Home Alone

A Syrian refugee, pleased with donated produce

This post was written by David Matheson, and photos were from Dakota Varen, Erin Cash, Hilary Rancourt, and Jessie Jollymore.

Through much coercing from the farm crew, Jen and Dave were finally convinced to go on a week long vacation to a cottage near Lunenberg. The crew woke up one morning and they had flown the coop! Broke out of the pasture! Hit the ol’ dusty trail! Jen and Dave indulged in a few days of (hopefully) stress-free relaxation, and left the farm in the hands of Marshall, Erin, Dakota and Matheson (with help from Lori, Dermot, and a new arrival on the farm, Liam). This handoff of responsibility was a great testament to how well they have taught us about their farm, and to how much we all care about farming.

Despite the fact that there was nothing but a bunch of 20-somethings on the farm madness did not ensue. The crew was able to witness the digging of a massive new irrigation pond, carry out daily field work and two huge harvests without breaking anything. Marshall and Isaac carried out Operation Farm Share with a two man crew! Dakota’s sister Brittany and her partner Matthew came for a great visit, and we welcomed a new team member, Liam.

The whole week the farm team joked about how funny it would be to create a blog post about the crazy things we did while unsupervised that week. I think we had more fun talking and joking about those things than actually carrying them out. The craziest thing that happened is probably using the flame weeder to cook up some sweet corn when the barbeque ran out of propane! Oh and Dermot ate a frog! (he didn’t really, but he did give it quite a scare).

Jen and Dave did come back a bit early, (they just couldn’t stay away!) but they came back to a farm fully intact, with all the buildings still in place, and a van that had recently left for Halifax with every square inch filled with produce. We’re glad to have them back on the farm feeling refreshed, revitalized and ready to answer our questions and fix the things we break!