Week 14 - More Hole Digging

Tuesday

Time in: 8:30am

Time out: 12pm

and

Thursday

Time in: 8:30am

Time out: 4pm

This week, we focused on digging more holes and planting fruit trees all around the front area of the Ranch. I didn't have my camera with me so I must come back to post more pictures. The Ranch is really shaping up! It's amazing to be a part of its development. And boy, it sure is really giving me some muscles!

Other tasks included:

• Organizing the tool shed
• Helping to plant more vegetables in the newly dug patches
• Assisting with the irrigation for the vegetable patches
• Weeding

Week 13 - Building a Burm

Time in: 8:30am
Time out: 4pm


More rows of citrus have been planted which frames the front area of the Ranch quite nicely. This row will continue much further, but for now I was assigned to build a burm for these trees. This task had 3 steps:

Step 1) After digging the holes for the citrus trees (which also included surrounding the trees with an underground cage to prevent gophers from root chewing), I filled in the area in between the trees with an even level of dirt.

Step 2) I then covered the dirt with about 1 1/2 inches of compost and watered it in.

Step 3) I covered the compost with a layer of mulch and watered that in.


Last week, we tilled in a very thick layer of compost into the vegetable beds. This week, I am happy to see that several our tomato seedlings have been planted into the ground!

Week 12 - First Trees

Tuesday:
Time in: 8:30am
Time out: 4pm


Today, I watched as a new volunteer and the head coordinator, Scott, put in the first citrus trees in the front area of the Ranch. There are many more to come, but it is fun to watch as the area becomes more defined.

Other duties of the day included:

• Transplanting more vegetables into the shaded coldframes
• Helping to unload a very large truck of plants for the upcoming plant sale
• Continue to mulch the Orchard
• Compost the vegetable beds

Thursday
Time in: 8:30am
Time out: 4pm


Most of the day included continuing the same tasks that Tuesday provided. The last couple hours of the day, however, I was assigned to pulling the unknown weed (pictured above) in the food forest. This weed has has very sharp-ended seeds that easily stick to skin and clothing.

Week 11 - Transplanting & Digging

Tuesday:
Time in: 7:30am
Time out: 3:45pm


Much of the morning involved wheelbarrowing large piles of mulch into the orchard. Shown above is most, but not all, of the 120 plus tomato plants that we transplanted into 4 inch pots. They are kept, for now, in a make-shift cold frame to harden off. Soon, they will be planted in both the food forest and the front area of the Ranch...


Thursday:
Time in: 7:35am
Time out: 3:45pm

It took 1 deep spader, 2 hoers, 2 pitchforkers and about 3 days to till the 100 square foot plot shown above. First, a person with the deep spade plunges and lifts up the ground 16 inches below. Next, a couple people, with hoes in hand, come in and break up the large clods the deep spade left behind. After that, the forks help to break up the dirt clumps even further.

Below shows the 50 square foot plot at the very far end, the 100 square foot plot in the middle and the soon-to-be-tilled circular mandala plot in the front.

Week 10 - Internship: My First Day

Time in: 8:50am
Time out: 3:20pm

Today is Earthday, a perfect day to start my internship at The Huntington's Ranch. I started the morning by reseeding some of the vegetable flats in the hothouse. Because the hothouse is mainly tailored for orchids, the temperature and humidity are a bit too high for some of the tomato and pepper seeds to germinate correctly. For the most part, however, many of them seem to be surviving quite healthily.

Most of my day consisted of carrying wheelbarrows of mulch to the main orchard. We were able blanket a good 15-20 square feet about 8 inches in depth before the rain started to come down.

Week 9 - Preparing

Time in: 10am
Time out: 12pm

The Ranch has some 50+ citrus trees in addition to other fruit trees that are ready to be transplanted into the ground. Pictured above is an abundantly fruiting Semi-dwarf Improved Meyer Lemon that I picked immature fruits off of to help preserve its growing power for establishing roots.

I also helped to mulch some of the fruit trees I assisted in pruning last winter. They all look healthy and well..

Week 9 - Desmoncus chinantlensis Mart.

Time in: 8:25am
Time out: 9:25 am

"Mexico: Chiapas: Mun. Palengue ca. km 60-61, 1.3 mi S of turnoff to Agua Azul 1950'.
Rainforest with yucca lacondonica."

Collected by: J. Bauml, M. Kimnach & H. Sanchez-Mejorada 10 Feb 1981

(Detail of specimen)