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“From his experience as a researcher at Rutgers, Firmin Bear stated that well-thought-out crop rotation is worth 75 percent of everything else that might be done, including fertilization, tillage, and pest control.  
                        To my mind, crop rotation is the most important practice in a multiple-cropping program." -Elliot Coleman                                         ~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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Elliot Coleman's Four-Season Harvest is a favorite resource in our farm library.  Here he offers some 
Guidelines for Rotation :    

1.) Separate similar crops or families of crops as much as possible. 
Apiaceae (Carrot Family): carrot, parsnip, parsley, celery 
Asteraceae (Sunflower Family): lettuce, endive, radicchio 
Brassicaceae (Mustard Family): cabbage, broccoli, cauliflower, Brussel sprouts, kohlrabi, turnip, radish, Chinese cabbage, kale, collards, rutabaga 
Chenopodiaceae (Goosefoot Family): beet, Swiss chard, spinach 
Convolvulaceae (Bindweed Family): sweet potato 
Cucurbitaceae (Gourd Family): cucumber, muskmelon, watermelon, squash, pumpkin, gourd 
Fabaceae (Pea Family): garden pea, snap bean, lima bean, soybean 
Liliaceae (Onion Family): onion, garlic, leek, shallot, chive 
Malvaceae (Mallow Family): okra 
Poaceae (Grass Family): sweet corn, popcorn, ornamental corn 
Solanaceae (Nightshade Family): tomato, pepper, eggplant, potato, husk tomato 
2.) Alternate cover crops 
~ legumes/grasses 
~ cool-season/warm-season 
3.) Alternate heavy feeders with light feeders 
~ Heavy feeders: broccoli, Brussels sprouts, cabbage, cauliflower, celery, collards, corn, cucumbers, eggplant, endive, escarole, kale, kohlrabi, lettuce, okra, onions, parsley, pumpkins, rhubarb, spinach, squash, tomatoes 
~ Light feeders: beets, carrots, garlic, leeks, mustard, parsnips, potatoes, radishes, rutabagas, shallots, sweet potatoes, Swiss chard, turnips 
4.) Soil builders: alfalfa, broad beans, clover, lima beans, peanuts, peas, snap beans, soybeans, vetch 
5.) Alternate flowering crops with vegetative crops 
6.) Place crops with different canopy heights next to each other 
7.) Alternate cool season crops with warm season crops 
8.) Alternate deep-rooted crops with shallow-rooted crops 
~Shallow-rooted crops are those whose main root system is in the top 1-2 feet of soil. 
Examples:  cabbage, cauliflower, lettuce, celery, sweet corn, onion, white potato, and radish. 
~ Moderately deep-rooted crops are those that have the main root system in the top 1-4 feet of soil. Examples are snap bean, carrot, cucumber, eggplant, peas, pepper, and summer squash.  Deep-rooted crops are those whose main root system is in the top 1-6 feet of soil. 
Examples: cantaloupe, pumpkin, tomato, and watermelon. 

* And I would've added-  rotate animals through your garden too!

This is our fourth season raising hogs -- and we just love it.  They are very social animals that are a joy to watch and interact with.  Watching pigs race around the pen, burrow in the unmowed brush, or wallowing in the mud will make you laugh.  They love attention and a good neck scratching.  And it is always sad day then we transport them to Alleghany Meats for processing.

But boy is the pork delicious!  What other animal can give you the diversity of tastes and cuts?  (Sorry beef and chicken lovers)  Nothing compares to ham, bacon, various sausages, pork chops, pulled pork, lard -- all from one happy animal.  

While they are fun to grow, hog-raising has to be profitable to make it sustainable.  For Taproot Farm, the economics of hog raising is -- and always has been positive.  Farmers have labeled hogs "the mortgage lifter", because they contribute cash to slim farm incomes.  We buy our weaned pigs (feeder pigs) from a couple of local farmers at about 8 weeks old.  The males are castrated before we accept them to avoid the foul taste called "boar taint".  These "barrows" can be raised with the female "gilts" -- and we generally get 2 or 3 pigs at a time at a cost of $50 to $65 each.

For those interested in the nitty gritty of hog-raising, here's how we do it:

Feeder pigs weigh only about 35 to 45 lbs when they arrive at Taproot.  We grow them to "market weight" of about 250 lbs -- which takes us about 20 weeks.  Their weight gain is modest for the first couple of months, but really picks up speed the last 4 to 6 weeks.

Hogs are omnivores (like us) so they can eat grains, meats, dairy as well as fruits and vegetables.  We purchase hog mash (16% protein) from Hotts AG Services, an independent feed mill in Franklin, WV.  And we supplement this standard feed with plenty of our table scraps and damaged garden produce.  Plus we allow our hogs to root in the ground for tubers, grubs, worms and, of course, roots -- inside electric fencing on pasture.

