Tag: garden

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Fezzik the buck is visiting for a few weeks, so we’ll probably have another crop of kids in the spring.

We have tons of orach sprouting in the garden from the stalks that went to seed. We’ll see if it lasts through winter. The Chinese broccoli is still going, and doing better, in fact, with the aphids diminishing as the weather gets cooler.

We haven’t had any mushrooms so far this fall, but we still have plenty preserved from last year.

We decided that try harvesting black walnuts from the tree across the road. They are notorious for their hard shells. First we gathered them and removed the meaty outer fruit, which can be used to make ink or dye. Now we’re letting them dry for a few weeks. Then we’ll try cracking them and extracting the nut meat.

We’re down to five chickens at the moment. We’re still getting some eggs.

Heather is doing the pumpkin drop-off site again by road, and the pumpkins are pouring in.

The garlic Heather planted a few weeks ago is barely sprouting. We’ll see what happens.

Posted on by Josh

Lots to catch up on…

The peas just kept on peaing through the summer. We got the last of them, for the most part, a week or so ago, but we’re still getting a few more here and there.

The green beans finally started producing and we got plenty for a few weeks, but they’re about done now.

We harvested the last corn on the cob last week. It was probably about a week past it’s prime.

I planted Chinese broccoli in early August, I think. It bolted quickly, but I cut and used the stalks. It also got aphids real bad on the buds and flowers, so I tossed those parts. We planted kale right next to the Chinese broccoli a few weeks ago, and a few aphids were showing up there, too. But we’ve been able to start picking some kale (and chard) last week.

The potato and chickpea harvests have been good. The tomatoes were late this year, but they’ve been doing well. We bottled about 36 points of pizza sauce. We’ll make salsa with our next batch. Which reminds me: the peppers have been solid producers this year: banana, jalapeño, and poblano.

Our plum tree about killed itself this year. Literally, several branches broke from the weight of the fruit. We made some great plum BBQ sauce and sweet & sour sauce. We harvested a bunch of purple plums from Wayne’s tree a few weeks ago and dehydrated them.

Heather started planting garlic today.

We harvested two of the young goats with much-appreciated help from our son-in-law. It’s a hard thing to do. He got one and we kept the other. We put 20 pounds of meat in our freezer. Heather was able to sell the other two young goats this week. They went to a lovely piece of land a few miles west of here to work in brush management.

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We have a gopher that just can’t resist bok choy. It took out the last of the bok choy from below yesterday and today. Luckily, the plants were left, and they crisped up in the fridge. We’re having Chinese food again tonight. I seeded some more bok choy in the place of the “harvested” ones.

Some Chinese brocolli sprouted. I reseeded the rest.

I reseeded some green beans once again. Tough going on green beans this year.

I transplanted an evil olive tomato.

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Only a few of the green beans in row 1 sprouted, so I replanted today. I came across some of the beans from the previous planting, and I can’t tell if they dried out or their sprouts were eaten. I saw ants in the area a few days ago. The beans on the other rows are doing better.

thevtomato plants are looking healthy, and the pepper plants are starting to look better.

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We had some great thunderstorms today that refreshed everything.

I reseeded corn where come seeds didn’t grow, and I added a few feet more seeds. I also seeded about five feet of Chinese broccoli.

I’m really happy about the bok choy. On plant got sucked down by a gopher, and one is struggling, but the other four are really vigorous.

The beans aren’t up yet, but I guess it takes them over a week to germinate. So we wait.

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We planted cowpeas in row 3. From east to west: pinkeye purple hull, red ripper, Ozark razorback. We planted cranberry green beans in the west end of rows 3 and 4 (beneath the trellises).

Heather pulled out the remaining kale plants from last year and hung them to dry so we can collect the seeds.

The neighbor’s hay was cut yesterday.

The plum tree is absolutely loaded this year!

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I planted about eight feet of Blue Lake bush beans on the west end of row 1. It’s been a grass-infested corner of the garden, so hopefully the bean plants and wood chips will keep the grass out.

Heather harvested garlic from the garden and in front of the house. The bulbs from in front of the house are small, but better than nothing.

And we still have mushrooms coming out our ears.

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A Pineapple Express dropped a half inch of rain yesterday.

