June 9, 2019 Open Farm Days & our Farm Stand Plant Sale are Now Over

Just a quick post, with more to come later this week, but I wanted to let you know that today was our last Open Farm Day and Farm Stand Plant Sale day for 2019. We are now closed to the public for the season. Thank you for your support! We sure appreciate it!!

We are open by appointment for tours. To schedule a group farm tour, email dcfhomeplace@gmail.com

We are also part of the Colorado Division of Wildlife’s Birding and Watchable Wildlife Trail and we welcome you to come to the farm to do some birding and such. Please read the page on this blog about the Colorado Birding Trail for all the details on how to visit for this purpose.

I’ll be back to writing my regular post later this week.

With Green Thoughts, Tammi

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June 7, 2019 Tammi’s 2019 Summer Walk-About Class Schedule – Register Now

2019 Summer Plant Walk-Abouts

with Tammi Hartung

These walk-about classes are held at Desert Canyon Farm

at 1270 Field Ave in Canon City, CO. No pets please…thank you.

You must register for these classes. You can register by email at dcfhomeplace@gmail.com or by phone (719-275-0651) between the hours of 8am and 5pm (please do not call at other times…thank you).  We need your name(s) and phone number, plus email address. Our phone is a land line, so we cannot accept text messages.

The Class fee is $15.00 per person 12 years old and older. Well-behaved children accompanied by a supervising adult are welcome . Children 11 and younger attend free of charge. Payment will be collected beginning 30 minutes before class begins, so please arrive 20-30 minutes early. Fees can be paid by cash, debit or credit card – no checks please.

Classes will be held outdoors and will include walking around the farm to see the plants and talk about their growing needs, their uses,  and when/how to harvest them. Please bring your own pen and paper and something to drink. Be prepared to be outside (rain or sunshine) for these classes…dress appropriately for the weather.  I’m sorry, but the farm is not wheel-chair or walker friendly and those using a cane or walking stick must use great care as the ground here is uneven and dirt.  If you have a mobility disability, please consider whether or not these are the right classes for you to attend.

            July 27, 2019, Saturday             10:00am  to 12:00 noon

          Herb Walk-About

                Tammi will share their growing needs, their uses and how/when to harvest them.

            July 30, 2019, Tuesday          6:00 to 8:00 pm

          Trees & Shrubs Walk-About

                Tammi will share their growing needs, their uses and how/when to harvest them.

            August 13, 2019, Tuesday          6:00 to 8:00 pm

          Desert Plants Walk-About   

                Tammi will share their growing needs, their uses and how/when to harvest them.

            August 17, 2019, Saturday             10:00am  to 12:00 noon

          Wild Plants & Weeds Walk-About

                Tammi will share their growing needs, their uses and how/when to harvest them.

Space will be limited, so you are encouraged to register early for these classes.

May 27, 2019 So Much Happening!

Since my last post, which was far too long ago, so much is happening here. We had snow that brought us nearly 4″ of good moisture and then another 1/2″ rain a week later, so things here are very happy, both plants and animals!

There were several nights when it was chilly enough that we lit the woodstove to keep the chill off the house, but now the spring is settling out and we have the windows open instead, enjoying the fresh air and cool, but not cold, nights that bring a restful night’s sleep.

The snow didn’t slow down the Tanager Gazania seed crop, which has been flowering for quite a while now. Chris is already harvesting seed from this crop.

This sweet little plant is called Silver Kisses Anacaylus. Chris finished weeding this bed yesterday and now you can really see this tiny plant and it is so cute! It won’t be long before he will be picking seed from this crop too.

Look at these seed crops, which have been blooming for a bit under 2 weeks now. This is Shangri-La Sage and Red Feathers Echium.

The Shangri-La Sage has huge gorgeous flowers and the fragrance of this plant is similiar to Clary Sage, but this is a much more showy plant. Bumble Bees are in heaven right now with these flowers!

The Echium Red Feathers is also stunning and the hummingbirds, moths and lots of different kinds of bees are all working these flowers.

