By Jeff on 29 August 2009
From a distance, weeding a rice paddy is a formidable task. The rice looks pretty healthy – green, anyway, and producing new shoots – but the field’s a bit shaggy. There’s a lot more than rice coming up in there. Somebody needs to get in there and deal with it. My farmhand, Ai Seud, is the usual somebody, that being his job. But I need to get into it too… read more
Posted in Blog / บล็อค | Tagged Ai Seud, ducks, paddy, rice, weeds
By Jeff on 29 August 2009
My neighbor Tee was standing looking into his paddy, shaking his head and laughing. “Unbelievable,” he said in heavily German-accented English. Nearly half his newly transplanted rice seedlings had disappeared overnight. “The other ones are laughing at me,” he said, laughing at himself. “They say, ‘don’t you know how to farm!?’”
Tee’s a Chiang Mai native, a grass-fed beef farmer and a tour guide with the Germans… read more
Posted in Blog / บล็อค
By Jeff on 20 August 2009
August 19, 2009
Hey Barry,
Things out on the farm are getting potentially interesting. To the north we have two new homesteaders starting chemical-free rice this year. I’m helping Ai Eed to the immediate north. We planted our “Kru Pratum” direct seeding plot too thickly, so after thinning we’ll have a lot of extra rice to plant at Eed’s. Ai Tee, whom you met, has already planted his… read more
Posted in Blog / บล็อค
By Jeff on 14 August 2009
August 14
5.30 a.m.
Annie has started school again. Second grade. To beat traffic, we need to leave home by 6.45. In order to first feed the birds and get in some weeding – not to mention coffee — I need to get up around 5 and be back home not long after 6. It’s still dark at 5, and will only become darker from here on, but… read more
Posted in Blog / บล็อค | Tagged ducks, paddy, rice field
By Jeff on 11 August 2009
7.30 p.m.
After dinner, Annie and I went back to the farm with our headlamps to hunt around in the dark and see what we could see. The Muscovy ducks were safely ensconced on the island. The khaki ducks were nowhere to be seen, probably taking off into the paddies at our approach. We crept around the pond and collected a couple of dozen apple… read more
Posted in Blog / บล็อค
By Jeff on 10 August 2009
5.30 p.m.
Manny, the hedgehog, was happily scurrying in the overgrown grass in the ‘lawn.’ I was happy to see that he couldn’t squeeze through the holes in the woven chicken dome used for keeping fighting cocks. I don’t like him spending too much time in his cage, poor fella. Sarah takes him out every morning so he can race around (at hedgehog racing speed) in the yard and… read more
Posted in Blog / บล็อค | Tagged Diary, ducks, paddy, rice field
By Jeff on 4 August 2009
This year we used three different methods to plant the Fair Earth Farm organic rice. Here are a few photos from a day with friends, direct planting our seedlings… read more
Posted in Photos / รูปภาพ | Tagged august, friends, organic, planting, rice, seed bed, seedling
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