The following posts were taken from the website for Harms Vineyards and Lavender Fields, which we operated from 2010 until 2019. They offer a window into our lives on the farm and the ways the farm changed us. In 2018 we decided to end our lavender business but we continue to work with our land in ways that bring balance and health. Posts on this website will continue to follow our work.
Dandelion adapted to our thin, dry top soils of northern California. My mother would have thought I was crazy, planting dandelion seeds in my garden! She tried to get rid of dandelions, although not too hard. We had a lot of them, the yellow heads and hollow stems dotting our yard each spring. My sister… Read more »
Valerian Yes, she is pretty, but she wants to take over! Nothing like planting a pushy plant in your garden! She’s not content to grow only in her own bed but wants to expand into the peppers and tomatoes. She also thinks she should move into the squash. Moving into the tomato bed. Yet her… Read more »
This week Smoky Zeidel published my Guest Blog in her series on what inspires artists and writers. “How Snakes Inspired Me to Write a Novel” tells how I came to write and publish Snakes, a novel written in the period of the demise of the family farm across America. It is a story about loss… Read more »
These the goats love! I have to be very careful photographing when the goats are with me, or the flower head is gone, quick as a wink! These are the kinds of plants our ranch expresses when it is in its full individuality and natural biodiversity. The more I understand, the more I see that not listening… Read more »
Kale planted last fall is still producing but has bolted. One of the best leafy green vegetables that we can eat is kale, and it is amazingly easy to grow in our gardens. Not only do we love it, but when it bolts (goes to flower), the bees also love it, and when I… Read more »
Gaviota and the silhouetted blue wildrye. Some years ago we contracted with Judith Larner Lowry to identify native plants on our ranch so we might better understand how to support the unique mix of plants that are at home here. One of my favorite perennial bunch grasses is blue wildrye, seen here silhouetted against the… Read more »
Open House June 23, 2012
Harms Vineyards and Lavender Fields Biodynamic Organic estate grown distilled lavender products Open House June 23, 2012 Please join us for a day of tours, talks, sensory delights! Sip our lavender limeade, taste lavender culinary goodies, meet our goats. Harms Vineyards and Lavender Fields 10: am to 4:pm 11:am Charlie Toledo, Ex.Director, Suscol Intertribal Council First People’s Sustainable… Read more »
Yarrow bed. Behind bed is sticky monkeyflower, poison oak, and coyote bush. Yarrow is one of the flowers that make up the six compost preparations. It grows abundantly in several grassy places on our ranch. Last year’s growth remains as straight stems. Yarrow likes to grow with soap root and coyote bush. Steiner held that… Read more »
Sticky monkeyflower tends to hang outwith poison oak and coyote bush. One of the plants in full bloom now is sticky monkeyflower. A member of the figwort family, the flower blooms on our hillsides most of the summer. The hummingbirds love it, and so do goats! I wonder what energies are collected and moved about… Read more »
We walk the hills this morning without the dogs, who abandon us almost at the beginning. The vultures are circling and swooping low, a sure sign of a recent kill, something that Moka and Leo cannot resist searching out. No amount of calling dissuades them. The goats walk solemnly in a straight line behind me…. Read more »
© 2024 Patricia Damery.
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