Recently in Farm Life Category

For all you city-dwellers who dream about moving to the country and becoming more self-sufficient, there's an auction coming up this Saturday you might be interested in attending.

Follow this link to see a few pictures of the four acres up for bid, and Jeff Potts at Potts Auction told me they'd be having an open house on the property on Thursday, Oct. 1 at 6:00 pm. 

The property is in south Catoosa County, which is a very pretty place to live! 

Where has the summer gone?  It seems like just last week we were harvesting our first heirloom tomatoes, yet on Friday I found myself pulling up the t-posts to clean up the tomato garden.  The garden clean up is in preparation for what will be for our biggest fall crop planting ever.  The plots not planted will be seeded in cover crop to replenish the soil. 

Thanks for the wonderful feedback you've given us at the market this summer, and based on your comments (and your purchases) we've invested in what you've told us you want to buy and enjoy.  So far, we have hundreds of heads of lettuce in the ground with a couple thousand more soon to be planted.   In addition, we've planted some fall root crops like carrots, beets, turnips and radishes.  Fall greens include cabbage, kale and collards, and the broccoli was such a great performer this spring that we are bringing it back and adding cauliflower.  The arugula looks great and should be available in a couple of weeks. 

Because I just can't seem to let go of summer, I am experimenting with some later than usual plantings of summer squash and french filet beans.  It will be interesting to see how these crops grow and perform this late in the season.  My friend, Mark Tant, from Tant Hill Farm tells me that the Farmers Almanac is calling for a warmer than usual fall - perfect! 

Burns Best Farm is expanding into some new areas that we will write more about in future posts.  The big news is that we have acquired our first piglets and we intend to raise and market this fine quality pork to our customers.  We've had a lot of interest in this venture already because of the strong interest in locally grown pastured meats.

Lastly, we made the jump this summer into Facebook and we have a fan page for Burns Best Farm.  If you are a Facebooker and want to keep track of special events on our fan page, or better yet, leave us comments that we know for sure we'll be able to access (don't get me started on blog comments on Moveable Type!), please join us there as we build a community of people who appreciate clean, locally grown food.

Until next time... keep buying local!

Mike

It's nice and sunny here in Ringgold.... at the moment.  It's Friday evening and we just had a very heavy rain with some good size hail here at the farm.  The stormy weather today and cold snap earlier this week have been hampering our ability to plant our crops.  It seems that when it is about dry enough to work the soil we get hit with more rain.  The fields then take a good 4-5 days to dry out enough to even begin to think about working.  Working a wet field will result in clumps and rough ground the rest of the summer - not good.  Here's a picture of a wet field.

We feel like we dodged much freeze damage on Tuesday night but it looks like the hail today has knocked several of the blueberry blooms to the ground.  We won't know the true extent of damage for a while.  The blackberries are in good shape because they are not in bloom.  William likes to collect the hail.

In the meantime, we have several trays in the greenhouse that are ready for a new home in the ground.

I guess this is the life of the farmer/weather watcher.  I'm not a very patient farmer.  Maybe we should grow rice?  We certainly have the paddies for it right now. Have a great day!

Our weather today was unseasonably cold. We saw periodic snow showers until about 1:00 this afternoon, with high wind that blew the flakes sideways. Last night (Monday night) gave us temps into the mid/low 30's but we did not see any freeze action.  Tonight may be another story:  our local weatherman has forecasted temps as low as 27*F, but we've also heard 29* and 30*.  All of which are below freezing.

This is a blueberry bush in close to full bloom.  Pardon the flash, but I took this photo tonight. I plan to photograph this same bush tomorrow as a compare/contrast exercise to see if tonight's low temps have any impact on the blossoms.

Two years ago, just 7 weeks after we moved from Atlanta to the farm to live full-time, the entire northern half of Georgia suffered a once-in-a-century deep freeze.  Today is the anniversary of the first day of those horribly low temperatures (it dropped into the high teens at night and did not climb out of the high 20's for three days straight.)  After dinner tonight, Mike and I did the only thing we knew to do:  we covered ten bushes with plastic tarps in hopes of protecting the blooms.

Last week gave us warm days which accelerated the blooms on several varieties of blueberry bushes. We have about 6 different varieties planted in the hope that if we had a late freeze like the one forecasted tonight, the later blooming bushes would still have fruit if the early bloomers got zapped.  And tomorrow's temps, and those forecasted for later this week, are also going to be warm and sunny.  It's just tonight.

We are praying for God to send warmth and wind to protect our plants and thus our harvest. It is completely out of our hands.  Blessed be the Name of the Lord, no matter what happens. 

I have always wondered how the Egg Hunt became a traditionally observed activity.  Even as a kid, I thought it was kind of strange to dye eggs different colors and then hide them. The church where we attended when I was small used to have a real competition (back when kids were allowed to lose in public, or better yet, back when one kid was allowed to win over all the others!) and the Easter egg hunt was hotly contested.  I don't remember ever winning, but I remember being mad about losing.

