It's a sunny afternoon here in Santa Cruz, and again I am here in the laundry room not far from the farm. I think I should rename my blog 'Notes from the Laundry Room' or something in that vein. Anyhow, though it is Monday, today is a day off at the farm because Saturday and Sunday we had our big plant sale and all of us were working during at least part of that time. The plant sale was a success, but that's not so much what I want to write about today.
I must admit, I wish I were a little more clear-headed as I sit to collect my thoughts. It's a hot afternoon, and I am feeling a bit dehydrated still from my bike ride up the long hill back to the UCSC campus a few hours ago. After running errands, which included a trip to a mall to get my glasses fixed, I appreciate being able to return to my wonderful, green, secluded home, full of verdant life and good people.
On the farm there is always work, always something to do. This is less of a burden and more of a pleasure. When I returned this afternoon, I checked the compost pile that fellow apprentices and I had built two weeks prior. It was a nice, hot 142 degrees F. On my way back from the pile, I noticed that one of the gopher traps that Christopher, a second year apprentice and I had placed in the garden had sprung, so I checked to see if we had caught one of those pesky critters. Gopher trapping has been an activity I've done daily recently. In the lower garden, where I've spent the most time working recently, gophers can be a plague, damaging crops, especially the tubers and some of the annual flowers. They can be a serious problem and cause severe crop loss if left unchecked. Part of working and being close to the land is coming to understand the role of humans on the landscape. Here on the farm, we are in competition over the land with the gophers: if they succeed, we will have reduced crops which means less to eat and sell and ultimately less revenue for our program. Food bills will rise, but more importantly, we will not have the satisfaction of harvesting and eating the food we worked so hard to grow. So despite reservations about killing animals, we trap the gophers. Although I don't relish the death of a small animals, I find trapping to be a satisfying activity. I head out into the garden, either alone or with another person, with a bucket of traps and a digging tool and search for signs of recent gopher activity. This means looking more closely at the soil, observing any recently created lumps or mounds that might conceal a gopher hole beneath. When I discover one, I dig out the plug that the gopher filled the end of the hole with, make sure the burrow is still active and not collapsed or buried, and set the trap. If all goes correctly, the gopher will notice light entering its' burrow, and will come investigate and then, bam, the trap will close, quickly snapping the small animals' neck. If this sounds brutal, I understand, but in nature that's how things can be. Whether we have a moral right to be on this land or not, I am not going to get into. But if you eat crops grown somewhere, there is a good chance that a gopher or two may have been killed in the process.
Not all is competition and death here at the farm. Yesterday morning after setting traps, I remembered the sapote tree. Sapotes are a type of fruit native to Mexico and Central America, and this particular variety we grow here at the CASFS farm is a while sapote. It seems to do well here, and produces small, unappealing-looking fruit that hang from the spreading branches of the nearly 40 ft tree in various stages of ripeness. A ripe sapote is delicious: when the skin is removed, a delicious creamy flesh is revealed, a consistency that is sort of like pear and avocado mixed, and a sweet, delicious taste with a hint of caramel. I enjoyed climbing the tree and knocking the fruit down to another apprentice waiting below to catch them nearly as much as I enjoyed eating our harvest. One thing I love about this place is the incongrous juxtaposition of vegetation: the sapote tree, with its' tropical origins, grows next to a stand of alder, a tree I associate with the Pacific Northwest. Wonderful.
On my return from the compost pile, I discovered a swarm of bees on the branch of one of the apple trees. Recently, we've discovered a number of honeybee swarms on the farm and nearby and have 'caught' them with varying degrees of success. The act of 'catching' the bees is much different from trapping the gophers, and the relationship between gophers and humans vs. bees and humans is much different: one of competition vs. one of cooperative dependence. I will hopefully learn for myself how to catch a swarm of bees and start a new hive in just a few hours...
After three weeks plus a day or two, this place feels like home. We are all in the routine of doing our chores (this is my last week of break baking), and have taken over cooking our meals. Another apprentice Jane and myself cooked breakfast on Wednesday (the second years cooked the rest of the days' meals because we were in class), we had limited ingredients--no eggs, flour and few veggies--because our ordering system is not running completely smooth at the moment--but put together a nice concoction of vegan 'sausage' patties (made of beans and rice), along with hot quinoa cereal and cooked greens gleaned from the field. It worked out well as served as a good warm-up for our full day of cooking coming up the week after this. The days spent working the land in the company of others pass quickly and the tasks impart a deep sense of satisfaction, which I think will only grow as newly planted crops take root and grow into maturity. Farm center life unfolds, with its' shared meals, cups of coffee (fair trade Nicaraguan) in the mornings and lemon balm tea in the evenings and the occasional party with beer, live music and even sometimes dancing. It is a good life here.
As I enter my fourth week on the farm, I realize that the time here will pass quickly. October is still a long way off, and I am still processing my departure from Park School, my time on Black Mesa and in the deserts and more so, my arrival and new life here at the CASFS farm. What I am finding here is that I have a sense of optimism and of possibilities that was often missing during the months leading up to my departure from Hayward Unified. Sometimes, visitors and others will ask me--what will I do in October? I have many ideas, but for now, I am trying to ground myself in this place, appreciate the community of those I live and work with and learn all I can from them and this land. That and an occasional sapote or an evening cup of tea made from fresh garden herbs fill me with a great sense of contentment, and I begin and end each day with a sense of gratitude for this experience.
