Coyote Ridge FarmsWelcome To Our Rural Blog

The last week has been a blur.  If we weren’t doing one thing we were doing another… added to the confusion, we did the taxes.

The last few days were filled with lots of field-work.  First working the soil, readying it for planting, then the planting.  Farmer Mike and I have been teaming up for the small-grain planting season.  I got to prepping a 40 acre field for planting… as well as another 9 acres.  Then Mike got to planting it for me.  The 40 acres now has non-GMO (genetically modified organism:no-no:) wheat and the 9 acres has oats. Then, yesterday, it was over to Mike’s acreage where we quickly dug and planted the same day… no break-downs – it went smoothly.

I decided to plant more wheat this year since we saw the potential of planting small grains last year.  There is something to the saying, “Do the opposite of what everyone else is doing.“  With most of the area’s big acreage farmers practicing the ‘scratch and spray’ method of farming with corn and soybeans, small grains on a minimal-input style of farming like what we do, makes sense.  Small grains like wheat & oats help crowd-out weeds, so there is really little need to spray chemical herbicides.  Small grains are also relatively cheap to buy seed for, thus reducing input costs even further.  This year we may have gotten lucky or just discovered a different way of doing things (aka… minimal-input farming).  This is what we did this year… we first used the disc to chop up the stalks on last year’s corn ground before the plowing this spring and then simply went over that with the digger once before planting.  Now that the oats & wheat are in, we won’t have to touch it until harvest.  My new belief is that one doesn’t always need the big return cash-crops if your inputs are low enough.  That’s kind of what we learned last year with the 20 acres of wheat and 20 of oats.  We made the same amount from those two crops as we did on 80+ acres of corn, the year before.  Those who farm “conventionally” may argue that it can’t be done that way… if it could, they’d be doing it.  But when using a simple, multi-crop, crop rotation and planting of the correct grains, one can eliminate the need for high priced chemical herbicides, pesticides and fertilizers (inputs).  Lower inputs MAY mean lower yields, but it doesn’t necessarily mean lower profits.  And if you need another reason to try minimal-input farming… how about this:  It’s better for the environment.  We will most likely attempt spring plowing again next year as it helps to reduce winter wind erosion and conserves soil moisture.

In between the field-work, I have been doing more fencing north of the creek.  I now have all the primary fence-posts in along the creek as well as the H-post support assemblies.  As soon as I buy a few rolls of high-tensile wire, I’ll be able to string it.    The grass is growing and I think the cattle are anxious to get to it.  I hesitate to let them into the pastures to early as I know it can cost more to do so, down the road.  I read somewhere that for every bale of hay you feed before the pasture is ready, you save up to 5X that amount of pasture grass tonnage.  So it really does pay to feed up that aging hay before letting your critters out on pasture.

Oh Yeah!  Here’s some good news.  We did qualify for the federal high-tunnel grant.  I signed the papers last week at our local NRCS office.  We originally applied for the grant but was turned down (like most folks ). But then we applied under the organic initiative… we were approved.  We already have it ordered and it should be arriving May 3rd.  We purchased it as local as we could.  There is a company in Castle Rock, MN, called Poly-Tex that sells high-tunnel structures at a very competitive price.  Our high-tunnel grant was approx. $4,900 and the cost of the high-tunnel itself is a tad over $5,000… but if I pay by check or cash, we get a 2% discount.  This particular hoop-house is 30′x72′ (2,160 sq ft) and 12’4″ high.

This is what our high-tunnel should look like.

We’re pretty excited.  :party:

More good news.  Our laying hens are in full production after taking a break over winter… and just in time… our egg customers are starting to visit us again.  Dozens of eggs have been leaving the farm in the hand of very pleased customers.  It’s nice to see them all again.  Speaking of egg customers, Carol has been selling as many turkey eggs as the hens will allow.  Some of the farm’s hens went broody before the egg orders arrived, so we’re allowing those girls to set, hopefully giving us some farm raised turkey poults soon.

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