Heather – Page 3 – Chehalem Prairie Farm

July 7, 2021July 7, 2021 by Heather

A few years ago Josh asked me “What are the most expensive foods that we could grow in our garden instead of buy at the grocery store?” We came up with a few things like specialty mushrooms and all “organic” produce. Also, cherry tomatoes are pricey when compared to Roma tomatoes.

But the truth is, right now produce is cheap. Carrots are 50 cents a pound. Potatoes are 10 pounds for under 2 bucks. A big bag of spinach that will go bad before you can eat it all is $1.98. So, can we really make a dent in our grocery costs by growing a garden?

That’s why I started my basil garden. Pesto from Costco is around $10 for a 22 ounce jar. If we make + freeze 24 pints of pesto for the coming year, I think we’ve found our gold. That’s $240 worth of something we love, but rarely buy because it’s cost prohibitive. And even if you add in the cost of the olive oil, parm, and a few walnuts, we still come out ahead of store bought pesto.

These are my basil plants (don’t judge!)

They’re struggling a little/lot because the ground where I planted them has never been amended. We’ve just had wood chips + weeds on top of it for the past 3 years. I planted my seedlings anyways. I ended up losing about 15 teeny plants over the past couple months due to slugs. The slugs hide in the wood chips then come out at 11pm. I’m never awake to pick the slugs of my sweet little Genovese basil starts. Anyway, each time I lose a plant, I start over and replant one of my fresh little basil seedlings that are growing in soil blocks.

Most of the basil in my basil garden is Genovese–the quintessential pesto basil. I also threw a few lemon basil plants in there, along with the ONLY Holy Basil plant to survive from my first planting. I put a few other Holy Basil plants in the main herb garden.

I also ordered some African Numun Basil (aka Scent Leaf) which is supposed to have huuuge leaves and taste like a mix of basil and oregano. I started those seedlings last night.

The white rocks around each plant is diatomaceous earth. It’s supposed to deter slugs. We’ll see!

Next year this patch will be amended, pH tested, weeded, dunged (fertilized), and guarded. I’m so excited to have an abundance of basil. It’s an herb that makes me happy.

July 5, 2021July 5, 2021 by Heather

A fresh batch of golden beets. This is two different varieties of golden beets but I’m guessing they’ll years the same.

I tried planting these cool weather crops in soil blocks a few weeks ago and they all DIED. I’m keeping these freshly planted ones indoors until August. Then, when the weather cools down, I’ll let them play outside with their friends.

July 4, 2021July 4, 2021 by Heather

Every day, something new. That’s why I love our garden.

Hello, horehound. You may come in useful one of these days…

These glorious, happy calendulas will be my end row flowers next year. I dumped out a plastic baggie of saved calendula seeds this spring and 110% of them sprouted!!

At first I wanted Egyptian Walking Onions, then I couldn’t find them anywhere, so I decided I didn’t want them (hmph!!) But then a sweet new friend shared some, and I loooove these onions! So glad these perennial beauties are in my garden.

I love the fat, soft leaves on this lubuous (adj. fat + loveable + luscious) sage plant. The leaves are leathery, which means they stand up to sauteing. I can’t imagine an herb garden without sage.

This unique variety of anise hyssop is called “Golden Jubilee” or “purple giant hyssop”. It hasn’t lived up to its name in size yet, but has surpassed my expectations in flavor. Amazing addition to salads, pestos, herbal limonada (fancy drinkies!)

Winter savory is a top ten herb that I can’t believe I ignored for so many years. Absolutely essential. It’s loyal, reliable, perennial, low maintenance, fragrant. Don’t get me wrong, it’s not rosemary or basil, but it’s very, very, very close.

We think we’re going to have a successful potato harvest. This variety is ‘red pontiac’ and we bought our seed potatoes at Buchanan Cellers.

We’ve been hilling up dirt around these plants for the past month or so. I have no idea why.

These space hawgs are going to grow us some winter squashes!!

I tried planting mustard seed. Twice! Not enough faith, I guess. The patch is still barren.

July 3, 2021July 3, 2021 by Heather

We lost two of our chickens last weekend to the extreme heat. In a strange turn of events we received a chick from someone whose prank went awry, so of course we bought 5 more Novagen chicks to keep her company. Big brown egg for attention.

The secret to dressing-less salad is too add these 4 things to the greens: nuts, fresh herbs, fruit\berries, and a member of the allium family.

