Soil Analysis

We got our soil samples back and we are busy reviewing what we have to work with. Its pouring rain around here so it seems like a good day to stay inside and get all nerdy with macro and micro nutrients. We're happy to see a good pH level of 6.4 where we planted the garlic, we made the right choice there, as the other fields are low at 5.5 and 5.7. It seems like we'll be making a few soil amendments, as we are low in a couple areas–but every apparent deficiency is within a correctable range, and the only crop already in the ground is the garlic, which we already added nitrogen and phosphorous to. So with lots of work and investments, we should have good growing soil come planting season. The information from these soil samples seems essential, we really would be diving in blind if it weren't for these, so its probably the best money we've spent so far. We used Pacific Soil Analysis, located in Richmond, and they seem pretty nifty.

Popped, Planted, Mulched–Our first crop is in the ground!

Yesterday we finished the garlic. It was a bit of a process. First we had to track down a large quantity of fine organic seed garlic; we ended up getting it from four different sources, some of them were local connections from the farmer's markets, and others were commercial seed growers like Salt Spring or Boundary Garlic. Then we prepped the land chosen for garlic, which was three 40 meter rows. Prepping involved adding organic blood-meal and rock phosphate to give the garlic a dose of nitrogen for the winter, and phosphate is good for bulb plant density and mass. Eventually, once the farm is more established, we will used our own composts.  After tilling this and some green manure into the beds, we measured them out, and drew 30 cm by 20 cm grids on them, which was our spacing for the garlic cloves. Then we hand planted over 3000 cloves and tamped them down to get good soil to clove contact. And finally we mulched the beds with straw to thermally protect the little cloves so they don't freeze and thaw too much over the winter. We referred to Growing Great Garlic by Ron Engeland throughout this process, and found the book to be pretty good. It was thorough and concise.  Next project... How will we, and can we, become a certified organic farm?

Popping Garlic

Delaney breaking garlic bulbs apart to get the cloves ready for planting. We will be planting several different varieties, like Music, Chesnok Red, Yugoslavian Porcelain and Armenian. The garlic will be going in the ground in the next couple days.

Cover Crops Growing

Our cover crop is coming up quick, despite the sub zero temps.

Soil Samples!

Soil samples from our fields. We are having them tested for nutrient levels in the big city at Pacific Soil Analysis Inc. to see if we have any deficiencies and to see what crops would be most suitable mmmmm, crops.  

Cover Crop's in the ground.

We seeded our cover crop a few days ago, it feels a little late, but my sources tell me it should still have time to take... We used a mix of mostly fall rye, some winter peas and a very small amount of hairy vetch. This mix is suppose to out-compete weeds, prevent erosion and nutrients from leaching out of the soil, and fix nitrogen. 

Putting in the first line

Here's Delaney breaking the first line on one of of fields with the BCS. The ground was really hard to break because it had such a thick sod root mass from years of hay production, but the Berta plow did the job...