Farmer John

Mardl.in

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 13 Dec 2010 17:29:00 +0000

My blog has a new home. From now on it'll be at Mardl.in. Of course most who do, read my posts as imported to Facebook so this won't affect you much. It's mostly for me, the wordpress interface and themes are much more eye friendly and user friendly. I guess it's nice that Google still isn't the best at absolutely everything.

A new name, and a new site also give me the opportunity to write about whatever the hell I want, without feeling like I need to stick to the farming theme, though there will still be lots of that here.

Falsification is Easier Than Verification. (Rant Alert)

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 18 Nov 2010 18:21:00 +0000

Do you ever find it funny that Star Trek fans, or football fans, or environmentalists or any other small group of passionate people, can be so at each others throats about small differences in ideology? Trekkers get riled up about the original vs. TNG, football fans about this team vs. that team, and environmentalists about different solutions to different crises. One thing is that individuals in these groups agree that there is an issue, and a debate is worth having. A football fan (who is a non-environmentalist), will simply shrug when listening to an environmentalist wax about relocalization, or green tech. The bigger an issue, the more differences in ideology you'll see.

Well, I'm thinking about this, because I am an environmentalist, and last night I went to see a talk by Derrick Jensen, who is also an environmentalist, and I sat in a room PACKED full of other environmentalists. Derrick's idea is that civilization itself, is inherently, irrevocably unsustainable. That you can't fix it, and the only sustainable way of living is with stone age technology. It's misanthropy, even self-hatred writ large.

There was a time when I would have been more open to these idea. He opened the talk by stating the premises that lead to his anti-civilization conclusion. But he really glossed over the big ones. Like, how would we actually get all the way back to the stone-age, without someone grabbing power? Will the majority of the worlds population just lay down and die without an even more ecologically devastating war? Let's say we do achieve stone age-ness. What's to keep us there? The history of humans is invention and innovation. That's what we do, and with big chunks of steel lying around everywhere, do you expect people to just ignore them? Especially without communication technology, how would you actually remind people of the reason that they are choosing to live lives that are once again solitary, poor, nasty, brutish, and short?

We need to at least be pragmatic about fixing our problems, and whether or not you think technology holds some answers, I'm pretty sure we can discard this idea.

To many of you, this is a totally unnecessary post. To a few of you this might irk you. I admit, I didn't stay 'til the end, and I regret that I didn't have the chance to actually put these questions to Derrick. He made it clear he wasn't interested in taking question during his talk.

Farmer Tans: The Calendar

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 05 Nov 2010 05:47:00 +0000

Look at all the awesome going on!

Yes, another amazing project I'd like to alert my enormous and fanatical readership(mostly my mom) to is the
Farmer Tans Calendar.

Some of my friends here have gotten it going, and the final product is in the works. It'll be 12 months of sexy barely concealed farm bodies, showing off the sensuously awkward tans they've earned this past summer.

Check out, and become a fan of the Facebook group, to stay updated on how and where you can get one of these babies. All proceeds will go to support initiatives to help young farmers gain secure, long term access to luscious acres of fertile land!

Dirt, on Skin, on Steel

The Ruminant

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 03 Nov 2010 20:04:00 +0000

Cows are ruminants, they chew their cud. That is, they don't just chew their food once, no, they chew it, soften it in their stomachs and chew it again. This is how they succeed in digesting the tough cellulose in a blade of grass.

People can also be ruminants, in this case meaning that they return to ideas, turning them over in their heads repeatedly, and examining the various angles. It's not always a good thing, but it's also not always a bad thing.

If you ever have the chance to talk to my friend Jordan Marr about farming, you get the idea that he's probably a ruminant, in the psychological sense. If there's an issue, he probably has something to say about it, on top of that, he's a hell of a writer.

I've already linked to Seeking Farmland, the blog which followed his cycling journey to visit farms, get ideas and identify farming opportunities across the east of this continent. Now comes The Ruminant.ca, which doesn't even have a wordpress.org URL! He's continuing the Farm Glances where people can share innovative farming ideas, and expanding into book reviews. I'm looking forward to contributing and suggest you check it out.