This pic contains 14 things we harvested from our garden

July 2, 2021July 2, 2021 by Heather

We have an abundance of ladybugs around our house this year. That tells me that we are doing a great job of attracting beneficial insects. The other day I saved a ladybug from drowning

We’ve got lots going on. When people ask me what I’ve been up to lately, I try to keep it concise, because who wants to spend 30 minutes listening to my stories of farm drama, garden news and homestead happenings? I usually say “I planted seeds today” or “We got chicks today”. I’ve found that people typically have a four word tolerance when they ask you “How is your day?” Amiright?

So our blog may not be interesting to anyone else, but that’s ok, because the details are interesting to us, and we’re the ones who read it and reread it. Is a personal history of sorts.

Here’s what’s happening this week!

I never planted these and they died. Maybe next year, but probably not TBH

I can grow carrots in a bucket. I can’t grow them in the ground, though

I accidentally planted all the bush beans 8 inches apart instead of 4 inches apart. Time to fill in the gaps!

These two watermelons we’re planted on the same day, but a slug got to one. Always plant double!! That’s what I’ve been doing! It pays off!

Empty spot in the garden where the garlic used to be

Goodbye tatsoi! You were never heat tolerant or cold loving. You tasted lovely when sauteed, and tasted kinda weird fresh, but we liked you. See ya this fall, maybe!

A super healthy Jimmy Nardello pepper plant next to one that got eaten by a slug yesterday

In the summer I adore wearing my Xero shoes, but the reality is that these hiking boots do a way better job of protecting my feetsies, keeping dirt out, and working a shovel or garden fork

July 1, 2021July 1, 2021 by Heather

Contender and Gold Rush.

These are the names of two bush bean varieties that I picked up today at Buchanan Cellers. I’m happy with Blue Lake #274 bush beans, but seeds are cheap and that’s reason enough to buy a couple new varieties to test in the garden.

While planting, I discovered that bush beans can be planted 4 inches apart. I had previously planted last week’s beans about 8-9 inches apart! I fixed that zoning error and filled in the gaps with Contender. The middle of the row (that used to have the garlic) got planted with Gold Rush, a bright yellow bean. Grant helped me mark everything. Super champ!

I don’t know if I’ve mentioned this, but I’ve been getting creative with soil amendments. Thank goodness the soil amendments don’t contribute to the flavors in the produce. But hopefully they contribute to the strength of the plant, the nutritional value of the produce, and the health of the soil.

And before you go to bed, Google “can I use urine on my garden?”

Fer reals.

June 29, 2021June 29, 2021 by Heather

Here are three highlights of today.

This is the last few bites of one of the sandwiches Josh made for
the family for lunch. I added a few leaves of basil to everyone’s sandwich and it 10x’d the flavor. I’m growing about 40 basil plants next to the house so that I can have pesto in abundance

Alden made these gorgeous cookies. They’re a “PB+J” cookies made with hazelnut butter and Himalayan blackberry jam. It’s his own recipe and design.

This was yesterday’s temp. We all almost *died* here in the PNW. Today, however, it’s in the 90s and we’re all kissing the ground out of gratitude, and wearing socks to keep from catching a chill. We’re so grateful for the 30 degree temp drop.

June 28, 2021June 28, 2021 by Heather

Here’s my lunch.

We grew the lettuce and beets, but that’s it. (Although I did brew the apple cider vinegar that the beets were pickled in.) One of my goals is to be able to create more meals that are made up of 50% (or more) of the things we harvest and preserve.

I know we won’t be able to realistically grow our own shrimp, but we are currently growing turkeys and rabbits to harvest. In the future we’ll be able put together salads that have many more home grown ingredients, such as:

Cucumbers and\or pickles
Hull-less pumpkin seeds
Slow-smoked rabbit meat
Cooked sorghum
Herbs (not sure why they didn’t make it onto this salad)
Roasted hazelnut oil
Yellow beets, carrots (maybe??)
Cooked dry beans (like our Old Mother Stallard variety)
Mosto cotto syrup
All of our vinegars
Fermented chili sauce
Sun dried tomatoes
Hard boiled eggs

June 28, 2021June 29, 2021 by Heather

There’s something so miraculous about seeing a plant or animal beginning to fulfill its purpose.

Like when you see that first pea tendril form, then grab on to a trellis and begin to climb. Or when a mommy duck takes her ducklings to water and they all instinctively paddle their little feet and dunk their head. Or when baby chicks, just hours after hatching are already scratching the ground, trying to find bugs and worms.

Who taught them how to do these things? It amazes me that they were created with the information to know how to do what they do. It also makes me wonder what information I was given as part of my spiritual DNA. What things was I born knowing how to do because of my divine identity as a child of God?

