We have completed fruit tree pruning and half of the small fruit pruning is done.  We’ll finish up the rest of the small fruits this week.  Hoping for some warm days for more sap!

Thanks to all the families who have signed up for our Fruit and duck egg CSA for this season.  The CSA is now full.  Please email to be placed on the 2014 waiting list.  We send out an email in early November offering shares to current members and folks on the waiting list.

Spending our days collecting and boiling sap, pruning, and making plans for spring planting.  The ducks and chickens are running around the orchard looking extremely happy.

Burned last winter’s fruit prunings this weekend.  The dry season last year was not conducive to raging flames.  Cider, fire & friends.

3-9-13

Our maple trees were tapped two weeks ago and we have been having fun doing daily bucket checks.  Idunn loves a big cup of sap.   John will prune the newer fruit trees today while maintaining the fire to boil down the sap.

John had a good time talking with folks at the CSA fair yesterday.  We have 4 shares left and don’t expect those to last long.  Thanks to all the local fruit fans!

Just a Taste will be featuring Daring Drake goose eggs on their menu this week.  We had one goose egg that tumbled to the kitchen floor twice without breaking open.  That egg became this morning’s omelette.  yum!

Spring must be around the corner.  The ducks are starting to lay like mad along with the chickens and for the first time at daring drake – goose eggs!  Two goose eggs make an awesome omelette for the three of us.  Let us know if you are interested in purchasing goose eggs.   We are also going to experiment with blowing out the eggs for pyskanka.

Daring Drake Farm is offering shares in their 2013 Fruit CSA.  Receive a diverse array of Daring Drake organic fruit for 20 weeks beginning mid-late June.

This is a fruit CSA for the adventurous culinary types!  For information:  http://daringdrake.com/csa/

What a season?!?!  By far, the most challenging growing season we have faced in our ten years of farming in the Finger Lakes.  I’ll skip over the lost crops, low yields, and potential weather disasters to address why Daring Drake duck eggs are so hard to come by this season.

When we began planting our orchard ten years ago we knew we would need all the help we could get in organically controlling pests.  We decided to raise a small flock of ducks – a Buff/Runner mix – to roam the orchard eating insects.  When we ate our first duck eggs, we were hooked.  We grew our flock of ducks and sold the eggs to support purchasing local, organic grains as supplemental feed for our waddling orchard workers.

Enter the winter of 2011-2012 – the mildest winter since we began raising ducks.  Our ducks consistently laid eggs the entire winter, the first season the girls skipped their January and February hiatus.  This was okay, it was nice to stock Greenstar with eggs all winter, but a duck will only lay so  many eggs per year and we knew production would be down slightly in the 2012 season.  Then, in June our neighbor’s dog got into our orchard and slaughtered a number of ducks, along with our laying and meat chickens.  That was quite a set-back.  More recently, we have had a very brazen fox snatching birds. All told, our flock is down 40% over last season.

We are spending the 2012 season rearing young birds to replace our duck flock, however it will not be until 2013 that this effort will be seen.  For the duck egg fans out there – absence makes the heart grow fonder.  Can’t wait until the 2013 eggs arrive!

One of the most difficult aspects of growing organically is weed control.  We use a variety of methods in our orchard to deal with the weed issue; all are extremely time consuming and require a ton of labor in spring when a thousand other chores also need completed.  Step one – hand weeding the trees and plants.

In our home orchard, we lay ground cloth at the base of our apple tree rows in early spring.  This is a multiday process as inevitably high winds pull up your initial rows.  After much cussing and re-staking the grass grows and holds it in place.  We will pull up the ground cloth in fall for two reasons: to extend the life of the cloth and to avoid giving moles and voles a perfect winter habitat.

For our gooseberry and currant plantings, we lay cardboard (feels like playing Tetris) then put a layer of straw over the cardboard.  This provides a great mulch layer.  The one problem I discovered with this method this year is Idunn’s chickens were tossing straw and cardboard around the rows as quickly as we could lay it!  Throughout the years, the ducks and geese would poke around the straw, but leave our work in tact.  The chickens have a different outlook on life, and while I know they are doing a great job controlling the pests, I still have to growl at their antics.

At our new u-pick orchard, we will use a cultivation method and plant a cover crop during the growing season.

