Farm jam is Saturday, July 30th this year. We will supply burgers and hotdogs for supper. Also outhouse and water. Power will be on a first-come-first service. Bring your tents or camper. Join us for the on-stage jam.
Tag: Small Prairie Farm
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Farm Jam 2021- The Year After COVID
The year after COVID. We didn’t get many pictures. It’s like we wanted to see people with our eyes instead of through a camera lens for once!
Malcolm Rice, David Rice, Bruce Rice in the S.S Tippy, and Ryder (The only dramatic one this weekend). It was a great FARM/ FAM Jam. WE HAD BABIES! You know we are close to the end of the COVID epidemic when babies can leave the house!
Adam & Jenna had their little one out along with Raje and Mike. Aunties and grand aunties we’re loving it!
The Boiler Room Boys & friends hosted by Malcolm Rice plays the main stage.
Drew cooked up a storm again. There was of course so much food and so many aunties to make sure you ate that food. Lots of people left with leftovers (goodie bags of food) or eggs.
It was a good group of people (Claudia and Bernie didn’t get that camper they were going to look at in the morning. the table bed was too small)
Most of the 35- 45-year-olds made it out of bed by 9 am. Their parents were still disgusted with them for sleeping in. Breakfast was already over.
Tents were set up and taken down. Every time it was funny and a family event.
What do you call 12 Rice’s setting up a tent?
Friday night entertainment. TAKING IT DOWN SUNDAY…EVEN FUNNIER. (Someone send the video please).
The pigs made their debut by being the smelliest of the evening.
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Wildlife on the Critter Camera
CRITTERS, CRITTERS, EVERYWHERE! WE HAVE THEM ON CAMERA.
We’ve had several Critters families stop in to try and figure out the cameras. We’ve also had a few who didn’t notice the cameras at all.
Birds, raccoons, deer, coyotes, fox, MOOSE, Owls, house cat, bald eagle, hawk, cougar, rabbit, white weasle, and more. We’ve had the pleasure of catching a few photos of some of Saskatchewan’s wildlife wandering through the yard. We just use our simple outdoor Nest Cam. These little Critters are always welcome until chickens start going missing then we’ll reevaluate.
FOX
COYOTE
GANGSTER DEER
DEER FIGHT CLUB
PHEASANTS
RYDER AND TROPHY GOPHER
We are itching for the season to start. The family has already started staying overnight at the farm with the camper furnaces in the campers on overnight. Until the snow of course.
In the fall over 200 bulbs, were planted. We are very impatiently waiting to see what comes up. Last year we also planted Virginia creeper along 1 side of the fence line, Hollyhocks, Delphinium, and more. We are excited to see what’s going to bloom.
We bought a used metal/fabric Gazebo just to test it in the violent Saskatchewan wind. Hopefully, it can withstand a year as an outdoor TV room. We are considering the heavy COSTCO one. We just need everyone to fall in love with the idea first.
This year our 20 chickens will mainly be providing eggs for Over the Hills Orchard and Winery (A local Lumsden company).
Seedlings are growing in windows waiting for the farm. This year we are eager to plant an extra-large garden to help supplement the 2 piglets we are raising (spring to fall). You will see pictures of the new pen soon!
We will be posting more updates about the beginning of the year as the weather changes.
We are excited about spring!
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Garden 2020
Summer 2020- Social Distancing!
Summer 2020 was my (Kelly’s) first full season living primarily at the farm. What better place to social distance is the farm. That’s a LIE! The Rice farm has been a haven for people looking for outdoor retreat! Bon fires, hiking, biking, sledding. We even showed up for Christmas.
Garden
Our giant garden produced a little before the swarm of grasshoppers wiped everything out. Cucumbers, carrots, garlic hardly produced. Corn surprisingly well again this year. Of course beans, peas and beets did fine. We used all heirloom fingerling potato seed this year as we couldn’t find red potato seed. WE HAVE CUTWORMS! Gross!