June 27, 2021June 27, 2021 by Heather

I don’t want to be insensitive to those struggling with addiction and mental health issues, but I have to be honest– right now our front yard looks like a Portland homeless camp. We have cages, rabbit tractors and chicken tractors covered with blankets, welcome mats, cardboard boxes, chewed up tablecloths, jeans, shirts, towels and sheets. Anything to keep our animals 100% shaded and cool during this “hell week” in Oregon. Today is supposed to hit 112 F, and tomorrow 115 F.

And I am reluctantly grateful for this hot, hot week. As our son prepares to leave for El Salvador, we’re getting a little La Croix of what he’ll be experiencing while there: blistering heat coupled with high humidity. We’ll be able to relate “un poco” to what he’s experiencing.

In about 2 hours we’ll make the rounds to all the animals again, making sure they have cold water, an ice block, frozen fruit, and a sprayed down sheet (evaporative cooling!). If they can survive this heat, it will be an absolute miracle.

June 26, 2021June 26, 2021 by Heather

We have our very first harvest of garlic! Over the last few weeks I’ve pulled a couple test bulbs to see if they were ready, but today everything was ready!! You can tell that is ready for harvest when the bottom two leaves are dried up and the third is partially dried up. If you wait too long, the bulb will split apart and but preserve as well.

I took the big garden fork (the one I gave to Josh for Christmas last year) and started loosening up the soil around the garlic while trying not to dislodge the corn, salad greens or peas.

Our garden holds water really well, so every clump of garlic I pulled up had about 4 pounds of wet dirt attached to it. No amount of shaking would dislodge it, so I resorted to picking off the clods so that the garlic would dry out faster. I went against all the rules and dipped about half of the bulbs in a bucket of muddy water to get the huge chunks of dirt off. Next year this won’t be an issue because the garlic will be in an area of our property where we don’t water–under the grape vines. I plan to double the garlic next year so that I can give some to friends and family as gifts. Also, I think we can eat lots of garlic in the year 2022. I can guarantee that.

These will dry out completely, then I’ll braid them

This whole wheelbarrow plus the galvanized bucket were filled to overflowing with garlic

These are two of our six bulbs of elephant garlic

We have a beautiful harvest of 100 bulbs. They’ll be drying in the carport for the next 2-4 weeks. It’s going to be 103-113 over the next few days, so we might end up with roasted garlic. No worries though, they’re shaded and there’s a slight breeze.

I’m so happy that we grew something that we can use throughout the coming year! We can use 1-2 bulbs a week for the next year (after I set aside a dozen large bulbs for planting this fall).

My next garden task, after the weather stops having a tantrum, is to aggressively prepare the grape area for growing garlic. We have the chickens out there amending the soil, but we also need to aerate with the garden fork, kill some grass with cardboard and wood chips, then add some fresh rabbit manure. I want next year’s harvest to be phenomenal and massive.

#garlicgoals

June 26, 2021June 26, 2021 by Heather

We have a massive heat wave hitting us this weekend. Highs will be in the hundred-and-teens. We’re doing everything we can to prepare. We’ve frozen blocks of ice for our rabbits, checked the water levels in the garden (those soakers hoses water deeply!) and have added extra water and shade for our chickens and rabbits.

While we may experience some non-preventable losses this weekend, we have done everything we can to be prepared.

The two animals that don’t seem to be bothered by any of this heat are the Indian Runner ducks and Karen (our St Croix–a heat tolerant sheep). The ducks + ducklings spend the day splashing and lounging. And Karen seems to not mind the heat.

Josh and I did a garden walkthrough last night as part of date night (but it’s also becoming a fun 2x daily tradition). He collected soil samples from four parts of our garden and I planted bush beans where the struggling peas are. We came inside the house, dripping with sweat. This heat coupled with high humidity reminds me of the very small, teeny tiny country of El Salvador. When we check the weather for El Salvador, we can’t complain about our little heat wave. They have high heat and high humidity 6 months out of the year–plus lightning, volcanoes, and organized crime. We just have two out of the three in Portland.

Our garlic is looking so, so good. I’m looking forward to a generous harvest in early July. I want to save a good amount to use as seed for this September when we plant garlic under the grape vines. Can you imagine what life would be like with unlimited free garlic??

June 21, 2021June 27, 2021 by Heather

Today is June 21st. We got our first two snow peas a couple days ago! And the rest of the garden is looking magical and lush. Here’s a little lookie-loo at what’s happening.

More corn, but spaced about 9″ apart. I may need to thin, depending on how many sprout.

I’m trying an old Bob Vila trick of adding 1 Tbs of epsom salts to 1 gallon of water. It’s supposed to be beneficial to tomatoes, roses and peppers. I also heard it’s good for seedlings. It sounds like witchcraft or bro science. Not sure if I’ll do it again.

