The sun is back and gone again, dedicated gardeners, first garlic sprouts, taxes & tax forms, notoriety
Warm and wet is the weather theme thus far for January. We have had twice the normal amount of rain for the period in these first several weeks. The average mean temperature has been 6°F above normal. The coolest temperature was 37°F, achieved on Sunday January 15. These numbers are all from the SeaTac airport. I guess we can hope that the insect eggs that aren’t being killed by the usual winter freezing are drowning instead.
We have had two bright sunny days, and the standing water on the farm has drained considerably. There are still plenty of puddles and the ground is saturated with water.
Yesterday there were several people out enjoying the sun and pulling weeds in the year-round plots of our Community Garden, also know as the P-Patch. We rent out 85 small plots to neighbors who want to garden but don’t have a suitable place of their own.
If I try to walk on the fields I sink immediately to the ankle, even where the winter rye cover crop is tallest. I keep to the roads and the edges of the fields where we have left the grass turf. We still need to start the apple and blueberry pruning, do any dormant spraying in the orchard, and take the remaining soil samples while it is still winter. We’re not hurting yet, but I do wish I had gone ahead and taken the soil samples last December. As of noon today, the wet has returned as a blowing mist. Enrique is working today; after cleaning the animal pens I put him to working in the barn, cleaning & tidying and getting things back ship-shape.
In my last entry I mentioned my concern about potential flooding damage to the garlic planting. Yesterday I did find one variety, Inchelium Red, has sprouted. This variety is planted in one of the wettest areas of the garlic beds, so I feel somewhat reassured about the other varieties. Last year Inchelium Red sprouted second, coming after Susanville. It may be the Susanville is buried under a deeper covering of straw. I can only visit the garlic bed from the edge of the field where I can walk on the grass turf. I’ll be keeping a close watch on the garlic.
The first sign of garlic sprouting through the straw. The variety is Inchelium Red.
I also saw quite a few honeybees hovering in front of our two active beehives. I haven’t looked inside the hives for quite some time what with all the cold and rain. It was good to see that the hives appear to be coming through the winter ok thus far.
My wife Carol & I spent Sunday afternoon preparing the Washington State Business and Occupations Tax forms. In addition to paying the sales tax collected and the use taxes for items purchased from out of state, businesses in WA have to pay a percentage tax on gross income. It doesn’t matter if net income is small or even negative; the tax is on all money taken in, before expenses. Ouch. Meantime, Ruth has sent out the W-2’s and 1099’s. The only thing left to tackle is the federal income tax forms, the K-1’s. This will take some time, but we are keeping on schedule.
I’ve spent some time working on creating “Farm Bucks”, which I’ll discuss more in a later entry.
Two different out-of-state folks who had discovered our farm have contacted me recently.
We were called by a magazine writer who is thinking to include our farm as an example U-Pick farm in an article about how to get your children to eat more vegetables. She was particularly interested in our Dig-Your-Own Potato field, one of our most popular activities. The article is due out about May. I’ll let you know if the mention survives the editing process.
A group from San Francisco planning a farm and farmers’ market tour of the Seattle area contacted me about including The South 47 Farm as a possible stop on the tour. We’ll meet next month to see if the farm fits their needs. More news later if it works out.
These leads may or may not turn into some later publicity for the farm. Either way I was pleased that The South 47 Farm was singled out as particularly interesting.
What is playing today in the Jeep CD player? Quartetto Gelato – Neapolitan Café