Cloverleaf Farm

Archive for May, 2009

Cloudy, and rainy. Not a good day to be planting. Then again, I won’t have to water when I am done.
I got the gardens plowed out for the most part. Just one more to go over a second time. The new sections will have to have the grass taken out. After that, we are as good as gold. I already have quite a few veggies planted, with more in the greenhouse to follow.
Going to the big city of Conway on Thursday, and we will be getting some more seeds. This year, I project to grow and can much more than we did last year. Last year we did upwards of 75% of our own food. This year I hope to beat that. I guess I shall have to stock up on canning jars.

My, you realize how old you are when you start hoeing up the garden. Yesterday, and today we started our seeds. We used raised rows, which require using the hoe quite a bit.
It is tough on the shoulders, back, neck, arms, elbows, and other muscles you forget you have after not using them all winter. It is a good work out indeed.
Today we planted zucchini, carrots, lettuce, watermelon and salad mix. The salad mix is a big hit at the farmers market in Wakefield. The farmers market started yesterday, and we will do it most Saturdays throughout the summer. Our gourmet herbal jams and jellies are always a great success. Yesterday, we debuted Dandelion Cream Syrup, and Dandelion Jelly. Everyone loved it. We sold out of the Dandelion Jelly. I think we will keep the Dandelion Syrup for us. You can use it like you would honey.

If the tractor did all the work, then why am I so tired?
Yesterday, we spent most of the day plowing up the gardens. We need to get the seedlings from the greenhouse in the gardens.
We had 3 huge garden fields last year. We decided this year to combine the north and south gardens into one gigantic one to save time on mowing in between them. This will also give us quite a few more feet of planting space.

The Crabtree garden is on the agenda for today. This one didn’t do well last year, and the soil needs some amendments to it. It is on the adjacent property to ours, owned by Allen Crabtree. He was nice enough to let us use part of his acreage. He owns about 20 acres that wraps around ours.  We only used a small portion of that. It use to be part of our property years ago. Most of the neighborhood use to be part of our farm. Cloverleaf farm was once about 100 acres. Over time it was subdivided or donated. The church in the background is the South Effingham Church. This land was once part of our farm, and was donated to the church in the late 1890′s . Cloverleaf Farm was last subdivided in the middle 1980′s.

Yesterday, we recieved 20 yards of loam. That is alot of dirt. Our chore now is to spread it around to different places in the yard to level off some areas. Some will be used to redo areas where crab grass had taken over. The crab grass was due to Freddy who dug up the beautiful lawn that was there. We are still not sure what ideas he had in his head. He, and the children that lived here, not only terrorized the neighborhood, but ruined the yard.  We have spent the last 3 seasons fixing what they ruined. The neighbors are amazed at the transfromation from what it was.
Today again, we will tackle the pile of the loam. Michael looked at the pile the other day after the truck had left and said “this means something”. I quickly replied, “yes, it means go find a shovel, we have loam to spread.”

We went over to the Remick Museum this morning to pay the deposit on our piglets. They had several litters from 6 weeks old, down to our batch which is only one week old. We will be picking them up in about a month. They were so cute and small, it is hard to believe that they will be close to 200 pounds in 6 months.

The brown one facing the camera, and the one in the background hiding are the ones we picked out. They are Tamworth X pigs.

Warm weather is here, and it will soon be summer.
I thought this was the perfect time to start an herb of the month series again.
This month’s herb is Borage.
Borage is a common Mediterranean weed thought to have originated from southern Spain and Morocco. A hairy annual or perennial growing to between two and three feet in height producing a pulpy stem, large basal leaves, and bluish-lavender, star-shaped flowers, it is now cultivated worldwide mainly for its seed oil. Borage flowers have a slight cucumber taste, and are a great additive to salads.
Borage is helpful in the garden as well. Planting borage between tomato plants help keep down the dreaded horned worm, otherwise known as the tomato worm. By interplanting, also known as companion planting, you can help keep the bad bugs at bay.
For more information on Borage please visit Borage Information.

Lemon Balm has been used medicinally since the Middle Ages. It is has been used to relieve anxiety, stress and tension since that time and is still used today for those same illnesses.
Lemon Balm helps heal naturally.
Lemon Balm is used most often as a medicinal herbal tea. It is also used in herbal and medicincal body care products. Lemon Balm can also be used in an extract or tincture form. Our biggest seller is Lemon Balm Ointment followed by Lemon Balm Oil. Read the rest of this entry »

We had ordered them about a month ago, and we have been awaiting their arrival. They are 2 days old and a bundle of fuzz. Just like real babies, they mostly just sleep, eat and poop. Right now they are sleeping all hudled up together. When they are awake, they are peeping like mad. The chickens on the other side of the wall keep trying to look through the hole of the coop to see what is happening. It is kind of cute.

Remember to vote for Green Mountain Conservation Group so they can win that grant.
You can vote every day at brickfish.com.
Cast your vote now, so they will recieve the grant.
Book mark it, and vote daily for Green Mountain Conservation Group.
For more information on what GMCG does for Effingham, and the surrounding towns please visit gmcg.org.
You can also stop by the office on Huntress Bridge road and talk with them about their ongoing programs.

Since 1997, the Green Mountain Conservation Group, a non-profit charitable organization, has dedicated its efforts to natural resource conservation in the Ossipee Watershed. Through education, research, and advocacy, and land conservation, we strive to create an awareness and appreciation of our watershed’s natural resources and encourage a commitment to protect them. Our guiding principle is to present objective information in a non-confrontational format enabling the public to make informed natural resource decisions.
Please visit Green Moutain Conservation’s website for all the wonderful things they do.
GMCG is not trying to procure a grant from Northface and Polartec. Please visit Brickfish.com and vote for them!
They will put the money to good use.