Month: April 2019

Farm update: April 29

/ Elizabeth / 7 Comments

San Juans 00

Spring is truly here and the Quiet Farm project list expands daily! The weather has been unusually warm, so much so that everyone is concerned about our wonderful mesa snowpack melting too quickly and flooding the creeks. This sunny (and windy) week alone, we received deliveries of soil, lumber, fencing and concrete. We hauled railroad ties, hefted 80-pound bags of Quikrete, wheelbarrowed soil, hammered in T-posts and more. Our farm muscles are coming along nicely, and we’re trying hard to remember to apply sunscreen and drink enough water. When people say farming is hard work, they aren’t kidding – especially when you don’t yet own a tractor.

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Farm update: April 15

/ Elizabeth / 7 Comments

Things are getting busy here at Quiet Farm! The weather is (mostly) conducive to working outside, and we’ve got a list of projects lined up. More trays of seedlings are potted up every day, we’re working hard on finishing the chicken house so we can bring pullets home, and plans for installing our game fence are coming together (I get to drive an excavator!).

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Run, Pony, run. But not right at us, please. It’s scary when you do that.

Temporary Pony is alive and well and running around our pasture at top speed while performing complicated dance moves. Someday soon she’ll leave for her new home, but she’s certainly provided plenty of entertainment (and no small amount of terror) during her time here.

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Farm update: April 8

/ Elizabeth / 11 Comments

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The hills are alive…with weeds! But we call them “wildflowers.”

The snow is finally gone at this elevation, even though plenty can still be seen on the mesa. Our pasture is coming back with a vengeance, and we spend our days walking the land, looking at what plants are coming up and trying to decide whether they’re helpful or harmful to us. Since we bought Quiet Farm at the end of a blistering summer in the midst of a hundred-year drought, pretty much everything was crispy and dormant. We hadn’t yet determined what bushes and trees might survive, and what would need to be removed. We’re giving everything a generous opportunity to stage a spring comeback before we tear it out.

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Farm update: April 1

/ Elizabeth / 16 Comments

Spring is finally here…with the exception of a small blizzard that blew in Friday evening, of course. The weather right now is capricious – gorgeous one minute, hurricane-like the next. But we haven’t yet spent spring on our farm, so we’re ready for all of it. Here’s what we’re up to these days!

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Why the long face?

Despite this photo, our pastures are greening up rather nicely, so we have a new resident at Quiet Farm. Temporary Pony belongs to our neighbor, and since we have grazing land available and no animals to graze it, Temporary Pony lives at Quiet Farm until she goes to her new home later this spring. She is a lovely, spirited horse who likes to sprint along the fence line, and she also runs straight at you full-bore when you’re out in the field – heartwarming and yet terrifying at the same time. It’s a pleasure to have an actual animal here; it makes our farm feel much more legitimate!

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