I must admit, I wish I were a little more clear-headed as I sit to collect my thoughts. It's a hot afternoon, and I am feeling a bit dehydrated still from my bike ride up the long hill back to the UCSC campus a few hours ago. After running errands, which included a trip to a mall to get my glasses fixed, I appreciate being able to return to my wonderful, green, secluded home, full of verdant life and good people.
On the farm there is always work, always something to do. This is less of a burden and more of a pleasure. When I returned this afternoon, I checked the compost pile that fellow apprentices and I had built two weeks prior. It was a nice, hot 142 degrees F. On my way back from the pile, I noticed that one of the gopher traps that Christopher, a second year apprentice and I had placed in the garden had sprung, so I checked to see if we had caught one of those pesky critters. Gopher trapping has been an activity I've done daily recently. In the lower garden, where I've spent the most time working recently, gophers can be a plague, damaging crops, especially the tubers and some of the annual flowers. They can be a serious problem and cause severe crop loss if left unchecked. Part of working and being close to the land is coming to understand the role of humans on the landscape. Here on the farm, we are in competition over the land with the gophers: if they succeed, we will have reduced crops which means less to eat and sell and ultimately less revenue for our program. Food bills will rise, but more importantly, we will not have the satisfaction of harvesting and eating the food we worked so hard to grow. So despite reservations about killing animals, we trap the gophers. Although I don't relish the death of a small animals, I find trapping to be a satisfying activity. I head out into the garden, either alone or with another person, with a bucket of traps and a digging tool and search for signs of recent gopher activity. This means looking more closely at the soil, observing any recently created lumps or mounds that might conceal a gopher hole beneath. When I discover one, I dig out the plug that the gopher filled the end of the hole with, make sure the burrow is still active and not collapsed or buried, and set the trap. If all goes correctly, the gopher will notice light entering its' burrow, and will come investigate and then, bam, the trap will close, quickly snapping the small animals' neck. If this sounds brutal, I understand, but in nature that's how things can be. Whether we have a moral right to be on this land or not, I am not going to get into. But if you eat crops grown somewhere, there is a good chance that a gopher or two may have been killed in the process.
Not all is competition and death here at the farm. Yesterday morning after setting traps, I remembered the sapote tree. Sapotes are a type of fruit native to Mexico and Central America, and this particular variety we grow here at the CASFS farm is a while sapote. It seems to do well here, and produces small, unappealing-looking fruit that hang from the spreading branches of the nearly 40 ft tree in various stages of ripeness. A ripe sapote is delicious: when the skin is removed, a delicious creamy flesh is revealed, a consistency that is sort of like pear and avocado mixed, and a sweet, delicious taste with a hint of caramel. I enjoyed climbing the tree and knocking the fruit down to another apprentice waiting below to catch them nearly as much as I enjoyed eating our harvest. One thing I love about this place is the incongrous juxtaposition of vegetation: the sapote tree, with its' tropical origins, grows next to a stand of alder, a tree I associate with the Pacific Northwest. Wonderful.
On my return from the compost pile, I discovered a swarm of bees on the branch of one of the apple trees. Recently, we've discovered a number of honeybee swarms on the farm and nearby and have 'caught' them with varying degrees of success. The act of 'catching' the bees is much different from trapping the gophers, and the relationship between gophers and humans vs. bees and humans is much different: one of competition vs. one of cooperative dependence. I will hopefully learn for myself how to catch a swarm of bees and start a new hive in just a few hours...
After three weeks plus a day or two, this place feels like home. We are all in the routine of doing our chores (this is my last week of break baking), and have taken over cooking our meals. Another apprentice Jane and myself cooked breakfast on Wednesday (the second years cooked the rest of the days' meals because we were in class), we had limited ingredients--no eggs, flour and few veggies--because our ordering system is not running completely smooth at the moment--but put together a nice concoction of vegan 'sausage' patties (made of beans and rice), along with hot quinoa cereal and cooked greens gleaned from the field. It worked out well as served as a good warm-up for our full day of cooking coming up the week after this. The days spent working the land in the company of others pass quickly and the tasks impart a deep sense of satisfaction, which I think will only grow as newly planted crops take root and grow into maturity. Farm center life unfolds, with its' shared meals, cups of coffee (fair trade Nicaraguan) in the mornings and lemon balm tea in the evenings and the occasional party with beer, live music and even sometimes dancing. It is a good life here.
As I enter my fourth week on the farm, I realize that the time here will pass quickly. October is still a long way off, and I am still processing my departure from Park School, my time on Black Mesa and in the deserts and more so, my arrival and new life here at the CASFS farm. What I am finding here is that I have a sense of optimism and of possibilities that was often missing during the months leading up to my departure from Hayward Unified. Sometimes, visitors and others will ask me--what will I do in October? I have many ideas, but for now, I am trying to ground myself in this place, appreciate the community of those I live and work with and learn all I can from them and this land. That and an occasional sapote or an evening cup of tea made from fresh garden herbs fill me with a great sense of contentment, and I begin and end each day with a sense of gratitude for this experience.
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