On the lookout for land!

Well, after a very successful season I am pretty much fully wrapped up now.  I should have my production manual finished within the next 2 months and will soon start doing seed trials for next season as I am considering trying to get my production Certified Organic.  There may be Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

improved machete shot

Thought I would post, for redemption’s sake, some new and improved videos of the machete harvest.  One is a close up of the cut and the other is a longer version of a series of cuts to give you an idea how the harvest operates: [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zBh93BEtU34] [youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kggRr9hGthY]

By cmthoreau, ago

Deconstruction

Well, I have started taking apart the sprouting system to store it for the winter.  It was the first time I had been out to the set up in a fgew weeks and it felt pretty strange to not be growing sprouts! As promised I have a video for you Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

A week without sprouts

Well, the sprout season is over and the downtime is nice.  But I am already looking ahead to next season.  My biggest challenge will be finding a piece of suitable land in the city for production.  I do have a few leads but still have some looking to do. I Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

All done!

Well, that’s it.  The season is now over! 2500 bags of sprouts later! I am now about to get into writing about the project. It feels good to be done, but I am already thinking about next year.  I am still hoping to get a mechanical sprout harvester designed and Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

The dreaded manual

Well, now that production is mostly under control it is timeto start writing the production manual for small-scale and urban sunflower sprout production.  This will be quite a project and wil include an annotated version of the Code of Practice for the Hygienic Production of Sprouts (CFIA document) and all Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

Onward and Upward

And on we go still. Just did the Saturday market today after doing the Friday harvest by myself for the first time.  It took two of us six hours to do the harvest and it took me seven on my own.  Go figure.  However, I find it was easier to Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

Yikes, it’s hot!

I wish I had the time to update this blog mroe regularly, but the sprouts take a lot of time. Let’s go over a few glitches we have come up against and worked out. As a start we are still having great success with the machete as a harvesting tool. Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

More Success

Well, the past few 2weeks has been a wild ride!  I shift between being elated and overwhelmed with anxiety. The sprouts have been selling well at the market.  I do 2 markets each week – Wednesday and Saturday.  The Wednesday market has been inconsistent so it is hard to determine Read more

By cmthoreau, ago

Off to the Market…

I feel bad that I have not been keeping this blog too up to date, but here we are again! I have now done my first two markets.  The first one was on Saturday and I sold out before the market was over.  The second was on Wednesday and did Read more

By cmthoreau, ago