Winter dreams of planting raspberries finally were realized as we finished up our new acre on Saturday!  The push to get those masses of bare root plants into the ground (well, at least mostly bare -- a few had shot out some sprouts and leaves) was at last accomplished!  And the number of the day?  2358!  Yessiree, we planted two thousand-three hundred and eighty-eight raspberries and blackberries last week -- thought I'd write the numbers out for extra emphasis!  It was a red letter day here at Plum Granny Farm!!

The week's planting began with a wonderfully rainy Monday and ended with scorching temps by Thursday.  The lack of rain this spring is indeed worrisome -- perhaps Mother Nature is giving us a break after such a soggy fall and winter.  This year it is hard to tell if it is spring or summer because the two keep running together!

After the planting was done, Ray and Cheryl continued the long-standing tradition of toasting the planting with a glass of raspberry wine.  Perhaps I should ask  -- does doing it for two years in a row make it a tradition?  I think the photos show that a good time was had by all...

After the few minutes of frivolity, it was back to work to get the irrigation going to our original raspberry field and the field that will be under the high tunnel.  Having lived in the arid West for nearly two decades, we are firm believers in irrigation.  Cheryl's dad hardly every irrigated -- but he planted more than twice as much as he needed to make up the difference -- we can't do that with our crops and drip irrigation is a key to ensuring the health of the plants.

Now that the raspberries are tucked into their new homes (and no longer living in boxes in the milk house), we can turn our sights to veggies, flowers and herbs!  And we're off!

It's Spring!  And that means that the farmers at Plum Granny Farm are running around like crazy wishing there were enough hours in the day to get everytihng done.  Or as we say here in Stokes County, we are wide open!  We are adding another acre of raspberries this spring so we are trying to turn a rocky slope that was last planted in tobacco about 6 years ago, into a welcoming environment for raspberries.  A challenge but it can be done! 

In order to prepare the beds, we are cutting the sod off with a sodcutter (not a task for the feeble of body or spirit).  After the sod is cut, we roll it up and remove it, and then we are able to till up the beds and amend them for planting -- sounds simple enough but that requires days of work when you are talking about an acre of land.  So why all the trouble?  Why not just plow the sod under?  Well, all those pieces of grass left in the soil would become weeds.  So we cut it now, or weed it later.  Oh, and the sod is being used to help mitigate some erosion issues that we have here (in NRCS-speak it is "Highly Erodible Land" or HEL).

This new raspberry field is in addition to our original 1/2 acre field that we planted last year.  We are expanding this crop because we had such a tremendous response to our berries last year.  The varieties we are planting this year are based on our farm market surveys or customer favorites -- if you tasted one of our berries last year and gave us your feedback, you were part of the decisionmaking process!  We are planting Heritage, Caroline and Anne (the yellow variety).  In addition to these we are also planting some varieties that will produce earlier and later -- so that we are able to provide you with fresh berries for a longer season.  New blackberries  -- Prime Jim and Prime Jan -- are also being planted to round out our collection of Triple Crown and Navaho, and deliver blackberries in the Fall!

We'll be planting this week -- look for updates and a few pictures soon!