On the web site, Max has introduced you to our Babydoll Southdown sheep. In addition to cute, and their traditional roles as wool and meat providers, they will also play an important role in maintaining soil fertility and controlling weeds and cover crops in our vineyards. But why won’t they eat the grape leaves, we ask? So, while our young farmers sweated-out the last rows in the Pinot Gris, Max and I have been working with our CSU Extension Agent, Robbie Baird Levalley, to train the sheep what NOT to eat.

The protocol for this training was developed by Dr Fred Provenza of Utah State University and has been applied in vineyards on the West coast. Robbie has successfully applied it to a flock of Babydolls on a vineyard in Palisade, CO. So we are not exactly pioneers in this: We hold the ewes off feed overnight and then present them with fresh grape leaves, which they are happy to eat. We then give them a pill of lithium chloride that gives them a stomachache – which they associate with having eaten the grape leaves. On the second morning of this regime, most of them declined the grape leaves; those who ate were treated again. Later we turned them out into a vineyard. Those who ate grapes were removed for further conditioning; it is important that they not teach the others that its OK to eat leaves.

Yesterday we had remarkable success: only the ram, Louie, continued to eat leaves in the corral. He was left behind when we turned the others out to the vineyard. Most of the sheep ate grass and weeds around the grape plants without bothering the leaves; a few tested the grapes but went back to the grasses. Only two ewes and a lamb required further conditioning. Today we’ll do it again.

A “heritage breed”, Babydoll Southdowns are the breed of choice for this work because of their diminutive size which allows them to move about between rows and under the trellis wires. They seem intelligent enough to readily grasp this training and, in addition, they are known for their excellent quality fleece, comparable to Merino, and for delicious meat. We are very excited by this addition to our agro-ecology.

Now I’m back in the cabin, listening to my machines chop the air, sipping tea, and watching the thermometer continue to fall. Some more data: the thermometers at the CSU Ag Experiment Station (accessed by phone, about a mile away and several hundred feet lower) are a couple degrees warmer and showing the same spread. The humidity is 33% which sets the dew point at 4 degrees (see www.dpcalc.org) — I already knew we weren’t close to the dew point as my shoes came back dry from the walk to the wind machines. No future in relying on this heat source.

Last Friday night’s freeze was the coldest it has been since then. But Saturday and Sunday nights were similar nail-biters: Saturday went down to 30 and Sunday to 32. Both nights my neighbors (or some of them) ran their wind machines and both nights I restrained myself from the temptation to follow the crowd. I sat awake by the wood stove in the wee hours, charting the mercuries (actually digitals), studying the skies for portents, and in the end resolved to stick to the data.At times like these I like to remind myself of the time that, on our first spring on Mesa Winds, I let the propane supply in one machine run low. Too late to order a delivery I realized we were in for another cold night and I would be unable to run our frost protection. Max was furious. I lay awake that night listening to every wind machine in Delta County chop the air and feeling the chill from the other side of the bed. I still can’t explain why we were spared the severity of the freeze that hit our neighbors that night. Was it the dew point, the wind chill, or beginner’s blind luck? Anyway, I was redeemed and grateful.

So, the observation that the mercury seemed to rise after I turned off the machines on Friday night doesn’t come as a total surprise. And such events make for more complicated judgements and less sleep. On Saturday and Sunday nights my data was easier to trust: on neither night did we reach the critical temperature, on both nights I couldn’t discern an inversion, one night there was a bit too much wind, and another an ample cloud cover.

Be that as it may, the proof is in the pudding: Jack Frost did a pretty aggressive job of thinning for us. But we DO still have a crop. We’re still not out of the woods, though, and tonight’s low is forecast at 26. The Crest Haven peaches fared better than the Red Globes, likely because they mature later and were, therefore, at an earlier, less vulnerable stage. There are more viable buds up high in the trees than low, reflecting the colder temps near the ground (an inversion).

The Golden Delicious apples fared better than the Galas both because they are a later variety and because they are a taller tree.  On the Galas that we sampled, about 40% of the clusters (a normal cluster has 5 or 6 blossoms, each with the capacity to become an apple) has only one or two viable buds.  Only the buds that hadn’t yet opened were still viable. This is more or less the rate we’d want to thin-to; the difficulty being that Jack Frost doesn’t necessarily distribute his handiwork evenly in the tree. We’ll still be hand-thinning to even-out the crop-load but will not be chemical thinning this year — an eventuality that I find most agreeable.

