Fruit buds and blossoms - May 27, 2013

Pictures May 18-19

Corn: more than its cracked up to be

We had a productive weekend working outside in the beautiful warm weather.  Finally!  It's been a mad dash to get everything done on schedule, and to make matters more complex I'm out of town for all of next week leaving Meridith to cope with planting and the maintenance of all our stuff by herself.  So I'm going all out to get as many things planted as possible before I'm gone. 

One of this week's accomplishments was the planting of our corn crops.  Corn gets a bad name these days, but that is a result of how it is grown and processed rather than its many virtues as a plant.  Corn is amazingly productive for a grain due to it being a C4 carbon fixing plant, which gives it a metabolic advantage over many other crops.  It is also easy to grow, can mature in a relatively short growing season, and has many uses.  We are growing three kinds of corn this year: Japanese hull-less popcorn, a hybrid sweet corn, and Mandan Bride flour corn.

At this point you may be wondering, "What the heck is a flour corn?  I've never heard of that."  That's what I initially thought, too.  Native Americans, however, knew the value of corn and developed many varieties intended for different uses and environments, and many of those were of the flour corn variety.  Flour corn is a starchier version with softer kernels that grind to a flour like consistency rather than gritty like the modern yellow dent corn varieties grown by farmers throughout America.  Flour corns typically have a higher nutritional content and a nuttier flavor than modern yellow corn because Native Americans bred their crops for nutrition and flavor rather than yield.  They were eating it, not selling it, and their priorities were perhaps a bit more food related than the modern farmer, who is typically more monetarily motivated.  If you would like to know more about how Native Americans grew, cooked, and ate corn and other crops, a great publication is available called Buffalo Bird Woman's Garden.  It is an account of Buffalo Bird Woman's gardening methods, a Hidatsa woman that was relocated to the Fort Berthold reservation as a child.  There is a great deal of fascinating historical info in this publication, not to mention a lot of great gardening ideas.

Mandan Bride flour corn was supposedly developed by the Mandan tribe of present day North Dakota.  I stumbled across a very interesting article about this corn awhile back and had to try it for myself.  I was curious about several things: would food made from it taste as wonderful as they say it is in the article?  Would it produce a considerable amount of corn in a small plot?  How would the yield compare to modern yellow dent varieties?  Is it resistant to local pests?  Because it was developed in an environment in close geographical proximity and with similar climate to our location, would it thrive here?

The statements about the flavor turned out to be true: it tastes wonderful.  We haven't had the opportunity to do much more with it than parching and making corn bread, but it has gotten rave reviews from us and our guests.  It has a light nutty flavor, and the finer consistency makes for corn bread that has a creamy rather than gritty texture.

It is also quite beautiful, and could be used for decoration if a person were to value that aspect of it more than its eating qualities.  I am not such a person, but I would not begrudge anyone that might want a few ears as part of a fall decoration.

If our crop of Mandan Bride is successful and we have enough to spare, we hope to bring some fresh ground Mandan Bride cornmeal to the market late this summer and give you all a shot at it.  We don't think you will be disappointed - we certainly aren't!

A day in the life: pics from the weekend

A very small collection of photos from the weekend.




Eggs!

 



More eggs!

 


Always nice to see when you walk into the coop.

 


No-till planting sweet corn - 2 inch deep furrows were cut into the mulch to seed the corn, then covered.

KITTENS!

 

The things they left behind: reclaiming the soils of once vibrant Canning, SD

We live in a place called Canning, SD.  I call it a place and not a town because technically it isn't really a town anymore.  It is just a loose collection of about 8 houses and a few ranches spread over an area that was once a bustling frontier community of homesteaders and pioneers.  To give you an idea of the size of the community, when Meridith and I moved to Canning several years ago we increased the population by about 7%, and when our son Henry was recently born we increase it by another 3-4%.  History left Canning behind, but to us and the other residents it is a place filled with stories.  And also a place filled with stuff - notably stuff buried in the ground that we dig up when we work in the gardens.



Canning was founded in 1883 and named after George Canning, chief engineer of the C & NW Railway Company.  There were about 275 people in town at this time, and three hotels, two restaurants, two hardware stores, two saloons, a meat market, and a barber shop.  When the Winnebago and Crow Creek reservations were opened for settlement in 1885, the population increased by another 75 people.  Drought took its toll, however, and the population began to dwindle.  A grain mill using hydro power from Medicine Creek (our namesake) opened and closed within three years due to lack of stream flow.  By 1934 the population had shrunk to 75 people, and it is currently around 30.

