Things are definitely moving along on the farm... We've hosted 4 WWOOFers in the past month, two of whom will be here through the Southside Social. Four more WWOOFers will arrive in the coming weeks and we'll have six of them to help during the Social which will be great.

We have been installing the annual garden and it's almost finished. A few more miscellaneous beds and we should be done. We had some extra space after moving the duck coop..Brandy spontaneously decided to install some beds for bush beans and then we added another 6 beds next to them. That makes approximately 45 or so 4 foot beds 10-12 feet long.

Our 16x50 greenhouse space is looking good, and I think our decision to reduce the number of tomato plants from 6 per bed to 4 will work well. Better airflow and healthier plants are what we're hoping for. Other than one experimental outdoor bed with about 12 plants, all of our tomatoes are grown in the greenhouse. Some of this year's varieties include: Brandywine, Gold Nugget, Gold Medal, High Carotene, Cuore di Bue, Persimmon, Mortgage Lifter, Costoluto Genovese, Cherokee Purple, Black Russian, Black Krim, Sun Gold, and many more. Aside from a couple of the cherry tomato varieties, all are open pollinated heirlooms which means that they breed true from seed. All are indeterminate, which produce throughout the season (unlike determinates which all ripen at the same time) and require a support system. We provide support from above, using twine and ropes. We're also growing basil, peppers, eggplant, and melons in the greenhouse.

We also have the lower field which includes about 100 feet of potatoes, a bed of onions (4 feet x 100 feet), nearly 600 feet of pole beans in four varieties, 2oo feet of open pollinated corn, and 50 feet of black sorghum. We're testing out the sorghum to see how it does in this climate--after meeting some cool sorghum farmers in Appalachia last fall who assured me "If youn's grow corn, ya'll can grow sorghum" I was inspired. Nearly half the field though, is taken up with our squash. Planted in the three sisters tradition with a squash plant, corn or sunflower, and pole bean in each mound, we have increased our space by nearly 30% and have about 250 mounds this year. Summer squash varieties include Giambo hybrid, yellow crookneck, Sunburst, Bennings Green Tint, Black Beauty, Tromboncino, and more. Winter squash includes Uncle David's Dakota Dessert, Acorn, Bush Delicata, Red Kuri, Long Island Cheese, and many more. We used a selection of different sunflower varieties, but the corn was Golden Bantam (open pollinated) and the beans were the traditional Cherokee Trail of Tears variety which is great for climbing corn as it has fairly light foliage and narrow beans.

But the project I'm particularly excited about is the herb garden expansion. We installed the reclaimed cedar posts for the living fence--wine grape vines (a selection of locally grown varieties) planted every 3 feet and a 50 foot section of the fence will include espalier fruit trees. This will provide a border to our new herb garden area--maybe I'll try to scan the layout design and upload it... We installed a wide variety of herbs this weekend-all grown from seed except the 40 or so lavender plants who were gifted to us from our friend Rick and his girlfriend (thanks!). Some of the herbs included Rue, Mad Dog Skullcap, Valerian, Echinacea, Catnip, Lemon Mint, Pennyroyal, Anise Hyssop, many more.

Please checkout our photos!http://s1222.photobucket.com/albums/dd485/finneyfarm/