Life is But a Dream

I commented to Laura-Jane at Whimfield that Susan and I are stuck in the purgatory of going back and forth between urban and country living and how oddly depressing that can be.

I'm not sure that will make sense to anyone shivering on PEI right now.

The thing is, we are so attached to our farm and friends in Canada. We mark the passage of our children through the years by the pictures that we share with family and friends each fall. The summers on PEI are the growth rings of our family.
Deeply embedded. Marking our orbital trajectory. Never to be revisited.

Here in Santa Barbara I enjoy working in an interesting field. I provide remote studio services to radio networks from New York, Washington, London, Toronto and Amsterdam. I work with famous people and large studios and I work with small sponsors on creative projects. I do silly voices and serious announcements and write and edit and promote my work in this busy urban metro-world on the beach.

But depression has been my companion since late last summer.
Who am I? Where am I? Who the hell cares?

On Sundays in Santa Barbara, I make a point of working on the farm. I pull up research or look at seed catalogs or read the Small Farmer's Journal or catch up on my organic certification paperwork.

Yesterday being Sunday, I pulled up some new information on the potential for commercial peach growing in the maritimes. I've been working on our peach project for 4 years now. Last May we took delivery and planted our first two varieties in a small orchard. I'm rolling the dice and betting that in 2010 we'll have a crop of fresh organic peaches to sell. That is my dream. Seems reality might actually catch up with me.

So there - you see? I work in this mechanical and virtual reality of a luxury urban landscape that sometimes blinds, burns, and turns its inhabitants to ashes. But I live in a pastoral dream.

We dreamed the farm on PEI. I dreamed a horse onto a trail ride. We dreamed a tractor into the field and we dreamed a peach orchard into a living thing. We have more dreams for green energy, sheep, cows and more chickens.

But (sigh) sometimes I feel a bit like Dorothy in OZ. If life IS but a dream, where the hell am I when I wake up?

And what if I discover that I can't really fly -
on the way down?

Better just keep working on those dreams.

Right now I'm standing in the wet spring grass, moving slowly through the orchard, pruning peach trees for the coming harvest.

Cover Crop Saves Top Soil, Reduces Inputs

A picture is worth a thousand words. This picture was taken last July just as the cucumbers were coming in. I'm posting it to show our plan to create a sustainable, integrated organic system that we can keep building on. I have to give credit to the Small Farmer's Journal for giving me the insight and information to start this plan. The article in SFJ gave information about cover cropping and green manure rotation using horse powered equipment. So far, our small scale operation and compact tractor are just the right scale for this design.

The picture shows 4'x 200' rows of cucmbers and squash, mulched with unsprayed barley straw I bought from a local farm. The straw mulch kept out weeds and kept moisture and soil temps even.

In between the crop rows is a cover/green manure crop of white clover and perennial rye grass. By keeping it mowed, but tall enough for the clover to bloom, we keep weeds out, feed the soil a mix of organic matter and fixed nitrogen and cover the top soil. We encourage bees and other pollinators to work for us. We also have a clean surface to work on that's wide enough to bring machines onto when needed.

So far, the results are good. But we'll soon see if weed pressure is manageable and whether the rotations of crops we plan will continue the high yields we've had so far.

The low till approach means less fuel required to prepare for planting. Cover crops keep weeds from establishing, so there is no input cost for weedkiller, equipment or fuel for spraying. We mow between rows with a lawn tractor - using far less fuel and creating less soil compaction than heavy machinery.

Anyway, I guess we're learning things that people who farm with horses or small tractors already know. We find it exciting and rewarding to learn more each year about how to work with nature to create high yields on a compact scale.