Cover Cropping

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 11 Oct 2010 05:07:00 +0000

I know that the beauty of seasonal rhythms sometimes gets pushed pretty hard by people of the earthier persuasion, but honestly, it rocks. All through this farm year, we've been able to witness a progression in the land, and the type of work we're doing. As the season slows down, we're starting to put most of the land to rest for the winter.

After we till in the summer's crop, we always sow a cover crop. For the most part we use a mixture of wheat, winter pea and vetch, in some cases we use clover. There are a lot of benefits to doing this and I'd recommend that home gardeners do the same.

Cover crops protect your soil from compaction and erosion during winter rains and their roots help to aerate and loosen the soil. Winter pea and vetch, being legumes, also fix nitrogen from the atmosphere, and all plant growth collects carbon from the atmosphere for building cells. In the spring, when you turn in a cover crop, all this new nitrogen and organic matter is great for your soil.

Go to your local garden store. They'll be able to recommend a good cover crop to protect your soil, and the work you put into it this year.

I'm looking forward to relaxing this winter, knowing that our soil will be well prepared for next season.

Canned Currency

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 02:42:00 +0000

Jill just made a great observation about what she called the "Canning Culture" here. She's been busily canning strawberries, blackberries, beets and tomatoes, in an effort to preserve the fresh fruits and veggies that we have a temporary abundance of.

What's awesome about being on the farm is that we have access to all the foods that aren't quite pretty enough to sell. This doesn't mean it's not yummy enough for us apprentices to eat or preserve.

And a lot of people around us are doing the same thing. This has given rise to a sort of canned currency. We've had to borrow a propane burner to get the canning pot hot enough, Jill will repay Heather for this with blackberry jam. Our friend Kelty just visited and brought us a jar of burnt-ginger apricot jam. We traded her three of our jars, in exchange for some much needed massages.

These are just some examples of the little economy of canned goods that's springing up around here. There are some things that you just can't pay for with money.

Death of a Chicken

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 31 Jul 2010 00:52:00 +0000

At the ripe age of 28, significant first experiences come less frequently. So yesterday was fairly significant for me; I killed a chicken, and then I killed four more.

I picked out the biggest chicken I could find and as I carried her to the processing area, I imagined that she was flying for the first time in her short life. I like to think that there was also something in her simple brain that interpreted this voyage as flight. Either way, it helped to calm my nerves.

I placed her upside down in the funnel shaped piece of steel, which is actually called a "killing cone" (we don't mince words here). The chicken's head and neck projecting below the cone, I grasped her head gently in my left hand, the knife in my right hand, took a deep breath and began cutting. Less than a second later her head lay on the ground and my hand was covered in warm blood.

Taking this animal's life felt surprisingly natural. It was difficult to start, but the instant that the knife touched her neck, there was no space for hesitation, the job had to be finished as quickly as possible.

I feel good about the experience. I raised this chicken from a day old, into a large bird, then killed it, plucked it and cleaned it. This is how we get poultry, well, at least that`s how we get it here...

Chickens of the west: Spread your wings!

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 13 Jul 2010 15:05:00 +0000

I blogged recently about being careful what you put in your head. One way to do that wrong is to only read what reinforces your beliefs. Which is why I follow a blog called Advocates for Ag, in which the blogger, Troy Hadrick, defends the embattled industrial agriculture system from accusations of injustice to animals and environmental degradation.

I have some sympathy for him too. All farmers work hard to provide food for eaters. Some farmers have had to go down an unpleasant road in order to stay competitive. But arbitrarily defending every criticism put against you is counterproductive and erodes your credibility. I'll admit, it would require more land base to feed the worlds population organically, we can't deny that, but we're getting better at it. On the conventional side of agriculture, farmers should be willing to admit that a lot of their practices have been very damaging and there is room for improvement.

Prop 2 was recently passed in California, mandating that "By 2015, every whole egg sold in the state must come

from a hen that is able to stretch her wings, standing or lying, without touching another bird or the edges of her cage"[1]. Can you really argue against that? Legislation like this actually set the level of the playing field at place where producers can treat animals better, but remain competitive.

So Troy, I think it's honorable that you're defending your industry. But consider occasionally admitting where there is room for improvement. It would give you more credibility.

Maybe don't spread your wings too wide, Jonathan Livingston Chicken.

