A year in the life of a farm

[elgato]

For the serious gamers here. Food [plot planting video in the works.

https://youtu.be/_7LU_BufWuk

[GLM]

Loved you video on your garden! You mentioned you put celery in your breakfast smoothies - what else do you put in it? I like making smoothies but usually just add fruit. I would like to try a vegetable smoothie!

[BlakeJ]

how is your compost pile set up? and do you have a watering system for your garden?

[elgato]

Loved you video on your garden! You mentioned you put celery in your breakfast smoothies - what else do you put in it? I like making smoothies but usually just add fruit. I would like to try a vegetable smoothie!

Not too many people...well actually no-one ever...has asked for my smoothie recipe So I am delighted to share.

It starts with what is fresh in the garden. I go out every morning picking ingredients. Today:
spinach, couple different kinds of kale, few beet leaves, few Italian dandelion leaves, few broccoli sprouts with leaves, couple carrots of different colors, couple celery stalks, a few skinny asparagus stalks, large handful of blueberries, handful of raspberries, handful of blackberries and a banana.

Now the powders:
teaspoon chlorella, teaspoon Moringa leaf powder, teaspoon maca powder, and a scoop of fermented dried green drink powder from Organixx.

All goes into a Vitamix with a glass of water and a glass of ice. Nectar of the Gods! Drink a couple of glassfuls of that every morning and good things happen.

[GLM]

Thanks for your recipe! Good way to start the day!

[elgato]

how is your compost pile set up? and do you have a watering system for your garden?

I make a big U with bales of hay twice a year. Get a couple of dump trailer loads of horse manure/wood chips mix from my niece that raises horses, then everything goes into the pile. Its big enough I can turn it with the front end loader periodically. I make a lot of compost. When one pile gets really full I stop adding to it and start the new one.

Every row of my garden has water available but I have found using heavy mulch I don't have to water much. Hardly ever actually. I'll water to get seeds sprouted mostly. When I do have to water I just use a wand on the end of a hose. I used to have drip irrigation on every row but I have taken that out. Just don't need it.

[elgato]

Spring planting techniques with no till

https://youtu.be/WS07EHzcOfk

[elgato]

Elgato when you started with the notill method did you fertilize your fields the first few years?

2 of my fields are in need of a boost. I will be planting the other half of one of them and I am considering adding fertilizer to my seed mix and drilling it in with seed. This may break every rule of farming and be a real bad idea but I have not read or seen anything that addresses the issue in the first year before a biomass Foundation is obtained.

Any assistance or advice by the notillers would be appreciated.

I think it is a great idea to add fertilizer in the beginning to start getting the bio mass needed to prime the pump. There are ways to do it with out fertilizer but admittedly takes longer. Just posted video that shows a strategy for building up weak field.

[Puncher51]

Excellent videos once again!

[HappyM]

As always thx for the info and videos. You sharing is saving us a few years on our learning curve. I started with 23 acres with a mix of sun hemp, sorghum, peas, sunflowers , millet, and okra drilled into 3 different fields that I terminated winter weeds with roundup. They are all now up and 2 are doing well and the other is up but looks to be struggling competing with the emerging Bermuda.

My next step us 15 acres I am going to divide into 3 segments. 1) will be 3 acres of sorghum Sudan . This part has heavy Bermuda that I have sprayed but want the shading of the Sudan to win out and begin to bui,d it back. Next is 6 acres of soybeans . I am again worried about the Bermuda but we will see how it goes. Finally 6 acres of dove field. Mostly sunflowers with some millet and sorghum. I sprayed all of it. I think I am going to add 100 lbs per acre of 0-24-24 to the soybeans to give them a boost.

Fingers crossed and thx again.

[elgato]

Another day in the life of a farm

https://youtu.be/cU9p3g2fdlQ

[hardtner]

Been watching the videos. Very informative.

[MAP]

I clicked on the chicken video and spent over an hour watching some of the other ones..... seems like a very enjoyable life over there in LA, that's good to see

That drop tine buck in mexico is unreal, your bucks down there have some tremendous frames which is my favorite trait in deer.

[HappyM]

Appreciate the videos. Good stuff. Early returns on my maiden voyage are looking ok but lots of weeds. I think I started a little early and did not get a good kill on spring green up. Put that one in lessons learned column. Pics of 2 different fields and the next project which will be soybeans.

[ATTACH][/ATTACH]

[elgato]

Planted joint vetch with alyce clover last Friday. Got 3" rain last night which should jump it up quickly. Vetch is one of my all time favorite plants! It grows big deer.

Here's the video:

https://youtu.be/1fRl7jeC1w4