A New Greenhouse

Yesterday we began putting up our shelter for the pigs in the field, which happens to be a greenhouse. When used for growing plants, greenhouses are enclosed and their purpose is to trap in solar energy within the house, and regulate the amount of sunlight that permeates the glass or plastic that can reach the plants. Many greenhouses are also designed to to blog passing wind to further control the indoor heat and atmosphere. In order to further regulate sunlight you can attach layers of dark shade cloth to the top of the house. Because ours is going to be used as a cover for animals, the purpose is going to be to keep them cool. This  means that we have to keep the front and back, as well as a portion of the sides of the house open for air to be able to pass through to keep it cooler. Also, we are going to add an extra layer of shade cloth to the top, so as to block as much sunlight as we can from reaching the pigs in order to keep them cool.

The Packing Shed

Here is a video of the guys bringing in a load of kohlrabi from the field. Before it can go to market the have to trim off excess leaves, wash all of the veggies, pack it in crates and then store it in the cooler until it is ready to get packed onto a truck destined to either a market or a CSA drop site. Every vegetable gets the same treatment and, as always, is handled with care.

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Tomato Update

Here are the tomato plants as of this week. Over the past week they have shown a lot of growth, and even are producing baby tomato fruits. they are still about a month away from harvestable maturity, but, nonetheless, are looking healthy and early compared to years past. Who knows, with the way that everything else has been coming in early this year, maybe tomatos will follow suit, fingers crossed!

White Hall Palms

Kale is an enormously leafy plant before the leaves are picked off, but after the guys have been through a field and picked the stalks clean, what is left behind on the plant looks kinda cool. The curly kale looks a little bit like a palm tree without its bulk of leaves, and the lacinato looks  like something you would find in the age of dinosaurs (maybe thats where its nickname of “dinosaur kale” came from).

Corn Planting

Here is Patrick’s newest video of how things work on the farm. This time the video shows you how we start up our corn crop and get it from seed to field.

 

 

This Week’s Tomato Plants

The tomatoes have now been staked and are really ready to start growing quickly. After that healthy rain earlier this week the tomato plants are looking healthy and have shown significant growth since last week when I posted pictures of them.

Tomato Progression

Our tomato plants are in the ground, but there is still a long road ahead before they are ready for the market tables and restaurant fridges, but wouldn’t it be fun to know how your tomato plants are doing as they mature in the loamy White Hall soil? Over the next month and a half I will take weekly pictures of the tomato plants as they grow so that all of our customers have the ability to watch them grow in the field along with us. Below are the first pictures of the plants. They are about a week old and are ready to really start growing. More pictures to come as they grow bigger! Also take note of the picture of the drip tape valve that is turned on or off to regulate the amount of water that let through the flow valve to directly water the plants without any waste of water.

New Videos

My brother Patrick has made some videos that I have posted to the blog in the media section. These videos provide great insight and information as they track the early season of One Straw Farm and document what has to happen before your vegetables can be put into the ground on our farm.