Out watching the ducks chasing flying insects in the orchard this evening.  With the extremely warm day, the air is filled with flying morsels of protein and the ducks look mighty happy.   Yesterday, John and Idunn- both armed only with veils and short sleeved shirts- captured a swarm of honeybees in the orchard.  The bees, possibly a break-away swarm from our hive, covered a pear branch.  John shook the branch to get half the bees to fall into a bee box.  Later Idunn checked the box and helped put the lid on.  In the next few days the two of them will check the hive for a queen.

The not-so-good insects are also making an appearance.  We’ve had to deal with the first generation of imported currant worms on our gooseberries.  If you have just a few (or many)  plants, you need to be vigilant against the pale green larvae.  Look over your gooseberry leaves carefully, if you spot black specks of frass or tiny holes in the leaves you need to lift leaves and find the larvae.  They can be drowned in a soapy mixture, or just squished.  Larvae of the third generation overwinter in cocoons in the soil and I can only imagine how easy their winter was this year.

Spring seed planting

Thanks to Emma for this great recipe.  Please check out her blog for some great photos of this dish and other delicious creations.

http://www.cayugastkitchen.com/

Duck Eggs, over Herbed Tomato, White bean and Winter Green Soup

Ingredients & Source

Yields: 5-6 servings

• 1 tablespoon bacon fat (Leftover from Blue Cheese Alfredo Spaghetti)
• 1 small onion, chopped (Full Plate Farm Collective, Winter CSA)
• 2 cloves garlic, minced (Full Plate Farm Collective, Winter CSA)
• 1/4 teaspoon ginger, minced (Full Plate Farm Collective, Winter CSA)
• 1 cup whole peeled tomatoes and juice, equal to 1/2 a large can (GreenStar Natural Foods Market; it’s hard to come by locally canned tomatoes – choose an Italian brand without any unpronounceable ingredients)
• 4-5 basil leaves (My plant!)
• 1 teaspoon cilantro (Stick and Stone Farm, U-Pick, Freezer storage)
• 1 teaspoon oregano (Stick and Stone Farm, U-Pick, Dried)
• 1/2 tablespoon sea salt (GreenStar Natural Foods Market, Bulk Section)
• 3 cups water (Faucet)
• 1 can Northern white beans or garbanzos (GreenStar Natural Foods Market, choose a can that is BPA free and does not contain any unpronounceable ingredients)
• Parmesan rind, as much as you have! Always save the rind from the Parmesan. It’s the best part and adds flavor to any soup. Cut the wax off the outside first. This is the prize treat in the pot – melted and chewy!
• 2 portions of frozen greens, defrosted (Or two fresh bunches from your local farm, farmers market, or the organic and as-local-as-possible section from the supermarket) (See How to Freeze Greens)
• 1/2 duck egg per person (Daring Drake Duck Eggs, Daring Drake Farm, Ithaca Farmer’s Market)
• Garnish: grated cheddar cheese (GreenStar Natural Foods Market, Locally Produced Cheddar)
• Optional: bread, ciabatta was my stroke of luck for this one! (The Piggery)

Preparation

1. In a large soup pot, heat the bacon fat over medium-high.
2. Add the onions and stir until translucent.
3. Add the garlic and ginger, and stir for a couple minutes.
4. Add the tomatoes and juice, along with the basil, cilantro, oregano, and sea salt. Stir and lightly mash the tomatoes with the back of your utensil. Reduce to medium heat, cover and simmer for five minutes.
5. Add the water, beans, Parmesan rind and greens. Cover with a lid and simmer for about 25-30 minutes.
6. Meanwhile, bring a small pot of water to boil. Gently drop the eggs into the water with a spoon or ladle. Boil for 10 minutes for a slightly soft interior, 12 minutes for a hard interior.
7. When the soup is ready, ladle portions into a bowl. Top with grated cheese, half an egg sliced, and enjoy with a slab or crusty ciabatta bread.

We are measuring 7 inches of snow in the yard this morning.  The lilacs, currants and gooseberries are all dropping with heavy layers of snow on them.    We are most concerned with the apples – in full beautiful bloom yesterday.  We won’t know the full extent of damage for a few days, maybe weeks.  Biggest problem – lack of pollination.  Even if the snow melts off the trees today and flowers are exposed – the insects will just not be out.  Cold nights ahead only add to the worries.  The optimist around here points out some fruit – plums, most of the cherries, even some gooseberries, were done – or almost done – flowering before this snow.  I have a feeling the ducks are going to be mighty upset when we open the barn door.

What a difference 3 days make:  4/20 & 4/23

Poor red currant: