Week 2 Update - Young Farmers

It was definitely a hot one! In spite of the record-breaking temperatures, we had a great day. We started off under the trees practicing compass use, where the kids were challenged to walk a large equilateral triangle using assigned headings to get back to their original starting point. We also played an active game of Metamorphosis where we use “rock-paper-scissor” challenges to move up through the stages of butterfly development. (It’s a visual.)

We then hiked back to our classroom, reviewed our agreements, and discussed results of our average frost date research. Interestingly there were many different answers on the web. We decided that the most plausible answer was November 28, which we noted on our calendars. It’s important to know the date as we prepare our farm for cooler weather. Fall/winter crops like kale, broccoli and lettuce need to be well established in their beds before that date so they can survive temperatures below freezing. We’ll be talking about other ways to protect crops from frost in future classes. 

After snack, we ventured out onto the farm to collect plants for seed saving. We gathered dried okra pods, dried zinnias, tomatoes and holy basil flowers. We then worked on the compost pile just a bit by adding bags of dried leaves. It got to be in the sun at that point, so we’ll get back to compost-building next week. 

We finished our farm chores by weeding out pesky amaranth sprouts from our seedlings on the hoop house. This prompted an excellent question: What is a weed? The best answer I’ve heard is that a weed is merely a plant that’s growing in the wrong place. 

They really love being challenged with riddles at lunchtime. Only a third of the class got this one, the rest are still thinking about it (no googling!) Maybe you can figure it out: A man gets ready for bed at 9:45 pm. He makes himself a drink, then turns off the TV and the lights. The night was windy and there was a major storm. The next day he discovers he was the cause of seven deaths. How is this possible?

After cooling each other down with spray bottles, it was time to move indoors to the tasting room. We spent the rest of the afternoon learning how to process the seeds that we collected. Okra is easiest: just unzip the pod and shake the seeds out. Zinnias take a bit more work: they need to be sifted and then winnowed (by wind power) to separate the seeds from the chaff. Seeds that have a gel coating like tomatoes (and the alien-looking Kiwano melon that farmer Cullen gave us) require separation from the fruit, then a period of fermentation to break down the gel coat. By next week we should be able to rinse them off and dry them before storing away for planting next spring. 

We spent a few minutes at the end of the day journaling about our experiences and writing questions to bring to next class. Please check in with your student to make sure that they finish their journal work before next class.

Looking forward to the first day of fall on Tuesday!

Cheers,

Ms. Bridget