The state of the garlic fields

We've done multiple passes with the tine cultivator to pull out the quack. I would venture that quack and horse nettle are our two most aggressive invasives in our fields. We essentially utilized the stale seedbed program all summer but a couple of weeks ago, we did a final hand-weed and then seeded with covers.

Bill hand weeding Field #1

Field #1 got buckwheat

Field #2 and #3 got a green manure mix

Field peas, oats and hairy vetch

Sowing the manure mix brought our first experience with using an inoculant. We utilized the slurry method which was startling to us both with how well it worked!

We poured the seed mix into a trug. (I can not recommend trugs enough. I've used them for everything from harvesting, washing, carrying gear, and mixing inoculant.)

We then sprinkled the half of the inoculant packet over the seeds and sprinkled about 3 oz of water (from our water jug from the cooler) and using our hands we stirred the seeds around. The black inoculant spread evenly thru the seed and the seed remained dry enough to still be spread through our hand spreader.

Seeds in the trug

The teeny black specks are the inoculant

This is Field #1 with the buckwheat barely sprouting. I hope it hurries up! It has a lot of weed seeds that need to be smothered.

I recently harvested the onions from the farm garden. I bought these on a whim all dried and half sprouted in June from the bargain bin of the local Cuba City grocery store. We planted them as an experiment and we got about 100 (smallish) onions from our efforts. They are curing in the barn. This little experiment has us dreaming us all of the onion varieties we will grow next year!

Lovin' those bread trays

Farm garden

The garden at the farm is indeed looking good! I'm several weeks behind everyone else, but that is OK. The weed pressure isn't too bad and things look really healthy.

Winter squash in foreground, beets, onions, beans...

Calypso bean

I took a walk and enjoyed checking out the fields and planning future garlic beds. Our newest invasive is horse nettle. Not sure to how to combat that one. I'll have to spend some time online and figure it out. The areas that I cleared of burdock and thistle are looking pretty good.

New broadfork

We have two new farm implements.

New trailer for hauling (hauling stuff!)

And we decided to experiment with a broadfork. Thanks to Barb for telling us about Gulland Forge. A-used-to-be-in Wisconsin based (now Kentucky) forger and artisan who handcrafts broadforks.



Bill is making great progress on the new ReAdapted shop. Sparky is running again too thanks to a new starter.

In garlic news, we've completed our garlic seed bank purchases. Our MOSA organic inspector called last week and they will be out to inspect in mid-October.


Church/home garden is looking great. I think I've finally gotten ahead of the quack grass this year thanks to the wheel hoe with the tine cultivator attachment. 3 passes have really cleared out the majority of the quack! This is the best looking garden I've had in years. (Although Bill tells me the farm garden is even better! I haven't been there in a couple of weeks; will be there tomorrow.)

Mustard greens, turnips, chard

Broken tractor

Sparky's starter stopped starting. He is stalled up near Field #1. Bill is on the quest to find a starter that works on a 60 year old tractor - not an easy task.

Garden is looking good. I spent Saturday weeding and enjoying the farm solo as Bill was at prairie plant nursery for a field day with one of his landscape groups.

Sunday was spent digging burdock and cutting blooming thistle. My efforts last year at hand control of the thistle were positive so I've continued another portion of the hillside below the feedlot.

Both Gardens - In!

I both both gardens in: the one at home in Chicago and the other in Wisc at our church-house. Nothing at the farm this year - we just aren't there enough to tend to crops. We would like to get some beds prepped and seeded with cover crops this year, but that involves buying a plow and we haven't focused on that (yet).

I planted all seedlings that I started myself. The weed pressure at the church-house garden is severe. In fact, it isn't just weeds - sigh... it is quackgrass and it is a formidable opponent for organic gardeners (all gardeners in fact).

I turned the soil with a garden fork and removed as much of the top grass and the roots as I could. I then went through it again with my Cobrahead (looove this tool!) and my hands and pulled every piece I could out. The soil is really friable and lovely thanks to the huge compost addition two years ago so it is almost enjoyable to weed quackgrass. The roots just go on and on!

We won't be back up for several weeks, so I am sure that it will take over the garden by then.

Meanwhile I'm doing some research on how to eradicate it without using Roundup. I've read that a cover crops can smoother it. A rotation of buckwheat, winter rye, buckwheat and winter rye again can almost eliminate it. The rye was sown at 175lb/acre in September and disced in April at knee-high. Buckwheat sown in May at 70 lb/acre and disced in full bloom. Repeat for a 2nd year.

All of this has made me realize that we better get shopping for a plow - I think we should get this cover crop rotation going on at least an acre at the farm this fall. Judging by the amount of invasives that we currently have (thistle, wild parsnip, burdock), it is pretty obvious that we will have quackgrass too.

One other note on quackgrass. I did hear that ducks love it and can clear a garden of it in no time.

Handmade hula hoe

This is a paw print of our dog that we had to put to sleep two years ago. Bill recently mounted it in a piece of old timber that he found in the belltower of our church. We have two of them - one in the Wisc church and one in our Chicago house.

This is a handmade hula hoe that Bill made me for me for my 4oth birthday. It is a white oak sapling.

This is the handle. He left part of the bark on the end. The silver band is a piece of metal from a can of dog food from our dog. He turned under the sharp ends with a metal bender and had carved out a section of the handle where the metal fits. Also, he hand punched a message on the band - it says 3 Flat Acres.

This is the top of the handle. It is hard to see but he carved a silhouette of our dog. When he gave it to me he said, "I know you miss her when you garden, so I carved her image so that she can still be with you."

Sun, time and edamame

Before we left Wisconsin on Sunday morning, I harvested all of our potatoes. It was a sad crop. I sometimes get very discouraged when gardening as our home garden in Chicago is more and more shaded by our neighbor's huge Silver Maple so my tomatoes, beets, beans, chard, etc are fairly scraggly. Our Wisconsin garden is so overgrown with weeds since we are only there every two to four weeks that the weeds are often taller than the tomatoes! Anyway, while harvesting my potato crop - that I was never able to hill appropriately, I became discouraged by these attempts to grow our own food. Bill, being a great partner, said 'just think how much you will be able to grow when you actually have sun AND live in the place you grow your food. If you can grow these potatoes and tomatoes and greens without trying - just think of how much you will yield when you are actually able to tend on a regular basis and you have full sun!' It did make me feel better. I did get about 10# of potatoes.

We both worked in the garden for about 3 hours on Sunday morning. I dug up the aforementioned potatoes and planted buckwheat as cover crop on the bare beds. Bill restrung the tomatoes. We think we will end up getting a fair number of tomatoes. I brought a lot of green ones home. Our neighbors' tomatoes are all dying. Ours look fine. hmmmm.... perhaps over fertilizing is the culprit? My grandma's tomatoes also always died early but she loved Miracle Gro and never rotated her locations.

I also found out that our neighbors have hens - I didn't get over to see them, but I will when we are back up over Labor Day.

Last night for supper we had steamed fresh edamame pods. I got them from a farmer coop that delivers to my food coop. They were delicious!