Friday, September 3, 2010

jenny

captured wild bee hive
chicken coop in firecracker red

swimming pool

sam making feta




home grown watermelon

farmer paul genke
chocolate turkeys chicks
paul . austin . chun
cool montu
sam @ 3 cups



rocket . chris . austin

Wednesday, September 1, 2010

Heading into fall

08 31 Blog update

Its been awhile since our last post and we've had quite a bit going on. Pigs, turkeys, new chickens and new goats.... Also an incredible summer harvest of tomatoes, beans, cooking greens, some lettuces, herbs, etc. Its been a lot to keep up with but the team has pulled together nicely. We have had some help from friends and family. Our long time friend Chun Rosenkranz came and helped for a month, taking a “vacation” from the concrete jungle that Florida has become. He did great, pests and weeds fear him as he would get out there on the hottest of days and just go to town, such a hard worker. Emma Jane came back for another summer visit and has taken charge of milking our goat herd. She also became quite the baker, hooking up the tarts and cookies we've been selling at the Eno River Market in downtown Hillsborough. Her blueberry pie won the last Friday pie contest sponsored by Cup of Joe. Its been a good summer, but we are looking forward to the cool weather that Fall brings. We have already started our planting and hope to have some brussels and cooking greens ready by the time the turkeys will be processed. Our weekly email produce list will be starting again in a couple weeks, if you haven't signed up yet contact austin@boxcarrfarms.com. We will have herbs, veggies, eggs, some prepared foods and of course produce.
Dani and Austin have a baby on the way any day now. We are excited to meet the newest addition to the family when he arrives.

Happenings.......
Every Friday night at 3 cups in Chapel Hill from 5-8PM we offer small plates of goodness from our farm. Come see us. You can also purchase our anti pastas out of their cooler anytime during the week.

Every Saturday we are at the Eno River Market in Hillsborough with hot biscuits, breakfast bars, cutting boards, goats milk lotion, anti pastas, prepared salads and other baked goods.

Saturday Sept. 11th we will be partnering with chef/farmer Dave Ramirez of Geodesic Gardens to cook for the Harvest Dinner put on by the Eno River Farmers Market. There are a few tickets left so check the website for availability.

October
We have been playing with the idea of a pig pickin...... We are raising 3 pigs and plan on taking them in to be processed, and like the idea of having folks visit the farm for food prepared by us and music from local musicians. Comment below and let us know if you would be interested, date TBD.

Wednesday, May 5, 2010

Wednesday, February 10, 2010

Saturday, January 9, 2010

classes

Austin signed up for a farm training workshop that started last Wednesday. He found out about it through the extension office in Hillsborough. It is being put on by Breeze Farms, a nearby CSA (community supported agriculture). There are seven more in the succession, once a week through February. The first lesson focused on whole farm planning and business plans. He came home having met some of the locals we’ve seen around town, and even came across someone who put a bid on our house as we were buying it! Most of the notes are posted on line, as so many people do these days to save paper. However, Austin did come home with a sample business plan from one of the neighboring farms called Tumbling Shoals Farm. It will be a good reference even though looking through it he found several things that could be done differently. Austin has written a few business plans in the past, one for school and a collage of some for the ever changing future we have coming up. I’m sure we will be commencing the updated composition fairly soon. He also mentioned how they focused on the importance of the appearance of one’s farm stand at the farmers markets. As obvious as it sounds, I guess it is an important point. Hopefully our marketing department has a unique, chic, tasteful style that attracts a plethora of respectable consumers.
Chris and I are signed up for a beginner beekeeping class. It begins January 14, and is also a once a week class for nine weeks. I am so beexcited. At first it appeared as though the Orange County class was full and so I was going to drive a bit further to a class in Burlington, but then Chris ran into one of the gentlemen who teach the course, and he happened to come across two more seats. Sweet.

big barn

before



after

Austin has begun some much needed clean-up and fix-up of the big barn. He removed some rotting wood and neglected metal scraps. He also salvaged some of the old windows from the house that were poorly stored in there. He wants to make space for the tractor and its implements on one side, and gardening equipment under another spot that currently houses an abandoned boxed in truck. The truck will be moved along the fence line and because it has a good amount of sealed, dry, closeable space in it, Austin wants to convert it into a turkey shelter. It can also be used to store hay or feed until then. And I haven’t pitched this to him yet but it could possibly be buried and transformed into a meat cellar.

chicken moving in day!

The coop is at a point where we felt the fowel could move in. Austin and I still have some fine tuning and tweaking to do. We plan on wrapping the coop in a plastic we found in a barn, and finishing the outside with metal siding that we also have acquired with the property. This should be a pretty nice seal and provide a bit of insulation too. The nests will need to be built and installed by the end of February or March. We plan on installing hopefully 24 of them. This will bring our coops maximum capacity to approximately 85. According to the books, there should be a nest per four chickens, and about nine inches of roosting space depending on the breed. We currently have about 890 inches. I have some automatic waterers that are on order and will be attached to an interior wall. They are supposed to be much more sanitary, as they require a chicken to peck at a nipple to dispense the water, therefore, alleviating any drips in the litter and any soiled water. We also have to put up a temporary fence as it is the chickens’ first time free range without a chaperone. The coop is currently positioned along the tree line of the western pasture, facing the house. We hope the trees will provide some shade when they need it, and also an ample amount of bugs for food. We are unsure of the predators we may have lurking around, and we pray there are few, but as the rumor goes, foxes like chicken.