Poor Man's Fertilizer

Snow, over the boot tops snow, ensures a quiet day for most of us. And in between snowshoe treks out to check on the animals in the barn, or to sweep the accumulated white stuff off the greenhouse, it is a quiet day at Green Gate Farm. With the wood stove cranked up and the kettle on the boil it is the perfect time to sit and think about gardens.  

The seeds we ordered a while back are already here, and the field plans are spread out over the big farm table.  While the snow is falling and the fire is crackling, our ideas for this season's gardens begin to take shape, and with them comes the growing anticipation of getting back outside and getting down to work.

The snow, however, is already at work in the garden.  Truly a blanket, snow is a terrific insulator, holding the surface temperature of the soil a bit above freezing and reducing the temperature fluctuations that are so hard on overwintering plants. Deep snow like this will melt at a fairly slow rate, allowing the soil to hang on to more moisture.  Moisture from rain and especially slow-melting snow is a significant source of nitrogen in healthy soil. 

'Poor man's fertilizer' the old timers used to call a late winter snow, since nitrogen, along with phosphorus and potassium, is one of the three essential macrobiotics which fertilizers provide.  This slow melt allows nitrogen mineralization, which is a fancy name for how nitrogen is converted by soil microbes into a form plants can use. 

Linger awhile, snow, do your work in the garden incrementally, even microscopically.  We'll be out there soon enough, working with spade and hoe, turning the benefits of a white winter into a garden green with summer vegetables.  

PASA - Farming for the Future

Folks wonder what farmers do in the winter time asking 'Do you get to slow down?'  Well, yes and no.  Farmers with livestock may not have to alter their routine all that much. Pigs, horses, cattle, etc. require a similar level of care in cold weather as when the pastures are green and lush.  At Green Gate Farm our pigs and layer flock are cozy in their winter quarters, but since we don't raise broiler chickens in the winter, there is a bit less outside work in that regard.

As produce growers, winter is a time of indoor work.  We inventory seed, design planting schedules and revamp greenhouse and field plans.  And of course, like all farmers, we try to play catch-up with the mountain of record keeping and paperwork that may . . . or may not . . . have been attended to over the busy growing season.  Yes, farmers are still busy during the winter, but the kind of work changes, and the pace is definitely slower.  So in the depths of snowy February, can farmers hope to take a break to recharge their batteries?  We can't speak for all the other farmers we know, but for Leslie and Lars PASA is the answer to that question.

Every February, PASA (Pennsylvania Association of Sustainable Agriculture) puts on a dynamite, energy-infused, information intensive, workshop-based conference called Farming for the Future.  Leslie and Lars have attended PASA together for the past two years, and Leslie has attended for several years prior.  Held at Penn State in State College PA, PASA offers a massive forum for growers in Pennsylvania and elsewhere to connect, share ideas and experiences, and attend workshops.  The dizzying array of topics includes biodynamic farming, encouraging earthworm populations in your soil, financial management for small farms, and Lars's favorite, draft horse power.

One needn't be a farmer to attend PASA, and there are scholarships to help folks interested in attending.  (Lars gratefully received a scholarship which funded his conference attendance.)  If you want to see what is happening in the Eat Local movement from the grower's perspective and have several days to explore the many ways in which we try to improve our businesses and practices, conferences like PASA's Farming for the Future is the perfect way.  To read more about what PASA is all about and learn more about future conferences, visit www.pasafarming.org.

Eating local, buying local, being local

It seems the label 'local' has become a real catchphrase.  "Think globally, act locally." "Buy local."  "Support your local farmer."  These make great bumper stickers, but when we talk about supporting our local economy or seeking out great local food sources, what are the qualities we are assigning to that magic word 'local?'

For those of us in the eastern panhandle of West Virginia, our concept of local is geographically fairly small.  It would be easy to purchase most of our fresh food year round from small producers within 10 to 20 miles from home.  And we can be pretty sure that when we go to the Shepherdstown post office, or the bank, or the library, we will run into the farmers who grow those peaches we love or who raise the pigs for that amazing bacon.  We're all neighbors, and we're all participants in the local economy as well as in our local sustainable food system.

So, what is 'local'when you live in the city, or even in many suburbs?  Local food might be defined as being sourced from within a particular range, usually about 50 miles, but 100 miles is not considered a stretch. That makes sense, since for urban consumers the sources for many products, especially fresh foods, usually are found well out beyond a city's limits. City or suburban dwellers may have access to great local shopping, with neighborhood coffee shops, bakeries, bookstores, etc., yet must look to farmers markets to bring locally sourced produce and meats closer to where they live and work.

Perhaps even more compelling than offering terrific food, farmers markets offer a unique and direct relationship between the farmer and the folks who will be eating the food he's raised. Whether set up in a small town side street or a large urban parking lot, farmers markets are both a market place and a meeting place, a place where there is more than commerce going on.  Farmers markets create their own kind of 'locality,' an interesting set of connections that are established because there is no middle-man.  At your farmers market you expect to pick up your usual dozen heirloom eggs and bag of spring greens, but also you can count on checking in and chatting with, well, your farmer.  What could be more local?  

Compost on a Grand Scale

Follow this link to PBS News Hour's great story about a local farm family.
http://www.pbs.org/newshour/bb/environment-jan-june14-foodwaste-01-26/

Five generations of Tabbs have farmed in Jefferson County, WV on what was once primarily a dairy farm.  The present operation, Lyle C. Tabb & Sons, is far more diversified.  The Tabbs combine raising grain, using no-till planting, and maintaining a 500 head herd of antibiotic and hormone-free Angus cattle with running an innovative composting operation.  Food scraps, yard waste and manure are collected and recycled in an organic, sustainable system which yields first-rate compost.

