Day 3: What a workout!

       Today we were at Earderly, mostly “weed whacking” and putting together the irrigation system. It was a hot hot day, and I tell you now I probably should have worn some sunscreen! I ended up with quite the farmers tan at the end of the day.  

       Although we're always removing weeds, day in and day out, they never fail to keep coming back up. And while you might think that sounds a little redundant, it does seem to be a little better each time. When you don't remove the entire root many plants will continue to grow. Its impossible to remove them all, they're so damn stubborn, but that's why they're weeds right? They're meant to be a nuisance (more often then not). Anyway, the way we go about removing the weeds depends on what kind of weed it is and where it's located. Sometimes we use our hands, when they're in the beds and their roots aren't deep. Other times, LIKE TODAY when the weeds are outside the garden fence and big and bushy we use large unfamiliar tools that tire you to death! ...I'm just kidding it wasn't THAT bad. Actually, after a while I got more used to it and it became much easier. Everything probably seemed much harder today because of the blistering heat. Either way, the weed whacking today was definitley the most physically demanding task I've done on the farm yet. Then again, it is only day three haha.

       After we dismissed of enough weeds, our next task was to set up the irrigation system. What this pretty much consists of is an arrangement of small plastic tubing/hoses that are set up throughout the garden and attached to a main hose. These tubes contain tiny little slits every few inches which release an appropriate amount of water for the plants. You can see what the black hoses look like in the pictures below. Before hooking up all the tubes we had to the measure them accordingly and then check them for holes. A hole any larger than the tiny slits can lead to unnecessary water loss and possibly drown nearby plants. 

      It was a tough day but it always feels great when you can look at the plot at the end of the day

 and actually see all the progress you've made. What's even better is showing up a week later and being flabbergasted by the amount of change that has taken place in just seven days. 

after weed wacking

before weed wacking

irrigation system

pretty lettuce :) 

Day 2: Cool Beans

        Today, Josie and I met Anne at the newest plot, made just a few weeks ago, on crescent street. Our project for the day involved building large wooden structures that will support the growth of the beans that we plant. Some of the wood pieces we were using were collected from a beaver dam and therefore already magnificently sharpened and ready to be dug into the ground. Other pieces were kindly sharpened by the lot owner. We started by putting together two wooden pieces to form a kind of triangle and then dug them deep into the ground; first by digging a hole and placing them in it, and then continuing by hammering them even further into the ground to assure stability. Once we got about four pairs done we nailed each pair of sticks together using a drill. Finally, we placed more wooden sticks across the top of the triangles. You can probably get a better idea of what this looks like by referring to the picture below. After we finished this we planted the little baby beans about an inch into the soil and approximately a hand length apart! Farewell little beans! Happy growing and see you soon J. Before we left the Crescent plot we spread a generous amount of compost onto each of the remaining beds so that soil is full of nutrients and ready to grow some vegetables for when we come back to plant some more!

        Interesting thought of the day: It is unfortunate that no matter how hard we try, some kind of artificial products or chemicals will always find their way into the soil and, consequently, our food. The water used at a lot of the plots, other than rain barrel water, is just city water which contains traces of chlorine in it. Although, rainwater will also contain various chemical compounds due to regular air pollutants. In the compost, that we get from the city as well, there are visible pieces of plastic. This is the simple result of people throwing plastic items into their composters at home. Therefore, in today's reality we still have to deal with things like bits of plastic and chemicals that seem to be unavoidable.

Josie and Anne drilling together some wood pieces 

adding compost to the beds

see ya soon little bean!

Once we finished at crescent we continued to Brook Street/Anne’s beautiful home. Here, we made another wooden piece for the beans, except this time we added rope going from the top of the structure to the bottom of it, vertically, so that the beans have something to wrap around when they begin to grow. Ropes will also be added to the beans at Crescent. 

Final product at Brooke street plot

       

My First Day!

        My first day I arrived at Aylmer farms, at the Earderly plot. It was a cool morning, supposed to get much warmer later in the day, and that it did! Since it’s still early in the season there remains a lot of housekeeping stuff that needs to be done. We spent most of the day lifting sod; mostly grass, crabgrass, and dandelions. While doing this we were also working on making the beds and pathways more defined so one knows where to step and where not to step. While digging in the dirt I was seeing plenty of worms, which is a really good sign for the soil. On the other hand, we also found plenty of little Japanese bean beetle larvae which we had to squish to kill because they’ll eat and kill the vegetables. Some of the smaller ones weren’t so bad to squish, but sometimes when I’d find a really big juicy one I had to squish it with my boot or my shovel; not a pleasing feeling when squished between two fingers (wearing gloves of course). We also placed round plastic protectors (yogurt/sour cream containers) around the kale plants as a preventive measure against cutworms (green caterpillar looking things), as they already destroyed two of the plants.  Overall, it was a great first day at the [backyard] farm! There’s still a lot for me to learn but I’m really keen and super excited!

kneepads!

Japanese bean beetle larvae

Oh, Hello!

        So here I am, writing my first blog... not really sure how to begin but I suppose I’ll start with a little bit about myself. I am currently, for the most part, a broke student, weaving through episodes of school, work, and play. I’m almost done my degree at Carleton, a Bachelor of Arts [Honors] in environmental studies. I just recently completed my thesis and now all I have left is two electives which I’m taking now, over the summer months. I guess you could say I’m at that point in my life where I’m [practically] done school and thinking… well, what now? I know for sure that I want to do a lot of travelling but in regards to my career I don’t really know much. All I do know is that I want to be able to grow my own food and rely as little as possible on large commercialised supermarkets. Why? Well, that’s a whole other story in itself, but to be as brief as possible I’ll say that it has to do with my health-nut parents and a number of my undergrad classes, combined with an assortment of enviro/health based novels and articles that have inspired me along the way.

       This summer, I have taken up a work share at Aylmer Backyard Farms in order to get some farming/growing experience. Aylmer Backyard Farms is a completely organic urban farm system consisting of three various backyards in Aylmer, Quebec, ran by the fantastic and food-passionate Anne Janssen. My main reason for starting this blog is to have something that I can later look back at and remember exactly the kinds of things I did on the farm. Ideally, it’d also be great to have other organic and local food lovers to be able to follow my weekly experiences and possibly learn something as well!