Farm Tales: A small plot, and a slightly bigger plot.

My last post, was about my plans to plant a very small plot of land, next to where i live on the farm – mainly with salad leaves or herbs. I took a picture, before i weeded and dug the soil. I am happy to say, i have just planted my very first salad leaves and herbs. And a picture paints a thousand words, which is about how many seeds i have sown actually. So here it is in all it’s glory, my plot revisited:

Top right: My friend’s parsley which is all that is left of the herbs he planted – parsley, along with being very tasty – is a very hardy plant.

Middle: A bottomless bucket, containing a little mint plant from my local supermarket. A bit of an experiment; i am not sure if it will survive — so fingers crossed.

Bottom Right: Lettuce, and a mix of peppery salad leaves (– due in 7 days)

Bottom left: Spring onions (– due in the New year)

Middle left: (above the onions) Spinach (–due in 7 days)

Talking of Spinach; we have just planted some fresh spinach on the farm. So to contrast with my little plot, i will show you what we do at work, to sell to the public at markets and in the shops:

This is one of our salad tunnels. You can see the soil already has been prepared, and we are making the beds to plant the salad leaves. The beds have been formed already and we now lay the drip irrigation lines (pipes), on top, and cover with a sheet of biodegradable plastic (which keeps the moisture in the soft raised beds). As you can see the beds are much larger than the little beds i made in my plot, and will hold 3 or 4 rows of spinach plants. Actually they were planted yesterday, this was taken the day before, so now the little spinach plants which are bought from the nursery, are nice and cosy and have been covered with large sheets of white fleece material to keep the warmth and moisture inside. My plot: food for a me – maybe a few others. My boss’s plot: food for a good few hundred – or more.

If my seeds do not germinate, all is not lost – i suppose.

 

Market Tales: a plot to grow your own.

Yesterday, at Parson’s green Farmer’s Market, i chatted with a few of the customers – and as usual, learnt a few  things in the process.

I chatted with a regular customer, a girl from Russia, who told me, their growing season was over for strawberries, in her part of Russia (situated near the dividing line between Europe and Asia). My own farm, which is slap bang in the middle of Kent- will be selling fresh grown strawberries for many weeks to come, before the cold of autumn sends them to sleep. I was also told, how every household would have their own plot of land to grow food, which seems a good idea. Throughout the year,  people would be selling the fruits and vegetables from their gardens, so wherever you went you could pick up some fresh grown carrots here – salad leaves there. This also reminded me of one of the Polish guys i work with, telling me of how, when he was growing up, instead of being sent to the local shop to buy a few bits for supper, he would be sent down the country road where they lived, where one of the households would be selling – from their vegetable plot – maybe carrots, the next house, maybe potatoes, and together with what they would have grown in their own garden, my friend could do all the weeks fresh shopping without going into town or anywhere near a local shop.  In England, almost nobody i know grows their own food,  but a generation before, everyone with any available small plot would have to grow something to supplement their diet. Someone did tell me only the other day, that in London, lots of the Italian people they knew,  still grew food on all the available spaces they had – which seems like a good idea. Veg – and not only organic veg, is pricey in the shops, but you can grow your own organic, with a bit of care.

One of my next customers, was a lady who is at the market most weeks, and is passionate about eating only organic produce – also she has her own allotment nearby, where she grows some of the food for her, and her friends, table. She was telling me of her glut of courgettes at the moment. Plots to grow food, are sought after in the city, and so the rules (for this site at any rate) are very strict: you have to actually grow ‘food’, no mucking about – if you don’t your out, and your plot will be up for grabs by people eager to grow fresh fruit and vegetables, and especially families, who i am told bring their children, to show them where the food they eat comes from, and how it is grown (one of the organic vegetable stalls at the market, actually teach school children about growing food, in exchange for the use of some of the school’s land for growing some of their crop – i am told) — we would all do well to know how food is grown, in this plastic age of ours .

I met a few other interesting people today at the market. One guy i served, used to work for the Soil Association, which is one of the certification bodies (companies licensed by the government to uphold the standards that the government has set out for ‘Organic’ food growing, and selling) here in the UK.

Another guy i met bought some damsons, which are just in season now-those bitter small blue plum-like fruit (they are actually a type of plum) – which many people thought were blueberries. He told me he was using the damsons to flavour gin. Soak fruit in the gin, for however long – i forget how long he said, overnight maybe(?). When the gin has absorbed the damson’s flavour, the resulting mushy-soft fruit would be used to flavour a game bird (pheasant i think?). What a lovely idea! Actually our farm is next to a great castle and estate, which rears pheasants for hunting. The adjoining woodland rings out with gunshot from smart tweed clad hunters, starting around this time of year.

