Some announcements and then on to the discussion of this Spring’s big project!
First a big “Thank you!” to those who came out to help plant potatoes this year. Unfortunately we had a bit of a tractor issue — the left front tire had a hole in the tread that exposed the inner tube — so we had to do it the old fashion way. Seemed to work well enough and everyone had a great time! Thanks again!
We still have shares available. Tell all your friends and neighbors! Can we sell out? I’d love to but we need help. Send people our way please! Use your social media. What else is it good for? Here is the link to our online store! By the way, we will credit your account $25 if someone you refer buys a veggie share.
You can also still order most of our add-on shares like coffee, fruit, ‘shrooms, cheese, etc. We have an egg waiting list. If we get enough interest we can add another case to our order.
If you ordered plant six-packs they are available and awaiting your pick-up. I sent and email out to those who ordered them with pick-up instructions. Let me know if you have any questions.
Farm News
If I recall correctly, and that is always a big “if”, the last couple of newsletters focused on ways we are attacking one of our biggest problems — how to prevent deer from eating all the food. You have to imagine the problem is huge if I devote three whole newsletters to it. Actually, you have to realize the problem is huge because we are trying so many ways to resolve the problem. This week I discuss our third and hopefully final solution.
Over the winter we contacted the DNR about deer fencing and they finally came out in April to survey the farm and devised a plan for a deer fence. The result was a monstrosity of a fence. Ten feet high. Wire mesh with 5 inch diameter wooden poles every 20 feet. Sure this fence could keep out deer — and bear and coyotes and probably moose. It would also keep me from ever enjoying the view from our back deck. Plus I’d feel like a caged animal.
So instead of a big, bold wire mesh fence we decided to try a sleek, slim electrified wire fence. Instead of 5 inch wooden poles we chose 10 foot (eight above ground) green metal t-posts every 20 feet with 6″ diameter poles in the corners. We used 12.5 gauge electric fence wire and a solar powered energizer. You can still see the fence from our house but it isn’t unsightly and almost blends into the background.
Two weeks ago we spent the majority of our time constructing the fence. It took four of us about a week to put it all together — which I felt was a far greater amount of time than I anticipated. I’m not sure why I thought it would go faster. Maybe it would have taken much less time if we knew what we were doing, but we didn’t. It was a “learn on the fly” type of project. One thing I learned about electric fences is that they are usually erected to keep animals in, not out. So all the YouTubes show the fence corners with the wire on the inside of the corners and not the outsides where we want the wire to go. Finding the answer to this challenge proved difficult but I finally did find it!
It is also surprising how much effort it takes to pull 1200 feet of 12.5 gauge electric fence wire around the perimeter of the fence line. It wasn’t that the wire was heavy but I think the bending and unbending of the wire at each corner post required a lot of work. Or perhaps it was the friction at the corner posts. Whatever the case, we had four of us pulling the wire around and it was quite the workout. Hmm, maybe I was the only one pulling…
Anyway, the Achilles heel to this fence is of course the “gate”. Our gate is simply a set of wires that we can hook and unhook as needed. If we leave the gate open some evening the fence will most likely be breached. Then the deer will know where we keep the good stuff and try harder to access it — even on those nights we remember to close the gate. So far I’ve only forgotten to close it at the end of the work day once but remembered before it was completely dark. Maybe I will set an alarm on my phone to remind me to check it every night.
Learning to farm — and more importantly how to drive a tractor — when there is fencing in the way is where we are at now. We lose about 20 feet at the end of every bed now that the fence stops us from going past the bed end. Turning the tractor around with a big transplanter on the back is not easy. When you turn the tractor to the left the transplanter swings to the right. And of course you don’t know quite where the transplanter ends and the fence begins. So far by being extremely cautious there hasn’t been any big mishaps. A bit of a nudge to a wire or two. I dread the day we accidentally snag one of the fence wires and break something. It would have to be immediately repaired so the deer don’t find their way in.
I don’t know if the fence will be successful in keeping the deer out. I hope it is. I’m optimistic but also a realist. Deer have all the time in the world to figure out how to defeat the fence. Plus, in theory they can jump over an eight foot high fence. But my hope it that the neighborhood deer have had it so good over the last many years that they’ve gotten lazy and if having to jump over an eight foot high fence is required to simply find out if there is something tasty on the other side they’ll just go find someone else’s vegetables to snack on.
Finally, for those of you who entered the pool to guess who would be the first to get shocked by the fence I want to let you know that those who picked Farmer Chris are the winners! So far, only I was dumb enough to touch the wire. I got a pretty good zap. Enough to be more cautious in the future.
That’s all for now. As always, send in your questions, comments, suggestions, share orders or anything else that is electrifying!
Jokes of the Week
I walked into an electric fence. The results were shocking.
There’s something I love about electric fences but I can’t put my finger on it.