RAMBLINGS

I know it’s been a while since I posted, but I promise I’ve been busy.

This past week or so, I have been clearing out spent plants, and harvesting and watering the plants that are still producing. I’m done with watering though. I am so cucumbered and peppered and tomatoed out that if Mother Nature doesn’t water the remaining plants and keep them alive, so be it.

I harvested the last of the potatoes – two pots of French Fingerling and one pot of Red Nordling. I didn’t realize how much better home-grown potatoes taste than the ones from the grocery store.

Last weekend and this weekend we disassembled the in-ground garden. I have given it a chance for two years now and am not satisfied with the results. I’ve decided to stick with my pots and containers and raised beds and will not continue with the in-ground garden.

As you may remember, I tried to grow a block of corn this year (after last year’s dissatisfaction with the Three Sisters Garden) but most of the corn did not germinate (or, maybe something ate the seeds?) and the weeds utterly took over. I did get to enjoy a few peas from the space in the spring (though not as many as I planted), a few sunflowers made a valiant effort, and the cosmos did splendidly until the last month when the weeds even overtook those. So, we took down the fence and the trellises, pulled up the cardboard (that did little to hold back the weeds), and mowed the whole thing down.

I’m considering planting a cover crop so there is not so much loose dirt to attract ants, etc., but we’ll see if that happens.

It was also time to change the bedding in the Chicken Tractor. You can’t really use the deep-litter method in this set-up though I was able to add fresh bedding on top of the old every few days which allowed it to last for a few weeks. So today I cleared it all out and replaced it with fresh bedding. The chickens will be sleeping in clean sheets tonight!

Now that the chickens are in the Chicken Tractor, we are taking the opportunity to update and do some maintenance on the main chicken coop. The coop was originally built three years ago, the run was added two years ago. Since that time, the two have been connected by a piece of unpainted plywood shoved between the two. We were able to remove those connecting boards and cut them to size, paint them, and reattach them. We also painted the coop. It’s original coat of Kilz paint was definitely looking shabby. There are still a few things to work on, but this is what we’ve accomplished so far.

I admit, looking at this in the North Carolina sunshine is painful. You end up with spots in your eyes. I bet it will be cheerful to see in winter though. I had a neighbor in Cheyenne who unintentionally painted her whole house this color, not realizing how bright it would be. When she saw it, she apologized to all the neighbors. I thought it was funny, but she was horrified.

The goats left this weekend. They were put in the first section Saturday, August 26th, for a week. They were finished with it by Thursday. You haven’t lived until you’ve experienced a bunch of goats yelling at you that they are hungry. Thankfully, the farm brought some hay out to hold them until Saturday.

When they came out Saturday (the 2nd), to move the goats to the next section, they took Bonnie home and left just Clyde, Pepper, and Oreo. You’d think being down a goat and a whole new section of undergrowth would help. No. They had everything cleared out by Monday and were – you guessed it – yelling at me again.

Smarter this time, Oscar and I took to cutting down leafy branches and trees from other areas of the property to toss into their pen. This satisfied them … until it didn’t. Tuesday evening, we gave them a bigger-than-ever pile of leafy branches thinking it would last until the next evening. When I let Timmy out the next morning and everything was gone though, I knew we were in trouble. They had eaten everything, and we wouldn’t be able to give them more until we returned from work in the evening. I called in reinforcements and the farm brought a whole bushel of hay to help out. The rest of the week was quiet.

I must say I had mixed feelings when they left this Saturday. On the one hand, they were personable (especially Clyde), did a good job, and I enjoyed visiting with them. Keeping them happily fed though was a trick I did not quite master!

The compost pile is climbing high as I add the end of season garden waste. Since I have no free source of aged manure, this year’s additions will not be usable for two or three years.

I have looked into getting sheep or rabbits on the property for manure production, but in truth, feeding an animal simply for its poop does not make economic sense. Yes, rabbits can be used for meat production, and I do enjoy the occasional rabbit stew, but after Oscar’s scalped bunny incident a couple years ago, I don’t think I could do my own butchering.

I even looked into angora rabbits. With these you, rather than use them for meat, you harvest the hair (imagine combing a bunch of rabbits), spin it into a luxurious yarn, and then sell it at a hefty (specialty product) price. I managed to pull myself out of that rabbit hole (yes, a pun) when I saw the price of a spinning wheel and my sister reminded me that I’m probably allergic to the rabbits.

Sorry, that was all to say: I cold-compost my yard waste which takes a long time to break down.

I need to focus for a while on food preservation as there is a lot of backlog in my fridge and I don’t want to waste any of it.