Clover, Winter Peas, Daikon Radish & Rye in the Ground
Planting for spring emergence means putting seeds in the ground in late fall. For us, this means planting late October for clover blooms in early April This year we decided
Simple Quilt Boxes for Toasty and Happy Bees
One of the things I’ve learned in my first year of beekeeping is that if you ask 10 beekeepers a question you’ll get 14 answers. Everyone has an opinion and
A Successful Seed Planting
The last blog post was all about the planing of the rye, clover and fescue seed at the farm. You do all that work, and you leave at the end
Planting Beautiful Seed and Holding Your Breath
Until this month, I watched the weather whenever we’d go to the farm, but I wasn’t what I’d say obsessed with the weather until it was time to plant seed.
Bee Vocabulary
On this Bee journey, I realized since I would be writing a lot about my bees, that it would be helpful to give out some vocabulary definitions. Apiary – An
Bees, Please!
Sometime over the winter, maybe even last fall, I decided I wanted to try my hand at beekeeping and have bees at the farm. In retrospect, I had no idea
A Direction
We’ve now had the farm for more than six months and part of the fun of this adventure is deciding what we want to do. Farming is the obvious answer,
My $.52
Some people want to give their two cents. Today I’m gonna tell you about my fifty-two cents! First, a little history lesson. Did you know that there have been some
Swimming with Pigs
It should come as no surprise that on vacation I want to see animals, and be outside in nature. What better way than to see some pigs? On our recent
Tractor Forks
When we bought the Mahindra it came with a bucket but it also had pallet forks. The tractor once lived at a golf course so there was much need for
Mowing
Sitting and watching Brett mow is very pleasant. Mike has gone for the day. I’ve buttoned up the worksite, put the chairs away and gotten everything done. I’ve grabbed three
Timber! (Lots of It.)
I never really thought about cutting trees before we had the farm. I knew there were people that ran around with chainsaws, but I didn’t really know what they did
Inside of Dam. Done.
After five or six days of work, we have finished clearing all the trees from the inside of the dam. On one side of the front of the dam trees
Blessed Rain
After eight long weeks, it finally rained at the farm. Sometimes when we’re down here, we see the gray clouds, and the rain looks like it might come. But more
Dam Work
Well I’m sorry to report that the pond guy we were excited to find and work with never showed up and hasn’t yet responded to any text or e-mail that
The Demise of the Burn Pile
We’ve been pretty impressed with our progress on the burn pile. It’s kind of cool to drive by it and see a visual record of the work we’ve done, via
Mowing the Pond
Yes, mowing the pond – or where it used to be. The water is gone. The little fish we saw, the snapping turtles, the ducks, egrets and herons, are all
Hell’s Front Porch
It’s hot. It’s so hot that the thunderstorms that threaten are just idle threats. The big dark clouds form, the lightning flashes and the thunder rolls, but there has not
Mowing
I didn’t know how proud I’d feel the first day we had our equipment down at the farm and we could actually do something besides cut trees and haul branches.
Barbed Wire & A Partially Cleared Fence Line
We’ve posted that we’ve been working on the fence line in the center of the pasture. It’s a tedious process. Through a great deal of trial and error, we’ve figured
From Low to Lush
Back in April we noticed so much of the farm was a lot of brown broomsedge, dull grasses and an infestation of small growing bradford pear trees. Short answer…no place
Clearing the Fence Line
Up the very middle of the property is an old fence line that Ms. Sara put in 60 years ago for cattle. It’s overgrown and tree trunks are woven in
Pecan Orchard. Done!
It took a few weeks of a couple trips a week to do it, but we finally finished limbing up all the trees, killing the poison ivy and cutting down
The Tractor with Racing Slicks
So first I have to give giant props to my hubby. He is the equipment-finder extraordinaire, the king of the deal, the guy that can find the needle-in-the-haystack. He spends
The Baby Snapping Turtle
While this discovery was part of the Pecan Orchard II post, I really wanted to give this little guy his own spotlight as he was super cute. We were cleaning
Pecan Orchard Cleanup II
We spent another day this week cleaning up the orchard. We’d hit the South end and needed to cleanup the middle back part of the orchard. It involved felling three
The Top of the Mountain
The farm is situated on the Southern end of the Pine Mountain Terrane. So even though it’s Southern middle-Georgia, there is actually elevation. The 45-acre piece of property is 1/3
Pecan Orchard Cleanup
This week Brett, his dad Mike and I spent more time cleaning up the southern side of the pecan orchard. In addition to chain saw duty, Mike has been on
Family Farm Day
It’s so much fun when the family comes down for a work day. Of course we picked the hottest day yet this summer, and we had some equipment malfunctions that
The Husqvarna 545FR
“Let’s get a brush cutter!” he said. “It will be easy,” he said.“We neeeeeeeeed it” he said.Enter the beast of a brush cutter, the Husqvarna 545fr. And it’s pretty darn
Trailers
Lately we’ve been renting a U-Haul auto transporter to haul the Mahindra back and forth from the house to the farm. And while for now that is a reasonable expense,
Project List
So much work to do! The long list of projects on the land – before we even *think* of having cows or any other livestock is a little daunting. They
The Mahindra XUV
We bought a new (to us) sweet XUV to get to the top of the mountain. We looked and looked and looked for the right one. John Deere? Arctic Cat?
The Polyphemus Moth
The more I’m at the farm the more I realize how much it is a little ecosystem and how varied the living things are on the land. Tuesday we took
In a Rut
Friday April 19 we had a ton of rain. And that’s not an exaggeration – some locations received six inches of water in about an hour. Creeks and rivers were
The Flora and the Fauna
Since spring has arrived the bright green leaves and the flowers are popping up everywhere. There are so many wonderful natural plants at the farm. We are still trying to
Broad Winged Hawk
So across the road and near the pond we’ve spotted a broad winged hawk pair with a nest. It’s not too hard to spot the nest in the top of
Finding the Farm
The search for property took more than a year. By the time we happened upon this property in Molena, we’d probably eliminated thousands of properties online and visited at least