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19 Comments

  1. You may laugh: we rented two chickens, a coop and everything else needed from Rent the Chicken to begin learning about chickens. So far so good. Birds settled in and we are getting two eggs every day. We will build our own coop and run for next year.
    Set out broccoli, more lettuce, hardening off tomatoes and marigolds.
    Met electric company at NH house to lay down line so tree guys could clear out under it from pole to house. Was happy to find that propane generator kicked in immediately and then turned off when power was restored.
    Stacked more wood.

  3. Ordered a new storage shed built to our standards, no extra charge, but takes 2-3 weeks to build. Finished grading the site and laid down two loads of gravel to keep the snakes and mice at bay. The delivery guy will set it up on concrete blocks and level it as needed. We have three shelving units down at the barn, but I think we will need 3 more. Also have some 55 gal food grade sealable drums which I will use for storing camping and bedding items. Will order large clear plastic totes to put other non-food supplies in. Will need another order of bay leaves to put in the containers and moth balls to scatter around the shelving.

    Put another 30 seedlings in the garden; have another 24 seedlings which need a couple more days before they go in. We are planting squash in containers this year IOT avoid bugs. Last year we burned off the garden and used DE/vinegar to kill off the bugs. This year we are planting hot peppers in last year’s squash area. Planted 20 Red peanuts as an experiment to see how they do. If they grow and harvest well they can be an additional oil source.

    Time to start dousing animals with DE; been putting eucalyptus oil in grape seed carrier on the dogs to ward off early flees. It works really well, but only for a couple of days. Summer haircuts, baths, DE plus neem and eucalyptus powered mix will hopefully give dogs relief from fleas.

    We are back to summer hours since our location has hit 90+ degree temps. Have a great week!

  4. JWR,
    Would love to meet you and possibly get an autographed book. I’m currently enjoying “Patriots” again from audible while I work assembling knives at a high end knife company here in Oregon.
    If you would announce which gunshow you will be at, I’d like to shake your hand.
    If you don’t want to announce it publicly, I’m easy to reach at the email address.

    1. Grew Tennessee Red’s last year, first time for me, was a successful harvest. They grew easily and well, though it was a long season plant. Never did roast them up, have been feeding them to our pet bird, he likes them quite fine au natural!

  5. Garden is all planted out except for the melons, which will go in shortly. Tomatoes are 2 feet high & flowering. We even have a few dime sized tomatoes underway.

    With temps in the 90’s this week, our spring garden is almost done, even with 50% shade cloth over it to control the heat. Cilantro is bolting, lettuce & spinach will get bitter soon. Going to pick it all, clean up & cover that bed.

    We planted a few more fruit trees this week – 2 paw paw trees for a “tropical” fruit. We have a perfect area where they get morning/early afternoon sun but not the brutal afternoon sun. Our two fruit orchards with 40 trees are bursting with fruit and we’ll be super busy come June & July. Fortunately we pruned the trees heavily this winter and all fruit can be hand picked without a ladder or step stool. It’s best to keep them short to prevent possible injury now or when there may be no medical assistance.

    Our three 8 foot strawberry are producing about 10 pounds PER DAY. We are sharing our bounty with family & friends, eating many of them ourselves and freezing the rest for smoothies, etc. Soon our blueberries, blackberries & tayberries will be ready and the harvest will be plentiful. Our tayberries are only one year old. The vines are 10-15 feet long and we have at least 100 large berries per plant. The most amazing producers ever. We are taking some of the rooted runners and planting them in various places around the property. Not tending them, just seeing if they will make it & become a “wild” edible for us.

    After last year’s late hard freeze that literally wiped out 95% of our fruit we feel so blessed this year. And we learned a good lesson that nothing is promised no matter how hard you work & prepare. Mother Nature gives and takes. Store plenty in good times.

  6. The annual battle with the thistle is on. Running the string trimmer a lot trying to cut it down before it goes to seed. Will be an ongoing battle as neighbors aren’t quite as diligent as we are.

