Greenman's Garden Update and Photo's

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Thanks for visiting Greenman's Garden! Corinne will be doing plant walks each month at the farm for more information please click here.

July 7, 2010

Yep it is midnight and I updating the website, finally!!! The weather has FINALLY impoved and I think we got into the 80's today for the first time this year! Summer has finally come, I hope! Things are growing but we are about 1-2 weeks behind compared to last year. That May rain really through the Pacific Northwest for a loop. I will say our lettuce has been amazing and great, along with some of the other amazing produce and finally fruit is coming in. The raspberries have just started really turning in the last couple days, I need to double check the blueberries this week but they were all still green last week, but then so were the raspberries.

The lambs are doing great and are as cute as ever, sadly I didn't get any pictures of them so I can't show you how they have grown but I will get them next time. The ducks are huge and chickens should be laying some eggs soon. I have been waiting and watching patiently but no eggs yet :(

Anyway I have added a few new photo's for everyone to look at of the farm, the market stand, the animals, plants, flowers, herb gathering, and Corinne's Apothecary.

Corinne with veggies is about 2-3 weeks old, but shows a nice head of cabbage, lettuce, radishes, and a beautiful smile!

Then we have Corinne at the Shelton Farmers Market with all the produce we grow and some of the herbal tea blend she has for sale.

Then a close up of some of the produce for the Market stand.

Poppies Poppen is a great shot I got of a violet poppy flower in the field.

Then there is a picture of poppies, crimson clover, and oats all at the end of the garlic patch.

Then we have the Painted Mnt Corn and Tobacco plant that is grown for special occasions, ceremonies, and offerings.

Strawberries is next and this is the 2 year old patch with some new plants on the far right.

Then just look at those apples that I hand polinated because there weren't any bees out in the cooler temps when the flowers on the tree popped so as I like to say I painted those apples on the tree because I used a paint brush to pollinate the tree.

After the apples you can see the egg laying chickens under the apple tree and roaming around the orchard, free to eat all the insects, grass and other goodies they can peck or strach up for themselves.

Then we have the meat birds out in the field which are in a 100 sq foot fenced area to run around and flap thier wings. I move thier pin once a week so they can be on new ground with fresh grass. I also feed them kale at least once if not twice a day in conjunction with the certified organic feed I give them.

Next we have Corinne's Apothecary work table after she harvested some self heal, chamomile, yarrow and a few other things I can't tell at this moment in that thumb nail photo.

The next photo is after collecting some blue elder berry flowers.

Then we have a special basket of produce we put together for someone who gave us some bee boxes so next year we can do honey bees. They have us like 6-8 boxes and frames. We are very excited to get some honey bees next year.

Last is a photo of Corinne and Samuel walking in th woods at near by Park looking at some plant most likely. This was the first full day that Corinne and I took off in almost 3 month. It was nice to get out and do something different.

Well I hope you all had a wonderful 4th and I hope you enjoyed the update. Time to get to bed as it is now 1:30am and I need to be up in 5 hours to let the animals out and feed them. Till next time!!! Best wishes!

June 3, 2010

First week of CSA's has started and we are off to a good start. Shelton Farmers Market this year has been great and lots of people are showing up each week to see what the market has to offer. We have lots of greens to offer along with some asparagus, but you have to be early to get it! Corinne is also making her tea blends and salves which have been a wonderful addition to the stand and Corinne is getting some really good feed back about all her products. Come on down see for yourself.

Strawberries are just starting to ripen so we should have those showing up at market in the next couple weeks so look for those in the next week or so. The weather has been pretty crazy this last week with a lot of rain. Needless to say it makes the soil a little harder to work in. We have our meat birds at the farm and they are 2 1/2 weeks old now and growing fast as usual. If you are interested in getting some of these birds for eating please call us at 427-1259.

Corinne will be teaching plant walks at the farm and here is a description from the flier: Click here to print the flier

Discover wild plants that grow in the local fields, wetlands and woods. Plant walks are located at the beautiful Loertscher Farm, 5 miles west of Shelton. We will be focusing on the identification of edible medicinal plants and discussing their year round uses. This is a wonderful opportunity to learn more about what grows all around us, including native berries, tonic herbs and springtime greens. Inspiring handouts provided, as well as a ‘question and answer’ time, at the end of each walk.

Please email Corinne at redruba@yahoo.com or call 360-427-1259 to sign up or for more information please read the flier.

