Recent Posts

I just finished attending a two day workshop with Dan Kittredge of the Bionutrient Food Association. In the past five years I’ve gone to a number of alternative agriculture functions, and I am always interested by the claims made and the evidence offered to support them. I’ve gone to lectures in which I’ve bought most of what I’ve...

As promised last Tuesday, I'm going to continue with the pig theme for a few long posts. I hope you'll stick it out as I could use your help at the end of my next piece, and you will better understand the issue after reading this one and the upcoming installment. I wanted to get...

Spring has finally arrived on the farm, at least if a diminishing snowpack and above freezing daytime temperatures count. I have a proud tradition of planting too early, and my records indicate that in my most delusional year - 2012 - a few weeks in the 70s convinced me to direct seed kale in the...

This is my first year with pigs. I have 20 pigs up the hill in the hoophouse we built. Up until Thursday I had 21. Back in the fall I optimistically set January 27th as the first slaughter date for the five largest specimens, but by the time the New Year arrived it was clear...

As a child of about seven I became so fixated on steak and kidney pie that my mom convinced one of her friends to make it with me. On a trip to England I subsequently took with my family I ordered it every time we ate out. But after this there was a long drought...

In Tuesday's post I mentioned trading some squash and beets for a bag of oats. I claimed  I got the better end of the deal. From a calorie for calorie perspective there is no doubt I got a lot more than I gave. From a labor to access the food calories stored therein, not so much. Oat...

I blame the fact that I grew up in southeast Pennsylvania for my ability to convince myself every year that something resembling spring will arrive the moment the calendar flips to March. And, to be fair, sometimes it does; in both 2012 and 2013 early March came with stretches in the 50s. The long term...

Back in early January when I posted the rules I thought point #3, barter, would only be of minor importance. I expected to swap a little bit of stuff here or there, but not much. I even considered not allowing it in order to be even stricter in the application of the homegrown aspect of the challenge....

Yesterday I went to a Farm Disaster Preparedness seminar. While most of the stuff was common sense, it was good to be reminded of common sense precautions, and it made me glad I don’t have a room full of chemicals I need to keep locked up. But the reason I’m writing about it is that...

After the last few weeks I'm ready for spring. I'm going to sing a little incantation over this photo from balmier times and hope for a warm March. This shows what our hay looks like when it's all put up. This is pretty coarse first-cut hay - really only adequate feed for mature cattle because...