But getting back to growing your own, and having a plot to do so. Here is my plot on the farm. It’s next to my humble dwelling, where my neighbour fenced off this little bit of Kent to keep the rabbits off his salad leaves. It is wild right now, but still, in one corner grows some very tasty parsley, which he planted here.

I will post a picture, when i have cleared the weeds and turned over the soil. It will be plenty big enough to plant a few choice vegetables and herbs for my kitchen, and some of my friends.

 

 

Spidermite and friends.

One of the hard parts about growing food naturally/organically, is dealing with pests and diseases when they arise. last week, there was an independent crop inspector on the farm. He went through the whole farm listing any problems he found, and the main problem was spidermite infestation on our raspberry, and aubergine leaves.  

Spidermite are very hard to spot in their very early stages, but are visible within a few days – if you know what to look for. Here we can see, healthy leaves directly behind the raspberries, below – the paler green leaf has the very early tell-tale lines/patches of white, where spidermites have been attacking the leaf (you can see the, small perfectly round, insects on the underside of the leaf: with a magnifying glass). Finally to the right we see leaves that have advanced evidence of spidermite infestation; the whole leaves clearly yellow/brown (and spidermites will be clearly visable, on the underside – with the naked eye).

There are two main options for us, to treat these pesky pests: 1) spray them, with organically certified compounds (which are natural based- and not harmful to crop or soil). 2) Use a natural predator that eats the insect, and so keep the population growth in check. We also plant different types of flowers that are a natural deterrent to some insect pests. In our case, the crop advisor recommended using a natural predator insect to keep the spidermites in check (the foliage was quite dense, so spraying would not reach the inner leaves). Also, as we have had this problem before – and used predator insects – there is an existing population of predator insects present on the raspberry leaves (clearly visible on the undersides of leaves: large white insects) , they just need some reinforcements, to help in their battle with the spidermites – and with a little luck should devour the pests, before the pests devour our raspberry leaves.

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Our second problem of the week, is in one of our cucumber tunnels. The cucumber leaves have developed leaf mould, which in this case is mildew – with round patches of mould covering the leaves. Our solution here is to use sulphur crystals, melted in ‘hotboxes’ as a non-toxic (sulphur: think volcanic activity – or maybe some brands of household matches) airborn treatment.  Fingers crossed this will cure our problem.

Growing food without using harmful pesticides, is difficult; but by catching any problems, in their early stages – we can use a variety of natural based weapons to help win each battle. The extra effort is worth it, to bring healthy, great tasting food, to our tables.

 

Monday, a new week, and some new growing tips.

Monday starts with unloading all the weekend market vans, and the yard is full of people sorting boxes of fruit into pallets.  My job is to look after the irrigation, so during the summer months, i rarely help out with this Monday morning routine. As my friends lug boxes and forklifts come and go, i start by cleaning the filters on the pumps in the main irrigation shed,  making sure all the pumps are working and all the tanks are being filled.

As i fill the main feed tank (liquid ‘organic’ fertilizer gets added to the watering cycle of each crop, the dose, along with time and frequency, is controlled automatically by a computer in the shed) i have time to speak with one of my colleagues who used to farm fruit and veg in his native Portugal. It is very interesting to hear how he would keep his crops irrigated and fortified with feed.

We grow most of our salad crop, and soft fruit in poly-tunnels – Spanish tunnels (all the strawberries and raspberries, and large tunnels more like greenhouses (tomatoes, aubergine, cucumber beans etc…). At the start of the season, we clear and plough the ground in the tunnels, spread manure and compost and plough this in before using a tractor with a different attachment, to make metre wide beds from the now soft rich soil. On top of these beds we lay 16mm pipes, which have small ‘soaker’ holes @ 300mm to 500mm intervals,  all are connected to the main water feeder pipes which are directly connected to one of 30 plus valves, and then the pump. After being tested, the pipes – and beds – are covered with a plastic sheet to keep the moisture in. Now the beds are ready for planting.

My friend from Portugal explained how he would plant his produce in open beds with no covering, using an ingenious system of: bedding soil + plant + manure, heaped in beds + another layer of soil to cap/seal the beds in. He said this system helped with watering, instead of the water draining into the ground – which would over the season become compacted, the heaped, and sealed in beds would draw the water up into them – the earth capping retaining the moisture, much as the bedding plastic we use. The resulting beds were better fed with fertilizer, better watered, and better drained; resulting in better/stronger plants. At the start of the season, where the first crops commanded the best prices this method, along with a very early pruning of the resulting ‘early’ stronger growth; would mean the plants would bear fruit up to a month earlier than usual.   Changing the dose of liquid fertilizer, and frequency of waterings each day, would also make a big difference to the crop. Most Mondays, especially the mornings, are routine; some days you really do learn something new.