This seed crop is called Tibetan Mountain Onions. Edible and beautiful!

Michael and Kaila are the field crew for this summer and they have been helping Chris whip the field into shape, getting things weeded. All the extra moisture we have had, which is great, does inspire the weeds to grow too. They have a big task ahead of them to get everything weeded in short order. Michael just recently arrived from Kansas to work the summer with us as an intern. Kaila has been helping us in the greenhouse all spring and will now transfer to the flower seed crop field for the summer months.

They did get a bit of greenhouse work in on this day when it was too rainy and cold to work out in the field. They planted up the 1 gallon tomatoes, which we will have for sale in the Farm Stand during this last 2 weeks of Open Farm Days.

Open Farm Days will be happening thru June 9th and we still have a wonderful selection of herbs, vegetables and fruits, native plants, wildlife habitat plants, edible flowers and so much more. Come by, if you can, and see if you can find a few special plants to grow in your garden or as container plants on your porch. Visit the Open Farm Days page of this blog for more specifics and directions to the Farm.

My fairy garden is beautiful and I’ve had several little children playing in this garden, looking for fairies as they play. It makes me smile to see kids enjoying my fairy garden.

This coming Saturday, we will be drawing a name from our raffle ticket jar to see who will be the lucky person who wins this last fairy garden we’re giving away. Tickets are $1.00 each and the money will be used to buy fresh produce for our local food bank. You do not need to be present to win, so when you stop in during Open Farm Days be sure to come into the Farm Stand and buy a raffle ticket or two. Maybe it will be your name we draw this Saturday for this cute little beach fairy garden.

Every weekend we have been hosting free workshops and those who have attended them have have a great time and learned new information or skills for living an earth-friendly lifestyle. This workshop was taught by Monica and it was about making herb butters. Monica had everyone in the class make their own butter from cream and she had delicious herb butter samples to taste. We all enjoyed those a lot!

I taught a workshop for the kids on planting your own herb container garden. They were able to choose from 4 different herbs and they planted gardens to take home.

Interestingly, this ended up being a class of all young women and they sure did have a lot of fun. They were great…asking questions and being good listeners. They each planted two gardens to take home. There were a few young men I thought would be joining us for the class, but they got caught up in playing a wild game of tag in the pollinator field and the heirloom orchard, so they had fun doing that instead.

Here are the free workshops that will be happening this coming weekend during Open Farm Days.

June 1, 2019, Saturday

Using Weeds for Food & Medicine                                                                                        10:00-11:00am     teacher:  Tammi

Herbs from the Middle Ages & Their Symbolic Meanings                                                   1:00-2:00pm     teacher:  Tammi

June 2, 2019, Sunday

A Foot Bath Extravaganza with Ro                                                                                            1:00-2:30pm      teacher: Ro

(bring a towel and comfortable clean socks to class with you)

Our desert garden in the center of the driveway is blooming like crazy right now, with Indian Paintbrush (above), Santa Fe Phlox, loads of different Penstemons, Cowboy’s Delight and so many other wildflowers and cacti.

Just look at this Claret Cup Cactus! This is a native wildflower and it looks just as amazing and beautiful blooming out in the wild places near our farm as it does blooming above in the desert garden.

Not to be outdone, the White Rabbit Garden, which is my personal garden, is also in full glory this spring. The Iris are blooming in a rainbow of colors, and these are only a few of the colors I have planted. The Flax, another native plant, is happily blooming, as are the California Poppy and so many other plants.

This Iris is called ‘Batik’ and it is presently my favorite one in the garden. Lizz gifted me with a start of it a few years back and now we are able to offer a few pots of it in the Farm Stand for sale.

This is another angle of the White Rabbit Garden and the Austrian Copper Heirloom Rose is in full bloom at the moment.

