Playing with kids

The theme of this week must have been children because it seems that I spent more time with them this week then on my research :) On Wednesday for our community day we had a group of 75 five to seven year olds come to the small farm for the morning to learn about various farming-related subjects. It was a bit intense to see all those tiny children file out of one school bus, and I must confess that that age group is a little out of my comfort zone. I worked with Kristen on the compost station which consisted of trying to explain to them why nitrogen and carbon was important to a compost but I think they got it. We also helped them make little compost bags to take home with them. The morning had to be cut short though because one of the teachers was having heat-related problems and the kids were getting tired. They did get to see the cows on the farm and I was really tempted to start throwing out some cool facts about them, but I restrained myself. Uneventful research in the afternoon, although the time we have left to do this research is quickly disappearing.

On Thursday morning I went to the library to work with the Jr. Master Gardener program again. There were fewer kids this week and the topic was nutrition. We went out to work in the garden for a while, but it was so hot that we went inside for the rest of the morning. When we were in the garden I found a plant that was dying and I wanted to know what it was so I half asked it out loud and to my surprise a couple of the kids standing next to me answered the question. These kids never fail to surprise me when it comes to their knowledge about gardening. When we went inside however, I was a bit disheartened when I overheard a conversation two kids were having about which flavors of Robitussin they preferred. Then another little girl told me that she was hungry because her family had been in a hurry this morning so they stopped at McDonalds and she didn't finish her breakfast sandwich. Correct me if I'm wrong but I think it's a bit counter intuitive to send your kids to a gardening program and then feed them fast food. The rest of the morning was great and my enthusiasm was again renewed by all the friendships that are forming between the kids. I asked two of them how they became friends and they told me that the boy, Matthew, had asked the girl, Rebecca, in the library if she wanted to be his friends and she said yes and now they were friends. I wish adults could be that simple.

Making Biofuel!

On Tuesday for our lecture we had Steve Moore, the small farm manager, came to talk to us about alternative farm practices and alternative energies. The work that he has done is extraordinary! He has been calculating how much energy it takes (man power) to do a variety of farm labors and used that amount to figure out the best use of time and personal energy. It is an important step to take when designing a small scale farm, especially a biointensive one. A biointensive farming system is one in which crops are grown very close together in a small plot of land. The biointensive plot on the small farm has enough diversity of crops and calories per crop to feed someone for an entire year! After the lecture we went to the mechanical building and learned how to make biofuel! We took some used vegetable oil and through a process of titration that involved using KOH to break down the oil and form a layer of glycerol and evaporation of water we converted the oil into something that could be used in a diesel engine. How cool is that! It's a fairly simple process but as usual it is difficult to sell because of political red tape. And the biofuel has shown to corrode engines more quickly than regular diesel fuel. Most engines that use biofuel are actually lined with glass, which costs an additional $300 at least. But this is amazing technology that is moving us in the right direction when it comes to reducing our reliance on fossil fuels.

Small Farm day

On Monday at the small farm we had our hands full with stuff to do. We started with digging up all the potatoes in the field which took less than an hour because of all 15 of us working at once. Yay teamwork! After the potatoes we split up and I ended up helping Marisa plant some starters for tomatoes in the fall. I fudged up the planting however and some pots had two seeds in them. Let the competition begin. We had a little bit of drama when part of the plot that Steve was trying to singe some of the wasps out of caught fire and everyone ran to help put it out. Why he tried to burn the wasps out I'm still unclear, but it seemed to work. After the crisis was averted, I helped turn a huge pile of turkey poop compost to make sure everything was exposed to oxygen. Whew, another hard days work on the small farm.

Bulls and Harry Potter Horses

This past weekend everyone scattered. Several of the interns went home or went traveling, so the farm was pretty empty. There was a group of about 5 of us that stayed and we needed to find some way of entertaining ourselves, so the only logical choice was to go to the Duplin County Rodeo. It was a great cultural experience to say the least. I had seen rodeos before on TV but actually being there was different. The crowd was almost more interesting than what was going on inside the ring. Boys dressed in jeans, button up shirts, cowboy hats and big boots with of course a huge belt buckle and girls in cutoff denim shorts and cowgirl boots. At one point they had a couple of kids doing "bull riding" on the backs of some sheep which was extremely hilarious. I don't know how they treat the bulls, they seem healthy, but I'm sure it's not the happiest existence. What I really enjoyed too was Elena asking me so many questions throughout the course of the rodeo for two reasons. First of all I enjoy answering questions, especially about animals, and secondly it was helping me realize what I knew concretely and what I needed to improve on. The ride home was awesome as well because it was dark and we were driving home through the North Carolina countryside, which is something I always enjoy doing.