Most of the old buildings have been torn down except for the Cracker Box - a tiny building that once served as a post office and home to various families - and a few of the original houses.  One old house is still inhabited, and there is another that is in a state of disrepair and is frequently scoured for ancient treasures by the adventurous young people of the community.  What is left behind is open space covered by grass with various objects littering the landscape - some exposed on the surface and some covered by soil.  Because Canning lies in the Medicine Creek valley, sediment from the surrounding hillsides has slowly worked its way downhill and covered many objects.  This process takes a long time, but it certainly takes place, and we have dug up numerous objects ranging from the soles of old boots to an axehead that I uncovered yesterday while prepping ground for the planting of a tree row.



Axehead and other assorted pieces of stuff


A detailed history of the happenings of Canning is available online and makes for compelling reading for the interested student of frontier history.

 It was said of Canning in the October 13, 1883 Blunt Advocate: 

This compact and beautifully located little village is situated on the main line of the C. & N.W. Ry. in the Medicine Valley about 10 miles southwest of Blunt, surrounded by a very large area of the richest farmlands in southern Dakota, and as it lies adjoining the Old Winnegabo Indian Reservation, its citizens and merchants will be among the first to receive the benefits of the vast tract of land now awaiting only the President’s proclamation for its final opening to actual settlers.  Canning has fine water power, with fall sufficient to operate a grist mill of four run of buhrs, by the virtue of which a mill in the near future is assured.  The town also affords a fine opportunity to the right man for the manufacturing of bricks, having all the natural advantages requisite to the successful carrying of the branch of the industry.  The citizens of Canning are composed of thoroughly stirring people, whom the following may be classed as the foremost:

George V. Harris, principal owner of the town site, is a large stock raiser of the vicinity and owns over 900 acres of land.

Miles E. Redick, also one of the owners of the town site, is station agent and Postmaster.

M. E. Billings seems to be comfortably located and doing nice business in the grocery, flour, and feed line. 

O’Crowley and Barry are the hardware dealers.  They carry a very large stock and apparently receiving liberal share of the public patronage.

The virtues of the townsite may have been a bit overstated, but the character of the inhabitants has not changed.  There are still many "thoroughly stirring people", and we'd like to think we are quite stirring ourselves and can continue the independent and rugged tradition of this once vibrant place.  Our gardens have replaced the hotels and grocery stores, but there is still a strong community spirit that thrives here.



This latest snowstorm gives us a great chance to talk compost.

It is almost May.  I repeat: it is almost May.  We don't like to complain about the weather here (unless it hails), but it's almost May already and it has been snowy and cold for weeks.  Ridiculous.  We already planted most of our early season crops during the last warm spell several weeks ago and they're all covered in straw to keep them from freezing to death.  We can't uncover them for at least a few more days because the weatherman says its supposed to get down to 20 or something.  Nuts.  We've got herbs piled in front of the patio doors waiting to go in the ground.  Once more: it is almost May.  This is just silly.



Green grass, blue sky... looks nice and warm, doesn't it?


Let us momentarily pretend that frozen water is not slowly drifting down from the sky and the chicken water bucket doesn't freeze if you leave it outside overnight.  Let's envision ourselves standing next to a large pile of light, fluffy decomposing organic matter.  It probably smells wonderful.  I say probably because we might have just dumped the kitchen compost bucket lately, yet amongst the wide range of horrible smells available in this world it can certainly get a lot worse than that. 

Speaking of the compost bucket, we divide our refuse into several general categories: chicken food, compost, recyclable, and garbage.  Between two adults we fill a 5 gallon pail in under two weeks with everything from egg shells to banana peels to coffee grounds (with filters - do yourself a favor and don't try to dump just the coffee grounds into the bucket like I did).   We also shred junk mail and newspapers and add it to the compost bucket.  The ink breaks down and doesn't hurt anything.  We are experimenting with composing animal waste like fish guts and butchered chicken carcasses - hopefully it isn't a total disgusting disaster.  I will report back on the results.




The most important ingredient in our compost piles is chicken manure.  It is the special stuff that makes the entire system of gardens function and the chickens worth the work.  Without it we would be forced to purchase organic compost and fertilizer in order to call our produce "organic", which would be very expensive.  The chickens produce all the fertilizer we need at a profit in meat and eggs, and they also offer some value in insect control.  Not to mention that they are surpassed only by hogs when it comes to being the pastoral version of the trash compactor.

When composted, all these ingredients supply everything a chemical fertilizer does, plus organic matter and valuable plant micronutrients like calcium (deficiency of which is the cause of blossom end rot in tomatoes), magnesium, and sulfur.  Many of these nutrients become nutrition for the eater of the finished tomato, pepper, or melon.  Not only does compost make your soil healthy for your plants, it makes the food grown with it more healthy for you.