Our ducks now have a fenced paradise to live in. We have not fenced them in previously, and they have been here a little more than a year now, and that was working out fine for a long time. They have a huge pond to swim in, the gardens and back orchard to forage in, and all was going well. Then Rosie, the third duck, arrived and we adopted her too. She, however, is a gypsy duck and that’s when things began to go bad. Every day, Rosie would lead Hannah and Gretel on a field trip to somewhere in the neighborhood. At first they just went next door to the Lopez Farm and that was ok, but as time pasted, their journeys became longer and we and the neighbors began to worry and fret. You see, ducks don’t watch out for cars, predators like mean dogs, or anything else. They would cross the streets, and even started sleeping in the roads! Holy Smokes!

These three ducks are mostly wild and they are friendly enough, but they won’t let you near enough to catch them or pen them up, so we had a big problem brewing. Chris and I are not “fence” people, and we don’t have many fences on this farm because we like it to be open and for wildlife to move freely on the Farm, but something had to give with these ducks! I was determined that they have access to the pond at will, and I didn’t want them to live in a small pen, so we pondered and pondered and finally decided to fence the entire big pond and the orchard and gardens around the pond. This gives them a huge paradise that is fully fenced so that they cannot wonder around the neighborhood anymore! Yahoo! Now we know they are safe, won’t get run over by cars, won’t worry or annoy the neighbors anymore, most importantly they won’t worry Chris and I anymore wondering were they are off too. It’s great having them here at home safe and sound and knowing they have a huge area to wander, swim and forage in.

We, and are farm visitors, are having to adjust to getting used to opening and closing gates as we move about, but with a bit of time that will become second nature I think. We made the fence so that it doesn’t impede the deer and other wildlife from moving on this Farm, which is important to us. The bonus is that I’m going to be able to plant my new fruit garden within the duck enclosure and it will be safe from browsing deer, so I won’t have to cage the new fruit trees and shrubs.

So, life changes and evolves all the time around here. Sometimes those changes revolve around 3 ducks!

This spring we have Western Tanagers visiting the Farm. I’ve never seen them on the Farm before and there are a LOT of them. They are gorgeous! We’ve also been seeing two kinds of Grosbeaks, Orioles, a Blue Heron, plus all the other birds in our bird community that live here year round. It has been a real treat to enjoy watching the Western Tanagers.

So, I suppose that catches you up on some of the many happenings here of late. I hope you are enjoying your spring season too. Summer is starting soon and with it a whole new season of events and happenings.

Another bit of information I want to share with you is about an Herbal Festival that will be happening in June in Lafayette, Colorado. It’s called Botanica A Festival of Plants and I, along with so many amazing teachers, will be teaching during this event. There will be a marketplace of artisans selling their wares, a Farm to Table dinner, and so much more. Check out the information below and if you want to know more or want to register, just visit the website. The link is at the bottom of this post.

With Green Thoughts, Tammi

An Ethnobotanical Celebration of the Plant World June 21 – 25, 2019 Workshops | Farm Dinner | Marketplace Join us to celebrate the world of plants and the ways we’ve interacted with them across time, culture, and geography. Explore the botanical realm with hands-on, interactive and thought provoking workshops relating to Art, Medicine, Food, Culture, Ritual & Spirituality, and Survival ________________________________________________ Weekend Workshop Schedule Friday Workshops: • Growing your Own Mushrooms With Michael Heim • Natural Dying with Plants with Phylleri Ball • Intuitive Herbalism: Remembering How to Listen to the Plants with Erin Smith Saturday Workshops: • Simple Remedies for Children’s Health with Astrid Grove • Osha: Bear Medicine of the West with Feather Jones • Forest Bathing Experience with Cat Pantaleo • Biodynamic Practices for Your Backyard with Kate Miller • Plant Based “Cheese” and More with Mindy Green • Brewing Herbs with Water with Rebecca Luna • Ethnobotany: A Round Table with Ian Sanderson & Erin Smith • Making Mead with Rebecca Schwendler • The Magic of Flowers: Working with Our Blossoming Allies with Tess Whitehurst • Making Herb Oil Infusions Using Fresh & Dry Herbs with Amanda Klenner • Wild Medicine of the Front Range with Brigitte Mars Sunday Workshops: • Growing Herbs in the Rockies with Tammi Hartung • Tincture Making for the Wild Free-Roaming Human with Laura Clemmons • Herbal Spa Experience with Faith Rodgers • The Sacred Folklore of Trees with Sara Stewart Martinelli • Introduction to The Maya Healing Hut with Ann Drucker • Making Cider at Home with Ian Capps • Benefits of Bitters: The Lost Flavor with Malia Thompson • Perfume Blending for Emotional Wellness with Amber Graziano • Wild Foods in Your Kitchen with Butter Perry

