Thursday, March 29, 2012

Holy Raging Radishes Batman! And other yard news...

I'm like a little kid when it comes to planting seeds.  When I look inside my greenhouse and see something sprouting that I just planted a few days ago, I get excited.  I'm also a bit impatient, which is probably why I get so silly when I see something happening.  Once I plant my garden, I go out there every day to see if I have any vegetables actually growing.  So yesterday, impatient me was peeking into one of the trays of pots and discovered that the radishes are going crazy in there!!  Little sprouts all over the place.  I'm not sure why I planted radishes, as I am not a big fan, but I like the way they look.  And I suppose, in times if crisis, they are better than nothing to eat.  Scarlett O'Hara might disagree on that one.  A few other things are pushing the surface dirt, so by the weekend there should be more stuff sprouting.

Big plans for next week!  It is Spring Break and it is time to get our wild jungle of a yard in order.  It's not even a jungle, as that conjures up visions of green, lush vegetation.  The only thing that is green and lush are the weeds.  Dry winter + spring rain storms + fabulous temperatures in the 70's = prolific WEEDS!!!!!!  The photo below is my beloved veggie garden...so much work to do!  Good thing Husband and I have 10 days off (snort!).


And this is after I pulled the weeds 2 weeks ago.  Grrrrrr....

The rest of the yard is either green with weeds, or brown with death.  I guess the hot summer, the lack of proper watering apparatus, our lack of standing outside for hours on end with a hose, the dry winter, and the stupid grasshopper infestation from last year all contributed to our hideous color palette.  I don't really understand what happened to some of the trees.  The top portion of the trees are dead...as a door-nail dead...the bottoms are sprouting like crazy.  Ugh. Not sure what to do with these.  



The ones that are completely dead are just getting cut down.  No replacements either.  That requires water, which as previously mentioned, is an issue where we live.  "Storm Warn 30" told us that because of the lack of storms (although when it rained...sprinkled...last week, the weatherman treated it like it was a typhoon), we will have a dry summer.  Not shocking news, as summers here are always dry.  None of the dead trees are really all that valuable anyway.  The trees on this property appear to have been placed in the back of a pickup truck, then the truck was driven as fast as possible to make the trees fall out.  Then they were planted in the exact random spot where they fell out.  Probably not the way it happened, but that's the way it looks to me.  If it had been up to me (and if I owned all of this property), there would have been some useful fruit trees and more shade trees.  Instead we have nonsense like this:


And this:


And of course, this:

I just don't even understand this.  So random.

In any case, we have our work cut out for us this next week.  Slave labor will be in full force (she is not looking forward to this), and I'm hoping for pleasant weather.  I will post before and after shots when we have finished everything.  Go us!!






















Tuesday, March 27, 2012

Poultry update!

With the onset of spring weather, the chickens have been quite prolific layers lately.  I think, however, that someone in the coop is not measuring up to the current production standards, as we seem to be one or two eggs short of the actual chicken count.  Coop Mama (not sure which buff that is, or if they take turns) has been cheerfully sitting on a small mound of eggs every day when I get home and check,  She (for the moment I will assume its just one Coop Mama) still protests loudly when I stick my cold hand under her to get the eggs.  The best part is when I get a couple of eggs, and move the rest away from her, she uses her beak to push the eggs back under her.  She's pretty fast.  I wish they would understand that those eggs will never become babies and we might as well enjoy them.  I guess it could be quite traumatic to have your "children" taken from you every day.

We've been averaging 10 eggs a day and the colors are beautiful.  Green, white, tan, brown, and tan with speckles.  I am still amazed at the fact that the hens have all of these eggs up inside of them.  Where do they keep them??  I'll look that up here shortly.  The suspense is killing me.

Saturday, I went out to the coop to collect eggs and found something funny.  Among all the large and extra large eggs, was this little(!!) egg.  Husband said it must have come out accidentally...sort of like passing gas.  Probably surprised the chicken.  I have visions of her walking along, feeling a little discomfort, going to relieve the pain, and whoops....out comes this little gem.  I put it in the carton with the other eggs, and it looks...well...small.

A midget among giants.


Not so much...

Ha ha, well, of course, I wanted to know if the little egg looked the same on the inside.  Yeah, I know...weird.  I cracked it and it had the tiniest yolk I've ever seen.  I felt a little like Alice in Wonderland.  We didn't eat it...that seemed wrong somehow.  


I took a break, and as promised, I Googled the reproductive system of a chicken.  Appears simple, yet so complex.  The eggs must develop at a breakneck speed in there.  I'm still in awe.  Makes me want to go in the coop and congratulate each hen individually...okay, not really.  But still quite impressive.  