How to Grow Food in Uranus

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 10 Jul 2010 05:36:00 +0000

When the farm we're on first started, there were 9 fields. Heather wanted to name each field, rather than just giving it a number. But what are there 9 of? I can't think of anything other than the planets of the solar system. Heather couldn't think of anything else either, so that's what we've got. Since then, the fields have expanded to include the moon, and the black hole.

These names make things fun. We get to say things like "there are chickens on the moon"! Of course the most entertaining, in a terribly immature way is the field known as Uranus. Even without this unfortunate name, Uranus is the most maligned of our fields. It was poorly drained and full of slugs in the spring, and the hot sun has now transformed it into a heavy clay brick. This field's saving grace, is that at the very least, it provides us with daily entertainment.

"I'll just be harvesting squash in Uranus"

"Man, Uranus is poorly drained"

Or simply,
"Where's the Shovel"?
"In Uranus"

If you could use some more chuckles in your day to day, maybe try naming something Uranus.

What are you putting in your head?

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 06 Jul 2010 03:59:00 +0000

My friend Neil wrote a good essay recently, on the connection between where we get our information about crime, and our perception of crime in society.I'd already been wondering about what I've been putting in my head lately, and his post kind of hit home.

But I'm not thinking about crime lately, I'm thinking about business and entrepreneurship, and about the daunting task of building a profitable farm/farming career. And I'm reading about business, marketing and entrepreneurship, and I find these topics exciting. An entrepreneur is taking charge of their own lives and attempts to create a business that starts as little more than an idea (and maybe some money).

I came across this book recently: How to Get Rich, by Felix Dennis, the guy who brought you Maxim, as well as many other magazines of varying degrees of respectability. I picked up the book because I'd heard it was a fun read, and that it had some good business ideas in it. I was surprised to find that it actually made me want to become rich, and had me considering whether or not I could muster the energy or the courage to single mindedly pursue wealth. What's up with that? That's not like me.

I think what I learned here is, to be careful what I put in my head, a good author, speaker or artist can be highly convincing, take it with a grain of salt. That said, there's something to be learned from people who are working hard and taking risks to achieve their goals, whether or not your goals are the same.

The Slug Boom

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 03 Jun 2010 14:58:00 +0000

Tuesday morning of this week, I was ankle deep in mud. My leaky $12 rubber boots were simultaneously sinking down into the soggy soil of the squash bed and filling up with water. I was bent over, scissors in hand, staring at the ground when Jill said to me, "Some of these slug guts are actually really beautiful". I was surprised to hear it, but she was absolutely right. According to Wikipedia, as a slug develops it undergoes a 180º twisting of the internal organs, this leads to a lovely helical formation of it's stomach, intestines and whatever else might be in there.

This beautiful natural pattern is revealed to us everytime we cut one in half, which seems to be the best way to control the unending onslaught of slugs. I don't know if more slugs are being born daily or what, but they don't stop coming. We've tried leaving small containers of beer for them to get drunk and drown in. This caught a total of 12 slugs in one night. We've left barriers of broken eggshells and oyster shells around the garden beds, to cut their bodies as they cross enemy lines, but to no avail. Like postwar prosperity and optimism creating baby boomers, this years warm winter and wet spring seems to have caused an unprecedented sluggy boom. They've already decimated much of the summer squash and the next likely victims are the North Carolinian cucumbers that Heather saves for the love of her North Carolinian husband, Lamont.

I guess this is farming. Nothing worth doing is easy, and if it was easy, everyone else would be doing it too.

seekingfarmland.wordpress.com

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 17 May 2010 04:52:00 +0000

Our friends, Jill's former classmates and my former pedicabbing colleagues, Jordan and Vanessa are on a very interesting journey right now.

If you're really into farming, you should check out their blog: seekingfarmland.wordpress.com.
They're travelling around Quebec and the East Coast, by bike, visiting farms and looking for land. They provide a good summary of each farm they visit, allowing you to get some of the benefit, without having to sit on a bike seat all day.

To Scythe or Not To Scythe?

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 09 May 2010 16:17:00 +0000

This past week, I got a feel of what it was like to be a peasant farmer in Europe early in the last century. The South Island apprentices group met up last week for a work shop on scything. The workshop was given by Alexander Vido, the local scything guru (who knew?).

You can learn more about scything and even buy your own scythe at his site scytheworks.com.

