It's been a while since writing one of these, but we have been extra busy this summer, specifically because of the weather.
The year started our very well in terms of conditions for the gardens and pasture. We got fertilizer on early, had a good balance of moisture and sun, plus the hay fields had a good early growth to allow us to start haying 2 weeks before we normally do. We also were opening our farmstand on weekends for most of the year which was another busy part of the year but very rewarding!
Christina and I started to get worried near the end of June when we saw the long range forecast show no rain coming over 14 days. Because her garden and dahlia's need regular moisture, we decided to invest in a gas water pump with hoses and use the existing 1000 litre tote
Although this meant we got water to the gardens (and eventually the cows), it meant we were pumping 1000 liters of water nearly every day from around the middle of July, until early November. This took up much more of our available time over the year, so although we were done haying by the 3rd week of July (much earlier than any other year), our time got spent hauling water.
The other major issue this year was with the pastures and hay fields. They couldn't be watered the same as the garden because of their size and we aren't set up to irrigate that amount of land. This meant that by early August, much of our pastures looked like the picture above. With no grass growing, and no sign of any second cut hay to make, we invested early in round rolls to feed out to the cattle from around the end of July until they go in the barn in late November. This was a cost we didn't expect and many farmers faced the same issue. Thankfully we were able to make enough hay for the winter but we couldn't feed it out in the summer.
Water for the cattle became another issue early on. Although we have two drilled wells on the farm, they have to keep water going for our house and the farmhouse plus they provide water for the cows. As we saw dryer conditions, we decided to balance out the well water use with a full tote of water they could drink from. Although we may have been ok to just use the well, this at least took pressure off the well pump.
Although the weather made it busy and stressful year, we did have some summer highlights! Christina finally was able to attend the Windsor Garlic Festival and it was a huge success, with her selling out of garlic in 2 hours! This has motivated her to expand her garlic patch so she has more garlic next year.
As we wind down the fall season and have Christmas Tree U-pick and cattle going in the barn for the winter in our sights, our plan is to rest this winter and recover from the busy dry seasons.