Water
We ran mostly off of rainwater this year. Our dugout went dry. We shipped cooking & shower water from Pence and Regina.
Chickens
We had a flock of 20 birds on the farm laying eggs in the new chicken coop. During the grasshopper invasion they hardly had to be fed. Their Eggs were sold by Malcom at SIAST. Next year there will be a price increase in eggs, so we can make our money back. At the end of the season October 25, the chickens were sold.
Critters and Such
Hollyhauwks first year 
Pine tree art 
Dilled garlic scapes 
Rainbow 
BBQ View 
Gilly finding the dead 
Moose Drop off 
Window Spider For the end of the season we lit all of Jeffs old brush on fire.
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Virginian Tiger Moth (Spilosoma virginica)
Pearls magic Princess Moth is actually a Virginian Tiger Moth (Spilosoma virginica). We found it in the garden and fell in love! Excepts it didn’t grant any of her wishes, DANG!
Spilosoma virginica is a species of moth in the subfamily Arctiinae. As a caterpillar, it is known as the yellow woolly bear or yellow bear caterpillar. As an adult, it is known as the Virginia tiger moth.
The Tiger moth we found on the farm Caterpillar life stage
Identification
The caterpillar varies in color, but is typically consistent in its coloration in a single specimen, without odd tufts of different-colored hair or separately colored heads.
Diet
It has a diet of a wide range of low-growing plants, including ground cover like grass and clover. The larvae are defoliators, skeletonizing the leaves they feed on, but only the late summer batch of caterpillars is plentiful enough to do much damage to crops. This species tends to have two to three life cycles per year, with one hibernating for the winter in temperate climates.[2]
Adult moth life stage
The adult moth tends to tent its wings over its back, rather than sitting with them spread. It is white with a darker-colored abdomen, but without the obvious, darker eyes of its close cousin the agreeable tiger moth. It is not poisonous, but some people may have an allergic reaction to the bristles on its body.[2]
ReproductionThe female is slightly larger than the male in larva form, and as an adult finds a mate by extruding an organ that emits a pheromone which the male can smell. The male, which unlike the female has the large, feathered antennae characteristic of pheromone-using moths, flies zigzag search patterns, eventually homing in on a female. After mating, he goes off to find other females, while the female stops to lay between 20 and 100 eggs in a single layer on the underside of a leaf. The larvae stay together when very young, but become solitary as they gain size.[2]
Woolly bear caterpillar
Read more about our adventures in the news
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Spring 2020
Spring 2020 is in on a confusing roller coaster ride
With Covid19 we all started the season early. The more we could get out to the farm the better. Whether Malcolm’s fixing the truck, Tania’s family is out hiking or Kelly’s recluse to her camper the farm acted like a getaway for all of us.
The dugout is way down of course, the wind has been brutal, cold toilette seat, cuddling up to the heater at night, all totally worth it not to be in the city with CovIdiots.
This spring we’ve got a lot done (write ups to come):
Malcolm and Sebastian build a wind generated battery to power the front driveway camera.Tent Alley Rejuvenation- Malcolm has filled in the spaces between the trees in Tent Alley to keep the garbage and the wind down. Malcolm always loves visitors and Tent Alley is one of his favorite places.
Malcolm got the old International truck running in order to get water from Pense.
The garden has shrunk but all is planted. Spinach, lettuce, kale, dill, cucumber, carrots, potatoes, beets, garlic, peas, 3 different kinds of onion, zucchini, squash, Radish’s, pumpkins. We have everything.
The Cherry, haskap (Honey berries) , apple, plumb, trees are budding leaves.
We have a new chicken coop this year made by Jeff. Kelly Decided to up the number of chickens. More chickens, means they needed more space. Jeff magically made the plans up in his head and built it from there. It turned out amazing!