I will conclude by saying that I hope this is the last you’ll have to endure my spring frost stories this year and I trust, with the help of the wind machines, that we’ll have a crop. We can tell that our customers are beginning to look forward to local fruit season as each mail brings more CSA member sign-ups. Thank you! We look forward to seeing you at the market and in the mean time, keep in touch through the web site and this blog. Thanks for paying attention!

April 30, 2010, 11:30 PM.  I’m awake, sitting by the warm wood stove, listening to my neighbors’ wind machines flog the air, struggling to find a modicum of warm air to stir into the frigid air mass that envelops Rogers Mesa. Why don’t I just turn mine on instead of belaboring this dilemma as I do every year at about this time.  I review the considerations:
1.  At each stage of development the fruit buds have “critical temperatures” at which 10% of buds will be killed (thinning the crop) and a lower temperature at which 90% will be killed (a disaster).  The further along they are, the less cold they will tolerate.  For our peaches in full bloom these temperatures are 27oF and 24oF, respectively.  My wireless thermometer stands at 27.3.  It will not be likely to rise again until 8 AM — this is a long period of cold.
2.  These values are gross generalizations.  Buds will withstand lower temps for shorter duration and vice versa.  Also, only some of our buds are at Stage 6, full bloom.  Other buds on the same tree which are at lower stages are good to lower temps: 26/21 or even 25/15.
3.  The wind machine is a giant fan on a tower which spins and rotates at the same time.  During spring frost events there is often a temperature inversion (warmer air above).  By stirring the air it is possible to warm the air at fruit level a couple of degrees.  Sometimes this is all it takes to save the crop.  Sometimes it is “fruitless.”  I have a wireless thermometer at crop height and one at the top of the barn in an effort to measure the amount of inversion.  Right now the spread is 26.4 x 27.8.  I’m looking for at least a 2 degree spread.
4.  Inversions occur under clear skies.  Cloud-cover acts as a blanket, preventing the relatively warm air from escaping.  Just when my neighbors turned on their machines a high cloud-cover moved in and the temperatures stabilized at 27 x 28.  Now the cloud has moved off and the temp is again falling — faster at fruit level than above.  This is an indication that radiational cooling is in effect.  The 2 degree spread will likely soon be reached.
5.  Absolute temperature is not the only effect.  When the dew point is reached, water vapor turns to liquid and gives off heat.  When the liquid freezes it gives off more heat.  When the dew point is close to the critical temperature, it is authoritatively said that there is nothing we can do that will be as effective at saving the fruit.  Dew point is calculated from humidity and temperature.  Tonight it is 25 oF.  Right now the temp spread is 25.5 x 27.3.   Would the wind machine simply dissipate this ephemeral heat?  How long does the heat last without wind?
6.  If the cold is the result of a cold-air-mass rather than radiational cooling under clear skies, there is no point in stirring the air around.  Tonight’s cold is on the heals of a cold front, but is there also radiational cooling taking place?
7.  So what’s the hesitation?  Cost vs effectiveness.  I’ve just outlined the effectiveness issues.  As for cost, the machine is driven by a propane-fired 440 cu in Chevy V-8, industrial engine.  It operates at full throttle and guzzles fuel.  It is not to be run unnecessarily.
8.  There is no point in running the machine if there is any wind: the wind is doing the stirring and, since the fan is a giant gyroscope that is constantly reorienting itself relative to the wind, it could blow apart under the stress of moving through too strong a wind with catastrophic results to the $20K machine and the farmer.  At the first hint of wind — indicated by intensification of the helicopter-throb of the rotor — I should hurry out and turn it off.

It’s 12:10 AM.  Spread is 25.2 x 27.1.  Sky is clear and calm.  I still have my doubts but I’m heading out to do my part to stir the air.  Call it giving-in to peer pressure.

