Even though we are well established, spring at SweetRoot is always a little, um, rocky.
Spring is always a wild adventure in the Bitterroot, and this year is no different. There's always so much to say in our first real spring email, and so little time to say it. Bear with me, and read on.
First, we want to encourage you not to panic. While Coronavirus may be here in Montana, and while it may have more impact on our local food system than we'd like, we wanted to let you know that we are strong, healthy, and have a plan. Soon, we'll have some hand sanitizer available at the farm store. We've started regular wiping down countertops and coolers and are working on some new creative ways to make sure our valley gets fed if this lasts longer than we'd all like. While we are not at all panicked, we also recognize the potential for disruption to our normal seasonal routines. Like many, our farm is making plans for a scenario that includes a partial shutdown of our farmer's market, or substantial reductions in market customer traffic, as people practice social distancing.
Let me be clear - the farmer's market here is not yet canceled. But, we've got a couple solid plans in place that we can implement if need be -- including making sure our regular farm members and market customers get food in an easy, abundant, healthy, and stress-free way.
In general, we plan our planting for best-case scenarios, and are continuing with seeding for abundant summer harvests, no reductions in planting a all (just a one-week delay because of excavation - see below). We've hired some incredible crew, promised them jobs, and, with the big help from farm memberships, we've already purchased supplies, and locked our crop plan in based on our winter rituals of researching new crops, talking to chefs, our growers cooperative, and listening to all your feedback. So don't worry, we'll have plenty of food for you and your neighbors. It's all more exciting than last season, and we can't wait to it all to begin, including this ritual of writing about this life.
There have been a few glitches in the process. Those 24 volt controller valves I've been waiting for since December? They were made in China, so I bought a US-version. The seeder we have on backorder because some parts are made in South Korea? We will wait for it, and our current seeders and systems are all fine and working.
And while the farm store, and some of our wash/packing/refrigeration and storage has been beyond capacity for a year or more now, and we are working on a solution to fix that. It's not an easy fix.
But now, you can come anytime and besides as many eggs as you want we have potatoes, kale, carrots, and later this afternoon, micro-greens and our farm roasted coffee. All the food is handled by us according to a food safety policy and conditions in our coolers are all monitored.
Two of our three mobile, pastured chicken barns. Each barn is insulated and wired to double as a brooder space. The first spring move of the barns — to pasture — will be this coming week.
Our chicken flock production is literally astounding, and, as you can see from the graphs below, we are well on our way to meeting your egg needs. When I scaled up our laying flock last year of about 220 hens to 335, by a whopping 50%, it was because of complaints we had at the market and farm store about how often eggs were sold out. we've never yet quite been able to meet demand. This was a tricky endeavor: it meant a new mobile barn, a commitment to better forage and pasture, and to make sure we could raise chickens not only well, but to our standards. It was a significant investment, not only of some farm proceeds from the fall, but of time. I'm proud to say, even though this was the first time we raised chicks in winter, the new flock is exceptional and healthy, and all the investments: in the brooder infrastructure and barn improvements look like they were good ones -- as long as you come and buy eggs. It was a large investment, and I need regular supporters so, basically, I can keep having a regular supply of eggs, whenever you want them. Also, the other night, had a dream, about eggs not selling in the farm store. It got a bit hazy, but I wound up storing all of our eggs in a personal refrigerator and when Mary asked me what I did with the vegetables in the refrigerator, I told her that I fed them all to our chickens. Please come alleviate my worries.
Egg tracking data from the past two weeks. Egg totals are individual number of eggs; by the end of the week we will be producing more than 20 dozen per day.
As a farm, we are on the tale end of our learning season -- a key time of the year when we finishing up watching videos, including private paid membership videos produced by some of our mentors. We talk to other farmers about innovating and share our own knowledge we've learned over these past six years. If you come and wander around, you'll see some of the results of that work. Our nursery is really starting to hum. That experimental pellet stove that we weren't quite sure about last spring, our attempt to not use propane or plumb a natural gas line, is working out well. And the nursery is starting to get so packed, we've re-designed and re-built benches leftover from the bunk of reclaimed lumber that our woodshed and market trailer didn't consume last season.
Zuges lounges on top of our germination chamber in the nursery.
The high tunnels are starting to get planted out and the tarps that have been down for a good portion of the winter, are starting to get moved so that they germinate and kill weeds, protect our soil, and keep our soil just at the right moisture levels as soon as it gets warm enough.
And, yes, for those of you who came to the farm last week, there were craters of sand and gravel everywhere. We finally buried waterlines to our tunnels and all the front growing space. We installed 5 frost free hydrants, including one in the nursery. This means no more 150-foot hose strung across the front parking area to reach from the hydrant by the shop to the delicate seedlings, and reliable any-time-we-need-it water in the nursery for the first spring ever!
Wrestling the 2-inch poly pipe was like literally like fighting with spring itself: convincing it to yield to our efforts, our desires, our hopes, our fears. Then, Mary's Dad told us to go out and buy a heat gun. And things got easier.
And while we were working on that, Jeremy from Bitterroot Mobile repair came and fixed up other things that needed doing so we could meet planting deadlines. It was the second big little project he did for us here, and we are so grateful for the web of people and businesses that are part of the farm and valley.
We also put in one giant stop and drain valve (just like some big acress points you see in downtown Hamilton), so the water can drain, not freeze in lines. And, underground, we ran power in conduit to our tunnels for more late season growing ability, and, my favorite: we ran 7, 18 gauge wires to automate some of our irrigation. I think I used 100 wire nuts. Mary believes automating just this portion of our watering, will save us about 8-12 hours each week. It was a huge project, and even when we kept adding one day of work on to the project (including shopping and phone consults it was a full 8 days), but we are excited about this giant leap ahead in efficiency. And, our well house received a new series of valves and controllers that ensures our washing water stays clean. It won't freeze anymore either, thanks to a small space heater with a thermostat -- that right now helps double as a space -- and way -- to incubate oyster mushrooms.
“The project was so consuming, and required so much work in the tight well house quarters, I even had to make a dedicated light fixture for the well house, repurposed from an old chicken waterer.”
The new system is a big enough deal that it will mean anyone on the farm team can be empowered to make moisture adjustments, and we will all feel better about our crops and management. At the end of the season, we'll have a cool spreadsheet that shows our water use. Mary and I can leave the farm and know that crucial parts will get watered, and that's huge. It's part of working towards a lean farming system where we can leave to do other projects, both personal and professional, even as we set ourselves up to be a thriving, year round farm.
And that's where you all come in. You are the community that makes all this work and click. We have some really big goals for the year, and for the next few years, and we are grateful for how you've made us think, evolve, and respond. We just can't wait for everything to enfold.
So with that, I'm going to get out and get back to seeding, or, as I told a farm member Becky on the phone recently, just go build something. We'll see you soon.
And thanks.