Wednesday, March 26, 2008

Fun and Frolic

Patty and Molly frolicking in the pasture with the big goats. They spent the day in the sun and seemed to really enjoy it.




The chickens got moved out of the gardens today. They are back batting clean-up for the goats and cows. They do a better job than a harrow. They are a bit slower, but they eat the weeds and the bugs, and they fertilize as they go.



The elephant garlic jumped out of the ground this week. Guess it was holding out for a bit of heat. All the garlic looks good. I'll really have to work on marketing this year.


I started preping some of the garden beds now that the chickens have moved out. I was cruising along with the broad fork, my favorite bed prep tool (it's the two handled thing standing in the picture above) when I hit a rock. Usually it just pops the odd rock out of the bed with out any trouble, but this one bent one of the tines and didn't budge. After 45 minutes of serious digging(with a spud bar no less) I realized that there were the remains of an old farm building buried under one end of my garden beds. The picture shows my bed prep tools and the pile of concrete and stone I dug out of the last 5 feed of the bed. The next bed was no better. It does explain the dry spots in the beds last year.


A finished bed. Now that I've made it, perhaps I should lie in it.

We launched our egg hatching project today. Rowan was home sick today, so he did most of the work. I'll be posting the happenings soon. Right now I'm too tired, and I still have evening chores to do.

3 comments:

jack-of-all-thumbs said...

Many thanks for the update and the great photos! I am SO jealous of the greenhouse (a dream of mine for years) and the explanation of the bent broad fork had me nodding my head in understanding. I've hit some serious rocks over my years of digging here in rural NC but never a foundation. The boom and bust of small flock egg production is also a familiar theme with us.

Elephant garlic is one that we haven't tried. Let us know how that works out.

A bright but curious note here is the observation that for the first time my honeybees seem to be foraging on dead nettle, a pretty weed previously only utilized by bumblebees. No clue as to why now.

Take care and keep at it.

Anonymous said...

I know very little about farming but I do like to garden; hope that counts for something. I am very fond of garlic although a good friend said that if I put garlic in the scrambled eggs again that he was not going to be happy. I don't think that he noticed that I also add crusshe garlic to the grits. I have thought of growing my own garlic so I look forward to reading about how your efforts go.

Alan said...

Jack,

Didn't see any bent tools in your recent garden project. You must have more skill than I.

Sheriareid,

There is nothing better than garlic. It's great in the garden. You have to plant it in the fall, but it does most of it's growing when nothing else will. And, you usually get a seven fold return. You can save bulbs to break up and plant next year. You should try it. P.S. It is GREAT in everything.

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