Forty-five minutes, 2 wind machine start-ups, and a snow-sparkling walk under the full moon later and I’m back at the fire.  Dew point has certainly been reached as the towers and blades are coated in frost which blows off when spinning begins.  Checking the sky I see that another bank of high clouds is moving-in from the west.  The temp spread is now 25.3 x 26.2.  Is the narrower spread the result of the cloud cover or the wind machine?  I hear the rotors throbbing as they chop their way through the wind.  I’m surrounded by noise.  The cabin shakes in time to the throb.  The pitch changes with the orientation to the wind and the wind velocity.  Is there wind with the cloud bank?  Or is it the wind we are generating?  Should I contemplate turning off the machine?  Can I go to sleep with these questions on my mind?  Spread is now 25.5 x 26.6.  It’s warming-up?

Later.  The cloud cover is not unbroken.  In the West it seems clearer despite the forecast that calls for 60% chance of snow.  Precip would obviate the wind machine.  Dilemma.  I think I’ll crawl my weary body and mind into the warm bed and try to forget that there are no certain answers.  Any major change will likely wake me — that is if am able to sleep at all in this racket… and with all these questions…

Morning after.  I managed four hours sleep.  In the dreary dawn there is an unbroken thin overcast blanket.  The temp spread has all but disappeared and stands at 25.5.  There’s no reason to keep the machines sucking down fuel.  At 6:15 I begin the process of turning them off.  By the time I get back to the cabin half-an-hour later the thermometer is at 27 and trending upward.  This raises the question: Did the wind machines, in the absence of a temperature gradient, actually suppress the temp?  Worse than for naught, actually counter-productive.

At least we now have a space tempered from the elements for a myriad of farm tasks.  As our readers know, we were grateful for the cool space in which to pack our peaches and apples.  We also crushed and fermented a half-bin of our pinot munier and chambourcin grapes to make our ‘09 vintage wine.  We were, in fact, returning to the house from pressing these grapes when tonight’s moon peered over my shoulder, 78% full.  We had just pressed 70 gallons of wine into a barrel and carboys.

First snow denotes the return of winter.  October, even late October, seems early for winter around here.  True, the snow-level has been creeping down the slopes of Mt Lamborn and the high peaks are well-blanketed.  And, we’ve had a few cold nights, two of which gave rise to the urgent need to pick the grapes before they were truly ready.  With help from our neighbors we managed to pick over six tons of grapes in three days and the chemistry of the juice turned out to be just fine.  We were pleased with this yield for our first commercial wine-grape harvest.  Still, I’m unprepared for winter.  My fire wood supply is meager, there’s holes to be dug and trellis repairs to be affected before the ground freezes.  The trees and vines, though, appreciate a little snow on the ground and if this melts off, as we expect, it’ll help to moisten the soil going into winter.  An all-too-brief Indian Summer enabled us to almost complete the roof on the barn and siding on the East gable end.  Windows are due to be delivered next week.  And, since I am building the doors, I’d better get moving on that part of the project.

A highlight of our post-harvest season was a four-day visit from nine Colorado College students who camped in the orchard and helped us take-in bird netting from the grapes and muck out silt from the pond.  They also helped a friend put his farm to bed for the winter.

So, with snow, cold, and shortened daylight, we wind down the season.  And I have time to write and reflect.  Another harbinger of the coming months of hibernation is the filling of our freezers and shelves of preserves.  Last Friday I picked-up our annual side of locally-grown, grass-finished beef from our friend, neighbor, and rancher, Cynthia Houseweart (see princessbeef.com), for the freezer.  This yearly occasion is a social event as well as nutritional one.  Parked haphazardly in the shade of cottonwoods, cars and pickups clog the ranch driveway.  We’re supposed to load our flats of paper-wrapped frozen beef cuts and get them expeditiously to our home freezer.  But there’s Shirley and Bill and Margaret and Philip and Pam and Steve; folks we haven’t seen since last year’s pick-up or, at least, since the irrigation water was turned-on back in the Spring, all picking-up theirs.  And we finally have a little time to visit with one another; to compare stories on the crop-year just past.

Along with meat, Cynthia customarily hands-out literature intended to remind us that the benefits of local, organic, healthy, nutritious food outweighs the modest additional cost.  We, of course, don’t need to be coached on this.  This year’s handout was a reprint from the Aug 31, 2009 Time magazine.  The sustainable ag conversation has gone mainstream.  The author went to lengths to underscore the hidden costs of “cheap” food and to reinforce the value of food that’s raised in harmony with the natural world.

