Tiny Farm Blog» organic gardening: vegetables, herbs, flowers – growing local food

Daily photo-journal of organic market gardening: growing local food with two acres and some tools...!

This blog is one of the best alternative medicine, organic blogs out there. Add this blog to My Feeds.

Play in mud!

Jan 29, 2010 11:14am

A mid-winter flashback to one of my favorite farm photos—it’s just so…hands-on. On the tiny farm, many of the things we otherwise consider inconvenient, like rain and MUD, are actually just fine. Sunny days are NICER, but there’s plenty of room for wet as well. Originally posted on Friday, Aug....

Winter storage

Dec 18, 2009 8:30am

[Backpost for Dec-14-2009] Snow’s here—it’s definitely overwinter storage time! Winter storage is a little different every year, as needs, facilities, and plans change. This time around, a fair bit of gear is in the 20′x32′ (~6×10 m) hoophouse, with its full sun exposure and fairly extreme temperature spread (from double-digit...

Snow pile

Dec 10, 2009 5:59am

A familiar season-marking sight for anyone in snow territory, this is the start of what may turn out to be a growing, winter-long snow bank. The mini-blizzards of the last couple of days laid down at least 7-10 cm (3-4″). Road clearing mixes up dirty snow in hard-packed windrows, and...

Chickens: ranging too far

Dec 8, 2009 9:31am

[For Jul-8-2009] These guys, the White Rock Cornish X meat birds, have free-ranged too far, making it to the edge of the veggie garden in the big field. Luckily, although it looks good in the photo, this all-lettuce mesclun is done, cut at least twice and now too full of...

Front yard farming!

Dec 5, 2009 7:38pm

Often heard about, never before seen first-hand, this is front-yard tiny farming in action—late fall edition. I’m at the home of Andrew and Sue and Margo, in a town of 70,000, leaning on the front porch rail on a residential street lined with single homes on small lots. Typical front...

In the cold garden

Dec 4, 2009 6:00am

[From 24-Nov-2009] The star by far of the last planting of brassicas, that mostly didn’t size up in time for market or CSA, is without at doubt this unusual Nero Di Toscana strap kale. This Italian heirloom, apparently from Tuscany, is hardly better looking than the cold-beaten rest of the...

Last of the chokes

Dec 3, 2009 9:50am

Digging up the very last of the Jerusalem artichoke, this is pretty much the final harvest of the year, besides a little kale and maybe a last few tiny cauliflower and cabbage. The few remaining feet of the original 50′ (15m) double row yielded about half a bushel. Not bad....

Bigger gear…

Dec 2, 2009 6:32am

Thanks to the comments on yesterday’s blog post, this piece of old farm gear, lying abandoned in the field for who knows how long, has been ID-ed as a sickle bar mower. Yet another in a long line of bigger equipment I’ve seen but not used in my tiny farming...

Second snow, 2009

Dec 1, 2009 7:21am

Around 8 am, just getting light, and it’s the second snow that’s sticking around for a while. Here, I’m standing in a weedy area right beside the barn, looking south-west over the south-facing slope, with the chickenhouse just out of sight to the right. (That’s a so-far unidentified piece of...

Tiny fall cauliflower tastes good

Nov 23, 2009 9:29am

Harvested a few tiny (tennis ball to softball-sized, like, orange to grapefruit…little ones!) cauliflower from the last-planted section of brassicas that also has kale and broccoli. It’s still producing in home-consumption quantities, but with the exception of some strap kale, they entirely missed sizing up in time for CSA or...