About time to head home and see what awaits me in the realm of chickens and vegetables!  Can't wait!



Monday, March 26, 2012

I think I've got this!! Well...maybe...

Okay, blogging for realsies now!  No more month long gaps in the action.  I think I might have overcome the feeling that I'm a total failure at this vegetable gardening thing too.  Proof is below!! 


Cucumbers, squash, and soy beans!!  Woo hoo!!

Peas, brussel sprouts, and a variety of tomatoes!

I did a little Googling and found out that while greenhouses are nice and effective when closed up, the plants inside also need to have fresh air and sunshine.  Who knew??  Well, obviously many people must know that.  I know now, so away we go!  

This weekend, Husband and I finally had some time off.  I decided it was high time to get all those other seeds planted that I feel compelled to buy every time I walk into Walmart or Tractor Supply.  I had purchased a ton of peat pots and soil and set up my planting area on the porch.  After filling all the pots with soil, I watered them thoroughly, let them soak through, and then watered them again...another rookie mistake on my part in the past.  After a while, I went out and methodically planted the seeds.  By methodically, I mean I very carefully counted out seeds for each pot.  I make a point of this, because again, in my previous rookie state, I would just dump seeds in and then wonder later why nothing is sprouting.  Dumb.  So, after counting carefully, putting vegetables near others that can easily be friends, and labeling each row so I don't wonder what the heck is this stuff, I watered the babies very carefully.  Yup, did that last time too...turned the water on so hard, half of the seeds flew out with the majority of the soil.  

I was able to put several trays in the greenhouse, but there wasn't room for these.  They will stay out on the porch in the "diffused" sunlight, so I think they will be okay.  I managed to plant quite a variety of things...more squash, beans, cucumbers, pickling cucumbers, peppers (red & green varieties), artichokes, spinach, lettuce, kale, bok choy, radishes, onions, cantaloupe, watermelon, and mini pumpkins.  More herbs too...rosemary, as my first efforts were part of the epic fail, and a couple of others that are now escaping my memory.
All tucked away in the greenhouse.

And now to wait...

Hopefully, this venture will be successful.  Of course, using up all the pots and soil did not deter me from buying three more seed packets yesterday at Walmart...he he he.  At least I'm on the upside of the learning curve.  I think...



Tuesday, March 6, 2012

Epic Fail

So, I am feeling like a not so Future Farmer of America...the term "epic fail" comes to mind.  I was really excited about sowing my vegetable seeds and getting them in my little greenhouse.  I thought this would be a fairly easy task...by easy, I meant that I would put the trays in the greenhouse, water occasionally, and miraculously, seeds would sprout, thus saving me from hours of wandering the aisles of Orchard Supply Hardware looking for vegetables...which everyone knows I HATE (sarcasm) doing.

It seems this sowing seeds and letting them sprout naturally is much harder than it appears.  I thought seeds would know what to do, but it seems they need much more coddling than I have been giving.  I'm not sure why the pesky weeds seed themselves with ease and my vegetable seeds are struggling with this concept.  (I see a correlation between seeds and society...)  Okay, back to the issue at hand...first of all, I had incorrectly assumed that the moisture level in the greenhouse would be fairly high even if I did not water daily.  Apparently, this is a very delicate balance.  I discovered the day after gleefully seeing corn sprouts, that if one doesn't provide adequate water, the seedlets turn an irreversible shade of brown and die.  Ugh.  I tossed those, went to Walmart and purchased new trays and seeds.  Of course, I managed to come home with more seeds than just corn...weird.  Replanted in those little peat disks...I'm not a fan.  Still waiting for sprouts.  The peat disks are just dumb...you add water to them and they poof up to epic proportions.  Then you are supposed to break the netting, ruffle up the "soil", plant the seeds and then hopefully get seedlets.  Yeah, I must be peat disk challenged, or they just suck.  I'm opting for the latter explanation.

There has been some minor success though.  What has sprouted are all the varieties of squash, some tomatoes, some brussel sprouts, cucumber, beans, and peas.  The herbs are either taking their sweet time, or are just not going to do it.  I'm a very impatient gardener.  I don't do well in wait and see situations.   I have a plan for my herbs this year, however, which involves the boy getting me some half wine barrels.  I think instead of letting them cook in the sun all day, I'm going to plant them in the barrels and place them along the porch railing so I can hook up drip to them.  We'll see...lofty aspirations at this point.  The garden isn't even in a position to plant at this point.  There has been little rain, so I'm pretty sure a jack hammer might be in order.  Husband will be so thrilled.

Signing off now and wishing I had given the seedlets more water this morning...Hopefully, they won't be too sad .