While I applaud the message and its significance, I want to echo the complaint of our friend, John Cooley, the organic potato farmer:  Why should the crops we raise, and their cost, be compared in any way with what conventional ag produces?  Why indeed?  Ecological farmers cherish and nurture our soils as the first essential of healthy food.  We build soil health and support the intricate web of organisms in the soil using compost, cover crops, and natural fertilizers.  Healthy, well-fed soils produce healthy plants which produce healthy, nutritious, and delicious food which is our passion and our mission.  Industrial ag regards the soil as expendable: kill the life in it along with the weeds and pests, degrade it, mine it, erode it, and when it can no longer provide what the plants need, then apply synthetic fertilizers.  We control pests by supporting a balanced agricultural ecology so that bugs, birds, and the plants themselves are able to combat bad bugs.  I could go on: we support local businesses, a vibrant rural community while industrial ag trades in a national, even global arena.

Really, there is no comparison in the nutritional value of the food produced sustainably vs industrially just as there is no comparison in the way its produced.  There is no separation.  Wouldn’t you rather feed your family food that builds and supports their health and development?  Wouldn’t you rather support vibrant local communities and open, agricultural landscapes?  For all these values, to spend a little more at your local farm stand, farmers market, or locally-oriented grocery, is a small price to pay.  Especially when you understand that, on average, we spend the smallest share of our disposable income on food of any developed economy and that it’s close to half what US families spent in the 1960s.  Let’s put our money where our mouth (and health) is!

Another cold front moved across western Colorado yesterday afternoon on the familiar spring winds. From the tractor seat I watched as storm cells skirted around us bringing rain across the valley to the Black Canyon area and up-valley to Paonia. I managed to finish cultivating the east half of Apple Wedge Vineyard in the waning daylight and retreated indoors to warm up. Boy, is that a change! Recently we’ve been grateful for the cooler early evening hours after days reaching into the low 90s. Rain began here about bed time. This morning is still grey and cool and damp.

I’m pleased to report that the fruit all looks good. The peaches and apples have “set” what appears to be a good crop and we’ll be hand-thinning in the not-too-distant-future. Max and Matt are pruning the Pinot Noir grapes which Bennett declares to “look good.” We’re enjoying profuse salads from the kitchen garden and rhubarb crisps, crunches, and cobblers. Aaron and Matt have big plans for the gardens this year and can often be seen planting and hoeing by the light of their headlamps.

The insects are back, of course. Lady bugs can be seen feeding on aphid larvae on the flowering salsify. Lacewings are around in profusion. Wasps are busy predating and siting their nests. Tomorrow morning I will be laying-down the first weekly organic spray against apple coddling moth larvae. We do our best to minimize our use of sprays but so far we still need to rely on the granulosis virus to control the worm in your apple. Fortunately, it is very selective unlike some other broad-spectrum insecticides that might harm our beneficial insects and bees. We hope that some day we’ll be able to rely on birds, insects, and bats to control coddling moth. We believe that you, our customers, our “eaters”, prefer your apples without the worms so, for this season at least, I’ll continue to spray.

The Pheasants are strutting and crowing; Mallards have returned to the pond where Red Winged Blackbirds have taken up residence in the bull rushes; Meadow Larks serenade.  Yesterday Wink had a FOS sighting of a Kestrel.  FOS is birdwatcher jargon for “first of season”:  We’re enjoying becoming steeped in birder-lore since we joined Black Canyon Audubon and decided to open the farm to birdwatchers for a couple of special events.  (Check the web site for details).  Matt is moving into our worker housing and will be helping us this summer and through the harvest.

The peach orchard shows a brighter pink every day; apples are greening and beginning to show a hint of red.  All this color is highlighted against the high mountains still white in snow.  Cautiously, the old timers agree that the danger of a killing frost isn’t past until May 10.  But with the current succession of bluebird days and temps ranging from 40s to 70s it’s hard to envision the need to crank up the wind machines again.  Knock on wood.  Our fruit survived the cold snaps of the last month better than we had hoped and, so far, we’re looking forward to a full harvest.  So it’s full steam ahead.

Dear Mark,

It was good to see you Tuesday night at Talbott’s.  I appreciate very much you reaching out to the western Colorado agriculture community through the Western Colorado Horticulture Society.  No doubt you already knew that you’d encounter a pretty conservative audience.  I found it instructive that the big issues were taxation and immigration; plus an aside about regulation (food safety).  Three traditional right-wing whipping boys that are used to distract and obstruct discussion on issues of real importance.  Please know that not all of the Western Slope or the ag community here are so narrowly focused.  I especially appreciated your defense of President Obama’s economic recovery plan.  Thank you.

