Farmer Dan

Today I planted one of my easiest/hardest gardens, the Heirloom Dry Bean Garden. It's one of the easiest because once you get them planted and — with a little weed cultivation later on — you don't have to do a darn thing to them until you harvest them. Which is the hardest. Read more »

April 27, 2009...just 8 months until Xmas.

Yesterday I planted cabbage plants in my garden. Usually I grow all my plants from seed, because I'm cheap. But this year I purchased my eight plants from a local garden center for a total of $3.50. According to my personal garden ledgers they should have been planted last week, but I was busy planting all of the other vegetables that can handle a late frost. Read more »

My favorite week of the year is the week between Christmas and New Year's. No, it's not because of all the post-Christmas shopping specials. We don't do that out here on the prairie. It's because it's the week that my rural mailbox becomes inundated with bunches of garden and seed catalogs for the spring planting season. Read more »

Out on the prairie, in the southeasternmost corner of Iowa's Pottawattamie County, on the eastern slope of the Nishnabotna River Valley, located on the third terrace at the south end of my upper garden is my perennial vegetable garden. Read more »

A couple of weeks ago I received a phone call from Cousin Joni. She said, “What are you doing Saturday morning?” Since it was early in the morning, and I had not finished my first cup of coffee, I absentmindedly said, “Nothing.” Joni said, “Good, we need some help butchering our rabbits!” Read more »

As I pulled out of the parking lot, I caught a glimpse of red and noticed that the homeless gentleman had his right hand held at ear's level, holding a large ripe red tomato. The tomato had a big bite out of it, and juices ran down and off the man's elbow. Read more »