Folks have asked, ‘what’s going on, on the homestead, we haven’t heard from you guys in a while’? Well, have we got some news to share!
We applied for assistance with the USDA EQIP, Environmental Quality Incentives Program, as new farmers/ranchers and Tony as a retired Army veteran. We were accepted and the practices we were approved for were drip irrigation, pollinator garden, seasonal high tunnel and improvement of our road. We dropped the road work at this time but signed off on the other three practices. The paperwork for the drip irrigation work began and once completed we were told it was time to begin purchasing the system. Tony purchased the kit and began putting it together the first part of July. This intense work took a great deal of time and work in the field pretty much came to a halt. There wasn’t time for weeding and managing the plants in the field but this work was important and needed to get done.
While that irrigation system was a major project we also were attending workshops and training sessions for our own professional development. The South Carolina State University 1890 Extension offered a series of workshops in collaboration with NCIS, National Crop Insurance Services and USDA about Developing Marketing Plans and Strategies. These workshops were once a month on Saturdays in May, June, and July at the Orangeburg Extension office in Bowman, SC. The training was offered to farmers and agricultural related professionals in each of the state’s clusters. The information was pertinent and strengthened our knowledge of agricultural marketing and was a great networking opportunity.
We are also attending the ongoing Capacity Building for Beginning Farmers and Ranchers in SC offered by Penn Center, taught by Dr. Roy Hollingsworth. These classes began in February of this year and meet every first and third Saturday of the month, occasionally we meet on fifth Saturdays as well. The class topics have included Simplified Farm Record Keeping, Introduction to Soils and Fertility, EQIP High Tunnel System, Producing Melons Organically, Pest Management, Good Agriculture Practices (GAP), Good Handling Practices, Farm Fencing and Irrigation Systems, Pasture Raised Poultry, Raising Meat Goats, Beef Production, and more. The final class meets October 14.
In addition, our local 1890 Extension Cluster held training for market hog production and we are considering this as a new enterprise on the farm. We’ve also attended workshops offered by SC Farm to Institution (Farm to Pre-School, Farm to School and School Gardening for SC Educators). So, as you can see, we have filled our time with improvements on the farm and our own personal development. Our next big project is to begin putting up our seasonal high tunnel. We’re inviting veterans to come help with that project as we begin an outreach to veterans and active duty service members who want to explore farming as a vocation or learn how to garden to relieve stress, or provide fresh, local produce for themselves or families. The service members are welcome to come learn and practice gardening and farming skills with us, attend workshops and enjoy the farm activities. We will have more information about this very soon.
After we get the field ready and the tunnel up, we’ll begin planting again. We have already started some seeds and are looking forward to getting plants in the ground. We will have spinach, arugala, cabbage, collards, pumpkins, beans, tomatoes, squash, rutabaga, turnips, broccoli, kale, Swiss chard, salad greens and more. We are excited about the fall season getting our SC Grown Produce to customers who deserve the very best vegetables we can produce.