Also new to the chicken fair grounds we’re trying in ground gardens with coop wire over top. This is so the chickens can at the greens but not destroy the plants. We planted different lettuces, spinach, chard, beets, cucumbers and a few more.
Kelly’s spice garden planted by the trailer. This year Kelly planted (experiment saved seeds) pea seeds. Onions, chocolate mint, dill, garlic chives, chives, snow onions, basil, parsley, lemon thyme catnip, saffron and there’s more to come.
We have finally picked out new strawberry patch location. We’ve been humming and hawing on a new place to put them. The old place was downing in grass and wasn’t producing garden. We are only on the first layer. If you know where there are some excellent rocks let us knowing. So after a few years we came up with something! A strawberry rock pile.See our previous years in gardening
Some of the silly stuff we come up with
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Garden 2019
Garden 2019 was huge in spite of lack of water!
This year we planted the entire Garden plot!
In the Garden 2019 we grew cucumbers, corn, raddish, (yellow, purple, green) beans, soy beans, swiss chard, spinach, lettuce, (yellow, green) zucchini, (heirloom, orange, purple) carrots, (green arrow, sugaranne, sugarsnap, mixed)peas, (red, yellow, mixed)potatoes, dill, cucamelon, garlic, onions, peppers, hot peppers, Spaghetti squash, pumpkins, beets, Dads tomatoes,
Added tomatoes along the one grapevine row.
Volunteer:
Tomato, spinach, sunflowers, chard, dill, watermelon, squash, borage
Annual:
Asparagus (not producing yet), chives, snow onions
Fruit Trees/Shrubs/Plants
Kelly had to nurse the goji berries back from a hard winter. We’re still searching for the perfect spot to put the strawberries. This year we had ground nests in them so we had no great opportunity to get to the berries.The ones we do find are tiny. We got a sandwich bag of hascaps. Lots of plumb and apples, cherries and a few grapes
Added
2 Black currant plants, 2 Rhubarb, Gooseberry
Canning
Pickled:
cucumbers, swiss chard stems, beans, eggs, peppers
Pressure canned:
Beans
Frozen:
Peas, spinach
Some ideas for seeds:
See all of our garden adventures!
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Farm Jam 2019
FARM JAM We had burgers, weenies, trout, salmon, potato salad, Mexican street corn salad, baked beans, amy’s dip, veggie, fruit and cheese platters and more! Cold water and juice machines!
Sunday we had a few people come out for breakfast. We have 4 dozen farm fresh eggs, hash browns, Toast (done on the Rollertoaster courtesy of Jeff Casemore)
I didn’t get any pictures! So if you have some. Post them! These are from Alex Marz
THANK YOU, THank YOU to everyone who came! The chickens thank you more! We have enough food left over we could have another one!
If you missed out, we’re usually always out at the farm and it’s CHERRY season so come visit.
Now from the farm expect: Zuccinnis we will be pushing them on you.
We had:
– BIOFLEX by Auntie Meg!
– Cherries, peas, lettuce, spinach, radishes and more ready to pick!
– The Go Kart
– Potato Canon
– Chickens ready to be chased
– Ping pong and foosball
– Stage, microphones, guitars, bongo drums etc.
– & TV to watch the Rider gameRead more about the farm
See videos of our latest creations
See our favorite photos -
Farm Jam 2019
Hi there friends and family,
Farm Jam 2019 will be on Saturday July 20th this year.
Location to farm Jam 2019 can be found on our website, as always. Visit the website to see last year’s event. It was lots of fun. Thanks to neighbour Jeff for the drone videos.
We invite all to bring their singing and playing talents of all levels to give it a shot on stage in the quonset. From beginners to so called experts are welcome to participate.
Bring your campers or tents for the weekend. We will supply hot dogs and burgers on Saturday night. We also supply power, out house and a spot for your bottles if required. Cherries will probably be ripe by then and feel free to pick a few.Hope to see you there,
Malcolm.