I recently received an email from your office in which you made the point that you are trying to bridge the divide that separates the parties and that has produced gridlock in Washington.  As a mediator, I appreciate the willingness of a party to reach out.  I also realize that resolution requires that both parties be motivated to settle. The Republicans demonstrate time and again that they are not so motivated.  They make no secret that the only thing they can agree on is obstruction.  The party of “No”.

The vast majority of Americans, including your constituents, reject the Republican Party, their ideas, and their tactics.  We need look no further than their behavior on the stimulus package to recognize their game plan: exact concessions, such as the middle-class tax cut, and then vote against it anyway.  With such an adversary it is a mistake, even dangerous, to try to find compromise.  And “adversary” they clearly are as they show no interest whatever in collaborating to solve the problems that their ideas created.  They are intent on seeing us fail regardless of the pain and cost to the Nation.

Thus, while continuing to seek a collaborative outcome remains a worthy and ethical effort, please be careful not to surrender the values that got you elected.  Max and I urge you to focus on getting the important work done and forget about trying to work with the other side.

We also want to weigh-in on the issue of food safety:  Certainly there is reason to be concerned when people die or are sickened by the food they eat.  The appropriate legislative response, however, is not to create new regulations which shift the cost of enforcement to farmers.  Rather, the FDA should be adequately funded to perform the inspections and enforcement that it is already empowered to do.  The recent rash of food-related scares can be linked to the trend to deregulation and “starving the beast” that has brought calamity on so
many levels.  Let’s restore a more responsible level of utilization of existing regulation before creating a whole new bureaucracy.

At the dedication of the Jerry Ahlberg Outdoor Education Center at CC, you enjoyed one of our delicious certified organic Gala apples. Remember?  As organic, small farm operators Max and I feel that the true threat to food safety comes from the industrialization of agriculture; from the concentration of market power in the hands of just a few large corporations, who are intent on extending their control by monopolizing access to seeds, and subjecting us to GMOs. It is important to remember that their overriding reason to exist is to produce ever-increasing returns for their shareholders.  This is in stark contrast to the small farm community that values diversity, quality, cooperation, and sustainability in addition to a reasonable return for our labors.  Our customers buy directly from us; they know we care about their health and well-being, we care about the health and well-being of our soils and of our rural communities, and we care about our workers and their families.  And our customers reciprocate the connection.

This is what Dr John Ikerd calls “The New American Agricultural Economy” (http://web.missouri.edu/ikerdj/). We urge you to pay attention to his ideas because we consider it a model for how the US can move beyond the collapsing unsustainable corporatist system toward a sustainable future; a future that values community, cooperation, health, peace, nutrition as opposed to just corporate profits.  This movement is well underway right here in western Colorado’s North Fork Valley.  If you’d like to experience it first-hand, we invite you (and Maggie) to pay us a visit here at Mesa Winds Farm.  We’ll show you models of the New American Agriculture, and I can assure you that we’ll turn out a bigger crowd, and actual supporters to boot, than last Tuesday.  In the mean time, please check out what we’re up to by visiting our web site at www.mesawindsfarm.com.  We’re looking forward to it.

With best wishes,

Wink & Max

The day was clear and cold with a biting wind.  But the work, on the whole, kept us warm and moving.  Max and I have recently been warming to the idea of grazing sheep in our orchards and vineyards to keep the cover crop mowed and to add manure to the soil as well as meat to our table and wool for whatever one does with raw fleeces.

Max has done considerable research and has learned a lot about this proposition.  So we took advantage of our neighbors’ shearing to get hands-on with the subject matter.  It was a treat and an education to observe a real Welch sheep shearer at his work.  Aaron crowded the fuzzy black critters toward the shearing floor which Max and I kept tidy.  We moved the shorn sheep back into the paddocks and admired the fresh fleeces as Oogie extolled their relative virtues and shortcomings.  Nothing is wasted; even the “junk” fleeces are salvaged for garden mulch.