You really need to have a scythe that fits you properly and you have to maintain the blade well. If you do these things, its not all that much slower than a weed wacker in open areas and it's actually kind of fun. Where we might use it would be to mow down cover crops, or trim the overgrown edges of a field. It's not great for mowing down grass around the edges of a greenhouse though, you'll just wreck your blade, and not get everything. Mowing the lawn with a scythe would be a full time job.

What I find interesting about the scythe is that apparently theres a growing movement of enthusiasts who love the thing again. It represents the opposite extreme from total mechanization and it represents perfectly something that Jill and I talk about a lot.

Just because we're a small farm, doesn't mean we can (or want) to do things more slowly, or less efficiently.
But then again, we're not trying to be a "Big Organic" producer. When you make big capital expenditures on all that machinery, you need to have large tracts of what amounts to organic monocrop veggies to pay them off. This is what happens when increasing efficiency is the prime directive.

For me, the challenge is to do things in a way that reduces our footprint as much as possible, and can still cost effectively and somewhat efficiently grow the food people want.

But it might be nice to have a Scythe lying around, just in case we run out of gas.

Migrant Chickens

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 06 May 2010 05:16:00 +0000

By last week the chickens had thoroughly decimated all the vegetation in their current home. What once had been a lush field of big leafy green plants, had been laid waste into a barren expanse of exposed soil and chicken poop. This of course is just what we'd hoped for. The chickens gorged themselves on the left over plants, and slugs, leaving behind a legacy of nitrogen rich manure. Like boys scouts on an outing they left their campground better than they found it.

SO, last week we rewarded them with a new field, just as lush, just as green, just as full of slugs. This was a great lesson for me in the value of simple, temporary structures. We don't make a significant income from the eggs we collect from our chickens, their purpose is more to fertilize and condition the soil, so there's no economic case for a large, costly barn laid on a permanent concrete footing. Besides, a permanent structure would prevent the chickens from doing their good work.

The temporary pen in which they were kept was made with rebar posts, and wire fencing around the perimeter of a field. Inside the pen are two coops on wooden runners that can be towed to their new home. The whole thing took two people about 1 day to move it, with a little bit of help from the tractor.

The most fun was that while the pen was being moved the chickens had free range, REALLY free range, to go anywhere they wanted. It made for a super fun day to watch them spread out, looking for bugs in the compost and scratching in the gardens. And now they're that much closer to our place.

Farm Community

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 29 Apr 2010 15:01:00 +0000

One of the reasons that attracted us to this particular apprenticeship, was the number of different enterprises on this farm. Heather's Aunt and Uncle live here and run a small flower operation, the "Apprentices that never left" are running their own succesful organic farm just on the other side of the creek and Saanich Organics' cooperatively run greenhouse and fields are here, with their own employees.

There are enough different people around that even though Jill and I are usually working on our own tasks for Northbrook, we can usually at least see someone else going about their work. This is nice. A dozen of us got together at the Saanich Road House for their dirt cheap Wednesday burger and beer last night. I think it went a long way towards helping to knit together the community of young farmers in our area.

One exciting discovery was that there is a young couple setting up a new farm just down the road from us. They don't even have a name for their farm, but based on their perserverance throughout unexpected challenges (streams running through the field, wind storms, etc), someone suggested the name F*#$ It Farms. I think it has a nice ring to it and it would definitely garner attention at the market.

Jill's Saanich Soil Summary

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 23 Apr 2010 04:53:00 +0000

I recently read a great book called Botany for Gardeners, this helped to fill in a lot of the gaps in my knowledge about how plants actually behave, grow and work. This leaves the soil as the major scientific void in my knowledge. It's beyond me, I can't tell you much about soil from looking at it. I can tell you if it's clayey, or sandy and that's about it. FORTUNATELY, I've got Jill here and this past weekend, she got a little nerdy about soil, and particularly the soil we have in our area. This is what she put together for me.

For organic farmers, healthy soil is the basis of everything.

In order to understand the soil here in the Saanich Peninsula you have to know a few basic things.

1) We are on an island (Vancouver Island)

2) Not all islands are made up of volcanic rock, but this one is!

3) During the last glaciation (25000-10000 years ago), when this soil was being formed from volcanic rock, the retreating glaciers left behind marine deposits of deep silt and clay.