This winter's chicken bedding (straw and pine shavings) on the left, fresh compost ready for the garden on the right.

Last year's compost is ready to be spread around our veggie seedlings whenever winter finally gives up and goes back into hibernation.  And as we do every spring, we cleaned out the winter accumulation of poop in the chicken coop and started another huge pile that will become prime black, fluffy organic compost by this fall.  The chickens poop, the veggies grow, and the cycle continues.

Chicken graduation party!

As chicks morph from cute, fluffy little peeps to semi-feathered awkward adolescents, they become significantly less endearing.  Sort of like people.  Gone is the steady, soothing "cheap cheap" call, and along with it the feeling that maybe I'm a bit stingy with my money.  It is replaced by something akin to the squawking sound of a teenage boy making the transition from child to man.  The soft layer of fuzz gives way to rudimentary feathers, and eventually to a fully feathered miniature rendition of a full grown chicken. 

Even though they lose the appeal of cuteness, they begin to make up for it with self-reliance.  They require no special care once they are introduced to the general population of chickens, freeing us from making several trips a day to the chicken brooder in the garage to fill feeders, clean the bedding out of waterers, and check on their general health.  The big question, though, is exactly when and how do you introduce them to the big birds?  If it has been a cold spring with more cold forecast for the future, like this year, another layer of complexity is added to the equation.  How cold can the chickens handle?  Do you ease them into it, or take them straight from the warm coziness of the brooder to the somewhat uncontrolled conditions of the chicken coop?

We decided to make the transition as easy on them as possible.  I fenced off a corner of the chicken coop to keep the big birds from picking (and pecking) on them.  Chickens quickly establish the pecking order when new birds are introduced, but sometimes it can border on brutality, so it helps to give the young and old chickens a chance to size each other up for awhile before they can actually get at one another.  I also hung a heat lamp from the ceiling of the coop to provide them with some warmth on the cold nights.  I turn it off during the day so they become acclimated to the cold weather.  They are fully feathered, so as long as the change from warmth to coldness isn't too much of a shock, they should be able to handle low temperatures without any harm done.



"Whoa... what the heck are those things?  They're like us, but smaller."






The answer to the question "How did they get poop on the SIDE of the waterer?"

 


Our most curious and friendly hen. 

  



"BA-GAWK!!!"



To till or not to till? Is that the question?

Recently we've been considering the purchase of a fancy, brand new tiller to work the soils in our gardens.  This seemed like a natural purchase considering we are in the process of starting a produce and egg business.  Upon further consideration, however, we may be able to save ourselves a good deal of labor and the cost of that fancy new tiller by implementing a no-till system.  Others have had success with similar systems, such as a successful no-till garden that is kept at the Natural Resources Conservation Service office in Selfridge, ND.  They use Round Up, which isn't something we're interested in, but we will find other ways of controlling weeds.  Also, the Dakota Lakes Research Farm is just down the road from our place.  They have been experimenting with no-till agriculture and cover crops in soils like ours for many years with favorable results.  The manager there, Dwayne Beck, recently gave a colorful and insightful talk on soil health and implementing a no-till system for large scale agriculture that we think can be scaled down to what we're doing.

 If you take a look at nature, you will see that all of the myriad variety of plants that grow of their own accord are grown in a no-till system.  Grasslands are covered with grass without the aid of a gas powered tiller, trees fill lush forests without a single turning of the soil, and beautiful flowers bloom every year without a helping hand from anyone.  Modern methods of growing things tend to ignore the powerful examples of nature, but we try very hard to work with nature whenever possible instead of fighting her.  She usually wins.  The reason all these plants grow so well without the aid of tillage is simple: plants don't need the soil to be tilled in order to grow. 

In fact, turning the soil leads to all sorts of problems.  One problem with tilling is that seeds are brought to the surface.  Weed infestation can be greatly reduced by simply leaving the seeds buried where they won't sprout up and cause issues.  Another problem is that the organic matter component of the soil is lost when the old dead plants from last year are removed and the soil is turned.  Unless a healthy dose of organic matter is added, eventually the soils will either become clumpy clay, or a fine dusty powder.  Neither are examples of a healthy soil.  Also, the more organic matter you have, the more water your soils will absorb and hold.  This means a lot in places that don't get enough rain, like where we live in South Dakota.  Precipitation often comes all at once, and instead of running off, the rain will be absorbed and held by a soil with lots of organic material for plant use through the hot days of summer. 