Saturday, the same group of us went to Holly Grove goat dairy for some raw milk and cheese (I brought some home later) and of course to pet the goats. We also were again reminded that the rules of mapquest does not work out in the countryside. Around noon, Claire, Gaby, Louise and I drove to Raleigh and meet Patricia, a secretary for international offices at State, at Global Village to go to the horse show. We ended up stopping at I heart New York Pizza for lunch so that Gaby and Claire could watch a bit of the Uruguay versus Germany world cup game. I also gave Louise a tour of State which was good practice for me for next year but I'm sure a bit overwhelming for her since she goes to a school of 300 students. After that we went to the horse show and watched some dressage and a costume contest. It was an interesting way to spend Saturday afternoon but I thoroughly enjoyed watching Gaby and Claire run around like kids in a candy shop :) After the horse show I dropped them off to be driven back to Goldsboro and I hung out with some friends in Raleigh for the evening and surprised my mom by coming home for the night. My sister also came back from Mexico and brought me a really cool wooden bracelet and boxers with condoms wearing sombreros. Thanks little sis. It was good to be home, but I imagine I'm going to miss Goldsboro more than I think when I leave.

Goat Cheese and Workers Rights

So I know I'm way behind on my blogs, but I promise I'm working on it. On Tuesday after Asheville we had a lecture and discussion with Dr. Washburn and Dr. Poor on confined operating systems and what the positives and negatives were associated with those types of systems versus the pasture raised beef systems. In our group we decided that some positives were efficiency (cost and time) and regulations (it was not so easy to convince some group members that standardizing everything was a beneficial thing and I see their point). The negatives obviously outweigh the positives, but it is not so easy to just drop everything and change the system. I think a lot of pro-sustainable agriculture people forget how intricate the system already in place is and Dr. Poor made a very good point when he said that there needed to be a group of people that just studied the system and all its intricacies. After the discussion, we went to Holly Grove, a goat farm outside of Goldsboro. We got a tour of the goat dairy and learned some of their practices and how they are different from traditional dairies. They use the milk solely for making cheese, which I bought some of at the store. It was very interesting to learn how their goat farm started. Before they had the goats, the family had swine and they decided to add some beef cattle to the farm. To feed the cattle, they grew their own hay but they had too much surplus so they brought in the goats to eat the surplus and the rest is history. I wish we could have seen their swine operation (they contract with Murphy Brown) because that could have been the tail of two farms...

Wednesday we went to an organization called FLOC (Farm Labor Organizing Committee) and learned about their work with the Hispanic farm labor community and their push for workers rights. They are a pretty busy organization that has looked past just boycotting companies like Campbell Soup, and instead threatening their biggest sponsor (usually a bank) who ultimately is more effecting at making Campbells pay attention. They've made a lot of progress and now they are working for the rights of the Tobacco farms who are contracting terrible illnesses from the amount of nicotine they are exposed to working in the fields. They are working on boycotting another bank and I've never been more happy to be involved with a local State bank :) We also went on a walk through Cliffs of the Neuse and learned about the symbolic importance of the region to the Native American cultures thanks to Dream weaver. He gave us a warming though which was a bit frightening. He told us we needed to prepare for a time when the food industry would fail us and we would rely on our own gardens to feed us. Normally when people say that I think they are a bot extreme, but something about the way he said it, made it seem like there was something he knew about that we didn't. Great day never the less, despite the heat (105 degrees!)

Weekend in Asheville

We had another CEFS sponsored field trip this past weekend this time to Asheville and it was awesome! Since we had a three day weekend for our national holiday we thought it would be worth it to go all the way to the mountains and boy were we right! We left on Saturday in a 15 passenger van and arrived in Asheville around early afternoon and went straight to Hickory Nut Gap, which is a small farm that raises their animals on pasture and sells the meats out of a cute little country store. A bunch of us went in on some beef and bacon for the coming days. We then checked in at the cabin near Black Mountain where we were staying at night and unloaded our stuff before heading into Asheville proper for some dinner and exploring. I went with Kristen, Jeremy, Louise and Wendi to an Indian restaurant downtown and had delicious Malai Kofta, which is a vegetarian dish made out of a nut/bean paste. We waited a long time for our food, but it was worth it because it was so tasty :P I also got to swing by Climax (a climbing gym) and see Rob for a couple of minutes. We were all pretty tired from the drive out so we went to bed pretty early.

