We have water!!!!!!

(CSA Newsletter: Main Season Week 14)

Meet this week’s vegetables:

It’s official — we have well irrigation water finally! The new well drillers completed their work on the new well last Tuesday, and this morning (Monday) the pump installer dropped the pump and connected the power.

And, unlike last time, when we flipped the switch: clean, beautiful water came out of the pipe. (Last fall when we first turned on our old well, the water came out brownish-black and the pump clogged with sand almost immediately.)

Casey and I spent the rest of the afternoon moving pipes and trying out the new well set-up with our irrigation system. The good news: it worked! Even better news: it worked better than we even expected! We can run about four times as many lines as we could with the trash pump we were using in the slough, and the watering appears to be much more effective (full pressure, good coverage, etc.).

We also took the time to refine our set-up further by adding a half-length stick of pipe to the front of every other irrigation line so that now each set of risers is offset from the one next to it. We had been noticing a clear pattern of areas that were over-watered while others were not being watered enough — by creating a diagonal spray pattern, we should achieve more even coverage on the entire field. We had been wanting to make the change for several weeks but kept putting it off because of the continued uncertainty with our water. Now that we’re good to go (wow!), it seemed like the right time.

So, I guess that’s the end of the well saga. Presumably. Since we’ve been dealing with this issue for over two years, it’s hard to believe we’ve reached a solution. Really hard to believe. If things continue to work, this will be the first time ever that we’ve had fully sufficient water for irrigating our crops.

Some of the happy benefits of moving to the well water:

We no longer have to buy and haul four 5-gallon cans of gas each week. We no longer have to refill the small gas tank every two hours to keep the irrigation running. We no longer have to listen to the pump run. Instead, we can now just flip a switch on the control panel, set the timer for the desired run time, and run our silent well pump using the green-source electricity we purchase from PGE.

We no longer have to think about irrigation all day every single day of the week, since one set will water a significant portion of the field. Casey will no longer have to get up early every morning (including Sundays) to start the pump. Rather than continually watering, we can run water two or three times each week and spend the rest of the time focusing on other work.

We no longer have to worry about the sediment or algae bloom that sometimes occurs in the slough water and has stained our vegetables leaves in the past. We no longer have to unclog sprinkler heads periodically. Instead, we will irrigate with clean, cold groundwater.

We also no longer have to nervously watch the slough level drop through the summer and start triaging water, thus decreasing yields in the best harvest months of the year. The groundwater should stay more or less constant and reliable — at least at a level suitable for our limited use.

All that being noted, I’m sure irrigating won’t ever be without problems. Already, we’re realizing that the increased capacity of our well is being limited by the two-inch mainline we use (which had been more than adequate before). So, now we have to decide what upgrades we should make for next year. Not a huge problem, but we can’t just stop thinking about irrigation now.

But we are hoping that we’ve moved past constant stomachache inducing worries and huge unexpected expenses. (At least, regarding irrigation. Farming is the wrong job for avoiding all stress of course.)

Even though we’re immensely grateful this is all over (hopefully), I think we’ve learned a lot from the two-year process of getting to this point. We’ve learned a lot about irrigation, water, wells, and such — but we’ve also learned a lot about how to handle crises and continual stress. At some point in this fiasco, we realized that we couldn’t wait for it to all be settled to be happy. Because it will never all be settled.

Although I hope it’s minor in comparison, I know another problem is probably just around the corner. We’ll take it in stride and keep enjoying farming, because there’s no other life we’d rather live — period.

Other events this week also conspired to put a big fat smile on our faces. For one, we flagged out and worked up ground for the orchard we’re going to plant this winter. We had hoped to get the orchard in last winter but placed our orders too late — thank goodness, since we didn’t have enough water this summer to keep trees alive. The timing will be perfect for this year.

What are we planting? We wanted relatively easy fruit to grow — especially organically — so we’ve chosen a diverse selection of apples, pears, and plums (105 trees total). Harvesting the pears for this week’s share increased our excitement for having a real orchard. We can’t wait!

We also had a fun, very social, Saturday this weekend. After doing some intense work in the morning, we essentially took the rest of the day off. During the day, we wandered down the road to our friend Laura Masterson’s newly purchased property. She’s planning to move her farm, 47th Avenue Farm, down to Grand Island from Lake Oswego, and she had a bunch of her CSA members and friends out to help brainstorm big picture ideas for the new farm site. It was great to hear everyone’s enthusiasm and vision — she’ll have a ton of support in her new endeavor, and it will be exciting to watch the farm grow.

We got to visit with our own CSA members later that evening at our first super successful CSA potluck. Lots of folks came out to see the farm and break bread together — we ate some fantastic food and had a great time hanging out in the shade of our Black Walnut tree.

Later, Laura’s crew joined us as well, and it was fabulous to watch the two CSA communities intermingle and get to know each other. Once again, Casey and I were overwhelmed by the real power of Community Supported Agriculture. People and farms and farmers all getting to know each other and committing to one another — it’s a beautiful thing. We stayed up late by the fire, talking about these and other topics.

Yes, many wonderful events happening here at the farm. Life out here just keeps getting better and better, as we get to know ourselves and the farm more deeply.

A friend we hadn’t seen since college visited a few weeks back. After taking a tour around the farm, she asked me if Casey and I are happy. ‘Happy?’ I asked. ‘That doesn’t seem to be the right word to describe something so difficult, intense, and real.’ I paused. ‘Life is richer than I ever imagined it could be.’

May you all enjoy these lingering rich summer moments of potlucks, fires, irrigation, and summer fruits. Enjoy this week’s vegetables!

Your farmers, Katie & Casey Kulla