From The Blue Ridge To The Green Mountains: Fat Bear Farm Begins A New Chapter

Fat Bear Farm is moving to Vermont!  We are embarking on this grand adventure with our two copilots, Thurgood Morsel and Miles Giles.  We're taking 100 little blueberry bushes, a few fruit trees, and beginning a new life on 27 acres in Orange, Vermont.

Unfortunately, our beloved chickens will not be making the trip with us.  However, they'll get to have an adventure of their very own.  Our best friends have been kind enough to give our hens a home.  They'll get to live out the rest of their lives in the company of several other chickens, peacefully coexisting with a  herd of rabbits.

Our new neighborhood

The three years we have spent on our Virginia farm have been educational and colorful, to say the least.  We moved into our Stuart home in June of 2010 and if you take a few moments to scan the pages of this blog, you'll see what we've been up to since the beginning of 2011.  From planting 1,000 asparagus crowns to raising baby chicks, our time here has been full of new experiences.

  Though we are sad to be leaving our dear friends behind, the relationships we have built will last a lifetime.  We're hoping that all of them will visit and maybe even make the move from VA to VT themselves!

This will be a fine place for blueberry bushes!

We are so excited to begin a new chapter of our lives in a place where:

 The unofficial state motto is, "We Do What We Want."

  

Thurgood and Miles can enjoy snow several months out of the year like all St. Bernards should.

Affordable healthcare is available for each and every resident.

Marriage equality is the law of the land, and gays and lesbians aren't treated as second class citizens.

There are more craft breweries per capita than in any other state.  Vermont has about 26 breweries (one for every 24,067 people).

There are MOOSE!

We can get the freshest Ben & Jerry's ice cream and enjoy the best maple syrup in the world.

Cheese is an art.

We can enjoy 52 state parks with our furry friends.

Confederate flags are not commonplace. 

I could go on for days about all the reasons we're making this move, but I think I'll just blog about all the awesomeness when we get there.  I'm still not sure if I'll start a completely new blog once we're settled, or if I'll simply continue this one.  Either way, everyone is invited to join us at Fat Bear Farm Vermont on the Interwebs!  

Have YOU Ever Seen the Rain?

Boy, have I seen the rain!  It has rained eight days this month, and it's only the ninth day of the month!  It rained fifteen out of thirty days last month.  

Though the rain destroyed almost all of our strawberries (we only had two weeks of harvest), it has been quite a lovely thing for the blueberries.

 We grow about half a dozen blueberry varieties.  The first to ripen are a true treat.  They have delicate vanilla undertones that give them rockstar status around here.  We'll do our first harvest this Friday!

So, how do we know when they're sweet?  The berries are ready to pick when the base of the stem turns blue.  As you can see, the berries above are preparing themselves for market on Saturday.

Much to the birds' delight, we don't use wildlife netting on the blueberries.  We have so many bushes that it just wouldn't be practical.  Luckily, the birds have been kind enough to share the bounty with us.  Unfortunately for the deer, we do have an electric fence to keep them at bay. 

While watching the berries ripen, we've been keeping ourselves busy harvesting, drying, and cleaning garlic.  I've had a lot of fun making braids this week.  The garlic braids will be tagging along with the blueberries this weekend at market!

Birdwatching

Aren't these little ones adorable?   I wonder if their mother is the same bird that nested atop our porch light last year.  Anyhow, she's definitely of the same species, whatever that may be.  It made me so happy to see them doing well this evening.  

What a face!

Can you see the Saint Bernard hairs in the nest?  Thurgood's and Miles' fur is always highly sought-after building material.

Safe and sound.

Sadly, tragedy struck the Mourning Dove nest last night.  A black snake got one of the two newly hatched Mourning Doves.  Ben was able to rescue the second chick, but the nest was completely empty this morning.  Mama Dove sat on her eggs for weeks without moving much at all.  She grew on me, and I admired her dedication.  I was very disappointed about the way things turned out for her family.

Damn, it's a rough life out there.

First Came The Rain, Now The Heat Is On!

 We have had beaucoup rain this spring.  If it wasn't raining cats and dogs, then it was Cloudy with a Chance of Meatballs.  I'm not one to complain about rain (I've seen plenty of droughts, and that ain't pretty either), but we really needed a drying-out period.  It feels like summer now, and it is H-O-T.

The lettuce and asparagus are handling the change in weather just fine, but we've eighty-sixed the spinach in the high tunnel.  The heat-loving crops are now having fun in the sun!

All eleven varieties of tomato are flowering in the high tunnel.

 Some of the plants even have lil'maters on them!

I love the bamboo stakes Ben procured for us.  They are sky high.

Cilantro on a hot day means it's salsa time!

Basil + Tomatoes = Heaven on Earth

The blueberries are putting on quite a show.

We'll be picking a little over a month from now.  My favorite.

I'm glad that we have enough strawberries to share with the birds.  They've been polite about pilfering so far.

 Strawberry shortcake is in my future.  Whipped cream or ice cream?  Hmmm...

Scatterbrained

I was all over the place today, both mentally and physically.  I was a busy-body and completely unable to focus.  I wish Ritalin were available over the counter.  Here are some snapshots of my scattered day.

Mama Mourning Dove is sitting on two eggs.  She is fierce.

All three elderberry bushes are fruiting!  We planted "Variegated," "Thundercloud," and "Emerald Lace" two years ago.  Here's a photo of the "Emerald Lace."

"Thundercloud"  has pretty pink flowers.  The birds eat the berries as soon as they appear.  I will never see their glory.

I picked strawberries today!

The "Gaviota" are the first to ripen.

This puts a smile on my face.

The butterhead lettuce is enjoying the weather.

The red butterhead lettuce is ready for market.  We'll offer both red and green this week.

I'm off to feed and walk the boys now.  If they weren't around to keep me on schedule, I don't know if anything would ever get done. 

 Dog is totally my co-pilot.