PBS took notice of the Tabbs' award-winning farm because of an unusual collaboration. Five years ago the Tabbs began working with the food service department of the local Veteran's Administration hospital in Martinsburg, WV to create a food waste management system.


                       
This collaboration has dramatically reduced food waste at the VA, every week recycling into compost hundreds of pounds of leftover food scraps once destined for the landfill. The food and nutrition manager estimates saving more than $50,000 by tracking types of food not consumed and adjusting her purchases.

With more than 40% of all the food produced in this country going to waste, according to PBS, it seems likely that all of us, from farms to suburbs and inner city dwellers, can look for ways to make a difference in our own practices and encourage the big players to take a harder look at theirs.

Small Farm Choices

As small-scale farmers we face big issues in trying to get our products into the hands of eager local consumers. It seems like it should be a straightforward business: the consumer pays us, the farmers right down the road, for the great food we raise.

For small farms like ours that raise fruits and vegetables, and laying hens for eggs, this is pretty much how it works.  In fact, because a small farm can produce only in limited quantities, the farmer, in order to make any profit, usually opts to sell directly to the consumer.  And whether selling through a CSA, a farm stand, or at a farmers market, the small farmer marketing fruits and veggies welcomes that direct interaction and feedback from his customers. 

Selling meat raised on a small farm directly to consumers is a bigger challenge.  At Green Gate Farm we raise chicken and pork, but the path these two products take before being ready for our customers is not quite so straightforward.

                                       

One alternative is for the small farmer to send his birds off to a commercial processor, who charges a per-bird fee for his services. Of course, that fee has to become part of the final cost of the bird.

Some small farmers prefer to do the butchering themselves, though in WV, as in some other states, the infrastructure and state and/or federal regulations limit the processing of poultry.  A small producer may butcher and sell birds, but only whole birds. The farmer doesn't have the option of butchering, then parting birds, so that consumers can purchase just wings, or thighs, or breasts.

The catch is that parting birds (dividing into sections) must be carried out in government approved processing facility which is wholly separate from the farm's butchering area.  Most small farms just can't afford to set up a separate building with a commercial kitchen.  

Non poultry livestock is a completely different scenario. Small farms raising beef, lamb, goats, or pigs usually butcher a few animals at a time throughout the year. These farmers have to try to find a certified USDA processor willing to butcher just a handful of animals at a time.  Once found, a facility is likely to be hours away from the farm, and often there is a waiting list to get on the butchering schedule. 

Not that long ago, every small town had such a business, an abattoir or meat locker facility set up to handle all the local community's butchering needs.  These days meat processing facilities operate on an industrial scale, handling mega producers, butchering hundreds, even thousands of animals a day.  

The demand for fresh meats locally raised from grass-fed animals is high, and small producers like us are trying hard to meet that demand and keep our customers happy.  The need for local, medium sized, USDA sanctioned butchering facilities is, as yet, unmet.   All of us, producers and consumers, will benefit when regulations are changed to support smaller scale operations, both farms and community based butchers.

Manure

In January the farm slows down.  The laying hens' egg production tapers off, and the pigs are still a few months away from optimum weight.  Broiler chicks and young pigs won't arrive until the weather warms up.  Then things will start bustling.  But all winter long there is one farm product we have in abundance . . . manure.

The horses and chickens, of course, all produce substantial quantities of wonderful, potential fertilizer, but most prized of all is the pig manure. 
  

 

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Pigs convert food more efficiently than other livestock, growing from 30 pound weanlings to mature 250 pounders in about four months. But they do more. Each day one of our pasture grown pigs eats about 15 to 20 pounds of grain, grass, and fresh veggies, then distributes across the pig pasture 8 to 10 pounds of valuable manure. Rich in nitrogen, phosphorus and potassium, pig manure is an especially effective way to return nutrients to the soil.

When we want to open up new ground for cultivation, we send in the pigs.  The ultimate rototillers, they go to work rooting up, cultivating and fertilizing. Soon the ground will be free of weeds and well fertilized, ready to sow crops later on, and the pigs will be ready to move onto fresh new pasture.
Image courtesy of ourterrain.org

First we eat, then we do everything else. MFK Fisher

Getting started

The gardens and pastures of Green Gate Farm yield vegetables, pork, broiler chickens and eggs.  Every day we set our farm table with food grown truly locally, no more than a five minute walk.  From the very beginning of Green Gate Farm feeding ourselves well has been a priority.  So, we began with a garden.

Rather, we began with a pretty ramshackle old farmstead which would need major renovations before we could move in.  So while crews hammered away on shoring up the buildings, we started digging.  We chose an area close to the house which had apparently never been cultivated.  The weedy tussocks were daunting, but the soil beneath was perfect.  That soil’s full complement of nutrients had been kept locked up and safe and was now available for our anticipated root veggies and leafy greens.

 We’d read that a garden on newly opened up earth could be amazingly productive.  That first summer’s garden at Green Gate Farm was proof.  Everything flourished, flamboyantly!   The showstopper was a van sized mound of green, spread out over an ever expanding trelliswork of scrap lumber and old garden furniture. Amazing what twelve heirloom tomato plants will do with plenty of sun, moisture, and the perfect soil.

Though we’d hit the jackpot with the vegetable garden soil, the rest of the land on the old farm was a different story. Much had been leased out for conventional cultivation, using herbicides and pesticides, no till planting, and gigantic heavy tractors.  It would take more than a season or two of rest to bring vitality back to the soil in those fields.   It would take patience and some serious animal intervention.  It was time to get started with livestock.