The Williams Center for the Arts plot is prepared for planting. Plant Ops uses a sod cutter and pulls up the poor quality (thin and dry) sod from the plot, then tills the ground a few inches down. The ground is extremely hard and tamped down. Corn workers unload the remaining compost (1/2 pick-up full) onto the plot, and work the compost into the soil. Organic fish emulsion is added to the soil and a pattern of four-triangles (for four varieties of corn) is layed out with string. Four heirloom varieties are then planted:

Back triangle - Bloody Butcher
Front triangle - Strawberry Ornamental
Left triangle - Country Gentleman
Right triangle - Wampum Ornamental

Given the option of installing orange fencing to protect the corn like on the quad, we opt to not install the fence because the site does not receive the kind of traffic the quad plots do, because we reason that deer and crows would be unlikely to attack this site, and because the fencing is ugly.

07/09/08

Going to pack up the lab mobile and drive down to the Alvord desert to catch up with Roegr Anderson's summer field ecology course, which is spending three weeks in a spot near Borax Lake studying lizard and insect ecology. I'm only going to spend three days, but my timing couldn't be better (or worse)...mid 90's and baking heat. Daytime humidity around 20%. So extremely hot and dry. Should be back Friday or Saturday.

Composting, hoeing, and fertilizing of the three quad plots. A group of 9 (students, faculty and staff) meet at the Bethlehem Compost Facility and fill two pick-up trucks with organic compost, and then on the quad to work on the plots. The group weeds (with hoes and by hand) the two sweet corn plots, then cuts shallow trenches and lays compost along the rows of corn. The Farinon and Quad Drive plots are then treated with organic fertilizer-a liquid fish-based emulsion-that is mixed with water and sprayed at the base of the corn plants. This adds needed nitrates to the soil.

The Skillman field corn plot is very wet and has a thick crop of weeds. For tending, the plot is divided in two: the north side (towards Markle Hall) is treated as industrial corn crops are treated, and the south half is left to hand tending and more sustainable practices. The north industrial side is sprayed with the common herbicide Round-Up. Since FC8288 is engineered to be "Round-Up Ready," the herbicide will kill the weeds, but not kill the corn itself. In addition, the industrial half is hand spread with chemical 10-10-10 (percentages of nitrogen, potash, phosphorous) fertilizer-to inject fixed nitrogen into the soil This is a relatively mild fertilizer, as modern chemical fertilizers go. The south side of the Skillman plot is hoed by hand, but is too muddy (either because of overwatering, poor drainage, or both) to remove all the weeds. Workers break two hoes in the muck, and decide to wait for the ground to dry before attempting to remove more weeds.