Knecht’s

Yesterday afternoon, we received several calls at home from people who had gone by a severe auto accident on Hwy 3, south of Northfield. Details we received from the State Patrol were a little sketchy as yet, but apparently one vehicle blew a tire, and this created an accident where a mini-van went into the ditch and hit a row of our trees in our Hwy 3 field. A semi truck carrying hay bales was also involved. How it happened - is still unclear to us at this point. The person in the minivan that hit the trees was airlifted, but according to the State Patrol officer, he felt that he would be okay. Our thoughts and prayers are with that person.

This is just another reminder to practice defensive driving. A nice afternoon, with dry roads, and an accident like this can happen. Drive safely!

We had our little grandsons on Saturday and what fun we had! Grandpa decided to show them where we get the firewood from. We put the truck in 4 wheel drive, and off into the woods we went. We downed a hickory tree, cut it up and split it all out in the woods while the boys watched. They then helped us put the wood in the truck and take it out to stack it. What an experience! They were fascinated and ready to help.

After we warmed up, it was outside again to make snowmen. The snow wasn’t quite sticky enough, so we had to improvise a little and use a shovel to help him stick together.

Last weekend, we were invited for the weekend up to Mike and Marie Hero’s home in Grand Marais to enjoy some of the winter snow - since the North Shore has over 3 feet of the white stuff! We journeyed up the Gunflint Trail to Bearskin Lodge where they have miles and miles of exceptional groomed cross country ski trails.

On Sunday we experienced a Lake Superior snow storm. The ice crystals on the lake roared with the waves and we ended up the day with about six inches of snow. We spent time in front of the fireplace and then went snowshoeing!

It was a fun weekend getaway. Grand Marais is only 5-6 hours away depending on the stops you make between here and there. What a wonderful place to enjoy our great Minnesota winters. Check out the famed Gunflint Trail.

On Saturday, we will be participating the the 2nd Annual Lonsdale Chamber of Commerce Business Expo. They will hold this great event at the Lonsdale American Legion Club which is located on North Main Street in Lonsdale. They will have businesses of all types featured with booths and displays all over within the American Legion. Lonsdale is a growing community and their Business Expo is a great way of showing all of their new residents the diversity of businesses located in or near their new homes! There will be Home and Garden type displays, Food Vendors, Service type businesses, Ag and much more!

Stop by and say hello to Heidi Gervais, our retail manager, who will be answering questions and handing out some early season coupons!

Make an outing of the day in the Lonsdale area! The Lonsdale area is rich in Czech history - the weather is supposed to be sunny & warm - explore a little!

I’m sure everybody has heard the tale of the shoemaker’s children having no shoes. Well, this same theory is true of the nurseryman’s trees. They get neglected as well. We have a small orchard of apple trees at home with 37 trees currently. We have lost some and replaced them with smaller ones and in this process, the larger ones have gotten neglected. On Saturday, Todd Harvey of Fireside Orchards here in Northfield was most gracious to come out and give us some advice on the pruning of apple trees.

Todd Harvey (on right), Leif (middle) and our newest employee, Jim Westlund, discuss the pruning techniques to shape these trees up to enable them to produce bigger and better fruit. Other factors we discovered is that when you are pruning apple trees so that you can harvest fruit, is that you want to prune into the tree “picking lanes” so that you can easily set up a ladder from which to pick the apples. The trees need to be pruned in such a way as to allow the most possible light to all the branches. Todd recommends dwarf variety trees so you can easily pick the apples.

We will be finishing the pruning of our little orchard this weekend, and with this in mind, we will be putting a photo album onto the photo page which will show the before, during and after on the pruning of the trees, and I’ll also do my best to include pictures at apple blossom time and later in the season with the fruit on the same trees.

In our meadow at home, we have a small pond. This pond is not spring fed, so in dry summers it will almost disappear. In the spring we will have a family of ducks who move on somewhere as soon as the little ones appear on the scene and that is about it. Yesterday when we came home from church, we saw a large flock of Canada Geese swimming around the pond. This was the first time that we have had this many geese all at once.
It was alot of fun to see a sight like this!

Another sign of Spring???

This business is insanely busy during the growing season. However, one of our passions is canoeing in the Boundary Waters! We’ll work for 60-70 days straight with no days off, and then head up north for 5 or 6 days of canoeing. We go into the wilderness as far as we can for the length of time that we have to work with. Leif has been thinking of getting a lighter canoe which would be easier to portage, and one which we’ll have for years! Last Thursday - with 48 degree weather - we journeyed up to Brooklyn Park to Ketter Canoe. Ken Ketter took us up to Monticello on the Mississippi below the power plant where the warm water keeps the river from freezing. We tried out two different canoes and had a wonderful time. This is one activity that definitely makes the winter a little shorter! I guess if we can’t cross country ski - we’ll canoe!
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We have received many inquiries already for spring and summer work. We are fortunate to be able to offer employment to a Dakota Vo-Tech student.

Leif and I are often asked what we do “all winter” when we’re closed. We actually continue to work 40 hour weeks all winter long with the different tasks it takes to run the many different operations of our business. Today, was spent pretty much on advertising. Newspaper ad layouts, meeting with our graphic designer, the different publications we’re going to be in during the next year, the upcoming Home and Garden Show and the changes we’re making to our website!

One of the magazines we’re advertising in again this year and is a fantastic resource for the home gardener is The Northern Gardener magazine published by the Minnesota State Horticultural Society. http://www.northerngardener.org/ For those of you who are dreaming of getting back out to your gardens to work and plant something new will find this well worth your time!

One of the very exciting additions to our website that we accomplished today was the addition of an “Audio Blog”. An audio blog is just that - you listen to some thoughts and ideas that Leif has to share. When you’d like to add a blog to your website and you’re not at the computer - you can do it this way just calling in and recording an “audio blog”.