My sticks!! For five bucks I got a thousand wooden stirring sticks from the restaurant supply store. They help me mark where I’ve planted. Love these!!!

This looks like a bad hoarding situation, but each little seedling will eventually find it’s place in the garden. I’ve been able to place 100% of my seedlings.

We have an abundance of ladybugs in our garden! This one’s name is “Francine” (but we call her “Fran-fran”).

I love my herbs! This is hyssop is one I divided from the end of season Champoeg kitchen garden. It’s one of my favorite medicinal herbs.

My goal is to preserve 12 quarts of chocolate mint herb tea. I only preserved one quart last year and we drank it all within a month. It was so hard to wait for the chocolate mint to start producing again!

Another strawberry that I will never get to eat. I might have to move these to a container garden to avoid the slugs.

These leeks are looking so good! Do I need to divide them??

I planted snap peas (better than snow peas) in with the strawberries.

Happy, happy beets. Succession planting has been so fun with these beets!

Green onions and chamomile (the wrong kind for herb tea, I discovered)

Mizuna–FINALLY!! It’s supposed to germinate in 40 degree weather, but ours didn’t really do anything until it got HOT. ???

Not pictured: the purple hominy in the pasture and the brand new baby duckling that hatched on Father’s Day!! In the next few days we’ll get a few more ducklings, plus we’ll be planting the sorghum! Exciting times!

June 17, 2021June 17, 2021 by Heather

We want to be like this guy…kinda. Sipping apple cider and contemplating life. Except this guy looks like he’s drinking alone, which is saaaaaad. So, minus the sad lonely drinkies, we want to be like him.

And that’s going to happen this September!! Last year year when our neighbor shared her windfallen apples with us, we mostly fed them to the sheep. Then as mid summer turned into deep summer, we started saving some of the apples for ourselves. We made some apple sauce. We also painstakingly hand-squeezed a few quarts of apple cider. Basically one for each birthday this year, plus anniversary and Christmas. We knew we eventually wanted a cider press, so we could make more cider.

So we looked at prices then decided we did NOT want to buy an apple cider press. But this week I found simple plans (in a library book) for a DIY Apple Cider Press, and we just happened to have all the supplies (except for some lag bolts, which we picked up yesterday).

The 2x6s came from Jake. The 4×4 pressure treated lumber came from Jalen’s dad. The buckets came from Blaine Jemmet. The extra 4×4 non-pressure-treated came from our neighbor John’s friend’s house. There’s a huge spike in lumber prices right now, so the fact that all this wood was gifted to us over the past couple months is a huuuge blessing.

For the cost of 8 lag bolts we got ourselves a free apple cider press. We’re going to test it out this fall!

We look awesome because we just finished the hard part of screwing in 8 lag bolts. Also, my phone has some weird anti-aging filter that makes me look 15 years old.

I love that we can make apple cider. We’re not huge juice drinkers in our family, but sometimes you just want something special to drink that reminds you of the happy, long days of deep summer.

June 17, 2021June 17, 2021 by Heather

The corn that Hercules trampled or ate is gone, and that’s disappointing. Three weeks of growth–gone. Time is so valuable in late spring. Everything is getting started, and so many things are time sensitive. If we don’t get the corn going now, we can’t just replant it in late July. There won’t be enough time for the corn to mature before the first frost comes.

Do you see how the top of this corn seedling got nibbled off?

If you sniff real hard you can smell corn growin’ in that soil

I replanted several bare spots in the corn row today, then watered the corn with something called Pee Tea or Poop Smoothie. It’s rabbit poop + pee and hay mixed with water. It smells like the bowels of Hades, especially after sitting in a yard cart for a few days, but it’s supposed to be hecka good for plants.

Hopefully that’ll give the corn a jump start and a strong dose of nutrients. I’m hoping it’ll catch up with the other corn within the next three weeks.

And in other sad seedling news, most of the Boston Pickling Cucumber seeds that sprouted in soil blocks last week were mowed down by slugs last night. I had the soil blocks in shallow plastic containers on the ground. Josh suggested propping them up tonight, so slugs couldn’t get to them. I’m going to try that. It’s not fun to have cute little seedlings eaten. Josh expressed sympathy, and I know he meant it because he knows how it feels to have cute seedlings mowed down, and to lose valuable time. It’s frustrating.

June 16, 2021February 4, 2023 by Heather

After our duck trampled the half-dozen corn seedlings on our last row while circling the chicken tractor, I decided to move the chicken tractor far, far away from the garden. It’s under the grape vines now.

My brain must live in a Disney fantasy farm world, where all plants and animals and hoomans live together in musical bliss.

