Farm Fun

Farm Fun was Originally Posted on June 7, 2012 by lavarock

I call this blog entry “Farm Fun” but I say that facetiously.

In an exceptional burst of energy today, which is unusual, I started at about 7:30am so I could beat the wind which picks up mid morning. I needed to spray weeds and the spray cannot get on the coffee. So I got about 7 rows done before the wind became too much. Then I sprayed around the water tanks, which seem to attract creeping vines looking for water. I also sprayed parts of the driveway and street area.

I then grabbed some lunch and went back up to pick 23 rows of old coffee cherry off the trees. That is just over half the trees and this is cherry that never made it to processing last round. I am making way for my first big crop. I picked some the past two years but the coffee was fairly immature and there was not a lot to pick. I still have some small trees (I call them challenged) but with lots more water and fertilizer, they should do even better.

Then I enabled the irrigation system and looked for leaks in the driplines. In the past week or so I had two guys cutting weeds between the trees for me and they nicked a few of the lines. I can’t complain because I have a tendancy of running over them with the mower. I had mowed between rows but weeds keep growing between each tree. Some trees were hidden under vines (think morning glory or similar).

They did a very nice job but there was one big drawback. That drawback is $800!

I hope that with the weed killer I can keep those weeds down. I ahve had weeds cleared before but they grew back because we then had massive rains and you can’t spray the weeds when it is raining. The trees were also too small to be able to spray under them without hitting the coffee tree leaves. You can imagine now why organic coffee from here costs more. They don’t use weed killer. Then again, they may not have to weeds I do. I’m just lucky I guess.

So, there you have it, lots of work both by the guys I hired and myself and I wish I had a jacuzzi tub to relax in. Come to think of it, there are 4 water tanks each holding 20,000 gallons each of soft rainwater. and it is at room temperature. Hmmm…. I wonder if I can find a motorboat engine to move the water around!

UPDATE!: It just started rainging so I got things done in the nick of time.