All those memories have flooded back to mind the last three weeks as we've been experimenting with one set of the penned chickens.  These hens are some of the first flock we ordered and we've been moving them around the property every day or so for the last two years. The pen (bottomless, which allows them to scratch, peck, eat grass and bugs) has been in slow-motion structural decline and almost three weeks ago, one smart chicken got through the plastic mesh netting we'd thrown over the top to keep critters out. 

I had one hen on the loose, but I caught her pretty quickly and put her back in.  When I woke up the next morning, she was back out, and she'd brought a friend with her.  Two out, eight in the pen.

Being outside was better than being cooped up (pun intended) so those two stayed on the lam and one more ventured out through the hole in the net. All of a sudden, I had three free range chickens, a Rhode Island Red and two Aracuanas. Chickens are not terribly brave (that's why we use "chicken" as a playground insult) so they stick pretty close to their friends in the pen and we've provided them with water and some feed.  But mostly, they wander around and scratch up weeds and bugs and grubs. And they are fertilizing the field where the lettuce/beets/arugula/cherry tomatoes will be growing this summer.

And then, I started to find the occasional egg.  I figured they were laying somewhere, but I could never catch any of them in the act to know where they were nesting.  I found one blue egg, laid by one of the Aracuanas, in a bucket that was turned on its side two weeks ago, on the rainy day.  But nothing else for almost a week.

Then I started to look very closely, slowing down from the usual rush of chicken chores to walk carefully and really notice what is always sitting around. And here, in the blackberry plants-in-pots, I found another Aracuana nesting spot.

Here is the spot where I found the treasure trove last weekend.  In the corner where the basement wall meets the porch/shed foundation, the Aracuanas both laid 8 eggs in four days, all piled up on top of each other.  I was so excited to stumble on their secret cache that I scooped them all up and forgot to take a picture!

Today's new location is on the gravel floor of the greenhouse.  We've been leaving the door open in this nice weather and both the Rhode Island and one of the Aracuanas shared a quiet corner to leave me these gifts.

Now, I walk through the yard deliberately, with a basket handy to gather whatever little presents these funny hens decide to provide us each day.  There are now five hens on the outside and the new two are scouting out new locations; I follow them with my attention, if not my actual presence so as not to scare them off.  It's just like the Easter Egg Hunt at church, except these taste much better, the colors are much prettier, and I'm the Winner Every Day!

....if you go metal detecting after supper with no pants on.

Thankfully it was still in the 60's when he wandered outside to dig for treasure.  And there is Elmo underwear beneath the tunic top! 

Once in a while we get a dose of snow here in Northwest Georgia.  The snow is usually just a dusting that quickly melts the next day but it's enough for some boys to battle in a quick snowball fight.  This was the scene tonight when we got home from our Wednesday night small group.  I launched the first volley and it was "GAME ON"!  I lasted about 10 minutes until the lack of preparation (i.e. gloves) got the best of me.  William and Cooper lasted a little longer until they saw my hot chocolate.

Enjoy your winter wherever you are!

 We are blessed with the arrival of Zta Kate Burns.  Born yesterday evening (December 20).  Mom and Baby are doing very well.  Grandparents and brothers are thrilled.  Dad is very proud!

7lbs. 1oz.

20 inches

Hair - Thick and dark like a Burns! :)

What a Chrismas gift!  God Bless - Mike

I promised everyone an update on the visit from my Dad.  As anticipated, it was less than a couple of hours before he was out in the garden pulling weeds.  We managed to tame some of the weeds but when you grow without sprays and pesticide this is a never ending task.  We also have a nice organized basement/packing area with storage shelves for all of our tomatoes and produce - I couldn't have done this without his help.

We are very grateful for the help around the farm and the boys enjoyed spending time with their Grandpa.  Grandpa also got to see our oldest, Cooper, get baptised as well as watch Eston enjoy a birthday cake with three candles.  

Dad has made it safely back to Kansas and is having a restful "vacation" from his vacation at Burns Best Farm.

We love you Dad!

Tonight I was working out in the tomato patch and noticed some black droppings by a few of our Green Zebra plants.  This could only mean one thing - the dreaded tomato hornworm (see photo).  I quickly investigated and sure enough found a good sized worm blending nicely on the underside of one of our stems.  I picked it off the plant and showed it to our oldest, Cooper, who just the other night told me that he wanted to be an entomologist. 

I was impressed that he even knew what an entomologist was.  Anyway, we observed the offending bug and doing what men do, quickly put it down on the ground and smashed it.  Hopefully another tomato plant saved.  Of course minutes later William and Cooper were looking for more of the bugs so that they could smash them.  There's something about bug guts that provides boys with the "ooooh gross" factor. 

Normally when the boys catch bugs they run them over to the portable chicken pens and feed them to the hens - it's free family farm entertainment to see which hen can catch the bug first.  However, a friend of ours informed us that the hens have a strong distaste for the tomato hornworm and to exterminate in the field.