Spring has definitely arrived

The past couple weeks have been a little bit crazy around the farm.  We practically doubled our animal population over the course of a week (well if you count the bees we increased it by a factor of 1000 or so).  We got the 2 lambs I mentioned in my last post, 2 bee colonies, 100 chicks, 30 ducklings and 4 piglets.  In addition to all this we were working in the vegetable field every day planting bok choy, daikon radish, turnips, snow peas, mizuna, komatsuna, shungiku, turnip greens, mitsuba and transplanting our chinese cabbages.  I didn't even have time to do any needle felting for a whole week!

Number 1

Number 2

Freedom Ranger chicks are bred to do very well on pasture

These Khaki Campbell ducklings are going to lay lots of eggs for us when they grow up

Red Wattle cross piglets from our certified organic neighbors at South Pork Ranch

Lambs!

Last night we added two new members to our farm family.  Gretel gave birth to two beautiful, healthy lambs.  That makes these little guys the very first animals born on our farm!

The new happy family

American Kestrel

This is a life-size sculpture of an adult male American Kestrel.  They are beautiful, tiny little falcons that are fairly common in our part of Illinois.  We actually have a mated pair living very close to our farm.  When they hunt they use the wind to keep them almost completely stationary in a spot above an open field, then as soon as they spot a mouse or other small rodent they dive in for the kill.  I got to watch this the other day right in one of our fields.
This little guy is now up for sale in my Etsy shop

Yes, their feathers are actually these colors

Beautiful photos by Kelty Luber of The Weaver House

After having to wait an extra day for a grain drill, today we successfully planted all 6 acres of our pasture and cover cropped our 2 fallow vegetable fields! It was all made possible by our incredible new friends and neighbors, Terry and Judy Bachtold. Terry and Judy raise 100% grass fed beef cattle at their farm, Grazin' Acres Farm in Strawn, IL. We got to know them because Terry is our local USDA Natural Resource Conservation Service representative and Judy is our mail lady. We also bought our steer, Number 13 from them. We only met them a few months ago but already Terry and Judy treat us like family, trying to help us out in any way they can. We've also helped them out by looking after their cows for a couple days while they were out of town. However, after all they did for us over the past few days I don't know how we can properly repay them. Terry helped arrange our pasture and cover crop seed order with a local seed supplier, he then found and delivered to us a grain drill (a tractor implement that plants large quantities of small seeds very efficiently) to borrow free of charge, and then spent almost 5 hours helping us actually plant our pasture and cover crops this afternoon!
One of the reasons Emma and I chose this way of life was because we wanted to live in a place where we would actually get to know our neighbors and become a part of a true, mutually supportive community. Thank you Terry and Judy for showing us that we came to the right place.

Terry and Judy helping us load the grain drill

Emma and Chad loading orchard grass seed

Terry teaching me the finer points of using a grain drill, like obstacle avoidance

The student becomes the teacher... not quite

Goodbye corn field, hello pasture

Today we spent a whole lot of time on the tractor.  We borrowed our landlord, Mr. Harms' John Deere 3020 and tilled up 6 acres our new land.  Year after year, for the last fifty years this acreage has been planted in conventional corn and soybeans.  Tomorrow we will be planting it with clover, alfalfa and grasses, just the way it was for a hundred years before the "green revolution".  We also tilled 2 more acres of our future crop fields.  These we will plant in a cover crop of peas and oats, which we will then let grow for the rest of the year to protect the soil and provide fertility for next year's vegetables.

She's a cowgirl.  On a steel horse she rides.

Ridin' dirty

Lucky Duck Farm action figures

The first in a series (www.etsy.com/shop/kiyoshimino)

Portrait of our Rouen Drake

First seeds

 Today we planted our very first seeds in the greenhouse.  We made our own potting soil using Elliot Coleman's recipe and packed it into soil blocks.  Into these little blocks we planted several varieties of Chinese cabbage, 2 Asian varieties of basil and Japanese green onions.

Making soil blocks

Planting Thai basil

We also bought 32 cubic yards of compost from a neighboring farm, soon to be spread on our vegetable field