Category Archives: Gardening

An Interesting Morning at the Farm

Bees, Bunnies, Gardening, Reflections, The Farm, , , ,

Graden Update

When my husband and I arrived at the farm yesterday morning we decided a garden tour was in order before we began working on our to-do list. It had only been a couple days since I had checked the progress in the gardens (my husband visits and/or works in them daily) but it seems they have grown in leaps and bounds since I last saw them.

The summer heat and intermittent rain has done wonders.

Everything is lush and green and many things are either flowering or fruiting.

So far we have harvested small amounts of Swiss chard a couple times to have with our dinner.

We now have some banana peppers ready to harvest and within the next week I expect to start harvesting green beans and cucumbers.

It won’t be long before the potatoes are ready to come out of the ground, but first we will harvest the garlic and get it drying in the barn.

I Could Hardley Believe What I Was Seeing

We see a lot of interesting and strange things at the farm and I don’t always carry my camera, so I don’t get pictures of everything. This first story is one of those times.

One of my tasks this morning was using our weed-burning torch to burn off some of the weeds around the edge of the pond. It’s quite common for frogs to be hidden in these weeds and jump into the water to avoid the danger, so when I saw/heard the splash I wasn’t surprised. I was however surprised as I watched a small furry animal pop up and begin swimming across the pond. It was a baby bunny, not much bigger than my hand. I didn’t know rabbits could swim. It was a tense couple of minutes, and I prayed “Lord don’t let it drown” as I watched it doggie bunny paddle the whole width (approximately 30 yards or 27.432 meters) of the pond. I lost sight of it for about half a minute when it exited the pond on the other side. Then I saw it scamper off into the woods. I would have felt so terrible if the little critter hadn’t survived. When I told my husband what I had witnessed he exclaimed, “No way!” But it really did happen.

A while later my husband also had an “I don’t believe it event”.

This is the first year since 2013 that we didn’t start off the year with bees in our hives. After losing two more hives over the winter, we made the decision in the early spring not to spend the money to buy more bees.

For the past several weeks I have been hearing my husband express his regrets about not getting bees. We have seen a few honeybees foraging on the farm but not nearly as many as when we have one or more hives there.

The two hives were still set up where we kept the bees last year. The weeds/wildflowers were growing up around them, so my husband’s task was to weed whip around them. When he finished the weed whipping, he announced to me “the bees are back”. “No way!” I exclaimed as I headed toward to hive. Sure enough, bees were coming and going as if this were their home. We’ll know for sure in the next few days if this was a swarm of bees that has decided to use this hive as their new home. Free bees how cool is that?

Thanks for visiting.

Monthly Inspiration

Gardening, Inspiration, Reflections

Hello and Welcome. WOW! July is upon us and already the year is half over. Today I’m sharing some inspiration for our gardening season.

“A garden is a grand teacher. It teaches patience and careful watchfulness; it teaches industry and thrift; above all, it teaches entire trust.” – Gertrude Jekyll

“Gardens are not made by singing ‘Oh, how beautiful!’ and sitting in the shade.” – Rudyard Kipling

“A garden requires patient labor and attention. Plants do not grow merely to satisfy ambitions or to fulfill good intentions. They thrive because someone expended effort on them.” – Liberty Hyde Bailey

“Gardening is cheaper than therapy and you get tomatoes.” – Unknown

“The Earth laughs in flowers.” – Ralph Waldo Emerson

“If you have a garden and a library, you have everything you need.” – Cicero

Thanks for visiting and Happy July!

The Pump is in the Pond – Our Off Grid Irrigation System

Gardening, Off Grid Irrigation, Reflections, The Farm, Windmill,

Hello and welcome.

In a previous post I mentioned that we would soon be putting the pump in the pond so we could water our gardens when necessary. I also told you that my husband had said it was my turn this year to put the pump in. Let me start by explaining how this works.

Each spring when it’s getting close to time to put the pump in the pond we have a conversation like this:

My Husband: It’s your turn to put the pump in the pond.

Me: Okay as soon as we have 3 consecutive days of 80-degree F (26.6C) temperatures so the water warms up.

My Husband: Puts the pump in the pond even though the water is still colder than is comfortable.

OR

My Husband: It’s your turn to put the pump in the pond.

Me: No. It was my turn last year.

My Husband: I did it last year.

Me: I know, but it was still my turn last year, so it is your turn this year.

My Husband: Puts the pump in the pond.

THIS YEAR

My Husband: Are you ready to put the pump in the pond tomorrow?

Me: I told my readers I would take pictures and blog about it. I can’t take pictures while I’m in the pond.

My Husband: Puts the pump in the pond.

