Your organic farm in the Eastern Townships
I’ve started working on my créole lately. I wasn’t particularly intent on studying another language. We already speak three at the farm, Spanish being our lingua franca given the time spent with our Mexican crew. But necessity is the mother of invention, and a smattering of créole has been useful given the help we’ve been getting from workers hired…
After a few years of dwindling corn yields, I am pleased to announced that our stratagem seems to be working; as a result, you will be able to munch on your cobs shortly…Without going into technical detail, it seems that the success of our electrification scheme had less to do with the 110-volt hook-up, and…
We had been waiting for rain for weeks, and it finally came on Sunday afternoon in the form of a sudden thunderstorm which lifted netting even as it dropped bucketfuls of thirst-quenching water. Indeed, our corn, squash, blueberries and carrots had all been standing still, desperately waiting for water-filled clouds to appear and break open…
Our corn is beautiful, tassled and growing fast…and yet, we worry about our corn nemesis, the raccoon – corn thief par excellence, this farmer’s Public Enemy No. 1, and most likely the bane of every market gardener’s existence. Following the havoc wrought on our 2018 crop by this pest – i.e., the total destruction of nearly 20…
I sowed carrots again this weekend. Carrots are one of the very few vegetables that we do not/cannot start in our seedling greenhouse. They are very uncompromising, carrots – an all or nothing kind of vegetable. Either you get it right with your seeder, or …you are forever trying to get it right. This year…
A scant two or three days over 30◦C and already, you’d think we’re at the height of summer! All of a sudden we’re faced with full-on heat, humidity, scarce rains and trying to figure out how to deal with it all. Fortunately, over the years we’ve developed something of a Pavlovian reflex: as soon as…
The pressure has just gone up a few notches at the farm – as if we needed that – but for a great reason: namely, the impending opening of our two farm stands at Atwater and Jean Talon markets, next Friday, as the florists and nursery owners who inaugurate the outdoor market season give way…
The farm has abruptly tipped into summer, without warning or fanfare. Overnight, it seems, we’ve gone from rainy days and chilly nights to balmy weather with hints of the dog days of summer to come. Our solanaceae have suddenly regained vigor and strength, and our cool-weather-loving brassicas are even looking like they may bolt. For…
Just as we were beginning to despair, the sun finally appeared, and some heat, too. As we toured the fields today, Sunday, we felt Mother Nature bursting at the seams, impatient to make up for lost time. Like us, she is all too aware that summer is short in our northern climes and that a…
Yo-yoing weather forecasts, mad transplanting dashes between scattered rain showers and an all-around schizophrenic spring – that about sums up the world we’ve been living in for the past several weeks. Things are progressing nonetheless, and as I write these lines, having taken advantage of the rare sunny moments and selected the least humid of…