We’ve reached 200+ CSA members for the first time in Fifth Crow history!!
So I’m taking my break and all of a sudden this large brooder comes “floating” by me. If only I could’ve captured the smiles on the crews face as they were carrying it over for the new chicks. This was the brooder that was being used all season as a drying shed for our flowers. The flower ladies have now moved into drying the last few rounds of fresh flowers in one of our greenhouses since the amount of seeding has slowed down and the baby chicks are getting bigger and need more room. The flowers in the fields are starting to slow down and lose their luster from the cold nights and the foggy mist we now have here now so regularly which means that they don’t have as many bouquets to make and can start using their creativity to make dried wreaths for us in the next couple of weeks!! Stay tuned for when we are able to offer wreaths for sale!
The flower ladies Emily L., Ellen, & Emily S. are all rotating weeks as the “mother hens” to the chicks. They make sure to keep the chicks warm enough or cool enough by opening and closing the plastic sides of the brooders depending on the strength of the sun throughout the day. They refill the food daily and while we have an automatic drip system for the water bowls the ladies add a tiny drop of milk and apple cider vinegar each day to the water. This aids in the digestion for the chicks and the vinegar acts as a mild antibiotic for the chicks to prevent infectious bacteria from causing disease. The vinegar is also thought to ease stress for the chicks and can be used throughout the life of a chicken especially after more stressful events i.e. moving the house/change in environments, an attack, or after an injury.
You can see in the second photo the addition to the initial brooder all the chicks are living in. If you look closely you can see that when I took the photo shortly after the placement of the new brooder most of the chicks are still the the one nearest in the pic. By now they have spread out and made themselves comfortable in the new north wing. However, when it’s cold they will still gather in the first brooder where the heat lamps are set up.
It’s cover cropping time! The tractors are working overtime to mow, disc, and spread over 12,000 lbs. of cover crop seed. Once the seed is spread we wait for the rain to germinate the cover crop. We sure do love our soils around here! I told John that cover cropping would be his direct ticket into heaven 🙂
On a sadder note.. Ali, our Harvest Coordinator, has worked her last day at Fifth Crow. She is moving on to new adventures in the farming industry and will stay in the Bay Area occasionally continuing to help us at our Grand Lake Farmers Market on Saturdays. We are all sad to see her leave but I have a feeling I will be missing her the most around here as we developed a great friendship that will definitely last beyond the farm and because both our jobs are one person departments we spent the most time as coworkers together. The field crew have each other, the flower team has one another but, Ali & I work alone a lot. We did our field walks together, harvested apples together, and kept each other company as best we could from across the pack out building. On Fridays we would stay well beyond light together helping one another finish up their job responsibilities long after everyone else was gone. We wish her well on her next adventure and truly appreciate all the hard work and many hours she put in here at Fifth Crow!
Our very own beekeeper is speaking at a symposium in South Carolina regarding sustainable infrastructure. He will be speaking about urban bee stewardship. ‘Reimagining Infrastructure’ symposium