Calm before the storm

I'm sitting on a screened porch of our friends beautiful Georgian mansion, listening to the birds sing and basking in the sunshine.  March is coming fast and with it the busyness of the season begins with seeding in the greenhouse, preparing the fields for planting and the barn for new critters.  A new commitment of mine is to get away every February for a little rest before the excitement of the new season is upon me.  This time we headed south with many stops along the way.  I won't bore you with tales of our time on the beach but instead tell you a bit about our first stop at the Pennsylvania Association for Sustainable Agriculture annual conference.  What an inspiring group of farmers!  I took in many workshops on topics from beekeeping to apple orchards to post-harvest handling techniques.  The one that blew me away the most was one on mob-grazing by Greg Judy.  He's a farmer who brought himself back from the brink of bankruptcy by implementing this new type of grazing on his land.  Basically it involves concentrating a fairly large number of livestock on a fairly small portion of pasture....which may not sound like a great idea.  But the trick is he moves them so frequently to new pastures that the animals always have more then enough to eat.  The benefit you ask.....the natural processes of livestock grazing heavily on an area while also depositing large amounts of manure and working it into the ground with their hooves revitalizes the soil and stimulates the microbes so much that a mediocre pasture soon becomes first class and your ability to graze more animals without increasing your landbase is constantly on the rise.  This fellow grazes cows, sheep, goats and pigs all together in his mobs and has found a very profitable way to raise very high quality meat.  Needless to say this workshop left me ruminating about all the possibilities on the pastures at reroot organic farm.....

Tractor Shopping

Farming is full of new challenges and steep learning curves for me, but by far my biggest challenge is understanding the world of mechanics.  It simply is not my strong suit and although over the years I've become quite adept at driving these big machines, buying one is a totally different can of worms.  After moving to our new farm last year, we've been in the market for a loader tractor to do our field work and other chores around the place.  I've spent hours pouring over website listings and used equipment catalogs finding myself ever more intimidated by the terms and numbers and the prospect of buying a lemon.  Enter Hal, my secret weapon.  Hal is a middle-aged friend of a friend and a tractor genius.  He smokes a lot, drinks a lot, swears a lot and spits a lot.  The first time I met him (okay, the first three times I met him) I was scared of him.  But he's turned out to be an incredibly helpful and supportive resource in the hunt for the perfect tractor.  A case of 50 is your ticket through the door of his shop, and once you're in, you're there for the afternoon to hear lots of stories, check out the latest piece of equipment he's working on and drink probably too many 50's.  All fall when I came across a listing that I thought sounded like the perfect tractor I'd call Hal, give him the name and model number and listen to his critique.  It took me 4 months to find a tractor that Hal would even agree to come and look at (he refuses to fix John Deere's so that eliminated a large portion of available used tractors).  Finally, one January afternoon after a few beers, we load into my truck to head out for a look at a Massey Ferguson 165.  On the way, I get a lesson about bargaining.  Once there, Hal puts the tractor through the third degree, looks at everything, teaches the guy selling it a thing or two and gives me a discreet nod to offer the previously agreed upon bid.  The guy won't budge so we're off again to see the next tractor.  An afternoon with Hal is an educational experience to say the least.  At the end of the day, my lungs and liver are a little worse for the wear, but I know a whole lot more about tractors and have a bid in on a great little Massey Ferguson 265 that passed Hal's tests.  I'll find out tomorrow if I'll get this tractor....if I do, I think I'll name it 'Hal'.

Welcome to our blog...

It's winter and a season when farmers' have lots of time on their hands and big plans for the coming season.  We're hoping this blog will provide an opportunity for us at reroot organic farm to share some of the stories from our fields, barn and beyond.  We can't promise how frequently we'll find the time to make posts here, especially once the season is in full swing, but we can promise that farming is a lifestyle full of adventure, hard-work, innovation, heartbreak and fulfillment.  We'll share as much of that here as we can.