The truth is while I know how to put the pump in the pond and could probably do it if I had to, it’s one of those jobs that my husband is willing to undertake. (He’s a great guy!)

Dual Purpose Windmill

If you’ve been following my blog for a while you have likely seen pictures of our windmill. Some readers might also remember that our windmill is used both to aerate the pond and pump water out of the pond for irrigating our crops.

Aeration

The windmill works to aerate the pond year-round.

In the above photo the bubbles in the water are cause by the windmill.

In the above photo the hoses attached to the windmill run down into the pond where they are attached to porous devices called stones. We have two stones located in different areas of the pond. When the wind makes the windmill turn, air is pumped through the hoses and comes out the stones and into the water, thus providing much needed oxygen.

Irrigation

We only pump water for irrigation during spring and summer (the growing season). This year we put the pump in the pond on Wednesday, June 4. Below is a picture of the pump that we use in the pond.

Notice there are two valves. The one to the left is marked “To Windmill” (the words are upside down in the picture). A hose attaches to that valve and the other end of it attaches to one of the valves on the windmill. We unhook one of the aeration hoses since we do not aerate and pump water out at the same time.

The valve on the end is marked “out”. That is where the water is pumped out. A different hose is attached to that valve.

That metal piece on the right end has many small holes in it and is where water flows into the pump. The tube attached to the cap-like piece on the top is a vent.

When the pump is in the pond, bricks are placed on top of that long bar attached to the bottom to hold the pump in place.

Both hoses are attached before the pump is put in the pond.

This year the water wasn’t too cold. The pump will be fully submersed in several feet of water

expect for the vent tube.

I regret that I can’t show you, or tell you, how the magic works inside the pump. I just know that when the windmill pumps air in, water comes out. If the windmill is not turning, water does not come out. Also, when the windmill starts turning again a small amount of water squirts out the vent tube in the pond.

The hose that the water comes out of is run to one of our holding tanks. We have three tanks strategically located.

The hose is about 120 feet long, which is more than enough to reach any of the tanks.

The tank is filled through an opening in the top.

My husband installed spigots near the bottom of the tanks so we can attach a garden hose. We can use the garden hose to fill watering cans or sometimes we water plants directly from the hose.

Within a few minutes of having the pump installed water was running through the hose.

How fast we can fill a tank depends on how much wind we get and the wind direction. When we do not get enough rain to keep things watered, wind is the next best thing.

Thanks for visiting.

P.S. My husband just informed me that next year is my turn to put the pump in the pond. Uh, no. This year was my turn. 😉

Catching Up-Farm Update

Apples, Blueberries, Chickens, Chicks, Flowers, garden, Gardening, Grapes, Pond, Reflections, The Farm, Wild Flowers

To get caught up on my posts I’ll start with a look around the farm These pictures were actually from last week so I’m still a bit behind. 🙂

Chickens

Our youngest chick hatched on June 29th.

My husband named her or him (it’s still too early to tell if this is a hen or rooster) Strawberry because when he took the flock some strawberry tops that I had trimmed she grabbed one and gobbled it up. Strawberry was probably less than two weeks old at the time. He or she still sticks close to momma, not necessarily because it is still being trained or cared for by momma, but it doesn’t have anyone its own age to hang out with.

These are 2 of the chicks that hatched on May 12. They are beginning to look more like adult chickens and we are certain that one is a rooster. My husband even heard him try to crow one day.

Rex is our roo from last year. He is the daddy of all the chicks that hatched this year. He is a bit of an odd bird. He does the normal crowing sound of a rooster (Ur Ur Ur Ur URRRRR!) but also makes a loud cawing sound (Arrrr!) that I have never heard a rooster (or any chicken) make before.

What’s Blooming

Hibiscus in bloom.

Cosmos.

Wild flowers

The Pond

On some of these hot days I’ve found a dip in the pond quite refreshing and a pleasant way to get in a workout.

Garden News

Keeping the gardens alive has been a huge challenge this year. The weather has not been kind. Both June and July were very wet and all of the plants have been stressed at best. My husband has spent many hours weeding and fertilizing. Doing anything he could think of to keep things alive and growing.

I think he’s done an amazing job. I really thought we would have more crop loss than we have.

Acorn Squash

Another type of winter squash.

Sweet corn and Melons

Tomatoes (they may be small but they taste great!)

Sunflowers

Cucumbers and Eggplant

Green beans and Beets

Fruits

We had an amazing blueberry crop this year. We began picking in June and just finished picking last week. I lost track of how many we harvested as we were eating them fresh, freezing some and having friends and family pick and take what they wanted.