The hops plant accidentally got weed-whacked, but it’s regrowing… plus, we noticed a couple additional bines coming up from the ground, too.

The first planting of potatoes is looking great. We planted the rest of row 2 in potatoes today.

The peas are sprouting.

The first planting of corn has a couple of sprouts coming up. I did the second planting today.

We have plenty of volunteer orach and lettuce.

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I planted Oregon sugar peas and the first 12 sweet corn seeds in row 1 of the garden.  The dirt on that row seems really compacted, so we’ll see how it goes.

We planted potatoes in part of row 2 a few weeks ago. They’re up and looking good.

We’ve had a good amount of volunteer lettuce and orach growing that we’ve been harvesting and enjoying at the dinner table.

We transplanted tomatoes and peppers last weekend.

We watched a deer decimate the fresh leaves on our grapevines yesterday. I’m glad the netting around the garden is working to keep them out.

The baby goats are all growing quickly. They’ve all been disbudded. In a few weeks, they’ll get banded and turned into wethers.

I think I’ve already ruined the new chainsaw engine. Not sure what’s going on.

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The chickens got into the garden, so we locked them in for a week or so, and they cultivated it for us.

This past week was really rainy until yesterday. We’ll plant potatoes as soon as the soil is workable.

We finished splitting next season’s firewood. It will be about 50/50 maple and Douglas fir or pine. This year was mostly pine, which was hard to use due to some extremely pitch-filled logs.

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We worked on some pasture fence repairs today, mostly pulling out some janky stuff and putting up new chicken wire to keep the chickens in the pasture.

We passed the cold frames on to a new owner today. They didn’t seem to make much of a difference in the garden.

We’re using some kale florets that we picked today in our stir fry dinner.

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It was our first day of the season doing a little cleanup and weeding in the garden. We added wood chips to the extra area on the east side that was created by putting up the archway and deer netting last year.

The beginning of spring seems to be here. It was 69° today. The plum tree blossomed this week.

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I worked on the mushroom bed. I removed the straw bale border, which was filled with grass and spreading into the walking path, and replaced it with wood that wasn’t able to be used as firewood.

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The freeze a couple weeks ago kept temperatures below freezing most of the week (lows in the teens). There wasn’t much snow, but something whitish that resembled snow that took forever to melt… freezing rain or sleet, I guess. It took out the celery and chard, and the artichoke plants took a beating. Even the kale got “burned,” but most of the leaves were still harvestable. The Chard and artichokes will resume growing with new leaves. The alliums (leeks and garlic) were totally fine. Surprisingly, the lettuce also seems to have survived fine. The ice took down the deer netting fence in spots. I tacked it back up when the freeze was over.

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A little January lettuce harvest before the temps go into the teens for the weekend. (It’s been growing since fall… super slow. The lettuce in the cold frame was larger, but just barely.)

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An endless summer. Today’s high was about 65°. More mushrooms are still coming up. I picked a few more small peppers and some kale.

Heather made some grape juice from Merrie’s Concord grapes.

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I think the mushroom harvest has finally ended. Wow! I’m pretty sure we have a year’s worth of dehydrated mushrooms thanks to Heather’s work.

The new growth on the artichoke plants looks great. They’re over two feet tall. Im excited to see what next year brings.

As of yesterday, we were still harvesting tomatoes and the late summer planting of peas. They’ve definitely slowed down, though, with fewer hours of daylight.

Heather pulled two potato plants today and got several pounds of potatoes. Here’s the biggest one:

She also harvested a rutabaga. There are several more out there. Plenty of kale and chard, too. And we haven’t even touched the leeks yet

Heather planted garlic in the garden and around the grapes around the beginning of October. It’s already sprouting.

We started moving some firewood into the carport for this season’s burning. We still have a lot of wood to split to get ready for next season.

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Wow, the first rain of the season, and the winecap mushrooms are fruiting. It’s like magic! We’ve probably picked a gallon in two days. They’re huge.

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Artichokes: I learned that they start their new growth for the next year in the current year. You’re supposed to chop down the old growth as soon as it’s done producing artichokes.

This evening brought the first rain of the season. We’re supposed to get a couple inches over the coming week. So we were busy outside today. We moved a lot of wood chips, put some tarps on things, and did a lot of general tidying.

Heather is dehydrating a bunch of peppers and onions. They smell so good.