On Sunday we all had a lazy morning which involved sleeping in, making eggs and bacon for breakfast and eating out on the front porch in rocking chairs. I stayed in bed till nine, but the I heard the 7:00am bugle that rang through camp. After we were all up and moving we gathered our swimsuits and towels and headed to a swimming spot in the Rocky Broad river just off of highway 9 (right past the Hillbilly Car Service store for future reference). This was probably the most awesome experience of the weekend because we all got to jump in and enjoy the cold water and just being in a mountain stream. I think Elena was the happiest out of all of us to be back in her special place (she is from Asheville). I had a little mishap with the rapids and ended up with a banged up and very sore knee. After the hike we went to Earthhaven, a small community outside of Asheville that uses environmentally friendly practices in their building, food production and energy production. It's a pretty intense community and to become a member is a long process that involves being an intern first and proving that you can be a positive member of the community. The next stop of the day was at the Crooked Creek Farm, run by Casey and Meredith Makissik (spelling?) where we grilled the steaks on the bar-b-que and had an informal discussion with them about the problems small scale farms faced. It was a great conversation to have because small scale farming is very often romanticized, but in actuality it takes years before the farmer really starts to see any profit and the hours are long and hard. the best advice they gave us: don't quite your day job. We toured their farm after dinner and saw the mobile chicken processing unit that Casey built with some money from Heifer International. It was a gorgeous setting in the pasture with a small enclosure full of ducks and chickens, beef cows and pigs grazing together before a mountain back drop right as the sun was going down. Heaven. We reluctantly left eventually and made our way to downtown Asheville where we watched the fireworks and hung out at a music bar for a little while.

Monday! Early start to the day as we visited with the Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Program which seeks to be the link between the community and local farmers. They have done a lot of work in creating a local food guide with all the farms in the area and restaurants using local foods. They are also responsible for the bumper stickers you see throughout Asheville that say Eat Local- It's thousands of miles fresher! After ASAP we went to a community college that has a processing facilities that it rents out to small food businesses. The organization was called Blue Ridge Food Ventures. To close out our awesome weekend we went and got ice cream at Ultimate Ice Cream (I got Kahlua-Almond-Mocha/Mystic Chai cone) and spent some time at Warren Wilson's campus on the banks of the Swannanoa River. What a perfect weekend!

When asked what I liked best about the weekend, I hesitated to say any of the visits or swimming because while they were all wonderful, informative and fun, I think the best part was getting to know all the other interns so well and hearing all their crazy and awesome stories. There was just such a relaxed and happy feeling amongst everyone that it made this weekend the best of the summer by far.

M.I.A

So sorry for not having posted anything in over a week but I've been feeling under the weather for a good portion of the week and just haven't been feeling up to anything really. A summery of last week:

Monday- We went and worked on the small farm weeding and tending the tomato plants. It was really hot and I got a wicked blister on my finger from stringing up the tomato plants but I learned what happens when you let them grow out instead of up.

Tuesday- Lecture on entomology and integrated pest management which was interesting and would have been a lot more if it hadn't been a three hour lecture. We went into the field to look at wasp nests but our trip was cut short because of a thunderstorm. That evening after dinner I went with Kristen, Louise, Elena, and Marisa to Coldstone Creamery to get a delicious ice cream dessert treat :)

Wednesday- We met the mayor of Goldsboro! He talked to us about his plans for planting gardens in the city and the extensive compost center (which we visited later) and it's amazingly progressive for small town North Carolina. The compost center was awesome and not really what I was expecting. It was much less stinky.

Thursday- Felt like I had been run over by a truck when I woke up which really affected my productivity during the day. In the afternoon Kristen and I led a discussion on food sheds and we had everyone draw out their food shed to begin with which was good to help them see everyone's own concept of food shed. The discussion went well, especially since it could have gone in a million directions. We went to see Toy Story 3 in 3D that evening (it was some people's first time seeing 3D) and it was surprisingly humorous.

Friday- Research in the library in the morning and went to Toraros to watch the Uraguay versus Ghana world cup game afterwords. The evening was spent preparing for our Asheville adventure this weekend which I will talk more about in my next blog entry.