Remember back when I said the garden was DONE! I was wrong. That was just the eye of the storm. It was calm and quiet for a few weeks. It was so quiet, in fact, that we even sneaked away for a long weekend of vacation — since there wasn’t much happening here. Maybe it was the extreme heat followed by the unseasonably cool weather that stunted the production of tomatoes, peppers and squash; but now they are back with a vengeance.
I came back from vacation to find a garden full of ripe red tomatoes, red and green peppers and more squash! In fact, I picked 14.5 POUNDS of tomatoes. Time to get busy canning again!
Thankfully — we weren’t affected by the hurricanes…But we’re in the middle of a tomato tornado
Isn’t it enough that we have a chicken coop? Now we need a chicken shed too?
We’ve been using a plastic storage bin that was intended for lawn furniture cushions. It has more than exceeded its life expectancy. The squirrels have taken a toll on it – nibbling to get inside to the chicken food. We knew we needed to replace it, we just hadn’t found the right thing – until the other day.
I was leaving the Amish farm market where I sometimes stop to indulge in their freshly baked sticky buns, and there it was with a “For Sale” sign. They called it a “trash condo” – intended for trash and recycle bins – but it was just the right size for the five gallon buckets of chicken feed, bird seed and chicken treats (yes, the chickens get treats). We went back out over the weekend (really an excuse for more sticky buns), so I could show it to Chris – and bought the thing.
Then another trip out on Monday to pick it up (really an excuse for MORE sticky buns). Chris was quick to point out just how useful his truck and trailer are. For a little shed – it’s heavy. It’s not like we could just lift it up and put it down. After a lot of maneuvering, we finally got it loaded, home, unloaded, settled in place, and all set up with the chicken food and paraphernalia stored inside. Now the chickens can have their treats. I went inside and ate a sticky bun – because I think I earned it.
This box has got to go!So we brought this cute little shed home.It doesn’t look that big, but it was a project to get it into place.I definitely earned this treat!
I thought harvest time would be in October – but here we are, barely into September, and my “root cellar” is nearly full already. I don’t really have a root cellar – I have a basement. And the basement door has a sign over it that says “wine cellar.” It’s not really a wine cellar either. I’m not sure what the basement is other than dark and damp and cool. I guess that makes it the perfect place for a root cellar and a wine cellar.
We’ve dug up the potatoes, harvested most of the winter squash, canned the tomato sauce and put up a year’s worth of pickles and jams – and it’s all stored in the root cellar/wine cellar/basement. It can be a bit inconvenient to traipse outside to go to the basement/root cellar when all I need is a couple of potatoes for dinner – but as long as I’m there, it’s a good thing that it’s a wine cellar too.
The “fruits” of our labors – jams and pie fillings.Pickles and tomato sauce.Butternut squash, butter cup squash, spaghetti squash and acorn squash.And lots of potatoes!
That’s funny. There’s always work on the farm, especially on Labor Day — a day off from work… so we can work!
The calendar changed to September and so did the weather. It’s cool (actually chilly!), and the garden seems to be winding down. There are still some tomatoes and peppers, and we’re waiting for that fall crop of salsify, but everything else is DONE! Even the corn. We didn’t exactly get a bumper crop. We had maybe two dinners with our own corn. I wouldn’t exactly call it corn on the cob. It was more like corn on coblettes. They were short, stubby cobs with a kind of starchy, rather than sweet tasting corn. It wasn’t the best thing to come out of the garden. But all was not lost. The best harvest from the corn was yet to come! The corn stalks!
Now, we’re ready for fall.
The corn wasn’t much of a meal.But the corn stalks look pretty for our fall decorations. Even our “pet” crow thinks so.Can summer really be over already?
Spring and early summer went so fast. I got a late start on my seeds since the greenhouse didn’t arrive until mid-March. By the end of June the greenhouse was empty — except for some weeds growing up from the floor. Seriously! I have enough weeding to do in my outside garden spaces.
I washed all the pots in a bucket of soapy water and let them dry so they’ll be ready for next spring. It’s kind of sad seeing it empty. Maybe I can start some seeds for a fall planting — there’s always spinach or lettuce. And I wonder how hot-house tomatoes might taste at Thanksgiving!
Weeds! In my greenhouse!A good scrub to get rid of slugs and creepy, crawly thingsAll cleaned up and drying in the sunshine — ready for next spring.
The gardens are overflowing, and it’s not even the end of June yet! Already I’m up to my elbows in canning and freezing. When the plants were so tiny, it seemed like a good idea to plant a lot of them. There was so much space between them in the garden that I couldn’t imagine them filling it in. Even Chris commented that I hadn’t over-planted this year and there was actually space to walk between the rows. I was proud of myself for my restraint, but with two gardens to fill, I didn’t feel the need to shoe-horn stuff in like I’ve done in the past. This year would be different. A spacious garden, everything in it’s place, perfectly placed rows — I could picture it in my mind.
Then came lots of rain and hot sunny days, and the garden took on a life of its own. I think I must have bought my bean seeds from Jack, and the cucumbers too. The vines are reaching for the sky. I keep piling them onto up-side down tomato cages to give them something to climb on and still they grow. I’m thinking in investing in a bunch of extension ladders to line the garden rows so everything can just keep growing and growing and growing.
