Summer has Finally Arrived

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It has been a real pleasure working on the farm this week. Although the rains have provided a great opportunity for mosquitoes and black flies to multiply, the sunny days have been truly magnificent.

Our first priority has been to tackle our Growing Dome aquaponic system issue: Algae. Those following this major experiment will recall that the presence of Algae has been stunting the growth of our plants. Furthermore while attempting to use a shade cloth over our main water tank we managed to inadvertently kill our fish.

The ultimate solution arrived in the post this week: Humic Acid. Humic Acid is not as acidic as the name would imply. It is the basic component of humic substances which are the organic components of soil, peat and coal. It is usually used as a soil conditioner and mild fertilizer.

A few years worth of Hunic Acid

Our main interest in this substance is not necessarily its benefit to plants nor the fact that it is inoffensive to fish, but rather the fact that just a bit of this powder will turn large volumes of water jet black. So, we first diluted this powder into a bucket of our Algae contaminated water.

Adding a few ounces of Humic Acid to our Algae prone aquaponic water

The result is an inky black swill

We added this to our tank and it almost seemed like we created an oil slick.

Adding the Humic Acid solution to the main tank

You may wonder why do this? The reason is simple. Without the ability of light rays to penetrate the water, this solution should completely eliminate the Algae. In fact, in the matter of two days, it has completely disappeared.

Although our water is still black, our tank is now healthy and void of Algae

This has had an impact on our plants which seem to be doing much better....now and once again, we have to get back to seeding the tank with fish.

Elsewhere on the farm, berries are ripening and flowers are blooming everywhere. Even our Kiwis on their new trellises are showing signs of a very abundant crop. 

We have never seen so many Kiwi flowers concentrated in one area

One of the more beautiful blooms is a new plant we introduced to the raised beds this year: Borage. The flower is bright blue and star shaped.

Flowering Borage

Borage is new to us and was recommended by Chef as one of the herbs on his rather long "wish list". Both the leaves and flower of Borage are edible. The taste of the flower is not what we expected. It is certainly not as sweet as many of the other flowers we have been using. In fact, Chef pointed it out best when he likened the taste to Oysters (without the sea salt).

Borage is used in many parts of Europe, but we had actually not seen or tasted it before.

So you may wonder what we actually do with this amazing plant. In the Tea Room, Chef has prepared this week a beautiful delicacy: Borage and Nettle Raviolone.

Borage and Nettle Raviolone in a butter sauce with Garlic Scapes.

Meanwhile on the farm, we also started an interesting experiment...one for which I think a lot of local farmers will consider us "crazy". It all has to do with the Apple trees.

We're tired of having insect infected and misshapen Apples. We also do not want to use harsh insecticides (including BT Toxin which is still acceptable to Organic certification).

So we decided to try a concept which originated in Japan. We selected a few good new Apples from our Pippin trees and covered them with nylon "footies" (the disposable nylon socks used to try on shoes).

A healthy small Pippin Apple...

...now protected by a nylon "footie".

We kept on the same branch some "control" Apples to see the difference in the Fall. We're hoping this will work, although we have to admit it does take quite a bit of time and unlike in Japan, we're not going to be able to sell any of these at $10 a piece.

What we are hoping for is an unblemished Apple that we can positively identify. There are quite a few varieties of Pippin and since these trees are quite old we are considering propagating them.

On the foraging front, we decided to tackle one of the fiercest "weed": the Wild Rose. The thorns of the Wild Rose have been more than often a very painful experience for us. But as we clear the land, we have actually been keeping a few bushes alive in some strategic locations.

This time of year, the Wild Rose is blooming and releasing a wonderful fragrance. You can usually smell them well before you see the bush. We noticed this last Spring.

The Wild Roses on the farm have white petals and a yellow centre

This year, we decided to put some of these plants to good use. We made a Wild Rose Petal syrup.

Amongst swarms of mosquitoes, we trimmed the end of the branches carrying these blooms and collected them in the back of our John Deere.

Collecting Wild Rose blooms

 We then took them to a safer site (away from the mosquitoes) to process them. Basically we pulled the buds and removed all of the petals which were ready to fall from the stem.

Petals and blooms ready for processing

The next steps involved making a light sugar syrup (1 part sugar, 2 parts water). The volume of syrup was identical to the volume of petals. This syrup was poured over the blooms and we let it steep over night.

The next day we filtered the petals twice. The second time through a fine paper coffee filter. The result was a wonderful rose flavoured syrup, ideal for deserts or as a tea sweetener.

Wild Rose Petal Syrup

There is a sediment to this syrup because we used some complete blooms. It proved difficult to completely filter the pollen. Either we will have to improve our filtering next time or we will have to spend the time picking the petals from all blooms.

Finally, the manor itself is starting to look quite different. This week, we started work on the front landscaping. The house really looks like a construction site, but not for long!

Back to a construction site....work on the landscaping has begun.

We'll end this week, by reminding everyone that next Saturday (the 28th) we are hosting the 2014 Pelham Heritage Tea Party. People are urged to come in costume for this annual event. The 10$ tickets are available at the Pelham Town Hall or at Tea Room.