4) Soils formed with marine deposits are very fertile. Think about the most fertile agricultural lands in the world (Mediterannean, California). Most of them had contact with sea water at some point or another. Many important plant nutrients like phosphorus and potassium are marine in origin, and these fertilizers are usually mined from marine deposits.

5) Clay soils have very small particles which means they compact easily. The reason why people have used clay for pots for thousands of years is because when clay is dried it becomes hardened and water does not drain through it. These are not the types of qualities that plants are looking for in good soil. Plant roots need soil with good air circulation, drainage and space to grow.

There are some good things about clay soil. It is negatively charged, which means it can attract, hold onto, and absorb postively charged elements (like potassium, calcium, magnesium - some of the important plant nutrients). Clay soils can be improved by adding organic materials, like compost or manure. The larger particles in these materials provide space in the soil for air and water to circulate better, give plant roots more room to grow and stop the soil from being compacted so easily.

6) The soil here generally has a low pH, which means it is relatively acidic. One of the contributing factors of the soil acidity is the coniferous forest. Over time, needles dropped from conifer trees decompose and make the soil more acidic. Farmers will often add lime to make their soil less acidic.

Peer Blogging

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 20 Apr 2010 03:38:00 +0000

Although I've yet to meet her, Heather Ramsay at Umi Nami farm near Victoria has a great blog which I've been following: http://heatherxenia.wordpress.com. She's good at getting out short, frequent, thoughtful posts when that's all she needs. I think I could take a note from her, I keep finding myself writing epic essays in my head about broad topics, but never being able to tackle them how I want to.

Also, I like the look of wordpress somewhat more than blogger. That's what I get for blindly trusting google.

Le tour de farm

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Mon, 12 Apr 2010 01:09:00 +0000

Uh oh, two weeks since my last post, I'm falling apart! But I'll endeavour to keep them coming at least at a trickle. I hate the idea of reducing this blog to a series of "today-we-did-this-and-it's-so-pretty here" posts. I prefer to focus on providing you city folk with the insight into the farmin' world, issues, politics, challenges, stories, etc. Today, I'm just going to link you all to something Jill and I put together for the SOIL apprenticeship blog, it's a tour of Northbrook farm, where we are. There are no goofy pictures of us on it. Just pictures of tractors and fields and maybe some chickens, maybe not... I forget.

Here it is: soilapprenticeships.org/blog

Farmer John's Consumer Product Reviews: Casio F91W Digital Watch

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 27 Mar 2010 21:26:00 +0000

Good enough is perfect

-Joel Salatin

I really like my watch. It's just a plain old watch, but I wouldn't want any other. It's the classic, Casio F91W.
I bought mine three years ago in Costa Rica for $12, I could probably buy it at Canadian Tire for the same price here.

Normally I don't give it a second thought, it's doesn't need much attention, but since arriving at Northbrook Farm, I've noticed that a disproportionate number of people working here wear one of these, five (5), counting me! The same watch has been around since 1991, and the design looks like it.

Products like this are rare these days; cheap, durable and good enough. They're practical, functional and there's no need to change it. This is why it's popular with the farmers 'round here; you just need something to get the job done well, not something flashy or expensive. If it ain't broke, don't fix it. There's probably something else broke that does need fixing.

Bona Fide Organic

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 26 Mar 2010 05:45:00 +0000

The organic certifier came to do her inspection yesterday, we followed her around and HOLY was she ever thorough. She went across this place with a fine toothed comb, poking her head into chicken coops, reading the fine print on the seed packages and following records from harvest to sale. There were many times where I would have felt violated if I were the farmer, but Heather was completely unfazed, after all, she'd signed up for it.

We really got into the nitty gritty while going through the records. The certifier asked if Heather could trace her veggies; could she say what seeds were planted, where and when? What treatment they received? Where and when the produce was sold? Heather reached for her binder and starting flipping through it...
"I'll take that", said the certifier, and flipped to a random page. "OK, Lettuce, sold on July 14th."
Jill and I exchanged glances. Heather looked a bit uncertain. She flipped through her pages... looked through her spreadsheets... back to the binder again... and pieced the history of that lettuce together. That lettuce was planted in this exact bed, on this exact date.

