Horses at Caseydale Farm

We have a neighbouring dairy farm, Caseydale, with huge, dreamy, surreal horses.  They let us have the manure for composting and then spreading on our farm and we offered to do some rock-picking on their field.  David and Phil (from Parkside Farm) spent a day loading and hauling manure.  David spent another couple of hours replacing a bent part on the manure spreader, and they will likely spend the better part of today hauling manure.  It is a huge investment at a busy time of year.  Is it worth it?  Definitely!  We get the manure and bedding, which gets our soil rocking and rolling with nutrients and soil humous.  It provides fertility, and stability to our soil.  It is all about relationships: farm neighbours, soil organisms, carbon to nitrogen.

Produce pack distributions have been delayed, but there sure is a lot of work getting done on the farm.  The soil has warmed up, the interns are learning lots, three hoop houses have been moved to new ground, irrigation is working, crops are being planted, laying hens are out grazing on the pasture, which is greening up.  This time of year is definitely a test of confidence and faith.  Two groups of wonderful people came to Abundant Acres on the last two Saturdays to help with planting.  One was from our church, and another was a group of students who run farmers’ markets at Dalhousie and NSCC in Dartmouth.  We are so grateful for these relationships too!

Below are a few photos from the past 13 days.

Planting kale

“Hey, look at all these red wigglers in the compost pile!”

The hens get a new section of pasture

The AA crew goes to Highland Farm for an educational visit

Sweetfern flowers

It was so nice to see Bruce and Nadege back on the farm

… and so many others from our church

All 16,000 onion seedlings got planted as the tide went up in the river

Where did that onion seedling go?

Little Hilda Plum is just like her mom Louise. They both love laying hens!

David hauling manure from our barn. I think he’s happy