Well gotta make this short and sorry no photo's this time as it is midnight and I am just wrapping things up for the day! ;)

April 20, 2010

Well another month has flown by and more has happened in this last month then can remember at this point. Chickens are teenagers, ducks are almost full size and now we have four baby lambs!!! We managed to plant 900 more strawberries so that will mean more strawberries this year. Last years strawberries are already starting to flower and produce fruit. The asparagus patch is tilled and with the warm weather there should be asparagus ready for the second week at the market.

Corinne and I have had a few set backs as well but nothing that we haven't been able to over come thus far. So of the set backs were broken water pump for the fields, didn't get enough compost turned for the year (but we have manure), 10 days of rain which set our tilling plans back, deer fencing and other fencing projects have been stealing a lot of time from us. Corinne is struggling with slugs in the new perennial gardens (but beer bait is coming, rest-a-surd those slugs are in for a party)! We have also had to deal with mice eating our peas that we directed seeded in the field. Then there are the lawn mowers which all seem to want to break at the same time and they don't want me to fix them they want a professional to do the job LOL!

Transplanting is going well and the greenhouse is filled with lots of early greens and raspberries are glowing with green leafs, the fruit trees are in bloom, we have also wild crafted lots and lots of violets flowers and leafs, nettles, dandelion leafs just to name a few. This farm is a "wise woman's apothecary delight" plus wild plants don't need to be maintained by humans, they just grow perfectly it is simply amazing, now if I could just get carrots, onions, corn and squash to do that that would be AWESOME!

We have managed to plant all the potatoes, the garlic is beautiful (see the pictures), then there is the rhubarb which is getting huge (though compared to most rhubarb it is already gigantic) plus Corinne found a clump of horse radish which I thought was an annoying weed, luckily I was unsuccessful in killing it.

Market is a week and half away so we hope to see lots of people there buying salad greens, leeks, rhubarb, chois, garlic leeks, arugula, and we will have some Seascape strawberry starts, Cascading blackberry starts, kale, chard, choi, cabbage, spinach, lettuce, and few other starts. Corinne will hopefully be able to sell her tea blends and salves at market but if not they will always be available here at the farm stand.

Well we are tired and need our rest so I hope that helps you get caught up with us. There are some new pictures to the right, hope you enjoy them!

March 11, 2010

Well it is a rainy, cold and wet day at the farm so I, Claude, am staying inside and updating the website. People starting to sign up but we still have space for some new people. Everything is going along pretty well expect my compost is not reaching tempetures and my arms are over worked so I haven't been working on it or attending to it like I should which is probably why it isn't reaching temps. Such is life. Currently it is reaching 120 +/- about 10 degrees shy of where it needs to be at a minimum.

The chickens and ducks are growing up and it has been super interesting to see how they both develop differently. Chickens like to grow a good set of feathers first and formost but don't get big at first where ducks just put on mass and size. I am blow away by how big they have gotten in just a month compared to chickens. Though I can start to see their adult feathers showing under their yellow baby down feathers. I recently biult the ducks a semi-portable night time box so they can be outside now. I also cleaned up and refenced the chicken yard so that the chickens can go outside and run around as well.

Corinne and I went and bought a few more perinnial herbs and plants for the herb garden as well as some personal grapes to plant out here. Sorry we didn't buy enough grape starts for CSA or for market, though we both with we could afford to beable to provide that.

I, Claude, also managed to plant 12 rows of carrots, 6 rows of bunching onions, 3 rows of peas a couple rows of radishes and a row of turnips. Corinne and I also planted about 80 lbs of potatoes and will probably do another 60-80 lbs here this next month. I also planted about 1000 onions starts, 800 beet starts, some celeriac roots and something else that I just can't remember at the moment.

We should be getting another 500 strawberry plants in early April which is exciting and I am planning on buying wood chipper this year so I can chip up all the apple prunings I do and then use them for smoking some meat!

Well time to get moving. I will get some photos added soon.

February 20, 2010

Is everyone enjoying the early summer weather this winter/early spring? We are, in fact it has allowed us to get a lot done in the garden in the last couple weeks. A new CSA member came out yesterday with his tractor, plow and tiller and opened up the rest of the upper field for us! Very exciting, this new plowed and tilled ground will be the Market and Farm Stand garden for us this year. Thank you so much Guy for doing all that!!!

Corinne and I have also been working on her herb beds and we went and got about $500 worth of plants. We have also been pruning the apple trees, and we managed to get 1650 starts started this last week in accordance to the moon phase of leaf plants. This coming week we get the flower plants started. This way we can lots of fresh greens for market in May and they will also be available at the farm stand.

We also got our 90-100 chickens that we ordered for laying hens and we also got our ducks and they are all so cute. It is so good to have them join us at the farm and we are so exciteed to know we will have them be around in the years to come. Luckly we only lost one chicken out of the 100.

