Record Keeping

It is ideal in farming if you are able to find the time to keep records for all you do. Seeding, transplanting, harvesting, cover cropping. The more information you have about past activity, the more informed a decision can be made for the following season. Additionally, the more informed you are when you head to the field with your hundreds of transplants, ready to go in that moment, the better decisions can be made about where they ought to go.

Not only do Wayne and Lee work hard to track what is planted where in the field throughout the season, but also the first and last harvest dates of these items, equipment used to plant, pots used to grow, dates when relevant activities occurred, etc... The more info the better. The only trouble is that this farm is so diversified it is sometimes like searching for a needle in a haystack to find a particular tomato or chile variety within the large data base of vegetable varieties that have been planted throughout the years at Tierra Vegetables. Proof again that you have here a wonderful diversified small farm.


Above is one of many spread sheets that have been used this season to navigate the field for planting decisions. After each phase of field data is collected, time is made to incorporate this information into the extensive data base system Wayne has created. I find this work to be especially interesting as someone who appreciates record-keeping and it's benefits. It is really satisfying to see the results as different data reports are produced in order to proceed with the next phase of work.

The only problem with this system in the past is finding time....about this time in the year a farmer gets far too busy to keep up with such things. This is where someone like myself comes in handy.