We have some apples that are looking good and if we can keep the birds away, we should have a decent harvest.

We also have a lot of grapes that are looking good.

We have put netting over them to try to save as many as possible for us. Homemade grape juice is one of our favorites!

Thanks for visiting.

Busy, Busy, Busy

Gardening, Making Curtains, New Shed, Reflections, Sewing

Hello and welcome!

The last few weeks have been very busy around here. That really isn’t uncommon for this time of year since it is gardening season. This year, however, our “busy” has included a couple other big projects that we have completed or nearly completed in the last two weeks. Are you ready for a look at what we’ve been up to?

Gardening

We waited until the last weekend in May, Memorial Day weekend, to begin planting our garden. It was a good decision since our last frost was earlier that week. On Saturday, May 27, we managed to get 48 tomatoes, 24 peppers, 24 cabbages, 12 broccoli and 12 cauliflowers planted – all plants that we had started from seed.

Keeping these plants watered then became a regular chore since we had no rain from that point until this past Sunday, June 11.

Later that week my husband went to the greenhouse and picked up a few additional plants – eggplant, kohlrabi, Swiss chard, celery and a couple of melons. We also put in the few peanut plants that I started from seed We did get a layer of straw mulch around the plants to help retain moisture and keep weeds down.

In the above raised beds we planted green bean and cucumber seeds, but we decided to wait on planting anymore seeds until we had rain in the forecast. We spent the next two weeks keeping the plants watered and watching the weather forecast. Since the forecast showed a good certainty of rain on Sunday, June 11, Saturday became planting day.

My husband planted two varieties of pumpkins and several varieties of winter squash. He also planted carrots, beets, Swiss chard, and dill. I planted a patch of sunflowers. We ended the day with a prayer asking the Lord to bless our efforts.

We were overjoyed and thankful when the rains came on Sunday. The gentle but steady rain soaked into the ground was accompanied by cooler temperatures that allowed the ground to retain the moisture. We’ve had more rain today (Tuesday) but not too much and we have rain in the forecast again on Thursday, so we do not anticipate having to water anything for a while.

Sewing Projects

In April, when Ken and Tina told us that they were buying a house, and had a closing date set in May, I asked if I could make curtains and matching pillowcases for Jackson’s and Addie’s bedrooms. Once they closed on the house, I asked Ken to measure the kid’s bedroom windows, then Tina and I took Jackson and Addie shopping at the fabric store.

Jackson selected this Mario cart fabric and a solid red trim and Addie, after much deliberation, picked out the pastel unicorn fabric with a pink glitter-infused fabric for trim.

I started by making the pillowcases using this tutorial that I have used in the past.

The curtains were my own design.

I added a 6-inch boarder (with the trim fabric) to the bottom of each panel and used the trim fabric to make the top loops for hanging.

In these pictures the curtains are hanging on windows in my home. The windows that they were made for are wider than the ones in the pictures so the top loops will not be so bunched up when the curtains are in their new home.

I am quite happy with the way these projects turned out and look forward to seeing them in Jackson’s and Addie’s new bedrooms.

Our New Shed (or is it a Barn?)

Last Thursday, we had a new shed built at the farm. Though its footprint is only 10 ft. by 12 ft. my husband said it is more of a mini barn.

The building crew (two men) arrived shortly before 9:00 a.m. with all of the materials and tools for building it. They were finished before 4:00 p.m. Quite impressive.

We purchased the shed from this company but when my husband originally called the company he was referred to a local dealer/contractor. Through the contractor he was able to order the shed by phone and arrange for delivery/assembly within about two weeks.

Before they came to build the shed my husband had to prepare the site where the shed would be located. He first had to move the old metal shed that this one was replacing. Then he leveled the ground and added several inches of gravel for a base for the shed to sit on.

It looked quite big inside until we started putting stuff in it. LOL. The loft provides extra overhead storage space. We had a few upgrades added to the base package. They were – the solid wood floor (instead of osb), the three windows, and the five-foot ramp at the entryway that will make it easier to bring in equipment with wheels on it.

We were both impressed with the quality of the materials and the workmanship. It was also nice that the shed was already primed (that is the brown color in the above photos) and ready for us to add the paint color of our choice.

We spent much of the day on Friday painting and a bit of the day on Saturday (but had to break from painting to get planting done). We only have a bit of trim left to paint but that will have to wait until dry weather returns. I haven’t taken any pictures of the shed since we started painting but, if you’ve been hanging around here for long, I bet you can guess what color(s) it is.

*If not here’s your clue – The question remains – will it be our Big Red Shed or Little Red Barn?

Thanks for visiting!

What’s been keeping you busy this spring?