Botanica Marketplace

All Weekend Open to the Public The Botanica Marketplace! Local artisans showcase their botanical related works, from fine art to food at this fun and unqiue outdoor market. There’s something for everyone! Friday June 21, 4 pm – 6 pm Saturday June 22, 10 am – 4 pm Sunday June 23, 10 am – 4 pm

Farm to Table Vegetarian Buffet Dinner

Botanica Vegetarian Farm Dinner and Silent Auction A fun, intimate farm dinner buffet is offered to our participants of Botanica! This dinner is only open to folks who are registered in at least one workshop during the weekend. A Silent Auction of delightful herbal and botanical items and services will take place during the evening to benefit our local chapter of Herbalists Without Borders Farm Dinner Registration

Thanks to our Sponsors!

THE BOTANICA FESTIVAL

LEARN MORE

Interested in being a sponsor, vendor, or volunteer? Please email us!

VISIT BOTANICA AND REGISTER TODAY!

Three Leaf Farm | Lafayette, CO | 720-334-4724 | farm@threeleafconcepts.com | Website

 

 

 

 

 

May 12, 2019 Iceplants Make a Garden Beautiful!

 

Hardy Iceplants Make a Beautiful Addition to the Garden!

Now that spring is definitely here and sunshine is happening every day, it reminds me of hardy Iceplants and the stunning color and beauty they bring to a hot sunny dry garden! These are plants that can hold up and look beautiful to areas that may not get much water, have soil that is not rich or loamy, and has exposure to hot sun all or most of the day, which only makes them bloom all the more.

Iceplants are hardy succulent plants, but unlike cacti, they don’t have spines or sharp points like agaves or yuccas do. They will thrive if you plant them in full sun or even in part shade, but they must be somewhere in the garden where they get a good amount of sunlight, as the flowers only open when the sun hits them. At night, or on cloudy days, the flowers will stay closed. The flower colors are amazing….usually very bright and intense and often they shimmer! Here are a few varieties I think you would like:

Purple Iceplant is the one most people have seen and is a spreading variety with intensely purple large bright and shimmering flowers.

Desert Canyon Red Iceplant is our special variety of a robust spreading Iceplant that blooms large red shimmering flowers that fade to orange as each flower ages. It is amazing and good for places where you need a larger Iceplant to cover space.

Tiny Pink Iceplant is a smaller leaf spreading variety with purple-green foliage and bright, but small, purple flowers.

Lesotho Pink Iceplant is from Lesotho, Africa. It has soft pink shimmering flowers and is a spreading variety.

Yellow Creeping Iceplant has bright green foliage and large yellow shimmering flowers. It covers ground quickly and looks beautiful.

Beaufort West Iceplant is a clumping variety that doesn’t ramble. It has soft pink delightful flowers…perfect in rock gardens or even fairy miniature gardens.

Oberg Iceplant is another clumping Iceplant that has white flowers…very pretty!

Compact Yellow Iceplant has large yellow shimmering flowers, but grows as a clump rather than spreading.

Some other favorite varieties include Red Mountain Iceplant, which has apricot shimmering flowers with a purple ring at the center. This Iceplant spreads, but not as much as some of the others. There is Sutherlandi Iceplant that has large magenta pink shimmering flowers and stays as a clump, along with its cousin Peach Star Sutherlandi Iceplant with soft peach flowers. Finally, we have one called Shrubby Trailing Iceplant, which grows more upright with weeping branches and tiny bright pink shimmering flowers.

