Weeding. Already.

I spent a large part of the weekend outside and it was awesome. I watched the apple tree pruning video made by the nursery Useful Plants and headed to the orchard, pruning equipment in hand. I decided to start with the hazelnut, after looking at and feeling daunted by my peach tree (how did it get so big in a year?). I think the pruning went well. I determined that I had not killed the hazelnut, it just had one dead branch. And I discovered that it already has beautiful white buds! Feeling good, I pruned the peach and the apples as well. I gave the bunnies the apple twigs. The cleaned the bark off in about five minutes.

Then I decided to plant my winnings from the bulb blitz before it got any later in the year and some wild flow seeds that, if the live, should make tasty food for my bees. Preparing a bed for bulbs and one for seeds leads us to everyone's favorite activity....WEEDING!! All I have to say is, if that damn wire grass doesn't give up the ghost soon, I may give up on farming (hah! That's funny!). Hopefully the berm and the weedy hillside will soon have a profusion of wild flowers.

In other news, I have decided what to do with the weedy hillside. I am going to forage for logs, hold them along the hillside with rebar, and the fill up the terraced sections with organic matter and mycelium. In a year or two, I will have nice dirt and slightly flatter land. I will be able to plant trees and such that will hold the land in place by the time the logs rot away. I think it is the best plan in the world.

Today will be 72 degrees. Spring most decidedly started this weekend. It will be in the 50s and 60s for the next 10 days. I saw 2 daffodils flowering last week as well as forsythia starting to bloom. Phew! I've made it through another winter!

Tomato redux

I harvested so many tomatoes a couple of weeks ago, I thought I could never deal with them all. We canned and dried and ate and ate and ate. Then, one day, no more tomatoes. The plants didn't die or get sick, the tomato train just slowed WAY down. I was out in the garden scrounging for something to feed the bunnies (high summer may be even more difficult than February for collecting bunny food) this morning, and I think the respite may be over. There are a lot of green tomatoes and a wicked lot of flowers. Here's to round two!!!

Welcome to the Darko Urban Farm!

This is the inaugural post for the Darko Urban Farm blog. It seems strange to get started in the summer, but I have to start sometime. The purpose of this blog is to document when I plant things, how they grow, what we harvest, the various bug, weather and disease issues we have on the farm and anything else farm related that strikes my fancy.


The Darko Urban Farm is located in downtown Durham, NC. The farm got its start in February 2009. It was great fun but not a great success in its first year. The soil wasn't particularly wonderful but i planted anyway because I wanted to grow my own food. But in the winter I added chicken poop compost from the Rock Shop, put down some red clover seed from Southern Exposure Seed Exchange and waited for spring.

This year the farm is producing like mad. Soil building and mulching are key.

The goals at the Darko Urban Farm are many:
To produce and store enough produce to avoid the grocery store most days and hit up the amazing Durham Farmers Market for meat and cheese.
To grow our own and get some exercise while doing it.
To keep the bunnies fed all year long.
To get rid of all the grass and have a food forest.
to get good enough at farming that I can do it as my job instead of as my hobby.
To occasionally be moved to tears by how amazing plants are and how beautiful hard work can look.