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Life on the Farm

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bjrogg:
Thanks for sharing your operation with us Mike. I have found it very interesting and I learned a lot from it to.

It’s like Ed said. There are so many different types of farming operations. It’s always interesting to see how they do things.

One question for you. Have you ever grown a variety of apples we called Rusty Coats? There were a few very old orchards around here that had Rusty Coats. They literally looked like rusty apples. I haven’t seen one since I was a kid. The old timers said they were very disease resistant.

They were not nearly as tasty as the variety on the market today. They really have breed some awesome apple varieties.

Hope you can find enough help. It seems to be getting harder and harder to find every year. A lot of our help has aged to the point they have either passed or aren’t in good enough health to do it anymore. Even though they would love to.

Maybe it’s just because I’m a old fart now, but it seems like we have been having a difficult time recruiting younger help. It’s not just us though. It’s the common problem we all seem to share around here. It’s one of the reasons there have been so many changes in the way we harvest our crops. Especially sugar beets.

Another thing. It’s almost funny. I’m almost surprised you can still sell tomatoes. I only had two plants I shared with anyone I could give them away to. I can’t find anyone to give them away to anymore l.lol

Once again thanks for sharing your operation. And have a safe harvest

Bjrogg

PaulN/KS:
I have friends who have a booth at the local farmers market and they sell my extra tomatoes, beans and peppers. We split the take and it gets me some summer spending cash. I can't officially call my stuff "Organic",(but it is)and is also pesticide free.
I had six Jet Star plants and three Roma this year and we had plenty to use, share and sell.

M2A:
Kinda funny. I have been reading up on heirloom apples the last few days. I have never heard of Rusty Coats but depending on the source there were 10k-14k different types of apples grown in NA 100 years ago. Most are gone now. I know where a few trees are next to a 200 year old log cabin, and was thinking of getting some graft wood this winter to put on junk tree or 2 in the big orchard. Just for fun, but that does not help the bottom line with the business. :)

We grow about 5 acres of tomatoes, I'd need to check my numbers but I think there are 6k plants an acre. Sounds high, I'll edit if I find out different too early to do the math.  Best year ever around here for that crop. Every one in there area has told me the same. We gave several 100 bushels to the local food bank and still had too much. I think they pay cost actually but I usually dont see the numbers. Last year because of bacterial diseases the crop was done in September. You never know when planting what will happen.

As far as help...Dont have the time to get too deep on that atm. But we have a crew with work visas for the growing season. Long hours, hard work and most are kids in their 20's. They will go back home in November. I did everything they do now back in the day. A lot of hand work. But its changed a lot over the past 30+ years. Most of the folks that work in the market are older and retired from a career but still hard to find people to run a cash register and similar jobs.  But I dont have to deal with that part of things.
Mike                     
     

Eric Krewson:
I read about a project where a group was scouring old maps looking for abandoned farms and orchards to try to find unique apple varieties still living and neglected from over 100 years ago that had not been passed on to today. I don't know how many varieties they had found but remember they were fairly successful with their project.

M2A:
Had been reading some information about the same stuff a few days ago Eric. I bet there is a lot of genetics in some of those older varieties that could, at the very least add some good traits into breeding programs. Wish I had more time to actually play around with it myself as a hobby.
Mike   

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