  7. This week it finally turned spring … or what we call break up here in the arctic. This year I am going to build a new green house, once I cut up and get all the dead or bent & broken birch trees that the heavy snow & ice we had this last winter cleaned up … 45 in all. That’ll be a lot of firewood for year after next, but cutting and splitting is going to be a summer long chore. As for planting we plan to use large plastic tubs we have been buying and or salvaging from the transfer site for planters. We’l fill them with gravel in the bottom with drain holes, and soil for the plants. The old raised bed garden will become a flower garden and herbs that will grow …

  8. I have planted all of my cold season crops and the early warm days and nights spurred me to stsrt planting some of our warmer season crops like squash. We still have almost 3 weeks u til our official last frost in Montana so it is still to cold for peppers and tomatoes. The warmer weather has also had the bees busy collecting pollen so I spent some tiem assembling more hive boxes to expand to 5 hives this year. The family also decided to move onto our next family farm project and adopted a 17 year old arabia mare. She had training early on to be a saddle horse but from 3 to 10 she was going to be used as a brood mare, but never breed and since she has been a pasture pony. She needed a serious hoof trimming but with that done I’ll be starting building a round pen next weekend to officially start her training. So far, we already have her leading in a halter by my wife, our 14 yr old son, and myself. She has proven to be very eager to please and should work out to be a good horse for the kids. Our farrier actually asked if we planned to keep her becuase her saw the same potential we did.

    1. If the Republicans lose their majority in the U.S. House of Representatives, then a raft of anti-gun legislation could be enacted.

  10. Oh I understand that part I guess I am surprised that you must be leaning in the direction that you think that will happen. Nothing I am seeing would indicate that to me . With the economic numbers, job numbers and the several world issues he seems to be impacting and the lack of impact the major news networks seem to be having I think the Blue wave is not likely. I feel as a whole the country has had enough of the past leadership and they will drain the swamp come Nov. some very well known Black people are making some very powerful comments and they seem to have made an impact with both the Black and White poor voters who now realize they have been used by Ds as pawns for years just to keep their votes and all they have gotten is empty promises.

    1. Hoping Henry Wood is right. Agree with many of his observations. Even with that outcome we are far from out of the woods. The whole interest rate and its impact on the government’s ability to service debt thing is still hanging out there. I see Trump’s apparent capitulation on the budget this last go around as his doing anything to get money for defense. Betting he pivots on that on the next go around.

  11. A very busy time of the year for us but so satisfying in that we are better positioned with the garden and pastures. We have had plenty of rain this Spring and hopefully we won’t have a drought like 2 years ago. I have been learning from my past gardening mistakes and feel like this year we may get the bounty that we haven’t had since starting a garden a few years a go.

    Each year the pests, diseases and lack of or over abundance of rain has turned the garden into a messy jungle of weeds. This year I planted further apart in the rows as well as placing rows further apart to be able to get tiller, lawn mover and hoe between the rows and plants. Amazing how quickly weeds can overtake everything. Because of the extra spacing I had to make some decisions on what to plant and what not to plant. A shorter list but hopefully more productive.

    The last two years our fruit trees have had many blossoms then lost everything because of late and hard freezes. I have observed the trees each year to see what works in our particular environment. Late freezes, Japanese Beetles and drought have really set some species of fruit trees apart from others. The winners for our homestead have been persimmons (late leaf and flower prevents freeze damage and they also are immune from pests like Japanese Beetles), figs (same reason and if some leaf damage from cold they grow back quickly), blueberry, mulberry, paw paw (late bud break, but grow very slowly no fruiting yet). Losers apples. Jury is still out on the nanking cherries (one successful season), peaches (some successful trees), plums (squirrels hit the fruiting ones really hard), pears (no fruit yet, need to get a soil sample to see if there are deficiencies that need to be addressed.

    Sold ewe lambs and steers will be going to freezer camp at the end of the month. Then we can work on pasture improvements weeding and over-seeding.

    Lost one baby Icelandic chick by rats in the barn. We have ordered hardware cloth to complete rat proofing the chicken stall. We have managed to trap several rats but those remaining have avoided the traps. We have used peanut butter, cheese and hot dogs but no luck. Next will be bacon, I heard that works well.

    Much to do before the heat and high humidly zaps are ability to work outside after noon.

  12. The snow and rains are finally gone – meaning the yard work can begin. I’m alone here as the rest of the family and dogs gave headed back to the American Redoubt. For the next month I will have a ton of work to do.

    My son moved a lot of Ragusa Rosa for a friend and tucked them in. I’m going to make an edible hedge with them.

    Praying that we have at least 3 more years as that’s how long I have till the final college graduate. Doing our best to get all our ducks in a row!

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