Corinne and I have also been walking around and exploring more of the land and what it has to offer. Samuel, Corinne's son, found an amazing purple violet patch the other day when he was out playing on the farm with Lola, coincidently it is one of Corinne's favorite flowers. Needless to say we have been out there picking violets and she has been experimenting with capturing their smell and the smell is simply amazing. My (Claude) favorite thus far has been sugared violets it has captured the flavored and made it sweeter then it already was, but then I do have a sweet tooth :P I took a few photos of the purple violet and a couple rare colored violets.

We have also been eating Nettles that are just now begining to come up and are ready to eat. Nettles are a great form of nutrients especially after a long winter of not being able to get that much local based produce. You can cook them much like spinach but you will need to cook steam them to release the chemical that causes them to sting you and when it interacts with hight temps it breaks it down and becomes vaporized. If you have never had them and would like to try them and would like to go out and harvest some feel free to contact me, Claude, and we can work something out or if you would like me to harvest some for you let me know and I will be happy to pick some and sell them to you. If you haven't picked them be sure to bring gloves and long sleeve shirt.

Enjoy the rest of this amazing warm batch of air, we are!!! :D

February 6, 2010

Well we did it, we managed to pass all the inspection for the new "dwelling" as Corinne and I call it, jokingly. We are still working on a few cosmetic things and a few touch up deals but we are living there and are loving it. We have also just started working outside in the gardens this week, spreading compost to the garlic, raspberries and to the new herb beds we are cleaning up for Corinne's herb garden. The egg laying chickens are coming next week and we have their organic food and I am cleaning out the old chicken coup for them. We are also getting some personal meat ducks to try it out and see how it is raising ducks. So maybe next year we will offer ducks along with the meat chickens. I have added some photos of the dwelling so people can see the work we did this winter to get it ready for us to live there. I have some before and after shots.

This next month or so is going to be a whirl wind with lots to do and the list is long since we didn't get to do any farm work this winter we get to play catch up. I, Claude, must say that living there make it so much easier to work there. I can stay later and eat lunch and not have to worry about bringing one and so many other great benefits to living there and farming I am so happy to move to this next level of farming. I know Corinne is excited and has already started putting some of her herbs in the ground in the garden beds we have been cleaning. We also plan on making another space out by the asapargus patch that will be a raised bed for perinnial herbs that grow big!

I also want to thank everyone for the support that has been given and expressed to this new venture. This year is going to be a productive year on many levels, I can just feel it!!!

Enjoy the pictures of the change we made, these are pretty recent but we still have done more cosmetic work since the recent photos were taken. More will be coming of the baby chicks and ducklings soon! :)

January 1, 2010

Corinne and I are so excited for this upcoming year. So what did we do to start it off? We updated the website!!! YAHOO!!! 2010's agreements are available for CSA shares. We are also going to have egg laying chickens; meat chickens for CSA and other community members (more information will be available later in the season for meat birds); we are thinking of doing a turkeys and a possible winter CSA (please let us know if these last two ideas are of interest to you). We will be growing perinniel herbs, both medicinal and culinary. Corinne will be offering hand made tea blends, culinary blends, herbal vinegar/honeys, infused oils, skin salves and various other herb based products at the farm stand and at the markets.

Corinne will also be offering a plant medicine basket CSA that will be available Septemeber 2010 through April 2011, 8 months total. This monthy Basket will have enough plant medicine for two people who use herbs regularly or for a family who uses it occasionally. The plant medicine in these baskets is created around the seasonal need/use of herbs for health. Included in the monthly basket will be tea blend, a tincure blend (alcohol/water extract), an infused honey or vinegar, and a bath blend, salve, or infused oil. Also each month 1-2 plants will be highlighted in an educational newsletter. Information and recipes will be given. More information will be available later this season.

Corinne, Samuel and I will be moving out the farm in early Febuary. Currently we remodeling the basement of the farmhouse. We have been working on this project all fall and winter thus far and the end is in sight. We are SUPER excited to move in and start the new season!

We are excited to start a farm stand at the farm. Here we will have fresh vegetables, fruit, eggs, herbs and other farm goods available Monday - Friday. It will be a weigh and pay trust based setup. We will be starting the farm stand in May.

We have ordered our seeds, more strawberries and potato seeds for the new expanded field. We have order 80+ chickens for eggs and we will also have some personal ducks running around.

Thanks for coming back and supporting us! We know that this year will be amazing and we hope you will join us!

July 7, 2010

Corinne with Veggies