All in all, the inspection went well. Northbrook farm managed to jump through the organic hoops and once again proven itself worthy. What I really realized through all this, was just how deeply Northbrook farm is affected by being Certified Organic. It's not just keeping pesticides out. It affects the compost heap, the crop rotation, how the chickens are kept and certainly the record keeping. It looks like a pain in the butt to me, but living up to these standards also makes Heather a better farmer and a better steward of her land. That quality of record keeping doesn't just make the inspector happy, it keeps her business affairs tidy.

I also got over that feeling of being violated by the end. When people pay extra for Organic veggies, they pay for that peace of mind that their food is being grown with consideration given to their health and to the environment. A grower should be able to proudly open their doors to prove that they're living up to these high standards.

If you'd like to take a look at these standards, they're actually somewhat interesting: http://www.certifiedorganic.bc.ca/standards/index.php

The Curse of the Mummy

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sat, 20 Mar 2010 20:30:00 +0000

The one acre of blueberries here at Northbrook Farm occupy almost as much space as all the other crops combined. Unfortunately, the blueberries are under the curse of the Mummy Berry!!!! This one's for the mycophiles in the crowd.

Sure, it may look like those beautiful berries are growing nicely in May, and in June they look like they're ripening nicely... but just before they're ready to eat, they turn black, harden and fall off the bush. Not all of them, but far too many of them. These blackened mummy's lie on the ground, hosting a devious fungus which sporulates when the weather warms up. The spores will linger on the new buds, waiting for new berries to form, and inevitably break our hearts when they mummify once again. The best thing to do would have been to cover the fallen berries with mulch, but I think this warm weather has caught up with us... although I haven't yet found any of the trumpet shaped apothecia which send out these spores.

Then again, the berries have other issues, they're 15 years old, but they look like they're only three and the soil is too alkaline. One advisor said not even to worry about the Mummy, until the soil has been improved, they may be onto something. We so often get fixated on symptoms that we miss the bigger picture; the root causes. Of course, these root causes are often the more difficult ones to fix, so we prefer quick fixes.

So even if we've missed mulching in time to permanently entomb the Mummy Berries, we'll still be pouring lots of energy into them. We've been pruning the dead, damaged and diseased limbs. We'll be using super strong vinegar to battle weeds. We'll be adding compost and mulch to amend the soil and a new irrigation system is going in this year. It's an exciting project that we'll be able to follow through our whole time here and hopefully see some improvement in the blueberries, and hopefully, over time, the curse of the Mummy will lift.

I just went out to take some pictures of the blueberries, then I accidentally deleted them... so here is a picture of our neighbours' ornery pet goose charging me while I feed it.

The Final Tricycle Related Entry

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Sun, 14 Mar 2010 19:49:00 +0000

It's now two weeks since the insanity of the olympics ended. Being in the middle of the horn blaring, flag waving, high fiving downtown crush is an experience I'll always remember with mixed feelings. What I'll remember with unabashed fondness is the next morning, when I found myself hanging out in the pedicab shop and a greasy spoon with my fellow tricyclist.

Reviewing our experiences together, we went over what we'd learned in the past weeks. These are a few of those things, I'm not going to bother spelling out how they relate to farming, you can use your imagination.

1) I've always thought that I hated selling, turns out I've just never sold anything that I believed in. After seeing countless hesitant people squeal with delight, it becomes so much easier to for me to convince someone that what they need right now, is to ride in my cab. Mark was great at this, he wouldn't just take no for an answer, he'd let them know that the ride would "Change your life!" and "Blow your minds!". For some people, that's all they need to hear. Because:

2)People are bored. A pedicab ride isn't transportation. It's an experience and it's a story to tell their friends. These things are highly valuable now a days.

3)If you can, you must choose your customers. Zane, our pedicabbing philosophy guru, would turn down 80% of his rides, until he'd come across just the kind of long, easy ride from someone who appeared to be a big tipper. We all knew enough to turn down rides from disrespectful, energy sucking people. When your capacity to provide is limited, provide to the the most deserving, those who will give you more than just their money.

4)Like people. Talk to them, get to know them. People want to connect with you, learn about you, and share themselves. People won't get in your cab if you're in a bad mood. I got in the habit of genuinely smiling at anyone who made eye contact with me, I'm trying to keep that habit.

