Tuesday, January 25, 2011

happy new year!

There are a lot of things happening these days at Blue House Greenhouse Farm!


First of all I want to give an update on the soil quality.  As you may have read in the 'about the land' portion of this blog, our farm had some questionable beginnings.  After a lot of reading, reviewing reports, testing for metals, and talking with soil scientists, I can finally say with confidence that the land we are farming is safe! Here is the complete report from the Department of Environmental Quality (DEQ) from the testing that was completed in 1997 on this site. The most problematic issue for the land was the potential contamination from heavy metals. After seeing the metals analysis in the report (page 15) and comparing those numbers to the DEQ Risk Based Concentration numbers (the residential levels for "Soil Ingestion, Dermal Contact, and Inhalation"), it is clear that the results are well within the safe levels.   


It was also recommended that I do additional metals testing, which I did.  Here are the results:Arsenic, Beryllium, Lead, and MercuryI was able to review the report and metals testing results with a DEQ soil scientist and he concurred that these and the previous results are within the safe residential levels.  Hurray!  Now on to the task of farming!


In other big news, we are getting ready for our first harvest!  The lettuce, mustards, arugula and tatsoi have all done beautifully in the tunnels. There may not be enough to sell at this moment but I will let you all know once we've harvested. 


Lastly, if you are interested in volunteering, please let me know!  There is a lot of weeding to do- seems to be a bit of a grass issue... yikes. AND there a lot of other fun tasks to do as well!