A 250 lb hog, once eviscerated, results in a carcass of about 188 lbs (75%).  Once boned and butchered, the "package weight" results in about 140 lbs (75%) of pork.   There are lots of different ways to cut-up a hog but a rule of thumb is:  20% is ham, 20% is shoulder, 10% is sausage, 10% is bacon, 16% is chops or loin, 4 % is spare rib, 13% is fat and 7% is bone.  We process our hogs in a variety of ways -- sometimes we get a whole hog made into sausages and other times we'll get the butcher to cure the hams, jowls and bacon.  Our specific instructions are spelled out on the "cut sheet" we drop off with the hogs.

The feed conversion on a hog is about 4 to 1.  Four pounds of feed will develop 1 pound of hog.  So to grow a 250 lb hog, we need to feed each hog about 1,000 lbs of feed.  If the weather is too hot or too cold, this feed conversion can be negatively affected.  So we house our hogs in a shady area with plenty of straw bedding and clean water.  This is NOT how most hogs are raised here in America -- most are raised by the thousands in confined, indoor pens on hard slatted floors so that the manure can be washed into huge waste lagoons.  No sunshine, fresh air or freedom to run or wallow. 

We are proud of our pork process!  Here are some of the happy hogs we've raised here at Taproot Farm. 

   A lot of hype surrounds the "High Tunnel" these days.  There's a strong push for them in both industrial ag & small-scale production coming from the land-grant universities & the USDA, which has been practically giving them away (generally in the form of 60-90% cost shares) in recent years.
   Understandably so: the opportunities for season extension and winter production can aide in the transition from a consumer culture that's used to a plentiful variety of produce whenever they visit the supermarket to a more localized diet more of the time.  High tunnels can help producers meet consumer demand over a longer period of time, increasing the economic viability of the enterprise and encouraging customer loyalty throughout the year.  They also afford the opportunity to produce crops that otherwise might not survive local conditions, such as ginger or certain citrus fruits.
   Sounds like a magic bullet, which should be a cue to all level-headed citizens to consider them with a healthy dose of skepticism.

   A high tunnel is essentially an unheated, plastic wrapped greenhouse.  The UV stabilized plastic covering lasts for about 4-5 years before exposure to the elements degrades it to the point of needing replacement.  Meanwhile the covered environment sheds rainwater that would otherwise directly water the plants inside thereby making irrigation a necessity.  Here's where the skepticism comes in:  Is the use and disposal of thousands of square feet of petroleum by-product every 5 years (READ: plastic) and the associated irrigation worth the benefits reaped by the farmers and the communities they serve?  Personally, I'm unsure.  This is my first season working with a high tunnel and I'm still getting my bearings.  Skepticism doesn't necessarily translate as  disapproval though, and ideally it enhances one's ability to investigate matters.

While I remain skeptical about high tunnels in general, I've had a lot of fun in ours.  It's really wonderful to have a protected enclosure to work in on chilly, windy days.  We've been able to get a good jump on the season, too.  The snap peas are shooting up, the cilantro is sprouting, turnips, beets, carrots, radishes, onions and all the brassica family crops (kale, broccoli, collards, brussel sprouts, etc.) couldn't be happier in there.

I learned a lot about cold-weather production in high tunnels at the West Virginia Small Farms Conference this year, and I'm totally stoked to use this resource to the fullest: focusing on crops that really like the heat in the summer and shifting to crops for winter harvest later in the season.

So while my mind isn't totally made up on the subject, I recognize that high tunnels can potentially be of great service to us. Give me a few more years of experience with these guys recording the data, weighing the harvest & tabulating profitability and I'll probably be able to make up my mind.  Till then, hope y'all get to enjoy some of these early veggies!

p.s. if you haven't picked up any hickory smoked jowls in the Honesty Store, do yourself and me a favor and come get you some.  If you don't, I'll likely eat myself into a pork coma.

So, this summer we finally took Keera to to a pediatric gastro-enterologist at UVA . As part of the exam, he tested her for allergies. And, returning with the results, he told us that Keera is highly allergic to a lot of things. And that sometimes it can effect the intestines and make them sensitive to lot of things. He also tested her for a disease called H-pylori- an intestinal disease that, at its worst, can sometimes lead to ulcers or cancer in the stomach.
That was a Tuesday. He scheduled her for a biopsy the next Friday, since she tested positive for H-p. "

Well, this is the great part-  the morning of the biopsy, they redid her blood work. She still went in for the biopsy, but that afternoon the UVA doctor called kind of excited and said, 'I need to know what Keera did differently this week between the first visit and today! Tell me exactly what you changed in her diet.  I need to know.'"
Lindsay didn't know if she wanted to admit Keera had eaten a whole jar of honey! Maybe she was in trouble. :-)

With a big smile Lindsay told me, "Keera's doing great. We had a 3-month checkup and her biopsy was fine. Bloodwork is better.  She feels so much better than she used to.
The doctor is so wonderful. He talks directly to my daughter about her health. 
When he came in the room this last visit, he was smiling and shaking his head again. And last thing he said to her was-
                                      'Keera, I can't get over this. You just keep eating that honey!    Doctor's orders.' "  :-)

Lindsay loves to tell her honey story and was happy for me to blog about it.  "I wish I could have had him on tape, Beth. He was so excited!"

She's been back recently for more honey and last report is that Keera is off all medicine. And her stomach has felt fine.
Ahhh... the mystery of good eating!