Finally, an important fact has been reinforced for me; the best way to bond with someone is to overcome challenges with them. It is in this way, that on my last day in Vancouver, I found myself looking at expensive shoes, in John Fluevog's Gastown store, at 11 a.m., having already been awake for 24 hours, with my new friends Eliot, Mark and Zane.

$urrey with Pedicab, $alad without Pesticides

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Fri, 26 Feb 2010 02:24:00 +0000

The most frequently asked question of a pedicabber or bike rickshaw driver is, "How much to go to Surrey?". If not Surrey, then Langley, Burnaby, Maple Ridge or even UBC. You almost can't blame them, if you're drunken friends fancy you to be the "funny one", in the crowd, you'd better have a comment for the bright red tricycle that seats 4. The thing is, I'll always respond with an honest figure: to Surrey, about $5000, to UBC, probably more like $500, to simply cross the Cambie Bridge, $80.

If someone were willing to pay me, I'd take the money upfront, put it in a bank machine and begin the arduous journey to Surrey. I imagine it would take somewhere between 4 to 8 hours, depending on the number of passengers, what route we'd have to take, and if I could even physically climb all the hills. Pedicabbing has gotten me thinking a lot about the nature of capitalism and pricing.

Small organic farmers often face criticism for the price of their goods at the farmer's market. People argue that lower income families should be able to afford organic produce and that it shouldn't be priced out of their range. But how can the smaller farmer, working without the economies of scale, and focusing on a higher quality product get by without higher prices than Safeway? This is a tricky one, and I have to be careful, because I'm not a farmer yet, but I've got ideas and the way I determine the price for a ride in my pedicab has something affected them.

How much for a ride? Standard answer: 1 buck, per block, per person. But that isn't set in stone. More often someone will say, "how much to go to _______", and that's the fun part. My answer depends on many things:

-Is it uphill?

-How far is it?

-How many people and how heavy will they be?

-How tired are my legs and how much longer do they have to work for?

-How much do I think they would be willing to pay?

-How likely is it that I'll get another ride if I turn this one down?

-Do I like these people? Are they going to be fun to ride around with, or will their attitude steal my mojo, making it harder to coax other people into the bike later on?

So it's basically supply and demand, how willing/able am I to supply the service, how desiring/able are they to purchase it?

Sometimes I make off like a villain. When the girls pour out of the #1 DJ in the world's show at Gossip night club, in 4 inch heals, with a ten minute walk to the closest cab, the price suddenly gets pretty steep. When I see some tired workers or volunteers coming out of a venue, I might take them to the skytrain or cabs for cheap, even free. It's an awkward combination of capitalism and communism; "From each according to his/her ability to pay. To me according to my desire to provide."

This haggling is typical of markets in the developing world and I don't see any problem with a variable pricing scheme. I don't know exactly how it would work on the farm, but it would be nice to find a way to get good food to people in need, while still making a decent living as a small farmer. Any ideas?

How Driving a Big Red Tricycle is Like Farming

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Tue, 23 Feb 2010 20:27:00 +0000

I've been busy lately. To busy to post. I've mostly been pedicabbing and sleeping and trying to get ready to move. Sleeping and moving, not blog-worthy. Pedicabbing, definitely blog worthy, but how to do it justice?

This is the exact pedicab I drive, but mine is red, she's a beaut. I can carry 2 people legally, 4 people safely. I can get four small people up a steep hill. Standard rate is $1/block/person. Haggling most definitely occurs.

I got into this gig because the Olympics were coming and it struck me as a good way to take the Olympic lemons (ie. severely restricted traffic, tons of people) and make lemonade (ie. money). I rent the bike by the night and keep my fares, so in many ways, it's my own little business. It was a decent job before the Olympics and during the games... it's ridiculous. I work 10-12 hour shifts, punishing my body to make pretty good money. I like it, and it's made me think about the skills that this little business shares with farming.

1. Self Motivation: How much you make depends on how hard you work. You can't just show up and get your paycheck, you've gotta hustle and keep motivated. Anytime I want I can kick back and sit in a coffee shop for an hour, or just not work at all. In fact, I could be riding right now, but I've decided that since there are no men's hockey games and it's a monday, I'm better off getting some rest.

A farmer doesn't have anyone giving them deadlines or goals. No one gets mad at you if you slack off for a day, but you might be mad at yourself.