If you have a xeric landscape, a rock garden or miniature garden, or want something stunning in a flower garden or near walk-ways, consider the hardy Iceplants as a great option. We have quite a collection of these varieties here in our Farm Stand store during Open Farm Days, so stop in and see what you think.

Open Farm Days and our Farm Stand Plant Sale are Saturdays to Thursdays, thru June 9th (closed on Fridays). Hours are 9 to 4. We hope you’ll visit our Farm Stand and do some shopping for garden plants or my books while you’re here. We also have free workshops happening each Saturday and Sunday during Open Farm Days.

May 3, 2019 Busy Week Here…so just a bit of this and that!

Our pond was very nearly empty two weeks ago.

And thankfully, the first delivery of our irrigation water arrived. Yay…All the gardens and trees got a much-needed drink and the pond was filled. The ducks were very happy about all of this!

James has been teaching workshops again this spring during Open Farm Days. He is teaching tomorrow (Saturday, May 4th) on gardening almost anywhere and in any kind of container. He will also be doing an heirloom fruit tree workshop in the afternoon tomorrow. On Sunday, Monica will be teaching us about butterflies and other pollinators. Check out the classes and events page of this website for the specific details.

This is one of the fairy gardens Lizz planted this spring that we will be giving away as part of our annual raffle to raise money to buy fresh produce for our local food bank.

This is the second fairy garden that we will be raffling off at the end of Open Farm Days. Come and check them out. They are cute as can be and raffle tickets are only $1.00 each.

This is the fairy garden I planted last spring in the Farm Stand store. Everything in the fairy garden came thru the winter just fine. It is planted in an old bird bath that cracked and no longer holds water.

Stephanie and Liz spend a lot of time keeping all the plants happy and tidy in the Farm Stand. These women are amazing and we love them dearly!

Our friend, a different Stephanie, stopped in to do a bit of shopping and settled on a Cape Aloe plant.

This was exciting! We had a small group of Willets land in our pond on the ducks island. These were beautiful water birds. We’ve never had them here before, so we enjoyed getting to know them a bit.

We have a very old agave that has been a houseplant. Actually, this agave was Chris’ before we got married. Now it has decided to bloom and is growing a flower stalk. The flower stalk is so growing so quickly, that it had to be moved outdoors where there wasn’t a living room ceiling to stop it.

Shrek discovered a toad in the White Rabbit Garden  two days ago. Toads are good luck and they eat a lot of bugs, especially slugs, so they are always welcome here.

The nasturtium baskets in the Farm Stand are beginning to bloom and they are incredibly fragrant and so beautiful!

A flock of yellow headed black birds arrived and has been hanging around. They are gorgeous and a racus bunch.

 

This looks like Willow, our cat, is outside ready to pounce on the birds, but he is actually sitting in the windowsill in our house watching them out the window. One of his favorite pastimes.

Meanwhile, Shrek was in the garden checking to make sure the Belen Hen  is in her proper place in the White Rabbit Garden.

Sorry this post is sort of scattered and brief. We are in our two busiest weeks of the entire year, so I decided this was the best I could mange today. More to come soon.

With Green Thoughts, Tammi

April 25, 2019 Plant a Climate Victory Garden

Before I tell you about planting a Climate Victory Garden, I would like to remind you about this weekend’s free workshops, with the hope that perhaps you can join us for one or more of them. Here are the workshops we will be having.

April 27, 2019, Saturday

Growing Tomatoes & Peppers in Your Garden                                                  10:00-11:00am     teacher:  Tammi

Growing & Using Native Medicinal Herbs                                                           1:00-2:00pm     teacher: Tammi

April 28, 2019, Sunday

Companion Planting in Your Garden                                                                      1:00-2:00pm     teacher: Monica

Landscape Design Strategies for Wildfire Prone Areas                                   2:30-3:30pm     teacher:  Lizz

Remember, there is no need to pre-register…just show up with pen and paper and something to drink. Be prepared to be outside, rain, snow or sunshine, for these workshops…dress appropriately for the weather. If you have a lawn chair to bring – wonderful, as we have limited chairs available. If it’s cold, a lap blanket is a good idea! Our free workshops are held at Desert Canyon Farm during Open Farm Days and we are located at 1270 Field Ave., Canon City, CO

Now…let me share with you the idea of planting a Climate Victory Garden!