One enormous benefit of not tilling your soil is that it preserves the network of micorrhizal fungi.  These networks of fungi run throughout your soil and help deliver nutrients to the roots of your plants.  When you till, this network is destroyed and roots are only able to get nutrients from the soil directly contacting it.  If you leave that network of fungi in place, nutrients can be delivered to those roots from a wider area. 

The most obvious benefit is the savings in time and money by eliminating a fairly large chore from the list of many that we must accomplish to successfully produce and harvest a crop.  This alone compels us to try a no-till method.  Another benefit is the long term sustainability of such a system.  Instead of scraping off the dead plants and piling them with chicken manure to compost and eventually be added back to the soil, we can simply knock the plants over onto the soil and let them compost right there.  And instead of adding composted chicken manure all over the garden, which is wasteful and fertilizes the weeds as much as our plants, we can applying it more precisely to the areas where only our plants draw their nutrition.  The entire system results in a more sustainable system with healthier soils for less work.  Sounds good to me. 

We will keep you posted on how things are going in our no-till gardens throughout the summer.  We plant to grow melons, tomatoes, and peppers with this system, and if successful we will do the same thing with our other crops. 

Early season crops and a blizzard

We like to get a crop of cold hardy crops in the ground in early April. Stuff like kale, brassicas, radishes, and salad greens. We plant our crop of napa cabbage for kimchi making at this time of year, also. This year we had a bit of a distraction due to the birth of our first child, and instead of doing the smart thing and checking the weather forecast before planting, I just went ahead and put 40 or so cabbage, broccoli, and brussel sprout plants in the ground. Two days later we got a foot of snow and temps in the teens. Whoops.

Right before the snow hit I covered the plants in straw and wetted it down with the hose. The snow piled on top of the straw, providing additional insulation. For the next four days (up to and including today) temps ranged from the high teens to low 30s. I uncovered one plant to see how it was doing on an afternoon with above freezing temps. The brussel sprout plant looked happy and healthy, much to my relief and delight. Phew!

Out of an unfortunate screw up, we have learned an easy, cheap, and effective way to protect cold hardy plants when the weather doesn't respect our wishes.  Which, in South Dakota, is most of the time.  

Tomatoes are started!

We had a pretty decent blizzard roll through the region this week, so we were kept in doors more than normal.  Except for the routine trips to the chicken coop and to the garage to check on our crop of future egg layers.  Being cooped up (pun intended) gave us a great opportunity to get our tomato seeds started.  We had room under the grow lights because I foolhardedly (is that a word?) planted all of our cabbage and broccoli plants 2 days before the storm came, but that's another story.  Mental note: check the weather forecast before you plant early season crops.

We started 88 tomato plants!  This is easily a record number for us as we had previously only grown tomatoes for our own consumption, but with the goal of selling beautiful heirloom tomatoes at the market firmly in mind, we went all out.  Our varieties for this year:

Amish Paste: A Roma style Amish (hence the name) heirloom.  These are bigger than your typical Roma style tomato and have a richer, more pronounced tomato flavor.  Very meaty, these are great tomatoes for sauce, paste, salsa, or salads.

Rutgers: We have never grown this popular heirloom variety until this year, but our search for the best round, red, typical tomato for our area led us to give these a try. 

Super Sioux: This is another typical round, red tomato, but this variety is touted as being heat tolerant, which may provide it with an advantage in our hot and dry climate.  Like the Rutgers, we've never grown this tomato so I can't comment on eating and processing qualities until I actually eat one.

Brandywine (Sudduth's Strain): Brandywine is another Amish heirloom variety that is noted for its flavor, having won a great many taste tests.  With just the right balance of sweetness and acidity, this tomato is one of our favorites for practically any use.  However, they are not reliable producers so we are hoping for a favorable season.

Pineapple: This is probably my favorite tomato variety ever.  The pink on orange on yellow color mosaic and phenomenal flavor make this an appealing tomato.  My favorite for BLTs because of the large size and beautifully patterned slices, and also makes a fantastic orange tomato juice.  An orange beer or bloody mary is out of this world with a pineapple tomato. 

Black Krim: This dark red to purple variety is a reliable mid season producer with great flavor and texture.  Makes a great dark red marinara and is wonderful on a BLT.  Also adds interesting color to salads.

Cherokee Purple: Another consistent taste test winner, we are looking forward to growing this tomato for the first time.  I will be happy to report back on what we think of them, but I have a feeling that this tomato will live up to its reputation.

Sungold: This hybrid orange cherry variety is famed for its intense sweetness.  While not an heirloom like we prefer, we think you will enjoy this tasty little treat.  We plan to have a bowl of these sitting out at our table for you to sample whenever we are at the market.  If you like them, we will have small packages available for purchase.