Pruning: Fruit Trees, Thornless Blackberries, and Ornamentals at Lauren's House

Our collective farming unit has begun, in ernest, our weekly planned work parties.  The Potter St. location launched the beginning of the farming season projects with a task list including: 

+ Prune: Pear trees, Apple tree, Tamarisk tree

+ Prune: Ornamentals; Forsythia, Roses, Clematis, Fennel, Thornless Blackberry

+ Seed out Arugula, Spinach, Hardy Salad Greens

The weather was beautifully mild for mid winter, so we were able to spend most of the day outside learning about the various pruning techniques from Lauren.  I came to realize a deep internal satisfaction with control and organization as i snipped away at the overgrown branches, limbs, and vines.  Essentially that is what pruning symbolizes, the imposition of human control over seemingly chaotic, organic and feral organisms.  This self realization made me want to get more in touch with my Wild Woman side, embrace more chaos.  

If this inaugural work party is any indication as to how the rest of the farming season will transpire, 2014 should be a phenomenal year.  The day was spent outdoors, conquering meaningful tasks, hanging out with friends, and of course we ended with a delicious meal shared together. 

Farm Chores (The Photo Series)

A random pictorial representation of our lives.

Harvesting Red Rocks and Dungeness Crab off the Oregon Coast with the incredible Mr. Bad Mojo

Crab Pots

One of several crab feasts

Volunteering for Laughing Stock Farm's Turkey Day

Bel's fermenting Beet Kvass

Winter time Hot Toddys

Shelling Walnuts with Urban Farm students

Christmas time

Homemade and fermented pizza dough, with Lauren's tomatoes and backyard chicken

Country Rabbit Pate ofal, fresh from the backyard processing workshop with Urban Farm students

Planning out new recipes

New IPA bubbling away: home grown Rabbit Pate and hor d'oeuvres for Ant Farm Collective planning

Vega resting on the baby, he's completely weirded out by some scent my hair is putting off now.  Crazy hormones

Cat nap

A Winter Solstice Celebration

This past year on the 21st of December we were invited to join in on the annual Solstice Celebration at our dearest Lauren Bilbao's house.  The shortest daylight day of the year, we couldn't have imagined honoring it any better than surrounding ourselves with incredibly beautiful people and feasting on massive quantities of quality food.  I have heard more than one friend within the Eugene community express the sentiment that the best food a person can experience is at local, back-yard potlucks.  This idea resonated deep with me, particularly as it truthfully continued to manifest itself at nearly every dinner gathering I attended, and the Solstice fete was of no exception.  A large percentage of the attendees grow a substantial portion of their own food, including the food presented in our six course dinner, however all of the guests relished in the depth of care and intention and joy that went into generating each individual ingredient.  Over the years Keegan and I have grown as farmers and have slowly established ourselves within an honorably interdependent community.  An event like the Winter Solstice dinner represents such a milestone in where we would hope our lives to be; a culmination of projects and relationships that we've dedicated ourselves to with long term visions in mind.  We were able to share food and camaraderie within a multi-generational group/tribe/family/community (however you view a group of people that cares for and supports each other unquestioningly).  What resonating life fulfillment.  What colorful conversation.  What exquisite sustenance.


Here's the menu from the event, along with a candid glimpse at the moments shared.

+ First Course
          Baguette, Cheese, Olives, Makenna's Pickles
+ Second Course
          Nick's home grown Winter Squash Soup.  Made with Carol Deppe's world renowned Sweet              
          Meat Squash and pureed heirloom apples.
+ Third Course
          Greg's wild caught Salmon from the Alsea River, Lauren's home grown leeks braised in cream,
          Meghan's wild crafted mushroom and rice pilaf.
+ Fourth Course
         Jenny and Keegan, and Shelley and Bel's home raised rabbit over a bed of root vegetables
         grown at the Ant Farm; carrots, rutabagas, celeriac, parsnips.
+ Fifth Course
         Salad from Lauren and Nick's gardens; arugula, frisee, radicchio, chicory, lettuce, mizuna,
         spinach, tatsoi.
+ Sixth Course
         Stored gleaned Bartlett Pears, Bleu Cheese, gleaned Walnuts

Pruning: Grape Vines

The arrival of the new year marked the beginning of pruning season.  Woody perennials prefer pruning to happen during their dormant season, when all the plants' energy is concentrated in the roots rather than in bud, bloom, leaf, or fruit production.  We prune plants with the intentions of removing dead, dying, diseased, or deranged wood while at the same time encouraging both proper structure as well as increased fruit set.  At the Walnut House, upon move-in we inherited 30 feet of table grape vines that had been left untouched for a decade, and even though this was the case we still harvested absurd amounts of delicious grapes that we feasted on endlessly.  Now, with some forceful TLC, our pruning efforts will hopefully whip the tangled vines into shape and produce even more outrageous, tasty clusters the summer to come.  After reading numerous pruning guides, and watching several YouTube videos (This one was great), we set out with Lauren Bilbao as our guide to manage the chaos.  Pruning can seem like a daunting task, but with such a tactile skill there's no better way to learn than to get out and actually do it.  Here's a few highlights of wisdom gleaned from our learning experience with Grape Vines.

> There are two different types of grape pruning techniques; cane, and spur pruning.  As a general rule cane pruning fares better for table grapes, while spur pruning is favored for vineyard grapes.

> Grape vines only set fruit on first year wood (canes that grew the most recent past growing season).  So unless you're saving cordons for spur pruning you only want to preserve the youngest canes growing off the trunk.  Younger growth has smooth bark where older growth has bark with a shaggy texture.

> With some sort of marking material, flag the canes and/or cordons you want to preserve as your final producers as soon as possible during the pruning process.  We used flagging tape that we tied onto each cordon at several spots down it's length since the entire vine was such a mess to clear through in the beginning.  This way you won't accidentally chop off the best looking wood for production while you're busily snipping away.

> If you're worried about possible frost damage after you prune, leave a few extra buds on the end of the cane to sacrifice to the weather.

> If it's warmer where you live than it is for us in Eugene, or if global warming really starts to catch up, don't worry so much about sap leaking from your cut sites.  The wounds will heal themselves.