In Min-a-sota

Working on a real farm is HARD! I have been here for about a week and 10 hour days are common.

I am enjoying working very much however and learning a lot. So far this week, I've:

-fed chickens and collected eggs from the chicken coop
-seen how eggs are cleaned and 'candled' in a home operation
-cut, washed, and bagged numerous vegetables for the CSA (community supported agriculture) that is delivered twice a week
-fed cows salt (more on this later)
-set up trellises for pea plants
-picked potato bugs
-tilled the land with both wheel tillers and automated tillers
-mowed
-weeded & fed drip irrigation lines for several rows of plants
-planted from seedlings numerous vegetables
-used a scythe to cut down daisies which are poisonous to cows and thistle whose bristles don't hurt after being cut and which the cows will then eat.
-filled several compost bins with weeds and shrubs

The quaker family i'm staying with have been great. They live a real lifestyle of simplicity and make most of the food they eat. So far i've seen homemade: jams & preserves, mayonnaise, ketchup, pickles, and bread. They rarely buy from the supermarket. We had worship in sunday morning in the typical unprogrammed quaker style...silence.

Some pictures of the 154 acre farm:

A rooster like this climbs up a picnic table every morning around 5 to announce the new day. It is two-toned and severely aggravating. I tried convincing the owner that this should be the next choice for the proverbial Sunday dinner but he had another old hen and rooster in mind. I may learn how to kill & pluck a chicken later tonight.



Evidently, the cows hadn't been fed salt in quite awhile, so yesterday when I brought the bag to the field, they could smell the minerals and started fighting for access to the salt while I was there. I was stepped on (WHICH HURTS) and horned (but not bad). I quickly stepped out of the way for the cows to fight amongst themselves and establish dominance and I could re-enter later.




These are two pictures of the 'upper field' with many of the vegetables. On the 'lower field' are mostly potatoes. Also there are many fields for pasture land.




I took a picture of a few of the hens where I collect eggs.