Many of you will remember when, during World War II, the Secretary of Agriculture asked everyone to plant a Victory Garden to help provide fresh food for their families during the war when food was rationed so troops overseas would have enough food to eat. Once again we are putting out the cry for people to plant a Victory Garden, this time it is for an equally important, but different, emergency…Climate Change. Please join me to do whatever you can in a small, but hugely important step, supporting your family’s health and the health of this Earth.

A Climate Victory Garden has several simple and easy parts to its creation:

1. It can be grown in any space, from a plot of earth on your property, in containers on your patio or doorsteps, indoors near a window on a tabletop. It doesn’t require a lot of space, being as small or large as you desire.

2. It includes edible plants – fruits, vegetables, herbs. These might be fruit trees and small fruits like strawberries or raspberries, asparagus or garlic, plus vegetables like carrots, lettuces, and cucumbers. Herbs are easy to grow and you might enjoy basils, thymes, cilantro, or parsley to name a few.

3. Use organic soil and compost in your garden. Consider starting your own compost from yard trimmings and plant-based kitchen scraps.

4.  Keep it pollinator and beneficial insect friendly by not using chemical pesticides or weed killers.

5. If you absolutely must use a pesticide, use only organic or OMRI registered ones made from plants or minerals and not synthetic chemicals. These include soap or oil sprays and neem oil.

6. Use people power to care for Victory Garden spaces. Planting, weeding and harvesting are all best done by hand by people, providing a chance to relax, get exercise, observe nature, and reap the rewards of your efforts, knowing you are doing good for the health of people and the earth.

Encourage public places like schools, government offices, store fronts and eating places to plant Climate Victory Gardens anywhere they can from raised beds, containers or gardens around  entrances to these buildings, areas along street curbs and sidewalks referred to as hellstrips. Everywhere is a possibility, even rooftop  gardens could happen.

In a time when climate is changing and people are contributing to that situation, it’s important we all do whatever we can to help. Growing a Climate Victory Garden is one way to help and bringing  joy besides. We rallied during WWII when there was a need to help by growing our own food! Now we can rally again to help by growing some of our own food! Please join me in this effort!!

If you are interested in exploring possible edible plants you might include in your Victory Garden, come by our Farm Stand during Open Farm Days to see what we have to offer. There are hundreds of edible plants available for your consideration.

Open Farm Days and Farm Stand Plant Sale are Saturdays thru Thursdays, April 13th thru June 9th (closed on Fridays). Hours are 9 to 4. We hope you’ll visit our Farm Stand and do some shopping for garden plants or my books while you’re here.

April 17, 2019 Free Workshops Happening this Weekend at Desert Canyon Farm

Free Workshops this Weekend

We’d like to invite you to join us this weekend during Open Farm Days and our Farm Stand Plant Sale for our free workshops. Here is the schedule and topics…

Saturday, April 20, 2019
Gardening: Prepping, Planting & Caretaking 10:00-11:00am
A Recipe for Building Healthy Soil Starts with Humility noon-1:00pm
Gardening Tips, Techniques, Tools, Etc. 1:00-2:00pm

Sunday, April 21, 2019
Natural Rabbit Raising 1:00-2:00pm
Growing Fruit in Container Pots 2:30-3:30pm

No need to register…just show up with pen and paper for taking notes, dressed for the weather as classes are outdoors, and bring a lawn chair if you want as we have limited chairs, but there is always grass to sit on .

We’re located at 1270 Field Ave. in Canon City, CO. Visit desertcanyonfarm.wordpress.com for more information and directions.