That’s never been the case on our farm.

Free-range chickens rip up plant starts. Sheep devour kale plants in one bite. Escapee ducks flatten teeny seedlings. Chickens kill bunnies. Bunnies mow down freshly planted herbs.

Yesterday Josh said that he could live without the animals. He would much rather just have the garden.

Yeah, I understand why he said that. The garden is a special place for Josh. And I absolutely adore our garden, too. However…I also love the variety, spontaneity, chaos, and personality that the animals bring to our farm. We don’t binge watch TV, and could care even less about the big screen. But if you were to count up the hours that our family spends watching the animals, you might say we have an addiction.

We’ve loved watching the rabbits + bunnies, sheep + lambs, ducks + ducklings, chickens + chicks. It’s adorable! And if I keep learning and observing, it will be more than just adorable. It will be beneficial.

One of my goals is to better manage our menagerie–to use the strengths of each animal to improve our garden, our pasture, our farm and our lives. We can use the animals to enrich the soil, reduce destructive pests, heat up our compost, enliven the land, and eliminate weeds.

But for now, we’re kicking the duck out of the garden.

June 14, 2021June 14, 2021 by Heather

It’s June 14th–not even summer yet–and we’re getting small, daily harvests. (Still no peas.)

Today I cut leaves off our lettuces. I love “cut and come again” types of lettuce. It means I can harvest as soon as a leaf is the size I want, then come back tomorrow to get another few leaves. Next year I’d love to try some different lettuces. Josh was all excited this year about planting lettuce, but I wasn’t. But now I am. Lettuce is an early win. You can harvest lettuce before almost anything else (except for overwintered crops). I guess I wasn’t too excited about lettuce back in February because we had so much kale and chard. Now that it’s gone, I’m so grateful for our little patch of tender greens.

We also harvested 5 beets. We eat the beetroot and the leaves. Beet leaves always look sickly and unappetizing, but they transform when they’re lightly steamed and tossed with butter. They turn a glossy, rich green.

I cut a few stalks of what I call our “grocery store green onions” because that’s what they were. Since planting the little stublettes from the bottom of the green onions last year, we have been harvesting non stop. Something that normally ends up in the trash has been a source of reliable flavor and color for well over a year now.

We also harvested our first real cutting of winter savory. Winter savory is an herb that I almost wrote off as just an old fashioned, outdated herb. You never see it in sexy poses on magazine covers. Winter savory never gets lead roles in Broadway musicals or even bit parts in made-for-TV-movies. I really don’t know why. Winter savory has got her act together. She grows upright, has a bright, fresh herbal scent, she’s easy to grow and she fits in with any recipe (never overpowering).

June 14, 2021June 14, 2021 by Heather

It’s been a very rainy, cool weekend. Our plants are loving it (with the exception of my precious little Jimmy Nardello peppers. Those little pepper plants are struggling. They’re in the garden expansion (which means the soil hasn’t been improved, it’s a high percentage of wood chips, and they are growing on to of dead grass).

But the rest of the plants are doing the happy dance. Even the tomatoes.

June 12, 2021June 12, 2021 by Heather

120 carrot seeds planted in little soil blocks. I WILL grow carrots.

It’s June 12th, and that means there is more happening in the garden and on the farm than I can write about. We’re keeping this farm blog so that we can improve, learn and grow. It’s working! We have used this blog to see “where were at” in terms of same time last year’s garden. It’s exciting and frustrating at the same time. Things seem to move so slow, but like I said, they’re almost moving faster than I can keep up with!

June 12, 2021June 12, 2021 by Heather

My kitchen is my food lab. Three of my recent experiments are in this photo.

Yogurt: this is a whole milk yogurt, filled with good, grocery store variety bacteria, and cultured in the Instant Pot. We put it on curry, pancakes, or in smoothies.

Popped Wild Rice: Popped like corn, but 10x crunchier. Best with lots of butter and salt. We served it on our chickpea curry last night. It was, as the cool girls on TV say, “Uh-MAY-zing.

And the last item in the photo is the one I’ll be holding my breath for–Mennonite sorghum. I feel like the secret to being self sufficient is growing storable calories. A.K.A. graaaaaains! We had great success with corn last year (as a fresh vegetable), so this year we’re expanding to include Mennonite sorghum, Bloody Butcher dent corn, and purple hominy. And yes, we will nixtamalize our corn and hominy (if you’re wondering). There is no proven link to autism or Alzheimer’s connected with nixtamalization, and we feel confident and safe with the process, so we’re moving forward–no matter what judgement we receive from others. Part of being a homesteader is being confident in your decisions, no matter what the fallout is.