapping up trickle tape, rolling up ground sheeting and dumping it with the dumper.

              Traying up cherry tomatoes, sowing squash seeds in the compost, hoeing celeriac, tieing up runner beans and staking them out with the post driver(hard work). Putting out and rolling up rabbit fencing. Pulling up canes after french beans harvest, carrying out plants to be hardened off and giving more space. Planting lettuce and pak choi in the greenhouse, watering plants with the wand and speading vermiculite on the seeds to be sown, weeding around the sweetcorn, picking sprouts for Christmas, feeding the chickens, picking apples and blackberries for the shop, picking spinach, chard, kale and rainbow chard, washing leeks down and weighing them, digging up celeriac, trimming it, washing, weighing and netting, bagging up spuds, labelling eggs, netting up squash and pumpkins, cutting red, tundra, white cabbage, purple caulis, leeks etc, broccoli too, planting, irrigating, setting up, mowing around and finally picking runner beans, the list goes on forever.

Harvest last summer

Here's another vid from the summer this time driving back to the barn after harvesting some ufo squash, spinach, spring green, chard etc. Check the fleeces over the crops to protect from pigeon, slug, insect damage and from frosts in winter.

Summer baling

Nice to see the sun and blue sky. We were bailing and loading up the trailer. Great fun and a good work out. PS I will remember to hold the camera on it's side from now on :\. Most farmers use those machines that spin plastic covers on the circular bales. This machine makes old style rectangular bales and we stacked them by hand.

Multispanning

Pulled some green garlic out of the multi-span at work. About 10 bunches for market. They just self-seeded. Picked mustard leaves (red and green), pak-choi (which were a bit holey due to slug damage), black and green kale (very hardy), spring greens (really nice looking) and 6 large boxes of spinach which sell very well. Absolutely freezing today, frost on the windscreen in the evening and very cold standing in the barn packing. I will start adding pictures to these blogs soon but for now will link up to other pages. Those spring greens at the Eden project look really nice.

 

                        On the back of the old trailer passing the multispan, off to pick some spinach. Sorry but you will have to lean over for a good view :)

Machete mania

Been clearing out the greenhouse at work, it's about the size of a soccer pitch. Just one section though. Lifted the heavy irrigation pipes to the side, rolled up the sheets that stop the weeds and put all the debris into the dumper. Next, lit up the gas torch and burned all the holes where tomatoes had been to kill any disease. Looks good now, ready for new life:)

Also been stripping leeks, cutting cabbage (red), picking spinach and chard and feeding the sheep hay. Nice warm weather for December.

Here's a short vid of me going to cut leeks, the machetes are really good for cutting them, caulis and cabbages but they get blunt after a while so we carry oil stone sharpeners. You pull the leeks up, sometimes they are really stuck in, keeping them low and shaking the mud off. If it is wet this is some task as you end up wearing half the field on your boots. You then lay the leeks down in a row so they don't get covered in stripped leaves or mud. Taking a heavy wooden box we cut the roots off leaving about a cm on and strip the outer two leaves or any ragged ones. Then chop the leaves leaving about half the green showing. You have to keep the box moving as soon you are standing in a big pile of leaves.

             Drove to Sussex to deliver veg, didn't see any deer this time (Ashdown Forest). Sometimes, especially around dusk the deer jump out in front of me. You have to always be on your guard in the woods. It is an amazing area with lovely open spaces and nice views. Cattle and sheep wander about in a sort of reserve grazing by the side of the  road with no fencing.
           On my route I drive through a small stream in the road at the bottom of a hill, really quaint.I'll get a picture next time.
            This is Winnie the Pooh country and I drive through the village where Christopher Robin bought candy (Hartfield). There are lots of references to the characters around the area.

Starting off..

One of the children scaling a pine on our trip out foraging. Loads of wood ants around here. Hope y'all enjoy my blog. I'm loading up all last years vids and pics from local organic farm work. Then I'll be up to date.