2. Self Direction: When you rent out a pedicab, you can do whatever you like with it, so long as you don't wreck it. You can specialize in giving tours, you can do the club scene, you can be a taxi that runs on pizza. Do you ride around looking like you're having a good time, or do you park outside the busiest places? I'm constantly trying to figure out if where I am is where I should be.

Same with farming, how am I going to run my farm? What am I going to put on it? What equipment am I going to buy? How are I going to integrate my different operations? How am I going to sell my products? Again, what I'll do is up to me.

3. Physical Labour: I like my body, and I like using it. Forgetting how sore I am right now, I've got buns of steel.

Farming is similar for obvious reasons. I look forward to using my hands and arms a bit more than on the cab though.

4. People: Obviously you have to be a people person to ride a pedicab, you have to deal with all types; drunks, tourists, the elderly, kids, etc. You have to figure out how to make them happy, what kind of music do they want, do they need a blanket? Are they in a rush? Are they joyriders?

A lot of people see farmers as the solitary type, happiest alone in the middle of a field on a tractor. That's not what I'm looking for as a career. I look forward to knowing my customers and finding out how I can serve them best, and how and what they want to buy from me.

5. Hassles from Bureaucrats: We get a lot of threats from housing inspectors turned Olympic By-Law Officers. They've intentionally misinterpreted the pedicabbing by-law map to tell us we're not allowed on the seawall. Supposedly at Vanoc's request. Unfortunately, since the seawall is blocked off for long stretches by the pavilions and canada hockey place's fencing, the young, the old and the tired are forced to walk at least 1 km to get out of the place. But can we help them? Nooooo.

Small Farmers are similarly over-regulated by bureaucratic rules which are designed with a poor understanding of the issues and then blindly enforced by government employees. Things like raw milk and the closing of all small abattoirs in the province come to mind.

So that's what I've been up to. Pedicabbing is hands down the weirdest job I've ever had, and I honestly do think it's applicable experience to farming, either that or I'm just obsessive. What's the weirdest job you've ever had, do you find that it prepared you for what you do now, in some surprising ways?

Northbrook Farm

noreply@blogger.com (Anonymous) — Thu, 11 Feb 2010 23:38:00 +0000

I've left a big gaping hole in the first posts on this blog. I explained the reasons for the blog, I explained the reasons for wanting to farm, but I haven't said anything about what Jill and I are doing about it.

We spent a lot of time thinking about that, and looking into our options. Most of these options we found through Stewards of Irreplaceable Land (SOIL). We actually visited eight (8) different farms on three (3) separate weekend trips to the island. We talked to the farmers, checked out their operations and looked at our potential living situation. We learned so much from each visit. In the end, we were fortunate to be given an apprenticeship at our first choice of farms, Northbrook Farm, in Saanich, BC.

Northbrook Farm is run by Heather Stretch, a lovely woman who's enthusiasm for farming and desire to pass on her knowledge was one of the biggest draws. She grows a wide variety of vegetables on about 1.5 acres, with another acre of berries and a flock of laying hens. There are several greenhouses on her property, which we're both excited about. Seeing the work involved in managing a 160 ft hoop-house greenhouse, will be a big step up from the 6' x 10' wooden framed one I made in my back yard.

A big consideration for us in selecting a farm, was the potential for feeling isolated. Fortunately, there is tons of stuff going on and lots of people buzzing around at Northbrook. Beside Heather's operation, there are a couple of past-apprentices who never left. They work a separate piece of land on her property, and apparently are pretty impressive farmers themselves. Having another young couple who're a few years ahead of us is great. There's also a cut-flower operation, and her brothers wood-working shop, which our living quarters are attached too.I like to think that my two (2) bee-hives will make a good addition to the already multifaceted farm.

Another plus: Northbrook is one of three (3) member farms in the Saanich Organics, a cooperative of farmers that work together on the marketing and distribution of their food. Saanich Organics sells to restaurants, through a weekly box delivery program and at the Moss St. Market in Victoria. They've got a great business model, which we're really keen to learn more about too.

And finally, the farm practically backs right onto the great big John Dean Provincial Park. It'll be a relief not to have to bike for an hour just to go for a hike.

I'll make sure to put up some pictures when we get there in March, to paint a clearer picture of the farm for y'all.