Roots Run Deep

Alfalfa, a crop which was the previous inhabitant of the field where the high tunnel was built, is still a part of our regular weeding. It is a deep rooted perennial which can reach depths of up to twenty feet, so to say to we are fully removing it when we weed would be silly and attempting to do so would be futile. 

I suppose I'm a bit metaphorical. I use what I see in the outside world to understand and justify what is going on in my own life. Sometimes good, sometimes bad...and maybe it's because I have a little too much time to think while planting seed after seed or pulling weed after weed, but I am beginning to see a real parallel between our lives and the lives of plants...both actual and metaphorical. Of course there is birth and death, disease and the ability to thrive, but there is also an individuality that comes with each plant and a status that we ascribe to each kind depending on our use for them...are they beneficial or noxious? Beautiful, luscious plants or ugly obnoxious weeds? And is our judgment of them reality or just our interpretation of their worth? How deep do our roots run? How much do we judge of each other on the surface, not knowing (and not caring) how differently our roots are?

As I knelt on the dirt, pulling away at each weed in front of me I felt like there would be no end...that as soon as I dug one up, twenty more would take it's place... and in this instance I am right. This is why using herbicides and pesticides are sooooo much easier than farming organically (I haven't even started in on the grasshopper issue). It is so much easier to pour out chemicals that will kill these weeds (and pests) than it is to spend hours at a time picking each one by hand... but just because something is easy doesn't mean it's the right thing to do.

Jake has been looking into the practice of permaculture, which despite it's lack of solid definition, is a way of utilizing nature rather than fighting against it in farming/gardening. It is using beneficial plants and cover crops and mimics the relationships found in nature to decrease the amount of weeds, increase the nutrients in soil, and be an overall better solution to the destruction that we are currently causing on our lands.

We met two other WWOOF'ers this week who are staying at Carols; John, a North Dakota native who had been working on an 8,000 acre canola farm; and Sagel, a PhD student taking a week off of her final year of studies. We got a break from planting and did two days of fencing (which, by the way is not my favorite thing to do) which included digging new post holes, digging up old/broken posts, driving the tractor around in a field with 4 foot high weeds, and tightening barbed wire. When we got to the end of the fence line (where there is a cliff that looks onto a bend in the river) we saw 8-10 large turtles. I also saw a blue heron up close which flew away. Jake also started on a new mini coup for the chickens which I helped with a bit. We finished up on the trench for the main irrigation line from the creek which should make watering the tunnels much easier. Oh- and I planted some sunflowers and pumpkins!

We can finally cross the creek to get to the 'other' garden without making it an all day trip!!







Boys working on the coop

now, if they'll just turn red!!