I thought a variety of squash would be fun this year — butternut, acorn, spaghetti, etc. Again I exercised such restraint. I only planted about four plants of each. They were barely a few leaves tall, with lots of space between each plant. Now, the garden is so overgrown with vines that it will take a machete to fight my way through to harvest them. What was I thinking?
Already there are cherry tomatoes, peas, beans, beets, zucchini, cucumbers, broccolini, scallions and spinach. Even if we were vegetarians, we wouldn’t be able to keep us with what is coming in — and so every other night or so, you’ll find me in the kitchen freezing and canning… canning and freezing. There’s nothing better than seeing the freezer fill up, or hearing the mason jar lids ping when they seal. And maybe this winter I’ll be glad I apparently over-planted the garden, but for right now… I’m not so sure.
The tomatoes are outgrowing their cages.Even the tomatoes are ripening already.How am I even going to get into this squash patch to pick my squash?Almost enough cucs to make pickles already.Just a few beets for dinner.And peas to freeze.
There is a big round pipe from the well that sticks up about a foot high in the middle of our front yard. You’d think there would have been a less conspicuous spot to drill a well on our five acres — but I guess the well-drilling company’s prevailing wisdom said they would find water in the front yard — and they did, 400 feet down. The well-pipe is an eye-sore and I’ve been wanting to find a way to camouflage it for some time now.
On Friday I made my weekly run to the my local Amish market. I try my hardest to stay out of the adjoining garden center — because there is always an impulse buy, and heaven-knows, I don’t need any more garden plants right now. But right there, right in front of the garden center was a well cover. Not only a well cover — but one exactly like I’ve been invisioning — with an actual well pump on top of it. I wedged my groceries into the front seat of the car, flipped down the back seat and opened the back hatch. There was only ONE there and I wasn’t going to risk coming back on Saturday with Chris and the pick-up truck. I wanted it now.
So now I have a swell well cover — and a new flag, just in time for Memorial Day!
An eyesore in the front yardThe perfect well cover for a farm!No more eyesore and a new flag! Happy Memorial Day.
Our porch is a popular spot. We love sitting out there in the evenings after a hard day of work in the garden and watching the birds, the deer, and occasionally a skunk wander through the yard. But things are getting a little too up close and personal.
The bats have returned. I begged and pleaded to have Chris squirt some Great Stuff, or stuff some chicken wire up into the crack between the house and the porch roof when the bats had gone to their winter home. I even offered to buy them a bat condominium and hang it some where NOT near the front porch. But Chris seems to like his pet bats — right where they are — hanging somewhere above my head, and leaving bat dropping near the front door.
They have been joined by some wasps who have decided to attach their home to the ceiling of the porch, a few spiders weaving their webs — and a very determined Robin. This Robin started with a few sprigs of loose straw between each and every eave all the way down the length of the porch. Apparently Chris doesn’t like Robins as much as he likes bats, so he took the blower to the porch and in a poof — blew the starts of the nests away. The next morning, the straw was back. He blew it away. The next morning the straw was back again, mixed with wet mud to glue the start of these nests to the rafters. He blew it away again — though a bit messier as the mud splattered onto the porch. And so it went for several days until Chris gave up — on one nest. They appear to have reached a compromise. The Robin has consolidated her efforts to that one nest — and Chris told her she can stay.
A squirt of wasp spray got rid of the wasps, a broom took care of the spider webs, the Robins have one nest — all I have to deal with now are the bats. Great.
Looks like a good place for a nest.The Robin won — Chris let this nest stay.
We aren’t into having a lot of flower gardens or landscaping that needs to be tended. We’re too busy with the vegetable garden, the fruit trees, the chickens and the bees. But we did need something to hide an unsightly hillside just off the back patio, and a little perky color in the springtime would be a nice sight to banish the cold and snow.
We recycled some old railroad ties that we found in the lower pasture and cobbled together a bit of a retaining wall (let’s just hope it continues to “retain”), filled it in with some bags of soil and planted four Forsythia bushes. My Dad hated Forsythia bushes, not that he hated spring flowers, but he hated the way the bushes spread every year. I think it will be good that they spread, in fact, a hedge of these bushes would be great!
Spaced behind our retaining wall to hide the hillside.Filled in with some top soil.I hope it spreads out to hide that hillside.It looks nice from the patio.
I didn’t think we needed a pick-up truck, but I will confess, it has come in handy a couple of times. It’s great to throw things in the truck bed and off we go — bags of dirt, Forsythia bushes, even shelving for my greenhouse. But I really DON’T think we need a trailer too. I mean, isn’t that what the bed of the pick-up truck is for?
But I got out-voted, and now we have the cutest little trailer. I think it might be good for hauling a goat — but I think Chris envisions using it to take in his John Deere tractor in for service — if it ever needs servicing. Of course, they can come pick up your John Deere tractor for servicing — if it ever needs servicing, and you don’t have to have a trailer — but — just in case, now we have one.
A cute little trailer — not too big, not too small — just right.With a gate on the back so “some day” we can drive the tractor up into the trailer, just in case it needs servicing.Good thing we have this pick-up truck with a hitch on the back.No room in the garage for the trailer.
No Rhyme or Reason Farm 