The deep, soft, warm, slightly greasy black fleeces were seductive.  Max brought home one of lamb’s wool that is sheer delight (no pun intended) to caress.  All week she has been washing and cleaning and cleaning and washing the wool.  Then drying it on the rack by the wood stove.  Finally tonight the clean fleece is stored in moth-proof sacks awaiting the next phase and we have use of our dining table again.  She admits to being obsessed:  a beginner flock will definitely be on site at the Farm next spring.

It will be interesting to see the carrying capacity of our orchards, as the goal is to do away with fossil-fuel-powered mowing.  The variety she has settled on is Southdown Babydoll; a relatively smaller heritage variety said to have exceptional wool, excellent meat, and a quizzical grin for a fixed expression.   An Extension Service researcher in our area has been experimenting with training this variety to graze in vineyards without harming the vines and we aim to learn from her.

Rain rode in on the winds of yet another cold front yesterday afternoon.  Our west windows are splattered with mud — fertile topsoil from the corn fields around Delta, presumably.  It rained over night but we’re still expecting snow and another night of deep cold temps.  Max claims this could be the last cold weather for a while, so I’m tuning up the sprayer and preparing to sally forth into the apple orchards as soon as the weather warms to spray against powdery mildew.

So the deliberation narrows: how localized is the inversion?  How severe is the frost?  How steeply is the temperature declining?  Is there any cloud blanket?  Any wind?  How soon will the sun be up?  One thing’s for sure — I’m up and not likely to get back to sleep with all those questions and machines stirring around.  So far, we haven’t turned on our machine a single time this year.  But maybe I’d better call the station again…

Up to last week we were headed into an early spring.  Day after day of warm, dry, bluebird days.  The fruit trees awakened almost a month ahead of average: buds were swelling and showed hints of pink blossoms.  The further advanced the bud development the more vulnerable to frost damage.  We monitor the bud stages and correlate to charts depicting temps where 10% bud kill is expected all the way down to 90% bud kill.  We set the alarm thermometer accordingly.

Then came the first cold front — roaring in on 50 mph winds and sending the mercury plunging to 13 degrees.  We welcomed the snow that followed but worried for the fruit.  A succession of fronts, wind-events, snows, and storms has followed.  It’s winter again, time to break out the fleeces and boots again.  But try telling that to the trees: they can’t go back to sleep.  So we engage in early morning deliberations that reduce to weighing whether the cold is due to a cold-air-mass that we can’t do anything about or radiational cooling that we can temper by turning on the big fans.  A morning like today where the temp is hovering around 20 degrees (well into the critical zone) is actually a relief from recent mornings when it just keeps sliding into the teens.

So, what are our prospects for the fruit season?  After the first two cold nights we clipped a few representative peach branches and brought them inside to dissect the buds in search of the tell-tale brown of freeze damage.  Before we accomplished this, though, we had another very cold night, and our earlier results were obsolete.  Now those buds are swelling to beautiful pink blossoms in a vase in our living room.  We’re not without prospects to report, however.  Our friends at the Experiment Station have been diligently dissecting bud samples and their reports are far more encouraging than our fears had been.  We still have at least a month of exposure to potential frost events, so prognostications remain premature but we’re again optimistic for a bountiful harvest.

Just to be sure, I phone again for the temps at the Experiment Station…  No change…  I can continue to peck at my keyboard, and sip morning tea by the warm fire, and listen to my neighbor’s wind machine and wonder what he knows that I don’t…

We spent inauguration day and evening with friends in Colorado Springs; it was a joyous event.  We also met with contacts to plan the growing season and fruit distribution.  Our friend Susan Gordon of Venetucci Farm (http://venetuccifarm.org/CSA.html) is helping us to plan a Fruit “CSA” (Community Supported Agriculture).  In the CSA model, a member buys, in the Spring and for a fixed cost, a share of the summer produce of the farm.  By purchasing the share in advance, the member helps the farmer afford the season start-up costs and each week receives a basket containing a pro rata share of that week’s harvest.  If the harvest is prolific, the basket overflows; should it falter, the member shares the loss with the farmer.  A personal relationship deepens; the member develops a sense of ownership in the farm and the farmer appreciates sharing the risks inherent in farming.  Originally applied in vegetable growing, the concept has recently been expanded to encompass meat, fruit, and even prepared foods.  We look forward to knowing our CSA members and welcoming their visits to the farm.

Stay tuned for news and updates.