Bug Basics, kids & nature, the big seed order is finally done

After all the extreme cold warnings and all our preparations, the freeze was not far out of the usual range for the season. It is several days now after the coldest nights and I’m not seeing new damage on the raspberries or the garlic. We’re back into a more usual weather cycle now. We did get a heavy rain yesterday, followed by a freeze last night, leading to lots of automobile accidents this morning.

Rob & I went to the Bug Basics 101 class on Saturday. This first class focused on introducing the more common insect orders and providing enough anatomy training to make a start at recognizing and categorizing the bugs we come across. Our objective at the farm is to create a diverse and healthy landscape. Strong healthy plants are less bothered by pests. A complex landscape also supplies and supports the beneficial insects that prey on the pests. Since the farm is full of all kinds of life, we need to be able to recognize the beneficial insects as well as the problem ones. We need to devote more time to walking the fields and observing the insect life so we can try to head off problems before they become too damaging.

Another motivation for attending the class is one of my schemes for the farm. I’d love to develop a bug center where visitors can learn, observe, and interact with insects. We all tend to focus on the “bad” bugs, but many more are directly helpful to us, not to mention their critical roles in the ecology around us.

Two bumblebees on Marionberry blossoms. These big insects are among easiest to see (and photograph) of the many different insects at the farm. We have a number of honey bee hives at the farm, but native bees and other insects do much of the pollination that enables us to produce many of our crops.

On a related topic, I’ve started reading the book “The last child in the woods: Saving our children from nature deficit disorder” by Richard Louv. He uses this phrase to focus on the shift in children’s daily activities due to safety concerns, organized activities, and electronic entertainments. He suggests that relationship our children have with nature is becoming more intellectual and less personal. I’ve come to realize that one of the reasons many families come our farm is because the parents want to provide nature experiences for their children. One of the indicators Louv mentions is that many children do not associate food with a place in nature, presumably a result of the increasing trend towards packaged convenience and processed food. Visiting our farm to dig a potato from the earth and taking it home to prepare for supper is a powerful way to instill that connection of food with nature.

The crew has finished pruning the blueberries. Rob continues to work on the equipment maintenance and repair. The flatbed truck is back from the shop and running well.

I have devoted much of my time this week to finalizing my list of crops for the year and deciding where to purchase the seed. I ended up with nearly 200 different vegetable seeds and starts (potatoes, onions, garlic). In addition we’ll grow 50 different annual flowers & herbs from seed to add to the perennial plants in the flower and herb gardens. I have ordered from 10 different vendors and have two more to go. I do have seed left from last year for quite a few of these crops so I haven’t had to order seed for all. Together with the blueberries, apples, raspberries, and perennial flowers & herbs, I suspect we will have over 300 different varieties this year. I still have to go back and add up the flowers and herbs.

I have added new crops (carrots, cabbage, leeks, & more) as well as replacing some varieties with (for example, a more tender Asian eggplant) and expanding the number of varieties of some types (14 different winter squash! 15 different melons!) We have a lot of treats in store.

It's decision time with the seed catalogs.

What’s playing in the Jeep CD player today? Phillip Glass Ensemble - Koyaanisquatsi