Rocking in May

Back from the city, back to the farm.

Skies were clear this morning and the air heated up quick. I was early today (for once), the Boss gave me a bit of a shrug. There was a frost warning last night, so everything in the main greenhouse was covered up tight. I rolled up the cloths and checked in on the little guys--

all the peppers are looking hearty and they've tossed out their second pair of leaves. The plum tomatoes look pretty good too, growing straight, four strong leaves getting bigger-- there's a lot of talk and concern over the "chocolate cherry" tomato variety, maybe the frost cloth weighed too heavy on them or something didn't click right-- they're thin looking and a dozen or so have curled over dead (not a good survival rate as we only planter 80-90 of them). The swiss chard and broccoli I thinned out last week are chugging along, just over the weekend they've shot up and thickened out. The 16- 20 trays of bok choi- eighty plants to a tray- have erupted, the boss is planning to put them in the field (weather permitting) later this week. The cauliflower is coming along, and a few of the eggplants we planted last week have already poked through the soil.
 Outside, the rainy nights/ warm sunny days have kicked everything into growing overdrive-- green trees, flowers, weeds-- it actually feels like May.

I didn't get a chance to check out the lower fields today, I forgot to mention  it but the Foreman sunk in two rows of beets last week over by the beans, peas and strawberries.

The Boss was in great spirits, he plans on opening up the farm store mid-May, so only a few weeks to go. I moved all the remaining crap out of the store, swept up and vacuumed-- then spent some quality time putting down a fresh coat of paint on the concrete floor. My time in the art studio paid off somewhat, at least I know what to do with a roller and a can of paint. I finished up the store with time to spare before lunch.

Over the weekend the Boss had taken a bunch of odds and ends over to his buddy's shop for a bit of welding. We have several different types/generations of irrigation pipes, so he sawed usable connectors off of damaged pipes and had them joined to make little cross-pipe-type-connectors. I spent the rest of the morning smoothing out the sharp edges of the welds with a grinder, buzzed off a bit of the outer corrosion and slapped a coat of anti-corrosive paint on all of 'em.

The Boss's buddy also welded a few not-so-minor reinforcements to the new tractor's bucket- ten iron plates now run front to back along the sides and the underneath-- with how the rest of the day went, it was a pretty timely fix.

After lunch, I rode with the Foreman up to the hilltop fields. We headed over to the far side by a stone wall where we planted potatoes and some of the fall tomatoes last year. Up there things still look very bleak, only 5 rows of strawberries have been planted so far with maybe 35 bare dirt acres surrounding them (I think a round of sweet corn is going to be planted in the next few weeks).

It was time to rock. Bah came over with a seven foot iron rod (2in thick) and we started shimmying boulders from the field. The Foreman brought up the new tractor with the reinforced front loader and we cut 20ft rows through the field top to bottom. We filled the loader 2-3 times a row. It was hard work and the boulders seemed to only get bigger. Bah would lever his bar beneath a boulder buried in 3-4ft of dirt and heave, as the Foreman and I would lift, push and dig it free. Then we'd kick the tractor into gear and scoop it up-- much easier said than done. Bah giggled his head off each time- "600lbs, easy", "at least 800lbs." After the "that one is 1000lbs, careful" Bah stopped giggling and ended his weight tally. We picked up any stone bigger than a baseball- which meant every stone.

Collapsing on a dirt pile between loads, we chatted away-- Bah questioned me about everything from "did I go to college" to "what do you do over winter" to "hows your girlfriend." We peed in the woods. Drank all our water-- Bah should be too old for this kind of work, but this man is tough as dirt.

5 hours of slogging stones and the Foreman finally called it a day. Bah and I walked back through the peach orchard. The trees have flowered and the blooms almost weigh down the branches. Bah inspected the 40 new trees we planted maybe a month ago- buds have started growing and a handful even started to open their pink flowers.

Back at the yard the Boss had attached the boom-sprayer to the old tractor and was giving its tubing and nozzles an overhaul. Later this week we're bound to get some of the heavy rains that have worked their way across the country- the Boss wants to get some weeds sprayed down so the water will help the herbicide seep in.

The floor was still drying in the store, so I closed her up and tidied up around outside. 2 jobs I have to remember for tomorrow morning--
1. Paint the back of the plate welds (new ring attachment oo boy!) on the reinforced front loader with anti-corrosive.
2. Take up the mallet and smash the old toilet to bits so it can go to the dump

Long day calls for tall beers, catch ya tomorrow.