Tiny Farm Blog Q&A - Recent questions and answers

Now that most of England is in drought what are people using to retain water in soil?

Tue, 17 Apr 2012 11:04:17 +0000

Since drought has been announced in my part of the UK, I have been using water retention gel in my soil from this website: http://www.glogrow.com/. I just wondered what everyone else uses to help increase the water retaining ability of their soil especially during drought and summer time? Whilst it's a drought I want to use as little water as possible to do my bit!

Thanks everyone!

Since pigweed (amaranthus ???) (2000+species) is high in N, could you turn it under and enrich the soil?

Fri, 13 Apr 2012 00:38:28 +0000

Answered: should i break up a hardpan 4-5 inches underground for my carrots?

Sat, 07 Apr 2012 01:22:16 +0000

Why not just broad fork it? Sooner or later your going to need porosity in your soil. If you break the forking up over a few weeks, you can do a 1/4 acre or more if you're reasonably fit.

Answered: Does anyone have a recommendation for a good walk behind rototiller?

Mon, 19 Mar 2012 15:22:20 +0000

I have an Ariens, 24" walk behind tiller that has worked really well for the past 3 years. I maintain a 2,500sq ft garden, plus I've lent it out to a few friends. Always works for me!

Have you ever put together a written year in summary - what are the highlights, month by month?

Sun, 15 Jan 2012 22:13:40 +0000

I'm just beginning, our first winter "on the land".

We're looking for a week by week, month by month of the major highlights for getting that vegetable garden up and running, moving forward through the winter, spring summer and into harvest and beyond!!

Thanks!

Answered: What horse power is your tractor?

Thu, 12 Jan 2012 19:30:19 +0000

VERY helpful ! We've been intensely researching tractors the last 2 weeks. On one tractor forum, I'm told the clearance on a Deere 2305 might be too low--7.7 inches. Yours is about 11ish inches according to the specs I can find. The guys on tractor tires think a sub-compact is just a tad small for cultivating our tiny farm--2 acres.....

I'm also very interested in seeing that you have TURF tires on yours. I would think that would be a real problem in the field ! Do you ever lose traction?

Answered: I'm expanding my Jerusalem artichokes; you mention you plant them 12" apart, how far apart is your second row?

Mon, 02 Jan 2012 21:59:39 +0000

Thank you for your help. Right now I have them packed in two small areas. I did pick some this year. They are as nice as the ones I purchased as seed, there was no information as to variety. That's fine with me since my "farm" is microscopic compared to yours. I did try to find out more online but the information is scarce and mostly copies of an older post. I really like your blog, especially since it's in the same zone as mine. Good luck in this new year.

Answered: Looking at the size of your shares over the year, I can't help but wonder what the price of your share is?

Sun, 25 Dec 2011 22:31:28 +0000

Over the last decade or so, for southern Ontario where I am, CSA share price has been around $30/week. That's for a "full" share - some farms offer half-shares, family shares, and other variations.

What's in a share of course varies, as far as quantity and quality. I'm only really familiar with my own CSA shares over the last while. I aim for an average of 10 items per share. Each item is roughly the same size as what you'd buy as a single unit at a farmers' market, for example, a bunch of beets, a decent size head of broccoli or cauliflower, etc. My rough average price per item at the market is about $3, so that's where the 10 items for $30 comes from.

I don't build in a discount in the share. You'd roughly pay the same buying individual items at the market. I do spend a lot of time and effort in making sure each week there is a fun, useful, varied selection, with greens, root crops, unusual veggies, not the same things every week, and so forth. On a small farm, maintaining that consistent variety, especially with our crazy weather, for 18-20 consecutive weeks, can be quite a lot of extra work, compared to just growing for market!

One other thing, early shares tend to have less in them, so I make up later on. When you see big shares in August and September, they're partly balancing the first 2-3 early season shares that may have had only 6-8 items.

I'm sure there's a fair bit of variation from farm to farm, but I also imagine it's roughly the same across North America.

Answered: What is the one thing you wish you knew in year one?

Sun, 25 Dec 2011 22:14:39 +0000

You haven't forgotten anything - you just have to get started! :) After nearly a decade of full-time, 2-3 acre market gardening, the one thing I learned that I pass on first and most often to people starting out, is that the first year is everything. Planning, research, prior experience, all of that is great, but you really have to get a full season of your own operation under your belt to see where you're at. Everything - your strengths, weaknesses, likes, dislikes, viability of your plan, everything - is put into real world perspective after Year 1.

It's really common sense. Imagine building, say, a car, from parts and plans. You can spend an endless amount of time, or very little time, testing components, fiddling with details, but until you go for that test drive, what can you really tell? Maybe it drives perfectly. Yay. Maybe it falls apart. Ooops, back to the drawing board. Likely, if you've done a reasonable job, it winds up somewhere closer to the perfect end of the scale. One way or another, you've gotta know if it works and what needs adjusting, and that only comes from doing!

Preparation, of course, improves your odds dramatically. You have growing experience for your location, and realistic expectations as far as timeframe, in that you are prepared for hard work, and slow and steady growth. Those are key things you will be dealing with. One detail you didn't mention specifically, but I assume when you say you've spent a lot of time researching that that you've done, is an assessment of your market: do you have workable access to enough people (like, farmers' market, good location for farm stand, likely CSA prospects, or some other approach) to provide the income you're hoping for? But as long as there are people around you who are buying food, I think you can build a market for quality produce.

Hope that helps. Happy farming!

Does anyone grow mushrooms?

Sat, 24 Dec 2011 16:30:09 +0000

I have looked into it and have the perfect conditions for growing mushrooms but not sure how to get started. I think mushrooms would be a good addition to my market garden as the local supply is minimal. Has anyone grown mushrooms successfully? Where is a good place to get starter supplies?

Where is the best place to have an urban market garden in ON - in terms of $$?

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 19:20:19 +0000

That is cost to obtain land, cost to particpate in market, people available to purchase goods.

Answered: How does your garden grow?

Wed, 14 Dec 2011 19:19:06 +0000

Location: Downtown Barrie

Soil:
Heavily amended with lots of municipal compost, locally sourced sheep and horse manure, really locally sourced pigeon manure and lots of leaves!

Our soil is basically sand so it prefers the sponginess of the litters but I am looking forward to the leaf mould we will have for water retention in the next year or so.

This years goal is to get a good rainbarrel system going. We had 2 last year but they didn't cut it especially during the drought-like conditions in July.

Method: Hand tools- Spade, hoe, rake.

Crops: Spring - greens, peas, early potatoes, herbs, onions, flowers. Summer - carrots, beans, amaranth greens, tomatoes, eggplants, peppers, herbs, flowers. Fall - onions, greens, carrots, potatoes, sweet potatoes (trying out this first year), herbs, dried flowers - maybe strawberry popcorn.

Market: Barrie Farmer's Market - going to try a Facebook farmstand.

I want this to be a strong secondary income and am looking to relocate to Peterborough (worried local market is saturated?) or Gravenhurst/Bracebridge since Barrie is getting overly large for my comfort.