#planting

Planting Garlic

November 27, 2021

The garlic cloves are beautifully arranged for planting

One of the students’ favorite fall-time activities on the Rural Studio Farm is planting garlic.

It is important not to plant the garlic too early, as this makes it more vulnerable to disease and damage from rodents, and not too late either, or else the roots won’t have time to establish themselves before winter. Here in Newbern, the farm team plants our garlic in mid-November. Fall-planted garlic has larger yields than spring-planted garlic.

Two farm workers delicately separate the cloves from each head of garlic

A student neatly arranges the separated garlic cloves for planting

First, the students split each individual clove of garlic from the heads that were saved from our own garlic harvest back in June. It is important to not bruise the cloves from rough handling and to keep as much of the papery outer coating intact as possible, as it protects the cloves from rotting. Then, all the cloves are placed out in their proper spacing (six inches) before burying them under about one to two inches of soil.

A student arranges the separated garlic cloves into neat spacing so that they can be planted

The placed garlic cloves are neatly spaced and ready to be planted

Finally, the students mulched over the top of the newly planted cloves with several inches of hay. The new garlic shoots will push their way through the mulch while weeds are suppressed and moisture is preserved.

Farm workers spread mulch over the newly planted garlic cloves

Tags: #planting, garlic, rsfarm

Tieing, Training, and Framing

November 23, 2020

Deliang installing cables on the nine-foot screens

The Horseshoe Courtyard steel screen frames are filling up! With help from the 3rd-years, more rope laced through the metal frames, leaving space for the steel cables which complete the screen patterns. The cables are placed every 5^th perforation and function as an auxiliary support system for the vines. In the process, the steel cables visually transform the rhythm of the screen.

Showing Them the Ropes

While both the Carolina Jessamine and the Confederate Jasmine, are twining plants that will organically grow up the screens, a little help goes a long way. By training the recently planted vines around the rope and cable, they can begin to cover the screen more evenly. In a few years, the stems of the vines will become woodier, and they will become their own structure. Until then the ropes and cables are their support.

Illuminating the Courtyard

Since the last lighting mock-up, the courtyard gained ropes and vines which affect the lighting on the south end. As seen above, there are also more trees, short screens, and a mock-up of the concrete wall. To account for these new elements, the team added more lights to the scheme to see how it changed the space.

Last Brick Pallet!

Addie removing the mortar of the reclaimed bricks

In the past four months, with the help of 35 Rural Studio students and Horseshoe Farm Fellow, 3,800 bricks have now been cleaned! All salvaged, the bricks came from the site or a home in Selma, Alabama. A typical dig on Horseshoe Courtyard reveals a couple of bricks or an old foundation wall from a previous structure. Luckily all that cleaning is over with, and the team can now begin the brick pad! The team graded the site and removed access soil in order to stack the bricks beneath the trees. This way, the bricks will be with in reach when laying the pad pattern.

Walls Going Up

The courtyard team also started the porch framing! Seen above, the western porch stud wall attaches directly to the existing brick wall. Knee walls hang from the eiling strucuture, to span studs across to the south brick wall. Next for the porch is the eastern wall, re-hanging the double doors, and sheathing all the new stud walls. After this, the whole thing will be covered with exterior dry-wall.

Tags: #alabama, #auburnarchitecture, #bricksfordays, #courtyard, #designbuild, #greensboro, #planting, #projectHSF, #ropes, #rsleftovers, #ruralstudio, #screens, #steel, #vines

Six Trees in the Ground, Seven More To Go

September 28, 2020

Dr.Dprsey and PHF fellows cleanign bricks

Horseshoe Farm Fellows Brick Cleaning Day!

Fellows cleaning bricks — Horseshoe Farm Fellows Brick Cleaning Day!

On a Saturday morning, the Greensboro Fellows, Dr. Dorsey, and several community members came to the courtyard site to help clean bricks! Together they cleaned about three-quarters of a pallet (roughly 350) worth of bricks. Thank you, Fellows and Dr. Dorsey, it was a great help!

Concrete Pour

The team finished the formwork, secured the rebar mesh, and taped over the formwork spacers and screws. The slab under the walkway is divided into rectangular pavers, which follow the grid system of the rest of the courtyard, and allow two-inch gaps that correspond with screen and grate placement. This week with the help of contractor, Clyde Fields, the team poured concrete!

Cured concrete before formwork was removed

While waiting for the new trees to be delivered, we began removing the formwork! To make prying the forms out easier, longer pieces of formwork were created at the edges of each rectangular slab piece, with spacers every foot or so.

View of grid from walkway — The trees are organized around a five-foot grid, like the screens and concrete. The students pulled batter board lines to help guide planting, with the intersection of the strings in the center of the tree trunks.

Crepe Myrtles Arrived!

Thirteen beautiful, single trunk, Natchez Crepe Myrtles arrived on site on a cloudy Thursday morning. The team unloaded all of the trees with the help of 3rd-year students, Mason, and the Bobcat. The trees have grown taller since being tagged at a nursery in northern Alabama! The caliper, or width of the tree trunk, ranges between three and four inches wide. The bottom of the tree canopy is at least six to seven feet tall, allowing people to comfortably wander beneath the canopy.

That Friday morning we, along with 3rd-years and Mason, excavated holes for the first two trees. Considering the size of the site, the trees needed to be planted two at a time before the following holes could be augured. David Hill, AU professor of landscape architecture, arrived to advise and help plant the Crepe Myrtles. The 3rd and 5th-years helped us plant the first six trees! A huge shout out to David for coming from Auburn to assist planting the first half of the new courtyard trees.